00:00:00
i internalize this idea that unless i
00:00:02
get a hundred percent unless i win
00:00:05
i'm not good enough i'm not loved doctor
00:00:07
and broadcaster doctor wrong and
00:00:09
chatterjee your first book was a huge
00:00:11
success my guest today is the perfect
00:00:14
guest it's a really big honor to have
00:00:15
you on my podcast
00:00:17
my son janam getting sick at six months
00:00:19
old changed the course of my career you
00:00:22
see we need to evolve the way that we
00:00:24
practice medicine sleep deprivation is
00:00:26
associated with pretty much every single
00:00:28
chronic disease we have compared to
00:00:29
about 60 years ago we may have lost up
00:00:32
to 25 of our sleep the way
00:00:35
society is set up now is making us
00:00:37
lonely we've moved away for work we've
00:00:39
moved away from our families we don't
00:00:40
have the tribes around us and it's very
00:00:43
very damaging for our health it took me
00:00:46
ages to figure this out the dots i think
00:00:47
you can always make a change right you
00:00:50
can use these
00:00:51
moments of diversity in your life to
00:00:53
teach you something it's the best
00:00:55
journey you'll ever take but it's a
00:00:56
journey it's not a one hit
00:00:59
the first step in any change is
00:01:04
so without further ado
00:01:06
i'm stephen butler and this is the diary
00:01:08
of a ceo i hope nobody's listening but
00:01:11
if you are
00:01:12
then please keep this to yourself
00:01:15
[Music]
00:01:21
dr rongan chatterjee
00:01:23
i am i have to say i have to stop this
00:01:25
conversation by saying it's a really big
00:01:27
honor to have you on my podcast because
00:01:29
you are someone when i started taking my
00:01:31
podcast seriously who i looked up to and
00:01:33
admired for so many reasons not because
00:01:35
you are you've really kind of paved the
00:01:36
way for these long-form conversations in
00:01:38
the uk
00:01:39
but because you have the same very
00:01:41
similar subject matter and apparent
00:01:43
interest in the conversations you have
00:01:45
with your guests to the point that it
00:01:48
inspired me in a really big way to start
00:01:49
this platform and so when um when i
00:01:52
found out that you were coming in today
00:01:54
it felt like you know it felt like a bit
00:01:55
of a felt like christmas day for me
00:01:57
because the the conversations you have
00:01:59
are the things that i
00:02:00
would spend my spare time
00:02:02
sort of um watering my brain with so
00:02:05
thank you first and foremost for coming
00:02:07
in today it's a huge huge privilege i
00:02:09
receive and i appreciate you saying that
00:02:10
and and likewise i feel really honoured
00:02:13
and excited to come on your show because
00:02:17
i think long-form conversation matters
00:02:19
and i don't there's that many people in
00:02:21
the uk
00:02:22
doing it like you are like i am and um
00:02:25
you know i think you're doing great
00:02:26
things with your shows so i'm i'm i'm
00:02:28
really excited just to have a long
00:02:30
conversation with you i don't know where
00:02:31
it's going to go
00:02:32
but um yeah thanks for having me so take
00:02:34
me back to the foundations who who were
00:02:37
you
00:02:38
so i grew up in the northwest of england
00:02:41
and
00:02:42
you know mum and dad were immigrants
00:02:44
from india you know dad came over in
00:02:46
1962 for a better life to the uk mum
00:02:50
came over in 1972 i grew up got an older
00:02:53
brother
00:02:54
and
00:02:55
you know like many immigrant families
00:02:58
education was
00:03:00
king
00:03:02
right it was about get good grades at
00:03:05
school go to a good university get a
00:03:07
good job
00:03:08
right that was the
00:03:10
kind of drive from home my experience
00:03:13
was very much
00:03:14
man the culture at school was really
00:03:16
different from the culture at home
00:03:18
and i didn't really think much of it at
00:03:20
the time but you know now in my early
00:03:22
40s looking back and reflecting as i've
00:03:24
done
00:03:25
for this new book is
00:03:28
that was incredibly problematic
00:03:31
in many ways because
00:03:33
you end up pretending
00:03:36
to be somebody you're not
00:03:39
in order to fit in
00:03:42
and i can see now that's been a pattern
00:03:46
for most of my life i've not been myself
00:03:49
i've tried to be someone else i've
00:03:51
i've tried to
00:03:52
do things to get validation and love
00:03:54
from other people and
00:03:56
i've got to say it's only been in the
00:03:57
last years where i've managed to kind of
00:04:00
let that go
00:04:02
another piece there which i think is
00:04:03
really relevant to your question is
00:04:06
because education was such
00:04:09
a big thing
00:04:10
you know because mum and dad dad in
00:04:12
particular so much discrimination he
00:04:14
faced
00:04:15
right when he came here in his job he
00:04:17
had to change career change speciality
00:04:19
as a doctor because he just couldn't
00:04:21
advance and so ultimately he ended up
00:04:23
moving to a speciality he didn't like he
00:04:25
didn't enjoy
00:04:28
to give his family security
00:04:30
so what do they want to do they want
00:04:31
their children to not have to go through
00:04:33
that
00:04:35
so
00:04:36
i grew up with this kind of idea that
00:04:39
i'm only loved
00:04:42
when i'm top of the class right i'd come
00:04:44
home if i got 99 in an exam my mum would
00:04:47
say why didn't you get 100.
00:04:49
what if i came out
00:04:51
uh with 19 out of 20 in a test okay what
00:04:53
happened why didn't you get 20.
00:04:56
now what's really interesting about that
00:04:58
is i'm not criticizing my parents right
00:05:00
i love my parents i think they've
00:05:01
brought me up really well
00:05:04
but it but it speaks to a situation
00:05:06
there's different perceptions right so
00:05:09
i spoke to mum recently i said hey mom
00:05:12
why
00:05:13
why did you ask me those questions you
00:05:15
know why did you push me so hard
00:05:18
and she said to me because i knew you
00:05:20
were capable i wanted you to be the best
00:05:21
that you could be
00:05:23
so mom did it with me from a place of
00:05:24
love right she wanted the best for me
00:05:26
but walk around to the other side of
00:05:28
that story i internalize this idea that
00:05:30
unless i get 100
00:05:32
unless i win
00:05:34
i'm not good enough i'm not loved
00:05:36
and i can now see that drove me my
00:05:38
entire life this need for
00:05:41
external validation what are other
00:05:43
people saying about you people say nice
00:05:45
things you feel good people say nasty
00:05:48
things you are literally broken inside
00:05:51
so
00:05:52
you know a lot there that i've come to
00:05:54
terms with over the past few years but
00:05:56
for me understanding that i can go back
00:05:58
and rewrite those stories put a
00:06:00
different
00:06:01
perspective on all those events
00:06:04
has given me this real sense of freedom
00:06:06
calm contentness
00:06:08
and ultimately
00:06:10
you know it's resulted in me feeling
00:06:12
really really happy
00:06:14
one of the things you
00:06:16
you've said is that
00:06:18
you believe the purpose of life is
00:06:20
really finding out who you are because
00:06:21
once you find out who you are then you
00:06:23
can go on the journey of finding out
00:06:25
what is what it is you want so my
00:06:27
question for you is
00:06:28
what did you then pursue as a
00:06:30
consequence of believing that external
00:06:32
validation was
00:06:34
true validation that was true truly your
00:06:36
purpose what was your
00:06:38
how were you misguided or led astray
00:06:40
yeah so i went to
00:06:42
university at edinburgh at edinburgh
00:06:44
medical school you know left home having
00:06:46
the time of my life partying you know
00:06:49
whatever you know people when they they
00:06:51
get that sort of sense of freedom for
00:06:52
the first time
00:06:54
a lot of my uni life was spent playing
00:06:55
in bands right so music is a big part of
00:06:58
who i am what i do
00:07:00
um you know so i'd be practicing layers
00:07:02
we'll be playing loads and loads of gigs
00:07:03
and then it all changed i must have been
00:07:05
20 21.
00:07:06
i think mum phoned me at like 10 30 at
00:07:08
night and said hey look dad's in
00:07:10
intensive care the doctors don't think
00:07:12
he's gonna
00:07:13
make it through the nights can you come
00:07:15
back home and i remember seeing dads in
00:07:18
the incentive care unit and you know he
00:07:20
ended up surviving the nights
00:07:22
his kidneys failed he went on kidney
00:07:24
dialysis for the next 15 years but
00:07:26
basically
00:07:27
dad getting ill changed
00:07:31
the trajectory of my adult life so yes i
00:07:33
was in edinburgh i finished off i worked
00:07:35
there for a couple of years but my mind
00:07:37
was always back in the northwest
00:07:39
and i moved back to the northwest which
00:07:41
is one of the reasons i live there now
00:07:44
to help my mum and my brother look after
00:07:46
dad and it was incredibly stressful
00:07:47
particularly in the last years before
00:07:48
dad i had really really stressful and i
00:07:50
would i would escape periodically so
00:07:53
coming back to your question about how
00:07:54
does that impacted me i wanted to do
00:07:57
well like i got my specialist exams i
00:08:00
uh want i got good jobs in prestigious
00:08:03
hospitals right i got those things i
00:08:05
thought that's what i'm doing i'm doing
00:08:06
the right thing
00:08:07
and then when dad died in 2013 march
00:08:10
2013
00:08:13
it was like there was a big hole in my
00:08:15
life and so
00:08:16
i would just go walking
00:08:19
i was just trying to make sense of
00:08:20
everything and the truth is the amount i
00:08:23
learnt from dad's death
00:08:26
was just profound i'm not sure i would
00:08:28
have learned these things i was asking
00:08:30
myself whose life are you really leading
00:08:33
i don't regret any of it
00:08:35
now that dad's not here i'm glad i spent
00:08:37
so much time with him
00:08:38
but i think it was a real cost to me
00:08:42
my inner peace my inner well-being
00:08:44
and dad's death here's the irony stephen
00:08:47
the things that my dad would have been
00:08:49
proudest of right
00:08:51
indian immigrant to the uk his son with
00:08:53
his own bbc one show in 2015 2016 right
00:08:57
his son with four sunday times
00:08:59
bestsellers dad would have
00:09:01
literally
00:09:02
been phoning all the relatives you know
00:09:05
being the embarrassing dad telling
00:09:06
everyone dad never got to see any of it
00:09:08
but i know if that was still alive
00:09:11
i'd be doing none of it
00:09:12
why
00:09:14
if i was still in the mindset that i was
00:09:17
when my dad was sick
00:09:19
i wouldn't have any time to engage in
00:09:21
this stuff like life
00:09:23
if there's anyone listening to this
00:09:24
who's a carer for someone in their life
00:09:27
they'll know what i'm talking about you
00:09:29
you don't have time you don't have
00:09:30
physical time you don't have mental
00:09:31
space
00:09:32
it just
00:09:34
it encompasses the entirety of your life
00:09:36
you're just trying to keep your head
00:09:37
above water you're just
00:09:39
trying to
00:09:41
get through day to day
00:09:43
you are fire fighting so i wouldn't have
00:09:45
had the
00:09:46
the physical time but also
00:09:48
i think a lot of what i'm able to give
00:09:50
to people these days
00:09:52
through books through podcasts through
00:09:54
you know one-on-one with patients
00:09:57
is the learnings you know that the
00:09:59
learnings i've acquired
00:10:01
from going through dad's death from
00:10:03
going through that pain from coming out
00:10:05
the other side from going what can i
00:10:06
learn from this
00:10:08
so
00:10:09
i'm not sure
00:10:12
if what i would have had to offer people
00:10:16
back then would have been
00:10:18
as valuable as what i feel i have to
00:10:20
offer them now
00:10:23
why did you choose medicine was that
00:10:25
again part of this broader thing of
00:10:26
thinking that was success and that would
00:10:28
be
00:10:29
that would satisfy parents or you know
00:10:32
society because again there's a bit of a
00:10:33
stereotype isn't there there with a
00:10:35
indian immigrant coming over and you
00:10:37
know when i sit here with um people from
00:10:39
that that background typically the
00:10:41
narrative is and to be fair in my case
00:10:43
as well as an african immigrant that
00:10:46
successes doctor lawyer
00:10:48
etc
00:10:49
100
00:10:51
you know
00:10:52
it is a stereotype but but it's largely
00:10:55
true for many families you know
00:10:58
as an indian immigrants child in the uk
00:11:02
the three careers that generally are
00:11:05
available to you are dots a lawyer
00:11:07
engineer
00:11:08
that's what is valued
00:11:10
of course just to be clear that's not
00:11:12
every single family but just by and
00:11:15
large
00:11:16
i think that's true
00:11:17
but i tell you this stephen i know loads
00:11:19
of them who are so unhappy as doctors
00:11:22
so unhappy they compensate for the
00:11:24
tedium of their work
00:11:27
right by getting smashed on a friday and
00:11:28
saturday nights
00:11:31
right and they wonder why they can't
00:11:32
give up boozing or why they enjoy it so
00:11:34
much well because that's a symptom
00:11:36
it's not the drinking isn't the problem
00:11:39
the drinking is a symptom
00:11:41
you don't enjoy your job
00:11:44
you've gone into the wrong career
00:11:46
because you thought it was what you
00:11:47
should do sometimes you're stuck now in
00:11:50
your 30s you've got a mortgage
00:11:52
you know you've got
00:11:53
a lease on your car you feel trapped
00:11:57
but you can free yourself from that trap
00:12:00
you you absolutely can but you have to
00:12:02
be honest you have to get to know who
00:12:04
you currently are now
00:12:06
before you've got any hope
00:12:09
of becoming the person that you i didn't
00:12:10
want to be
00:12:12
it's so unbelievably true in every way i
00:12:14
mean so much of that i can relate to for
00:12:15
so many reasons and
00:12:17
you know you were talking there about
00:12:18
your your almost your parents missed
00:12:21
place love what you've clearly managed
00:12:23
to figure out later in your life is that
00:12:25
actually came from a place of love yeah
00:12:28
that's why i call it misplaced love
00:12:29
because they were trying to protect you
00:12:31
because they loved you
00:12:32
but it turns out that
00:12:34
that
00:12:35
misplaced love what it's doing is it's
00:12:39
stopping you from being your truest self
00:12:42
and the long term consequences of that
00:12:45
when you end up living someone else's
00:12:46
life is what you've spoken to there the
00:12:48
symptoms of
00:12:49
addiction and drinking and impulsive
00:12:52
behavior that we see in people so my
00:12:54
overall conclusion there was this urgent
00:12:56
need as soon as possible in your life to
00:12:59
get in touch with exactly who you are
00:13:01
and defend it at all costs
00:13:04
at all if you can do it at 16 if you're
00:13:06
45 and listening to this
00:13:08
now is the the second best time yeah i
00:13:11
mean
00:13:12
i've got so much to say on that um
00:13:14
you're never too late
00:13:16
to start on this journey
00:13:18
but how does someone start on that
00:13:20
journey right
00:13:22
i think it comes down to
00:13:24
values
00:13:26
right
00:13:27
values is what
00:13:29
i think what sews it all up together
00:13:32
right so
00:13:35
you know for this new book i've created
00:13:36
this new model of happiness i call core
00:13:38
happiness
00:13:39
so core happiness has three components
00:13:42
alignment contentment and control we can
00:13:44
talk about those if you want
00:13:46
but one of those legs is alignment
00:13:49
alignment is when
00:13:50
your
00:13:51
inner values and your external actions
00:13:55
are the same when the person who you
00:13:57
want to be inside and the person you are
00:13:59
actually being in the world are one and
00:14:02
the same that's one component it's not
00:14:03
everything but it's one component
00:14:05
so if someone has heard what we're
00:14:06
talking about say okay i want to start
00:14:08
i'm not living the life that i want to
00:14:10
lead but i don't know where to start
00:14:13
there's this exercise in the book called
00:14:14
the identity menu and the goal is really
00:14:17
that you
00:14:19
go through and i picked number three
00:14:21
because i think it's quite a um a
00:14:23
realistic number for people out of the
00:14:25
list of all these possible identities
00:14:27
and values
00:14:29
which three do you think
00:14:32
feel
00:14:33
kind of the most true to you and i've
00:14:35
been doing this for a little while and
00:14:36
the three that have been pretty static
00:14:39
with me for the past few months now i'd
00:14:41
say and they're right at the top of my
00:14:42
instagram profile because i think this
00:14:44
is what i want to give to the world and
00:14:45
say let's
00:14:46
lead with our values
00:14:49
integrity curiosity and compassion
00:14:53
so this is who i am
00:14:56
right i'm not
00:14:59
a doctor i'm not a father
00:15:01
now i i really i think this is such an
00:15:03
important point that i've been thinking
00:15:05
a lot about the last few years
00:15:08
i have a role as a doctor i have a role
00:15:11
as a father but it's not who i am
00:15:14
because when we cling too tightly to our
00:15:17
identities
00:15:19
we put ourselves in a very fragile
00:15:20
position let's say
00:15:22
you know i go over i'm the doctor you
00:15:24
know i'm dr chatterjee you know when i i
00:15:26
sort of absorb that and i think that's
00:15:28
who i am then what happens
00:15:30
if i get fired
00:15:32
right what happens if i get sick and i
00:15:34
can't work as a doctor what happens when
00:15:35
i retire this this is real this happens
00:15:37
to people they lose their sense of who
00:15:39
they are
00:15:40
what about my role as a father
00:15:43
right
00:15:44
to be really clear
00:15:45
me bringing up my kids well is one of
00:15:47
the most important things to me more
00:15:49
important than my work 100
00:15:52
but being a good father is not who i am
00:15:55
if i cling too tightly to that what
00:15:57
happens
00:15:59
when my kids are teenagers
00:16:01
and they get annoyed and they call me a
00:16:03
crap dad
00:16:04
i've seen this happen i've had patients
00:16:06
come in
00:16:06
say oh they call me a crap mom but you
00:16:08
know that's all i do i i do everything
00:16:10
for them i've given everything up for
00:16:11
them it's like wait a minute
00:16:13
you are much more than your roles
00:16:17
you know let's talk about cars right
00:16:19
you said when you were 20 you wrote down
00:16:21
what you wanted right
00:16:23
there's nothing wrong with having a nice
00:16:24
car
00:16:26
the problem comes for your happiness at
00:16:28
least
00:16:29
when you identify
00:16:31
with that car where that car says
00:16:33
something about you and the problem is
00:16:36
you drive around i don't mean you one
00:16:38
drives around in their flash
00:16:40
bmw let's say
00:16:44
and they think you know that says
00:16:45
something about me who i am what i'm
00:16:46
saying if you lose your job what happens
00:16:48
if you prang it what happens if you have
00:16:49
a divorce and you can't afford it
00:16:50
anymore
00:16:51
you go from what i call core happiness
00:16:53
to junk happiness junk happiness is what
00:16:56
many of us think happiness is
00:16:59
right we think it's that momentary hit
00:17:01
of pleasure
00:17:03
you know buying something online
00:17:05
instagram uh chocolate bar uh hit of
00:17:08
booze right these things can be
00:17:10
pleasurable things they may have their
00:17:13
role from time to time but don't mistake
00:17:15
that for being
00:17:17
real core happiness
00:17:19
core happiness is i think what we are
00:17:20
chasing but i think we misdefine it we
00:17:23
think it's something it's not happiness
00:17:25
it's not a destination that we one day
00:17:28
get to right it's a direction that you
00:17:31
can choose to take in life it's a choice
00:17:33
right
00:17:34
i heard your conversation with mo in the
00:17:36
hotel room last night which was
00:17:38
fantastic so good
00:17:41
and i agree with what you and me was
00:17:43
saying happiness is a choice
00:17:47
when you understand what happiness
00:17:49
really is what is it
00:17:51
it's not a thing
00:17:53
that you can get to
00:17:56
it's not something that you can
00:17:59
pursue directly it's something that
00:18:01
ensues when you do
00:18:04
the right things
00:18:06
and the right things for me
00:18:10
are when you focus on the three
00:18:13
i call call happiness this three-legged
00:18:15
stool alignment contentment control you
00:18:17
can apply it to anything in life i i
00:18:20
think that's what happiness is and i
00:18:21
think we are pursuing it like people say
00:18:23
we shouldn't be
00:18:24
we shouldn't be going after happiness we
00:18:26
should be going after meaning have you
00:18:28
heard that yeah yeah all the time right
00:18:30
i have a different perspective
00:18:34
meaning and purpose
00:18:36
is really important no question
00:18:40
but i don't think that's happiness it's
00:18:41
meaning
00:18:42
right
00:18:43
it's a necessary ingredient
00:18:47
for happiness but it's not happiness in
00:18:49
and of itself and i don't mean to be
00:18:51
controversial but let's say
00:18:53
um
00:18:54
a soldier fighting in world war ii
00:18:56
against the nazis
00:18:58
right
00:18:58
one might make the case that
00:19:02
that has meaning
00:19:04
it doesn't mean they're happy hundred
00:19:05
percent right so meeting hummus is
00:19:07
subtly different have you heard of the
00:19:08
japanese concept of ikigai yes yeah yeah
00:19:10
right i love ikigai this idea that
00:19:12
um
00:19:13
you know we should be looking we not
00:19:14
should be but we could be looking for
00:19:16
something in our life that we enjoy
00:19:19
that we're good at
00:19:20
that's what the world needs
00:19:22
and what pays us money
00:19:24
right the kind of holy grail does it
00:19:26
were and i remember writing about this
00:19:28
in my second book on stress i remember
00:19:30
the book came out and i was in london i
00:19:32
was giving
00:19:33
a talk
00:19:34
and at the end of the talk we were doing
00:19:36
q and a
00:19:37
i remember the back right of the hall
00:19:40
this young lady had a hand up and she
00:19:42
said dr shastaji
00:19:44
i'm an 18 year old japanese student
00:19:47
living in london
00:19:49
i've grown up with the concept of ikigai
00:19:51
my entire life and frankly i found it
00:19:53
demoralizing demotivating too high a bar
00:19:57
for me to get to
00:19:59
and that stuck with me mate because i
00:20:00
thought since then okay that's so
00:20:02
interesting because i love this concept
00:20:04
of icky guy
00:20:05
she grows up with it and finds it
00:20:07
off-putting
00:20:08
i think the problem with
00:20:10
these grand ideas of meaning purpose
00:20:13
ikigai
00:20:15
as much as i like them
00:20:18
they're not for everyone someone someone
00:20:20
might be hearing that in a call center
00:20:21
right now they don't like their job
00:20:23
they're doing it and they're like what
00:20:25
icky guy you're kidding me mate i just
00:20:27
want to get through and and pay the
00:20:29
bills right so i think i bring it all
00:20:32
back is this core happiness store that
00:20:34
i've created is it applicable in all
00:20:36
situations i think it is because if you
00:20:38
look at it through the lens of what
00:20:40
we're talking about this comes under
00:20:42
alignment
00:20:43
so that chat working in the call center
00:20:45
they do the exercise and they figure out
00:20:46
kindness is something that's really
00:20:48
important to them
00:20:49
then
00:20:50
if on the way to work
00:20:52
they stop in the coffee shop and they're
00:20:54
kind to the barista
00:20:56
they get on the bus to work and they're
00:20:58
kind to the bus driver they go to the
00:21:00
job they don't particularly like but
00:21:02
they are kind to their colleagues and
00:21:03
their boss
00:21:05
they're living an aligned life they're
00:21:08
living with meaning it doesn't mean that
00:21:10
the job that they're in currently is the
00:21:11
job that they love and they're going to
00:21:12
be in forever but they're living in
00:21:14
harmony with who they are and that's
00:21:17
going to mean that meaning and purpose
00:21:18
come naturally as a byproduct
00:21:21
so i want people to really focus on
00:21:24
alignment
00:21:25
it's one pillar of happiness and i think
00:21:27
your meaning and purpose will come can
00:21:29
you talk to me about control as well
00:21:32
i thought long and hard about this word
00:21:33
control
00:21:36
and i am denied was it the right word to
00:21:39
use and i spoke to some of my patients i
00:21:42
suspect some of my friends
00:21:45
i don't really think it is when we
00:21:46
understand it's about what are the
00:21:48
things that i can do
00:21:50
in my life that gives me a sense of
00:21:52
control we know from the scientific
00:21:54
research when you have a sense of
00:21:56
control
00:21:57
right you have better relationships you
00:21:59
have longer relationships you're
00:22:00
healthier you have lower stress levels
00:22:02
you live longer
00:22:04
so it's that sense of control and and
00:22:06
that could mean many things to to
00:22:08
different people you know for me
00:22:10
i'm really big on morning routines right
00:22:14
i know for me if i get up early if i
00:22:16
have time to myself to have a little
00:22:17
routine
00:22:19
i've i've almost got this like resilient
00:22:21
bubble around me doesn't matter what's
00:22:23
going on in the world doesn't matter how
00:22:25
bad work may or or may not get that day
00:22:27
i've got an element of control because
00:22:31
i've i've sort of nurtured that routine
00:22:33
for myself so that's one that's one way
00:22:35
that people can think about control and
00:22:37
another way people might want to think
00:22:38
about control is
00:22:39
there's a and there's a chapter in the
00:22:41
book called talk to strangers
00:22:44
which is basically this idea that
00:22:45
actually
00:22:47
relationships are very important of
00:22:48
course but there's kind of two different
00:22:50
kinds of relationships that are the deep
00:22:52
nurturing intimate relationships but
00:22:54
there's also the
00:22:56
there's also those kind of
00:22:59
almost trivial interactions that we have
00:23:01
day to day
00:23:02
right so when you say hi to the barista
00:23:05
or you know i said hi to your work
00:23:08
colleagues when i got here
00:23:09
those little things
00:23:12
they are not trivial there's a network
00:23:14
in your brain called the sociometer
00:23:16
right it's constantly detecting
00:23:18
your external world for threats and when
00:23:21
it receives positive information like a
00:23:24
smile like a you know a bit of a nod a
00:23:27
handshake
00:23:29
you know it it sort of relaxes you your
00:23:32
stress levels go down you feel a sense
00:23:34
of connection with the world around you
00:23:36
coming back to control
00:23:39
you feel that the external world is safe
00:23:42
i've got degree of control there is
00:23:44
order in the world let's focus
00:23:47
on these simple things you can do each
00:23:49
day if you
00:23:50
say hi to the amazon delivery driver and
00:23:52
smile at them say thank you to the
00:23:54
barista and say a few nice words to them
00:23:57
say hi to the bus driver and smile at
00:23:59
them thank the postmen
00:24:01
you are working on your happiness
00:24:04
you know it seems trivial but it's not
00:24:06
the research is so so clear right
00:24:08
because it gives you a sense of control
00:24:10
second pillar of the three
00:24:12
and we've got to touch on the third
00:24:14
pillar before i start getting into all
00:24:15
of these topics because so it's so
00:24:16
interesting that these are the things
00:24:17
that you know we're talking about today
00:24:19
because i think i spent all weekend
00:24:21
um reading about studies on the
00:24:23
importance of you call it the sociometer
00:24:25
in the brain but just that that thing
00:24:28
that connects you with
00:24:30
your tribe but please do get into the
00:24:31
third point which i think you said was
00:24:32
contentment contentment yeah yeah
00:24:35
contentment is
00:24:37
about feeling calm and that sense of
00:24:40
peace when you're at peace with your
00:24:41
life and you're at peace with your
00:24:43
decisions so what things in your life
00:24:47
give you that sense of contentment
00:24:50
and i really feel it's these three
00:24:53
things
00:24:54
when you put them all together
00:24:56
the side effect of doing them
00:24:59
is you're happy yeah right but but also
00:25:03
happiness is not
00:25:06
often what we think it is that that big
00:25:07
billboard image of the
00:25:09
the happy family on the beach with a
00:25:11
smile on their face in the ocean behind
00:25:13
them right
00:25:15
that to me
00:25:17
is not happiness that's a pleasurable
00:25:19
experience yeah it can form part of a
00:25:22
happy life
00:25:23
but that's not happiness you can be sad
00:25:26
and happy
00:25:27
the way i look at happiness core
00:25:28
happiness
00:25:30
i was thinking about this last week i
00:25:32
was chatting to someone who
00:25:35
who was going through grief
00:25:38
you know someone very close to them had
00:25:39
died
00:25:40
and you know we were having a really
00:25:42
long deep conversation
00:25:45
but they were present with their grief
00:25:47
and they were able to share with me
00:25:50
exactly how they were feeling no masks
00:25:53
on at all in terms of these kind of
00:25:55
metaphorical masks that we put on
00:25:57
they were just being themselves
00:26:00
that's called happiness
00:26:03
because they're aligned
00:26:06
right their inner thoughts are i feel
00:26:08
sad upset
00:26:11
frustrated for my loss
00:26:13
and their external actions
00:26:15
are completely aligned with that
00:26:18
so i kind of feel
00:26:20
really what happiness is about
00:26:22
is living an intentional life
00:26:25
it's about taking the time to understand
00:26:27
who you are
00:26:28
defining for yourself what happiness is
00:26:31
or what success looks like not using
00:26:33
society's definition you post a few days
00:26:36
ago don't use society's definition of
00:26:38
fun
00:26:39
right that's a great post you know just
00:26:41
because society says to have fun you
00:26:43
need to go to a bar have loud music on
00:26:45
and get drunk well if you like to sit at
00:26:49
home in the bath reading a good book
00:26:52
that that's great if you don't that's
00:26:54
fine as well but it's got to be you it's
00:26:56
your values so
00:26:58
i can't tell someone what they need to
00:27:01
necessarily do in all aspects of their
00:27:03
life to be happy
00:27:04
but be intentional about your life
00:27:08
my girlfriend came upstairs yesterday
00:27:09
when i was having a shower and she said
00:27:11
to me that she tried the heel protein
00:27:12
shake which lives on my fridge over
00:27:14
there and she said it's amazing low
00:27:15
calories you get your 20 odd grams of
00:27:18
protein you get your 26 vitamins and
00:27:19
minerals and it's nutritionally complete
00:27:21
in the protein space there's lots of
00:27:22
things but it's hard to find something
00:27:24
that is nice especially when consumed
00:27:26
just with water and that is
00:27:28
nutritionally complete and that has
00:27:31
about 100 calories in total while also
00:27:34
giving you your 20 grams of protein
00:27:36
if you haven't tried the cured protein
00:27:38
product do give it a try the salted
00:27:40
caramel one if you put some ice cubes in
00:27:43
it and you put it in a blender and you
00:27:45
try it is as good as pretty much any
00:27:48
milkshake on the market just mixed with
00:27:50
water it's been a game changer for me
00:27:52
because i'm trying to drop my calorie
00:27:53
intake and i'm trying to be a little bit
00:27:55
more healthy with my diet so this is
00:27:57
where heel fits in my life thank you for
00:27:59
making a product that i actually like
00:28:00
the salted caramel is my favorite i've
00:28:01
got the banana one here which is the one
00:28:03
my girlfriend likes but for me salted
00:28:05
caramel is
00:28:07
the one
00:28:08
you know when people give um advice in
00:28:11
their books and you know when i do it
00:28:12
online with my content there's something
00:28:14
which i
00:28:15
realize
00:28:16
has to be done first so as much as you
00:28:19
could have told me to get into alignment
00:28:22
the the counter force that was saying
00:28:24
[ __ ] that was this deep sense of
00:28:27
insecurity and that piece of work i had
00:28:29
to do as you describe it to heal first
00:28:32
before i could start looking with a
00:28:34
clear view
00:28:35
at um the way i was living my life
00:28:38
because if you'd asked steve butler at
00:28:39
18 years old what his values were
00:28:41
you know he would have said lamborghini
00:28:43
next question he would have said money
00:28:45
right i know there's not even values but
00:28:47
that's what he would have said right so
00:28:49
i'm interested to know how you think
00:28:50
someone can go on the journey of healing
00:28:52
um and understanding themselves in
00:28:54
self-awareness which i think is the
00:28:55
foundation and all the pillars you
00:28:57
mentioned of happiness
00:28:58
it's a great question um
00:29:02
i don't think it's going to be
00:29:05
you listen to this
00:29:07
conversation you watch it on youtube you
00:29:09
get the book whatever i don't think it's
00:29:11
that you do that and then you're like oh
00:29:12
i've got it i've figured it out now i
00:29:14
know my values okay great no this is a
00:29:16
journey
00:29:18
it's the best journey you'll ever take
00:29:19
but it's a journey it's not a one hit
00:29:22
the first step in any change
00:29:26
is awareness
00:29:28
all behaviors serve and needs
00:29:31
where every behavior we have is there
00:29:34
for a reason
00:29:35
you can't just i can't tell the patient
00:29:36
you should drink less alcohol
00:29:38
without helping them understand
00:29:41
why do they need to be drinking that
00:29:44
alcohol in the first place
00:29:47
right it took me ages to to figure this
00:29:48
out the dots i think why why why am i
00:29:50
struggling why do they stop for two
00:29:51
weeks then they they get back on the
00:29:53
horse it's like
00:29:54
oh we've not dealt with the underlying
00:29:57
needs it's like new year's resolutions
00:30:00
right
00:30:00
no one has a problem going spinning four
00:30:02
times a week for the first two weeks in
00:30:04
january
00:30:05
but third week fourth week
00:30:08
when life gets busy and life gets
00:30:11
stressed or they can give up booze for a
00:30:12
couple of weeks
00:30:14
and they just can't keep it going it's
00:30:15
like you know i need it to unwind from
00:30:17
my work day that's because your alcohol
00:30:19
consumption
00:30:21
is a symptom
00:30:23
of the way you're living your life if
00:30:25
you want to change that you can try and
00:30:27
white knuckle it and reduce it
00:30:29
sure you might be successful for a short
00:30:31
period of time but you'll always go back
00:30:32
unless you
00:30:33
understand the behavior
00:30:36
same thing kind of works for food
00:30:37
cravings a lot of the time so someone's
00:30:39
listening to this and they go okay i
00:30:40
want to know what to do
00:30:42
but even if they're starting to
00:30:44
challenge themselves already and go
00:30:47
you know i'm pretty interested what
00:30:48
these two guys are saying you know i
00:30:50
don't kind of know what my values are
00:30:52
but
00:30:53
i've got a feeling that i'm not living
00:30:55
life in accordance with them like i
00:30:57
think i'm chasing the wrong stuff but i
00:30:58
don't quite know what to do about that
00:31:00
even that awareness is progress
00:31:03
right so i think it's really important
00:31:05
we we can't always just find out get to
00:31:07
the solution go and live happy lives it
00:31:09
doesn't work like that
00:31:11
so step one is awareness now if you have
00:31:13
that awareness
00:31:15
and you want to go further
00:31:17
a simple thing you might want to do is
00:31:18
what i call the identity menu in the
00:31:20
book you might literally want to
00:31:24
try and write down three values or even
00:31:27
one value start with one right start
00:31:29
with one right just write down one value
00:31:32
and then
00:31:33
in a week's time ask yourself how often
00:31:36
in that week did you live in accordance
00:31:38
with that how often in that week did you
00:31:40
live
00:31:40
in a way that was not in harmony with
00:31:42
that okay it's not about beating
00:31:43
yourself up it's not about holding
00:31:45
yourself to this
00:31:46
unattainable ideal it's just ask
00:31:48
yourself the question just gently start
00:31:51
compassionately probing
00:31:53
what's going on
00:31:54
right so i think that's a useful
00:31:56
exercise and build up to three values if
00:31:58
you can
00:31:59
and you know these things need
00:32:00
reassessing the other exercise i like
00:32:02
which i think is really practical
00:32:05
it's got two parts it's called define
00:32:07
your happiness habits
00:32:08
and write your happy ending right and if
00:32:11
if you want we could try actually just
00:32:13
do it if you're right for us
00:32:15
so i would ask you stephen
00:32:17
think of three things
00:32:19
that really bring you a sense of
00:32:22
happiness deep calm and contentment and
00:32:24
make you really feel good
00:32:26
um
00:32:26
so i think one of them which i've
00:32:28
actually read about in your book is
00:32:29
about
00:32:30
serving others and helping others
00:32:32
it feels to me like a
00:32:36
a happiness rush or a sense of
00:32:38
fulfillment or contentment that i can't
00:32:40
seem to get anywhere else the other one
00:32:42
is like pursuing my artistic interests
00:32:44
so things like when i can see my djing
00:32:47
equipment over in the corner there when
00:32:48
i do my djing or when i give give time
00:32:50
to myself to write or create okay i call
00:32:53
that like expression that's like yeah um
00:32:56
and then i think the third one is is
00:32:59
what i think you call in your book like
00:33:00
movement
00:33:02
so moving so um
00:33:04
exercise when i go to the gym and i and
00:33:07
i'm not sure why that is because this
00:33:08
might fit into a number of categories
00:33:09
because in in part it's like meditative
00:33:11
when i'm on the running machine or on
00:33:13
the peloton it's really meditative on
00:33:14
the other part it's has there's
00:33:16
obviously physiological impacts and
00:33:17
biological impacts of the exercise and
00:33:20
then on the third part it might just be
00:33:21
because i'm giving time to myself so i'd
00:33:23
say those are the three that came to
00:33:25
mind straight away yeah okay so you've
00:33:26
you've picked what i call three
00:33:28
happiness habits yeah right so each week
00:33:31
and please correct me if i've
00:33:32
misinterpreted any of this
00:33:34
um each week if you could do something
00:33:36
that serves others
00:33:38
if you could engage in your artistic um
00:33:42
passions
00:33:43
and you could do a form of movement you
00:33:45
enjoy yeah there are three things that
00:33:47
would give you you know real sense of
00:33:49
happiness so i believe
00:33:50
okay no no i i think they probably are
00:33:52
and i'll share my name it's just second
00:33:54
seconds let's get to the second part of
00:33:55
the exercise
00:33:56
okay it's called write your happy ending
00:33:58
so
00:33:58
imagine now you're on your deathbed yeah
00:34:01
okay so at the end of this is it right
00:34:05
look back on your life
00:34:06
what are three things you will want to
00:34:09
have done so that's really interesting
00:34:11
because it's funny because the answers
00:34:12
are different
00:34:13
um one of them is definitely about
00:34:15
connecting with others my friends so
00:34:16
like my friends my family my niece
00:34:18
that's like that's in fact so central to
00:34:22
my happiness
00:34:23
um the third is helping others that
00:34:26
gives me a real sense of um that i spent
00:34:28
my time in a worthwhile way
00:34:30
and
00:34:31
sorry the second and the third would be
00:34:34
the third is a as a personal one it's
00:34:35
the feeling that i've i've
00:34:37
done my potential
00:34:40
justice yeah lived up to your potential
00:34:42
lived up to my potential done myself
00:34:44
justice yeah yeah
00:34:46
i love them i mean first of all thanks
00:34:48
for sharing that
00:34:49
um
00:34:50
so what's really interesting when you do
00:34:51
the second part now
00:34:53
you can go back
00:34:55
and redo the first one and
00:34:57
what's really beautiful i think there's
00:34:58
i think there's a real deceptive
00:35:00
simplicity
00:35:01
with this exercise it gives you the sort
00:35:04
of granular
00:35:06
day-to-day
00:35:07
look at your life and happiness and it
00:35:09
gives you the 30 000 foot kind of big
00:35:11
picture view and you can see if they're
00:35:13
aligned so if you do the three happiness
00:35:16
habits each week doing something for
00:35:18
someone else
00:35:19
sorry serving others
00:35:20
engaging creatively
00:35:22
and um
00:35:24
uh you know moving
00:35:27
will that get you to your happy ending
00:35:29
no
00:35:31
so i was missing one you're missing one
00:35:33
yeah the relationship piece yeah exactly
00:35:35
yeah and so this is not about catching
00:35:37
anyone out this is something i think we
00:35:38
can all benefit from myself including on
00:35:40
a regular basis
00:35:42
it doesn't mean you can automatically
00:35:44
change the entire trajectory of your
00:35:45
life but it does mean this is about
00:35:47
intention right it's like if that's what
00:35:49
the goal is at the end
00:35:51
well like for me
00:35:53
i know
00:35:55
three happiness habits for me are what
00:35:58
number one spending undistracted time
00:36:01
with my wife and my children each week
00:36:04
that's really important
00:36:06
number two doing something that helps
00:36:08
improve the health and well-being of
00:36:09
others
00:36:10
really important number three
00:36:14
having time
00:36:16
to pursue things that i'm passionate
00:36:17
about that's kind of my three
00:36:19
i'm doing the the
00:36:21
the final piece the 30 000 foot yeah so
00:36:24
i know
00:36:25
each week then for happiness habits if i
00:36:28
have let's say five meals
00:36:31
around the dinner table with my wife and
00:36:33
kids
00:36:34
that's
00:36:35
where there's no phones and we're
00:36:37
totally undistracted and in the moment
00:36:38
right i know that i'm i'm doing that
00:36:41
i know if i record an episode of my
00:36:42
podcast each week i know that i'm doing
00:36:45
something that's going to improve the
00:36:47
lives of other people
00:36:49
and if i have time to
00:36:52
i don't know play guitar play snooker um
00:36:56
you know whatever you know i've got all
00:36:57
kinds of creative passions
00:36:59
each week then i know that if i just
00:37:01
consistently do that just a little bit
00:37:02
each week i'm getting to the happy
00:37:04
ending that i want
00:37:06
and for that person who may be listening
00:37:08
to this and struggling that may be
00:37:09
something else that they can start doing
00:37:12
you know and what's really interesting
00:37:13
stephen is we think we think we're all
00:37:15
quite different there was a study from
00:37:17
last year which showed us that actually
00:37:19
despite all our differences we feel as
00:37:22
if we're being our true authentic selves
00:37:24
when we're being kind
00:37:27
compassionate
00:37:28
doing things for others enthusiastic
00:37:31
presence and in the moment right all of
00:37:33
us and what i love about these exercises
00:37:36
they really bring awareness and
00:37:37
attention to your life you could say
00:37:40
yeah i really value health i really
00:37:43
value my health and well-being and then
00:37:44
they can assess their life and go i do
00:37:47
nothing each week to support that i say
00:37:50
that's who i am but i'm not
00:37:51
you can say as i did for many years i
00:37:53
valued my friends you know what i got so
00:37:55
busy with work i wasn't making time to
00:37:56
see them
00:37:57
and again it's not about beating
00:37:58
yourself up this is really really
00:38:01
important point this is about honesty
00:38:02
and awareness right you're never going
00:38:05
to become the person who you want to be
00:38:07
until you know who is the person you are
00:38:10
right now it's not about guilt it's not
00:38:12
about shame it's about just transparency
00:38:14
going okay all right i'm not aligned at
00:38:16
the moment okay fine no problem i'm
00:38:19
going to take one step this week i'm
00:38:21
going to
00:38:22
make an effort once a week i'm going to
00:38:24
phone one of my best mates just for 10
00:38:26
minutes
00:38:27
just to say hi
00:38:28
even that
00:38:29
is
00:38:31
it's helping you become more aligned
00:38:33
it's helping you get to that happy
00:38:34
ending so
00:38:35
you know maybe there's some useful stuff
00:38:37
in there for people to kind of take and
00:38:39
actually start applying it's so funny
00:38:41
because when you said that exercise
00:38:43
you know i could spend a lot of time as
00:38:44
i think i have in the past trying to
00:38:46
figure out who i was and the techniques
00:38:48
are complicated and they're largely
00:38:50
influenced by um
00:38:52
who society thinks i should be and what
00:38:53
my values are the minute i did that
00:38:55
exercise it was so clear
00:38:57
it was so unbelievably easy to do and so
00:39:00
clear and then as you said when we
00:39:01
zoomed out to my deathbed and said like
00:39:03
what are the things in your last days
00:39:05
that you're going to value
00:39:06
to to see how obvious it was that i'd
00:39:08
left out something so
00:39:10
so so fundamentally important which is
00:39:12
like my friends my family my
00:39:14
relationships
00:39:15
in my sort of you know the things that
00:39:16
make me happy was like alarming to me it
00:39:19
was like how are you not
00:39:21
living in alignment mentally how how did
00:39:24
you not know that that was so
00:39:25
fundamental
00:39:26
i think you just beautifully illustrate
00:39:27
seeing that we can see it yeah
00:39:30
brilliantly in other people oh hundred
00:39:31
percent man i could see and you i could
00:39:33
see it in my patients but you know what
00:39:35
it's pretty hard sometimes to put the
00:39:36
mirror up and see it in yourself
00:39:40
do you know what i mean
00:39:41
i think the other you know i think you
00:39:43
you've asked a brilliant question what
00:39:44
can that person do
00:39:46
i think the other the other thing
00:39:48
and probably
00:39:50
arguably the biggest this is the biggest
00:39:52
thing i think that's had the most impact
00:39:53
on my happiness and wider health over
00:39:55
the past years
00:39:57
is this understanding
00:39:59
of perspective
00:40:01
that there are multiple perspectives
00:40:05
on the same situation and i think it's a
00:40:07
really important point for people to get
00:40:09
so let's say someone's stuck in their
00:40:11
life
00:40:13
i think look i don't know what to do i'm
00:40:15
trapped here right uh i i don't know i
00:40:17
get up i go to work you know i try and
00:40:19
look after my family you know i don't
00:40:21
know this stuff about values and all
00:40:22
that kind of stuff okay fine
00:40:25
if you just forget all that stuff for a
00:40:27
moment and go okay let me just see if i
00:40:29
can start broadening my perspective
00:40:31
because once you start broadening your
00:40:32
perspective and start seeing things from
00:40:34
somebody else's perspective it changes
00:40:37
everything so one of the ways i do this
00:40:40
is to understand that
00:40:42
this phrase
00:40:44
yeah i'll go as far as this
00:40:46
this phrase has had the most impact on
00:40:49
my health and happiness above anything
00:40:51
else
00:40:52
if i was the other person
00:40:54
i would be doing exactly the same as
00:40:56
them
00:40:57
again a very simple phrase but when you
00:40:59
really really get it you're basically
00:41:01
saying if i was that person
00:41:03
with their childhood
00:41:05
their
00:41:06
parents
00:41:08
with their life experiences
00:41:10
i would be acting in exactly the same
00:41:13
way as them
00:41:14
and if you think you wouldn't i would i
00:41:16
would
00:41:17
very gently invite you to consider that
00:41:20
this may be your ego talking
00:41:23
if they could act differently they would
00:41:25
and what that does is it brings such a
00:41:28
deep sense of compassion to every single
00:41:30
day of your life you can start to have a
00:41:32
perspective for them for example it
00:41:34
could be maybe their daughter was sick
00:41:35
last night and up and they didn't get
00:41:36
much sleep maybe they think they're
00:41:38
going to lose their job when they're
00:41:39
they're late for work right whatever it
00:41:40
is it doesn't matter the truth doesn't
00:41:42
matter right for your happiness the
00:41:44
truth i would say doesn't matter
00:41:47
again i don't mean to be controversial
00:41:48
but i think some people will take that i
00:41:50
think that's quite controversial you're
00:41:52
a football fan right there was a study
00:41:54
done
00:41:55
football match one incident
00:41:57
right um two sets of fans they were
00:42:00
interviewed about the incidents
00:42:02
both of them
00:42:04
had a completely different perspective
00:42:06
on the same incident
00:42:08
right you we all know that there's a
00:42:10
foul or you know one team that's
00:42:12
definitely foul that's a foul and a
00:42:13
yellow card the other side that was
00:42:15
nothing you didn't touch him he died we
00:42:17
know that anyone who's got a partner
00:42:19
right or had a partner
00:42:21
you have a row you have a disagreement
00:42:23
well depending on which side at the
00:42:24
table you're sitting on you have a
00:42:26
completely different perspective of the
00:42:27
same situation
00:42:29
right so i say in any situation choose a
00:42:32
happiness story
00:42:33
right i'll give you another example
00:42:36
one of the most profound conversations i
00:42:38
have ever had on my podcast was with
00:42:40
this lady called edith eager
00:42:42
when i spoke to her last year she was 93
00:42:44
years old
00:42:47
at the age of 16
00:42:50
she was getting ready that evening she
00:42:52
had a date with her boyfriends
00:42:54
knock on the door
00:42:55
her parents her and her sister get put
00:42:57
on a train taken to auschwitz
00:43:01
within a couple of hours of getting
00:43:02
there
00:43:03
edith's parents get murdered
00:43:06
somehow she gets through
00:43:09
the next few years she survives what she
00:43:12
has taught me
00:43:16
is that
00:43:17
you can always create a different story
00:43:20
on any single event
00:43:24
she said when she was in auschwitz she
00:43:26
was totally free
00:43:28
the prisoners they were free
00:43:30
they were the ones who won't be able to
00:43:32
act and behave the way that they wanted
00:43:34
to they were trapped in her mind she was
00:43:36
free
00:43:37
after her parents had died she had to
00:43:40
dance for the guards
00:43:42
right
00:43:44
and she said the last thing my mom said
00:43:45
to me
00:43:46
was edith nobody can ever take away from
00:43:49
you what you put inside your mind
00:43:52
so she's dancing there she knows her
00:43:54
parents are dead but in her mind
00:43:57
she said
00:43:58
wrong and i was dancing in budapest
00:44:00
opera house
00:44:01
there was a full orchestra there's full
00:44:04
crowds i was dancing there
00:44:07
right the other thing she said to me
00:44:10
is i've been in auschwitz but i can tell
00:44:11
you the greatest prison
00:44:14
you will ever live in is the prison you
00:44:16
create inside your minds
00:44:19
so
00:44:20
for people who are listening who
00:44:21
struggle to forgive
00:44:22
who struggle to see the other side who
00:44:25
see someone
00:44:26
put a tweet up and then spend an hour
00:44:28
getting agitated and frustrated
00:44:31
i
00:44:33
humbly
00:44:34
suggest to you if edith eager can write
00:44:37
a different story
00:44:40
in the hell of auschwitz
00:44:43
i kind of feel
00:44:44
we probably can as well
00:44:47
it's so true that
00:44:48
the greatest harm we cause to ourselves
00:44:50
is is our own
00:44:53
negative or illogical or
00:44:55
self-harming stories as you were saying
00:44:57
that i was thinking about even the
00:44:58
stories i've i've told myself in the
00:45:00
last 24 hours or the last week which
00:45:03
have like tormented me mentally in the
00:45:06
sense of they've just like bothered me
00:45:08
unnecessarily and how much of a choice
00:45:11
it was for me to focus on those stories
00:45:14
if you know what i mean like
00:45:16
as you say like someone tweeting
00:45:17
something or leaving a comment and then
00:45:19
that you then give
00:45:20
48 hours of your happiness to just this
00:45:23
when you could as you've expressed so
00:45:25
eloquently choose compassion for the
00:45:27
person and
00:45:29
you know you could you could choose to
00:45:30
try and find the best intentions in any
00:45:32
behavior right yeah
00:45:34
the way i i put it in the book there's a
00:45:36
little section called make everyone a
00:45:38
hero
00:45:39
i think it's such a great sentiment in
00:45:41
life whenever something happens you
00:45:42
don't like make them a hero
00:45:44
make them a hero i challenge people try
00:45:47
that for seven days if your life has not
00:45:50
been improved in any way fine forget it
00:45:52
say the guy was splashing nonsense i'm
00:45:54
not interested i'm getting back to my
00:45:56
cynical nature i'm gonna see the worst
00:45:58
in everyone right fine
00:46:01
it's up to people make them a hero the
00:46:03
person who cuts you up find a way to
00:46:05
make them a hero in your heads
00:46:08
right
00:46:09
march 2020 what happened
00:46:11
everything's getting locked down
00:46:14
toilet roll shortage on the shelves
00:46:16
right so what do people do now i
00:46:17
understand that was a very unique
00:46:18
situation people are getting triggered
00:46:20
people are getting scared i understand
00:46:21
that but let's look at what was
00:46:23
happening
00:46:25
people were bad mouthing um who are
00:46:28
these people who are taking all these
00:46:29
toilet rolls it's so inconsiderate you
00:46:31
know they shouldn't be doing that okay
00:46:33
okay fine
00:46:34
let's just see could we write a
00:46:36
different story what might have happened
00:46:38
well it could be that every shopper that
00:46:39
day
00:46:40
took one extra roll and so by the end of
00:46:43
the day when the tv cameras came in
00:46:45
no one actually did anything that bad
00:46:46
they just took one extra roll
00:46:48
and the supermarket stock was all
00:46:50
planned around
00:46:51
average
00:46:52
shopping habits and behaviors okay
00:46:55
um it could be
00:46:56
that someone was really really scared
00:46:59
and anxious and let's say they've got
00:47:02
ulcerative colitis and they have to go
00:47:04
to the toilet 20 times a day and they're
00:47:06
petrified so maybe they did go and buy
00:47:09
ten packs or maybe let's take it to
00:47:11
another extreme maybe
00:47:13
someone is skint
00:47:15
right they've got no money they've got
00:47:17
no prospects in life they thought you
00:47:19
know what i can make a fortune here
00:47:22
right so i'm gonna get them all i'm
00:47:23
gonna sell them on ebay okay
00:47:26
whatever you think
00:47:28
of that if you can have compassion for
00:47:30
that person and understand if i was them
00:47:32
i'd be doing the same thing
00:47:34
it changes everything it changes your
00:47:36
physiology it changes your perspective
00:47:39
and why i think that's so powerful
00:47:42
particularly now more than ever stephen
00:47:43
like we
00:47:45
seemingly we're in a very divided and
00:47:47
toxic world
00:47:48
right seemingly
00:47:50
what we need is more compassion
00:47:54
right but how do you get compassion we
00:47:55
can't just say
00:47:57
you know i want to be more compassionate
00:47:58
that can work for some people use this
00:48:01
right
00:48:02
make them a hero
00:48:04
ask say to yourself if i were them i'd
00:48:06
be doing the same thing
00:48:08
you know it really helps humanity it
00:48:11
helps you feel better individually but
00:48:13
it will help connect you with people
00:48:14
around you people who've got different
00:48:16
views and perspectives it allows you to
00:48:18
sit alongside them so this is probably
00:48:21
one of the things that i use the most
00:48:22
along with which sort of goes along with
00:48:24
this
00:48:25
um
00:48:26
and this is sort of the big heading in
00:48:28
chapter 5 of the book it's called seek
00:48:29
out friction
00:48:31
right look this is when you become a
00:48:33
master of your own happiness
00:48:35
right
00:48:36
the whole goal of my work at the moment
00:48:38
is to
00:48:39
i don't want
00:48:41
people to be dependent on the actions of
00:48:43
other people for them to be happy right
00:48:47
if you constantly getting triggered and
00:48:49
and frustrated by the tone of your
00:48:52
colleagues emails or the way that your
00:48:54
partner is talking to you right
00:48:58
if you're waiting for them to change in
00:49:00
order for you to be happy
00:49:02
well you could be waiting a long time if
00:49:04
we go back to my core happiness stool
00:49:06
you've lost control you have no control
00:49:09
because you're dependent on other people
00:49:12
so
00:49:13
i
00:49:14
talk about this as social friction
00:49:16
right just as in in the gym you know you
00:49:18
can do physical friction you can push up
00:49:20
you can press up against your body and
00:49:22
you get stronger i'm saying you can
00:49:24
press up against other people and also
00:49:26
get stronger so every time you get
00:49:28
triggered i actually do this i do this
00:49:30
every single day
00:49:32
let's say let's say social media
00:49:34
let's say you get a negative comment
00:49:35
let's say i get negative comments
00:49:39
in the past five years ago when i you
00:49:41
know was first on bbc one about seven
00:49:43
years ago now actually
00:49:44
um i would have got triggered got so
00:49:46
frustrated i would have felt really bad
00:49:48
what's going on why is this happening
00:49:49
you know all i'm trying to do is help
00:49:50
people would have created this narrative
00:49:52
now
00:49:53
it's like ah
00:49:55
why is this triggering me
00:49:57
is there some truth to it that i can
00:49:58
learn from
00:50:00
or is it because the other person's
00:50:01
having a bad day and they're taking it
00:50:03
out on me
00:50:05
and you become a master if you practice
00:50:08
this every day right because what
00:50:10
happens is that you take control over
00:50:12
your inner
00:50:14
thoughts you take control of your own
00:50:17
happiness because it's like okay it
00:50:18
doesn't matter you're being given
00:50:19
opportunities every day to learn
00:50:21
something
00:50:22
for me i can i can speak but i know this
00:50:24
to be true for most people
00:50:28
it's because it's it's pressed on one of
00:50:29
your insecurities
00:50:31
right when you get truly secure in who
00:50:33
you are
00:50:34
what other people say
00:50:36
it doesn't affect you like i've noticed
00:50:38
this in my own life right
00:50:40
we started off the conversation talking
00:50:41
about external validation
00:50:43
like the problem when you need external
00:50:45
validation for your self-worth
00:50:47
is that when you get it you feel great
00:50:49
or you think you feel great
00:50:51
it's a very fragile uh way of feeling
00:50:53
great but when you get criticism you go
00:50:55
to the other extreme where you feel
00:50:57
worthless and you turn to whatever your
00:51:00
junk happiness habit is instagram
00:51:01
gambling drink porn whatever it is right
00:51:04
you turn to that as a way of
00:51:05
compensating but when you do the work
00:51:08
when you look for social friction
00:51:12
and you allow it to become your teacher
00:51:15
you start to process your insecurities
00:51:17
and then if people praise me now on
00:51:20
social media say oh wrong in that
00:51:21
podcast changed my life or you know your
00:51:23
book has really had an impact on me and
00:51:25
my mental well-being
00:51:28
i
00:51:29
like hearing that
00:51:30
but it doesn't artificially elevate my
00:51:32
ego like it might have done a few years
00:51:34
ago but at the same time if i get
00:51:36
criticism
00:51:38
right if i get criticism it doesn't drag
00:51:40
me down to those depths either i can i'm
00:51:43
just a lot more level
00:51:45
did that make sense
00:51:47
100
00:51:48
as you were saying that once again my
00:51:51
mind
00:51:52
sat there and thought how does he know
00:51:54
all of this stuff and how has he gotten
00:51:56
to a place where he can be so empathetic
00:51:59
and he can understand others to the
00:52:00
point that you can as you say make them
00:52:02
a hero and practice that what seems like
00:52:04
a pretty radical form of empathy in
00:52:05
situations where others would resort to
00:52:08
blame and um you know antagonism and
00:52:11
attacking others and it appears to me
00:52:14
that is because you've understood
00:52:15
yourself and actually being able to see
00:52:18
the you know what people might describe
00:52:20
as the insecurities or the flaws in
00:52:22
others or the triggers and others
00:52:24
is only possible once you've understood
00:52:26
yourself and it's funny because when i
00:52:27
put certain things on instagram i know
00:52:30
that i'm going to get backlash so if i
00:52:31
say
00:52:32
personal responsibility is really
00:52:33
important you can choose for example in
00:52:36
the case of what you've said there you
00:52:37
can choose to make someone else a hero
00:52:39
if someone cuts you off it's a choice
00:52:42
um as to whether you're you're happy or
00:52:44
you're triggered i know
00:52:47
there's a small proportion of people who
00:52:48
will slide into my dms and go you're
00:52:50
wrong if they've cut me off that's
00:52:53
forced me to be unhappy or i'm not at
00:52:55
fault for being unhappy right
00:52:57
and it tends to be the case that those
00:52:58
that are able to make that person a hero
00:53:02
or to practice empathy are those that
00:53:04
have actually done the work to
00:53:05
understand why
00:53:07
they are triggered why they were
00:53:09
insecure and why they react in the way
00:53:10
they do so again it feels to me that
00:53:13
this really underlying foundational
00:53:15
piece of work that is the catalyst for
00:53:17
being able to do all of these amazing
00:53:18
things that you've written about and
00:53:19
that you understand again is that like
00:53:22
that awareness as you described it
00:53:25
yeah i think he's spot on stephen
00:53:27
it also comes from
00:53:31
having lived through the mental turmoil
00:53:34
of
00:53:35
taking a different path of
00:53:37
blaming others
00:53:38
and seeing yourself as a victim and
00:53:41
often we absorb these sort of patterns
00:53:43
from our parents right
00:53:44
i can see clearly now how mum and dad
00:53:47
would react to the world and i could see
00:53:50
how i absorbed a lot of that and i
00:53:52
thought that's how you show up with the
00:53:54
world
00:53:55
but we can all choose to approach the
00:53:57
world differently
00:53:58
just because you have approached the
00:54:00
world a certain way
00:54:03
for all the years you've been on this
00:54:04
planet let's say until this conversation
00:54:06
right
00:54:08
everyone listening or watching has a
00:54:09
choice at the end of this conversation
00:54:12
they can decide whether to act on
00:54:15
something they've heard
00:54:18
or not
00:54:19
can i just press you on that one on that
00:54:21
point there about your parents because i
00:54:22
think it's it touched on something that
00:54:24
i really relate to in my
00:54:26
in one of my parents which is um
00:54:29
and this might be an immigrant thing my
00:54:30
mom was pretty badly racially abused for
00:54:33
for you know living in plymouth she's a
00:54:34
nigerian woman you know i really didn't
00:54:36
see anyone else in my in my city that
00:54:38
looked like her if i'm honest once upon
00:54:39
a you know once in a while i might once
00:54:40
a year but she was an anomaly in
00:54:43
appearance she was a nigerian woman with
00:54:45
long you know nigerian hair
00:54:47
um
00:54:48
and i grew up i have to say because she
00:54:52
was often racially abused
00:54:55
seeing a kind of bias in her towards
00:54:57
thinking that
00:54:59
the world was out to get her
00:55:03
and
00:55:03
um
00:55:04
i don't think that served her if i'm
00:55:06
gonna be completely honest if you know
00:55:08
what i mean there that and you see in
00:55:09
other people that kind of sense that
00:55:10
they are a victim
00:55:14
do i ever
00:55:16
you know
00:55:17
i would say this is how
00:55:21
my mum
00:55:22
very much has shown up with the world
00:55:25
and
00:55:26
similar stories you know there is all
00:55:28
kinds of reasons for that
00:55:30
and you absorb that you think that's the
00:55:32
way you know that's what your parents
00:55:34
how they react it's often what you
00:55:36
absorb as a child you think that's the
00:55:38
way so i can't believe they did that
00:55:40
they they did that differently
00:55:42
i would feel differently
00:55:44
and
00:55:46
it's really understanding that you have
00:55:47
a choice
00:55:49
in how you show the world you have a
00:55:50
choice in how you feel about a situation
00:55:52
you can
00:55:53
choose a different story mum to be fair
00:55:56
to my mum's now 81 she's pretty immobile
00:55:58
uh me or my brother give her breakfast
00:56:00
on most days um
00:56:03
she is changing
00:56:05
right she it's so wonderful to see
00:56:08
sometimes it's like
00:56:10
well done mum like
00:56:12
you're not it's just so wonderful to see
00:56:14
that
00:56:15
any one of us can change
00:56:18
at any age right we can make subtle
00:56:21
choices small things that make a big
00:56:22
difference you know i also grew up very
00:56:24
protective you know
00:56:26
you'd see things that weren't there you
00:56:28
know man if someone cut me up in my 20s
00:56:31
i'm not sure i should even
00:56:32
say what went through my mind right
00:56:35
you know i wasn't calm and content
00:56:38
you know at all i'd get triggered
00:56:41
i think they were
00:56:42
you know whatever you know i may even
00:56:45
shout in my car
00:56:47
you know
00:56:48
uh for the sake of my career should
00:56:49
probably just not go any further but i'm
00:56:51
just joking you know i'm saying i
00:56:53
probably said things in my head
00:56:55
or scream them out that i'm not
00:56:57
particularly proud of now
00:56:59
but i can see that i didn't have the
00:57:01
emotional maturity
00:57:05
and the emotional awareness
00:57:08
to do anything different
00:57:10
what is that what is that that vic is
00:57:13
victimhood in your view often like an
00:57:16
ill thought through form of self-defense
00:57:19
that because i'm thinking about why say
00:57:21
our per se our mothers who are subject
00:57:24
to a lot of abuse or whatever why did
00:57:27
they make the choice that the world was
00:57:29
not on their side and how because that
00:57:31
seems like maybe in the
00:57:33
the short term it might help you so if
00:57:35
something happens to you or you know
00:57:38
you know you're unsuccessful in business
00:57:40
um you can say well it was the bank
00:57:42
they're racist
00:57:44
um how how what is the cycle the
00:57:46
psychology there and the human that's
00:57:47
choosing to default to victimhood and
00:57:50
you see it in a lot of my i see it a lot
00:57:51
of my friends actually when they fail at
00:57:54
something it appears that they use they
00:57:56
use blame as a way to protect their
00:57:59
self-esteem or i think you just nailed
00:58:01
it that that's what it is it's
00:58:03
protection it's it's to give you that
00:58:04
feeling of safety that's what we're
00:58:06
always craving we want to feel safe so
00:58:08
it makes you feel safe actually it's not
00:58:10
it's not me
00:58:11
it's out there it's not in here it's out
00:58:13
there that's the problem if that changed
00:58:16
i think that's part of it
00:58:18
so but is that because those people
00:58:20
can't
00:58:21
they could they can't deal with more
00:58:23
that they're too they're too fragile
00:58:24
that they can't deal with more
00:58:26
what they perceive to be
00:58:28
evidence of their inadequacy
00:58:30
yeah
00:58:31
absolutely and it also comes down to
00:58:37
any trauma
00:58:38
that they may be carrying from their
00:58:40
childhoods this is the other thing i've
00:58:42
learned stephen is that
00:58:43
you know without going to details on mum
00:58:45
and dads um that i don't have permission
00:58:47
to share you know there were traumatic
00:58:50
things that happened early on in mum's
00:58:53
life
00:58:54
and so now i can look at that with
00:58:57
a deep level of compassion that oh
00:59:00
that's why
00:59:02
mum behaves the way she does because
00:59:04
actually she got programmed at a young
00:59:07
age
00:59:08
that i have to be a certain way
00:59:11
right and then you you pass it on and i
00:59:13
think you said about your mum and my mum
00:59:17
let me share something from from my life
00:59:19
that maybe just fits in there a little
00:59:21
bit which is
00:59:23
we create these behavioral patterns
00:59:26
usually in childhood
00:59:29
right because we want the love and
00:59:30
affection of our parents we want the
00:59:32
validation because they're our
00:59:33
caregivers right we need that to feel
00:59:36
safe
00:59:38
so
00:59:39
touching what we said earlier
00:59:42
i knew that if i came out with 100
00:59:44
there'd be smiles at home right
00:59:46
everyone's happy wrong is done well
00:59:48
right
00:59:50
so
00:59:52
i internalize that i think that's the
00:59:54
way to be loved in life
00:59:57
fast forward i'm at university and
00:59:59
there's a passion here in all aspects of
01:00:01
life
01:00:02
um
01:00:03
like
01:00:03
whether i was
01:00:05
seven and if i lost at ludo
01:00:07
my mum says i would literally toss the
01:00:09
board up and storm out the room like i
01:00:11
was furious if i lost at ludo
01:00:14
right and it sounds like a funny thing
01:00:16
that your mum embarrasses you with from
01:00:17
thailand no actually now that i've
01:00:19
unpicked it it's actually very serious
01:00:22
i remember i was at uni
01:00:24
maybe second third fourth year at uni
01:00:26
can't remember on a sunday often after
01:00:28
the passing of the friday and saturday
01:00:29
night we'd end up in diane's pool hall
01:00:31
in edinburgh i go with one of my mates
01:00:34
and i'm a pretty decent pool sneaker
01:00:36
player right
01:00:38
if i was ever losing
01:00:41
i'd go into the
01:00:42
toilets and look at myself in the mirror
01:00:44
give myself a talking to you i'll tell
01:00:45
these guys have a little slap on the
01:00:46
face come back out
01:00:49
more often than not i would go on and
01:00:50
then win the match
01:00:53
and i thought i just liked winning and i
01:00:55
was competitive
01:00:56
that was all the story complete nonsense
01:00:59
it wasn't that i liked winning
01:01:01
it was that the pain of losing
01:01:04
was too great because it
01:01:07
it reminds me on a deep primal level
01:01:10
i'm not loved when i lose when i'm not
01:01:13
the best
01:01:14
right so it's that feeling of safety
01:01:17
and here's the other thing
01:01:19
if i did win i wasn't happy that one i
01:01:21
was just happy that i didn't lose
01:01:23
right and then you compensate you don't
01:01:25
realize it it might be a bit more sugar
01:01:27
that evening a few extra beers that
01:01:29
night
01:01:30
a little cheeky trip to the casino on
01:01:32
the way back because you've got this
01:01:33
discomfort
01:01:34
in your body in your soul
01:01:37
right that you need
01:01:40
something you need a junk happiness
01:01:41
habit
01:01:42
to deal with it
01:01:44
we're all going through that
01:01:46
my parents your parents right
01:01:49
they've
01:01:50
they've also had childhood programming
01:01:52
that they're playing at
01:01:54
and i think when we really get that we
01:01:55
can be compassionate
01:01:58
i have to say that was
01:01:59
just outstandingly beautiful the way
01:02:01
you've articulated all of that and it
01:02:02
really did bring me back to this sense
01:02:04
of empathy which links to something you
01:02:06
said earlier which is if i'd gone
01:02:08
through what my mum had gone through
01:02:10
coming from africa
01:02:12
to the uk
01:02:13
you know god knows what age she did i
01:02:16
think maybe 17 having left school and
01:02:19
then having to fight for survival in the
01:02:20
way that my mum did and i what you know
01:02:23
my mum is the single hardest working
01:02:25
person i've ever met my entire life
01:02:27
i would have behaved in the exact same
01:02:28
way yeah and that really it does a
01:02:31
remarkable thing for
01:02:33
your perspective on them
01:02:35
how you know how you view their struggle
01:02:37
and how you view their current behavior
01:02:40
which i think is actually a really good
01:02:42
pathway to engaging with them and then
01:02:44
being able to have conversations and
01:02:46
that's it is such a beautiful sentence
01:02:49
that one of had i been through what
01:02:50
they've been through i would have
01:02:52
behaved in the exact same way and that
01:02:55
is completely true of my mother i did
01:02:57
not
01:02:58
i did not have to struggle in the way
01:03:00
she did because of her struggle
01:03:02
it's true for all of us actually
01:03:05
i think we can all apply that
01:03:08
to every single interaction in our life
01:03:11
and in fact my challenge would be try it
01:03:13
suck it and see see what life
01:03:16
feels like see what your
01:03:18
experience of life
01:03:20
physically viscerally emotionally see
01:03:22
what it feels like when you start to
01:03:24
show up like that day to day
01:03:26
right if you're skeptical okay i hate
01:03:28
your skepticism
01:03:30
my challenge to you if you're skeptical
01:03:32
is try for three days
01:03:33
just try it
01:03:36
because i'm not here to try and convince
01:03:38
people i'm not here to tell people what
01:03:40
to do
01:03:41
i know this has literally transformed
01:03:43
the way i show up with the worlds and
01:03:45
try it with your enemies
01:03:48
right yeah sure try it with your parents
01:03:49
who hopefully you love
01:03:51
trap with your enemies try it with that
01:03:52
person at work
01:03:54
you don't like
01:03:56
try it with that boss
01:03:58
who really pisses you off and
01:04:01
riles you up every time
01:04:03
try it maybe you can't do that straight
01:04:05
away maybe we have to work up to that
01:04:07
this is a skill
01:04:09
right happiness is a skill you can get
01:04:12
better at it but how would you know how
01:04:15
to get better at it when did you get
01:04:16
taught the skill of happiness
01:04:18
i didn't get taught it right i don't
01:04:20
teach it at school
01:04:21
i didn't teach at university i didn't
01:04:24
learn it from my parents i didn't learn
01:04:25
it from society in fact the lessons i
01:04:26
learned from society were that you need
01:04:28
to earn more money you need to get a
01:04:30
better job you need to get a nicer car
01:04:32
nicer holiday those things are signs of
01:04:35
success and therefore happiness
01:04:38
and it's a myth i think that's the
01:04:39
biggest myth we fall for we think that's
01:04:42
what happiness says
01:04:43
success is success happiness is
01:04:46
happiness they can sometimes coincide
01:04:48
but they don't always
01:04:50
but they can do if you back up if you
01:04:53
take a pause you start to do some of the
01:04:55
things that we're talking about you
01:04:57
start to have a bit of time
01:04:59
to reflect
01:05:01
you know
01:05:02
solitude stephen is so important
01:05:05
right every bit of our free time now is
01:05:09
sucked up
01:05:11
like i went to this gorgeous coffee shop
01:05:12
next to your studio just before i came
01:05:14
in right
01:05:16
now i imagine
01:05:18
15 years ago you go into any coffee shop
01:05:20
in london you'd be standing in the queue
01:05:22
you'd be waiting
01:05:24
you know there might be five people in
01:05:25
front of you fine you'll be looking
01:05:26
around you'll be you might bump into
01:05:29
someone you know
01:05:30
you might be daydreaming
01:05:32
now what happens if you go into any
01:05:34
coffee shop
01:05:35
everyone's head down stuck in their
01:05:37
phone
01:05:38
right you're looking you're trying to
01:05:40
catch up with your emails just have a
01:05:41
quick cheeky look on instagram
01:05:43
i'm not criticizing anyone for doing
01:05:44
that but that comes at a cost it means
01:05:46
these little micro moments of downtime
01:05:50
where your brain is trying to solve
01:05:52
problems for you and process life
01:05:54
they're being lost if you're constantly
01:05:56
consuming
01:05:58
right if you're constantly consuming
01:06:00
content from outside whatever it is
01:06:03
even good content
01:06:05
right even
01:06:06
nourishing content if you're constantly
01:06:08
consuming you're not allowing your own
01:06:11
thoughts and emotions to come up
01:06:13
you know every summer now i take a
01:06:15
social media break i tried it two years
01:06:17
ago for the first i think three years
01:06:18
ago for the first time i took a few days
01:06:20
to really get into it then after two
01:06:22
weeks i didn't want to go back on now
01:06:23
i'm not anti-social media right i can
01:06:25
see the value that it has i use it to
01:06:28
try and spread helpful messaging as you
01:06:29
do
01:06:31
but i felt really good and what what i
01:06:32
really experienced even as i allowed
01:06:36
these deep innermost feelings to come
01:06:37
out i started to figure out what i think
01:06:40
what i think not what the world thinks
01:06:43
because that's half the problem going
01:06:45
back to what you said that person who's
01:06:46
confused
01:06:48
right it doesn't know where to start
01:06:49
here's another tip for them
01:06:52
see if you can have 10 minutes a day
01:06:56
without your phone
01:06:58
without music on right without an app
01:07:01
that you're looking at without
01:07:03
distraction just sit
01:07:05
maybe with a journal if you want but
01:07:06
just see what comes up
01:07:08
because often we're so scared of what's
01:07:10
going to come up we distract
01:07:13
and i would say you know for me a daily
01:07:15
practice of solitude for me typically
01:07:17
it's first thing in the morning
01:07:18
is so needed right the way i describe it
01:07:21
to people
01:07:23
it's like an early warning system
01:07:25
right so when i was a junior doctor in
01:07:26
edinburgh i remember being taught
01:07:30
when you're looking after sick patients
01:07:33
if you do regular
01:07:35
what we call obs so heart rate
01:07:37
respiratory rates um
01:07:39
you know temperature
01:07:42
depending on what parameters they fit
01:07:43
into
01:07:44
we could detect
01:07:47
several hours beforehand who was going
01:07:48
to end up needing high dependency beds
01:07:50
or intensive care it was like it was
01:07:52
really simple concept that by doing
01:07:54
these regular checks we can then take a
01:07:57
verse of action and make sure that
01:07:58
person doesn't end up going downhill and
01:08:01
i see my daily practice of solitude
01:08:05
as my early warning system
01:08:07
like it allows me to see what's coming
01:08:09
up right i know for years stephen i say
01:08:12
i know i know now but i didn't know then
01:08:15
when
01:08:16
my stress load was going up work family
01:08:18
pressure i'd feel this real tightness to
01:08:20
my right upper back but i was so busy i
01:08:23
didn't even notice it now i notice i
01:08:25
know
01:08:26
if in the morning when i'm doing my
01:08:27
solitude practice i feel that i'm like
01:08:29
oh
01:08:30
okay
01:08:31
there's stuff going on right what is
01:08:33
there is it work is it emotional and it
01:08:35
allows me
01:08:37
to intentionally say okay do i need to
01:08:39
cut out some commitments i've got do i
01:08:41
need to have a conversation with my wife
01:08:43
about something that's been bothering me
01:08:44
and i haven't said anything yet
01:08:46
everything i recommend steven is simple
01:08:48
i don't think anything i've suggested
01:08:50
so far costs any money at all
01:08:54
none of them actually take that much
01:08:56
time i'm really really passionate about
01:09:00
making sure this information is
01:09:02
accessible to everyone i've worked in
01:09:04
affluent areas i've worked in some very
01:09:07
very deprived areas
01:09:08
right and actually we're all
01:09:11
of course there are different pressures
01:09:14
but actually we're all having the same
01:09:15
universal human experience the same
01:09:17
ingredients are there in all of us that
01:09:20
when we apply them they make our lives
01:09:23
better no matter where we are
01:09:25
right someone when i was working in
01:09:27
order
01:09:28
right
01:09:30
an area of low socioeconomic status a
01:09:32
lot of my patients want benefits very
01:09:34
poor income
01:09:35
levels you know you would say a very you
01:09:38
know struggling area financially i can't
01:09:41
take away their poverty and their stress
01:09:43
from life
01:09:45
but if i can help them have 10 minutes
01:09:47
of themselves each morning
01:09:48
and do some breathing practices or even
01:09:51
write in a journal what they're feeling
01:09:54
that is going to lower their stress load
01:09:56
and that means they're going to be
01:09:57
better able to show up in their life and
01:10:00
deal with their stresses right so when
01:10:02
people say oh health happiness it's the
01:10:04
preserve of the middle classes and the
01:10:06
wealthy i disagree i absolutely disagree
01:10:10
and i'm so passionate to get that
01:10:12
message across health and happiness
01:10:14
can be accessible to everyone yes
01:10:17
it can be challenging for some people no
01:10:19
question there could be lots that you
01:10:21
want to change there'll be lots that you
01:10:23
ideally would wish it wasn't the way it
01:10:25
is
01:10:27
but you can
01:10:28
choose
01:10:29
your response to every single one of
01:10:32
those things you absolutely can and when
01:10:34
you learn to do that
01:10:36
that's freedom you know what's the
01:10:38
victor frankel quote in between stimulus
01:10:41
and response is a space
01:10:43
in that space lies your power to choose
01:10:46
your response and with your response
01:10:49
lies your growth and your freedom
01:10:53
one of the things you touched on there
01:10:54
which was really is really foundational
01:10:56
to everything you went on to say was
01:10:57
this idea of a morning routine and um
01:11:00
you know when i do q and a's and stuff
01:11:02
like that on social media people will
01:11:04
always ask me steve what's your morning
01:11:06
routine my morning routine is pretty
01:11:07
shitty i'll be completely honest i would
01:11:09
never lie to anybody about that it's
01:11:11
really really shitty and it's
01:11:12
inconsistent and it's quite
01:11:16
it's unthinking so it's kind of being
01:11:18
dragged into the day
01:11:20
um you describe these the 3ms of a
01:11:22
really good morning routine what are
01:11:25
those three m's of a good morning
01:11:26
routine what can i do today how long is
01:11:27
it going to take me and what do you
01:11:29
believe a good morning routine contains
01:11:31
yeah it's a big picture of you here
01:11:36
i have a bias towards morning routines
01:11:38
because i have found in my own life
01:11:42
they've really really helped me
01:11:45
so let me just talk about stress for a
01:11:47
moment because this really plays into
01:11:48
why i think morning routines are so
01:11:49
important
01:11:51
i've got this concept of micro stress
01:11:54
doses and stress thresholds so
01:11:57
every one of us have got our own unique
01:12:00
personal stress threshold right that
01:12:02
depends on your life how you deal with
01:12:03
things and what's going on
01:12:06
and what we get to that threshold that's
01:12:08
when things start to go wrong that's
01:12:09
when we
01:12:10
um we snap at someone we have a fight
01:12:13
with our partner our net goes or our
01:12:15
back goes into spasm right that's when
01:12:16
you're at your threshold
01:12:18
right
01:12:20
so
01:12:22
i'm saying to people and i've i've
01:12:24
really found this to be true for pretty
01:12:26
much everyone
01:12:28
let's say you wake up
01:12:30
and you are far away from your threshold
01:12:32
you've had a good night's sleep right so
01:12:34
you're feeling you've been good
01:12:37
what's the average morning for a lot of
01:12:38
people these days okay let's say the
01:12:40
alarm goes off at 6 30 right so they're
01:12:42
in a deep sleep
01:12:44
alarm goes off jolts them out of that
01:12:46
sleep they have to get it okay that's
01:12:47
micro stress dose or msd number one okay
01:12:50
pick up the phone
01:12:53
oh man i'm just gonna put it on snooze
01:12:54
you know i need a bit more snooze put it
01:12:56
back
01:12:57
six minutes later it goes on again msd
01:12:59
number two
01:13:00
you need pick up your phone you get i'm
01:13:01
quick you're gonna check email
01:13:03
oh man there were these three emails i
01:13:05
didn't get back to yesterday oh man i
01:13:07
need to do that msd number three
01:13:09
um have a quick look on instagram
01:13:11
someone's left you a snarky comment msd
01:13:13
number four then you realize oh man i've
01:13:14
been in bed for 10 minutes i have to get
01:13:16
up get ready i've got a guest coming to
01:13:17
shoot a podcast with i'm not talking
01:13:19
about your life i'm just saying anyone's
01:13:20
life you are talking about mine right
01:13:23
and so here's the point at me ronan each
01:13:25
one of those things right is a micro
01:13:27
stress dose and each one of those is
01:13:29
getting you closer and closer to that
01:13:32
stress threshold the mistake we make
01:13:35
is that when something happens at three
01:13:37
o'clock in the afternoon
01:13:38
right when that email from your
01:13:40
colleague frustrates you
01:13:43
you think it was that email
01:13:45
but it wasn't the email it was the fact
01:13:46
that you've already acquired 20 micro
01:13:48
stress doses you're right at your
01:13:50
threshold you've got no capacity to deal
01:13:52
with it so that email now bothers you
01:13:55
so
01:13:56
what i suggest to people is
01:13:58
many people leave the house in the
01:14:00
morning having already accumulated about
01:14:02
15 micro stress doses so they're already
01:14:05
a lot closer to their threshold than
01:14:07
they would have otherwise mean which
01:14:08
means they've got less resilience they
01:14:11
won't take much for them to get
01:14:12
triggered right so why i think morning
01:14:15
routines can be so valuable is they can
01:14:18
reduce
01:14:20
how many micro stress doses you're
01:14:22
exposed to first thing in the morning so
01:14:23
you are going into your day
01:14:26
with much more headroom and much more
01:14:28
resilience
01:14:29
but i think they're also useful
01:14:32
if you're feeling quite stressed when
01:14:34
you wake up and anxious i think they
01:14:36
help almost undo the damage of
01:14:38
microstrategies and bring you back to
01:14:40
baseline
01:14:41
was that clear
01:14:42
perfectly clear so that's my kind of
01:14:45
overarching view on why they're so
01:14:46
important so for me i know
01:14:49
if i do that morning routine yes it
01:14:51
gives me perspective on my life it
01:14:53
allows me to reflect but it also
01:14:55
um feeds the control leg of the core
01:14:58
happiness stool
01:15:00
but it also means that i'm not exposing
01:15:03
myself to micro stressors in fact i'm
01:15:04
getting back to baseline or i'm going
01:15:06
into negative i'm actually giving myself
01:15:09
a lot more resilience and capability to
01:15:12
face the day so i was trying to simplify
01:15:14
things to people so i think a complete
01:15:16
morning route scene for me has got these
01:15:19
three m's
01:15:20
mindfulness movement
01:15:22
mindset
01:15:24
and that's how i orientate my own
01:15:26
morning routine so i started with
01:15:28
mindfulness
01:15:30
now i've been doing this for a few years
01:15:32
right and currently my morning routine
01:15:33
is about 30 minutes but that's because
01:15:37
i've created a life where i can do that
01:15:39
and it works for me and i get up silly
01:15:41
early that's also because my kids have
01:15:43
always been early wises and i know
01:15:45
if i don't get that time to myself
01:15:48
i'm just not as good a dad and i'm not
01:15:50
as good a husband so my bedtime has got
01:15:52
earlier and earlier so i can get
01:15:55
up earlier and earlier before my kids do
01:15:57
right so i start with mindfulness which
01:15:59
at the moment is a practice of breath
01:16:01
work and then meditation
01:16:03
then what i do i go to my kitchen and i
01:16:05
put coffee on now very particular with
01:16:07
how i do my coffee i weigh out 15 grams
01:16:10
in the french press i pour 250 grams of
01:16:12
water and i put a timer on for five
01:16:14
minutes
01:16:15
why is that important it's not it's the
01:16:17
way i like my coffee but the point is i
01:16:19
know for five minutes my coffee's gonna
01:16:22
brew so in those five minutes
01:16:24
i don't go on instagram i don't check my
01:16:27
email i do a workout in my kitchen in my
01:16:30
pajamas
01:16:32
right i'm in my pajamas i'm not to put
01:16:33
on any fancy gear
01:16:35
i might do a bodyweight workout i might
01:16:37
have a kettlebell kicking around
01:16:38
whatever i feel like i will do and then
01:16:41
i get the gorgeous rewards of a hot
01:16:43
fresh cup of organic coffee that i like
01:16:46
and i sit there and i'll read something
01:16:49
um positive like i've got a few books
01:16:52
kicking around in my living room i'll
01:16:53
just pick one that i'm drawn to i'd
01:16:55
probably read for about 10 minutes while
01:16:57
sipping coffee something that's not
01:16:59
negative that's uplifting
01:17:01
right so that's what it looks like for
01:17:02
me now sometimes my daughter is
01:17:04
currently nine she's got a sixth sense
01:17:06
that daddy's up and she creeps in with
01:17:08
me if she gets in with me
01:17:11
what two things i want to say about that
01:17:13
the old wrong good from a few years ago
01:17:14
we got frustrated man i kind of need i
01:17:18
want my own space you know why yeah you
01:17:20
know i should have got up earlier i
01:17:21
don't do that anymore i'm a lot more
01:17:23
compassionate to myself i use that i go
01:17:25
okay great okay great she's here okay
01:17:27
okay darling just sit here daddy's just
01:17:29
finishing off my meditation
01:17:31
and she said i think okay this is cool
01:17:32
like i don't need to look at it as a
01:17:34
problem this is life right
01:17:36
if we think life is gonna be great
01:17:39
when everything goes our way we're gonna
01:17:41
be waiting a long time so i embrace it
01:17:43
now go fantastic
01:17:45
and then i also think as a dad what
01:17:47
she's also now
01:17:48
seeing
01:17:50
daddy prioritizes his health he thinks
01:17:52
it's important to look after his mental
01:17:54
well-being every day i'm hoping that she
01:17:56
also absorbs some of these ideas as she
01:17:58
grows up but the mindset piece i don't
01:18:00
sit there and read if my daughter said
01:18:03
we instead do affirmations together so
01:18:06
there's really good research on
01:18:07
affirmations in terms of what they do
01:18:08
for us
01:18:09
just short positive powerful statement
01:18:12
so the one we do together is we just say
01:18:15
i'm happy i'm calm i'm stress free right
01:18:18
so the two of us sit there we hold hands
01:18:19
and we say that for a minute
01:18:22
at the end of it i feel brilliant she
01:18:23
feels amazing
01:18:25
no i get it some people hear that okay
01:18:26
that is cheesy as anything
01:18:29
and maybe it is but you know what
01:18:31
there's good research on it
01:18:32
undergraduate students who did
01:18:33
affirmations before their exam perform
01:18:36
better
01:18:37
right
01:18:38
you know how you program your mind
01:18:40
matters so that's what mine looks like
01:18:43
right it used to be about five ten
01:18:45
minutes now yeah i can do half an hour
01:18:48
right but i've also become aligned i've
01:18:51
now i go to bed earlier right and let's
01:18:55
not forget stephen you're at a different
01:18:56
stage in life to me right i'm in my
01:18:58
early 40s i'm happily married i've got
01:19:00
two young kids
01:19:01
right you're in your late 20s
01:19:03
right was i doing morning routines when
01:19:05
i was 29 no i wasn't it's like clue that
01:19:08
i text you at 2 a.m last night isn't it
01:19:10
yeah well i woke up i was like oh man
01:19:12
like i'm getting up to do my routine and
01:19:13
steve has just gone to bed
01:19:16
but
01:19:17
but
01:19:19
let me tell you about a patient who i
01:19:21
saw
01:19:22
many years ago
01:19:24
i can't remember how old she was she's
01:19:25
probably around 42
01:19:27
really bad skin and i strongly felt that
01:19:30
stress was
01:19:32
exacerbating and really aggravating her
01:19:34
skin
01:19:36
and she said that's actually i don't
01:19:37
have time for any of this stuff right
01:19:38
i'm busy
01:19:39
i've got two kids i've got to get out to
01:19:41
work
01:19:42
and we try and make various things but
01:19:45
i managed to persuade her and inspire
01:19:46
her to try a five minute routine and
01:19:49
this is what she did she did the three
01:19:50
m's in five minutes it's just one minute
01:19:53
of what i call three four five breathing
01:19:56
right so you breathe in for three
01:19:58
you hold for four and you breathe out
01:20:00
for five any time your out breath is
01:20:02
longer than your in-breath you help to
01:20:04
lower your body's stress response and
01:20:06
activate its relaxation response okay
01:20:09
there's many ways you can do that but i
01:20:11
like this breath that i call the three
01:20:12
four five breaths so she did one minute
01:20:14
three four five breathing
01:20:15
she did two minutes of yoga
01:20:18
right she had some of her favorite
01:20:20
sequencing two minutes of yoga
01:20:22
and then she did two minutes of
01:20:23
affirmations
01:20:25
that's it and she got on with the day
01:20:27
she came to see me a few weeks later
01:20:30
and she thought she actually i just feel
01:20:33
so much better and her skin complaints
01:20:35
had gone down by over 50 and over the
01:20:37
course of the next few months she was
01:20:39
hardly getting any flare-ups at all
01:20:40
because it was a ripple effect it wasn't
01:20:43
just that
01:20:44
but by doing that and giving her that
01:20:46
little bubble of resilience first thing
01:20:48
in the morning
01:20:49
she would then go out for a walk at
01:20:51
lunch time instead of just sitting in
01:20:53
the canteen on her phone she'd go i'm
01:20:54
gonna go for ten minute walk around the
01:20:56
block you know it so for me it's just
01:20:59
you showing yourself right at the start
01:21:00
of the day
01:21:02
you know what i'm worth it i'm worth
01:21:04
spending a bit of time on today
01:21:06
and for me i'm a i've got a bias there
01:21:09
because if i don't do stuff like that in
01:21:10
the morning
01:21:11
i don't do it once the day starts forget
01:21:14
it and it's something that might have
01:21:15
value for your audience steven and i you
01:21:17
know i guess i'm coming and thinking
01:21:20
steven bartlett successful businessman
01:21:21
loads of entrepreneurs listening
01:21:24
um
01:21:25
thinking about you know business and
01:21:27
stuff and i'm i you know i i kind of
01:21:29
want to help people and
01:21:32
let's let's zoom into the middle and
01:21:34
movement
01:21:36
why is it that i'm able to do a five
01:21:38
minute workout every day like i've
01:21:40
really missed a day for three years
01:21:41
that's not because
01:21:43
i've got more motivation than anyone
01:21:45
else it's because i understand
01:21:46
the science of behavior change
01:21:50
right i think it's gonna i hope it's
01:21:51
gonna have value for people
01:21:53
there's two
01:21:54
big rules i've learned about human
01:21:56
behavior number one is
01:21:58
if you make something easy
01:22:01
you will do it
01:22:04
so
01:22:06
what's that got to do with my morning
01:22:07
routine well i made it so easy for me to
01:22:09
do right i don't need to buy any
01:22:11
equipment everything's there i don't
01:22:13
need to get changed i don't need to look
01:22:15
up a workout i don't need to do it's it
01:22:17
literally happens because
01:22:19
i don't have to think i've made it
01:22:21
really easy and to zoom this out to
01:22:23
business for a moment
01:22:25
it's reported that when amazon went to
01:22:27
one click ordering it's reported their
01:22:29
profits went up by 300 million dollars a
01:22:31
year
01:22:32
right so let's rewind 10 years when they
01:22:34
didn't have it what did you have to do
01:22:37
put in your order go to the next screen
01:22:39
you know type in your card deals go to
01:22:41
the next screen confirm audit right
01:22:42
every single step is a reason to
01:22:44
procrastinate pull out and not make the
01:22:46
purchase so what do they do one click
01:22:48
ordering boom before you blinked
01:22:50
something's coming that evening right so
01:22:52
they're doing what i think they should
01:22:54
do for their business why do netflix
01:22:56
roll one video or one show into the next
01:22:59
one
01:23:00
it's not out of the goodness of their
01:23:02
own hearts to go oh you know let's help
01:23:03
people
01:23:04
no they're using the science of human
01:23:06
behavior before you realize it's
01:23:10
12 30 at night
01:23:11
i need to go to bed i've got to get it
01:23:13
for work you are straight into another
01:23:15
episode so you don't stop that's why
01:23:16
youtube roll and see the next video
01:23:19
right so these guys understand human
01:23:20
behavior when we as humans try and apply
01:23:23
it to our own health we throw it out the
01:23:25
window we think it's got to be hard it's
01:23:27
got to be really tough i've got to go
01:23:29
running one hour four times a week
01:23:32
and we we again first two weeks in
01:23:34
january we managed to do it then we fall
01:23:36
off the wagon because we think
01:23:38
motivation is going to last forever and
01:23:40
it doesn't and the science is called the
01:23:41
motivation wave motivation comes up
01:23:43
motivation goes down
01:23:45
plan your behaviors for when your
01:23:47
motivation is down not when it's up then
01:23:50
you will still do it so number one is
01:23:52
you make it easy i've made it easy
01:23:54
number two
01:23:55
which is just as important as where are
01:23:58
you gonna put this behavior you can't
01:24:00
just think about it oh i'm gonna i'm
01:24:01
gonna meditate i'm gonna move no you
01:24:03
need to be very intentional
01:24:05
now every single behavior we do needs a
01:24:08
trigger
01:24:09
right so
01:24:10
a trigger could be oh i remember to do
01:24:12
it
01:24:13
sure that works it's just the most
01:24:14
unreliable trigger that exists the next
01:24:16
best trigger is like um a notification
01:24:20
like uh you know oh you've got to be
01:24:23
here to record a podcast with stephen
01:24:25
okay great i know i've got to do that or
01:24:27
you put a post-it note on your fridge
01:24:29
that's great but the very best trigger
01:24:33
as evidenced by the research and a lot
01:24:34
of this comes from professor bj fogg at
01:24:36
stanford instagram was literally
01:24:39
invented in his class as an assignment
01:24:41
essentially
01:24:43
he has shown that
01:24:45
if you stick on your new behavior onto
01:24:48
an existing habit
01:24:51
it's much more likely to happen
01:24:54
like the coffee like the coffee i don't
01:24:56
need my pa to phone me at five in the
01:24:58
morning say hey rongan listen
01:25:00
uh you must remember to make your coffee
01:25:02
i don't need my google calendar
01:25:03
notification to pop say hey wrong don't
01:25:05
don't forget
01:25:06
to make your coffee
01:25:07
i'm gonna do that it's locked in as a
01:25:10
habit i don't have to give it any
01:25:12
conscience but it's going to happen so
01:25:13
therefore if i stick my workout on there
01:25:16
i vastly increase the likelihood then
01:25:19
it's going to happen add on to the fact
01:25:20
that i keep kettlebells and dumbbells in
01:25:22
my kitchen my wife used to say can we
01:25:24
not just put these away in the cupboard
01:25:26
and i said listen babe here's the thing
01:25:28
and i've seen this with patients if you
01:25:30
put this stuff out of the way so that
01:25:32
the kitchen looks nice right
01:25:35
i'm never gonna lift up that weight
01:25:38
out of sight out of mind we need to
01:25:40
constantly trigger so
01:25:42
the kitchen's not a mess it's just in
01:25:43
the corner there's a kettlebell so as
01:25:44
i'm making the coffee i can see it it's
01:25:46
looking at me
01:25:47
even if all i do is pick it up to move
01:25:49
it i've picked it up and what it does
01:25:51
steven is that on a very on a very base
01:25:54
primal level it shows me each morning
01:25:58
that i have value that i'm worth
01:26:00
treating with respect you know chapter
01:26:02
three the book is all about treat
01:26:02
yourself with respect many of us um
01:26:06
as i've done for much of my life
01:26:09
don't we struggle with compassion for
01:26:11
ourselves we struggle to be kind to
01:26:13
ourselves
01:26:14
right but the research is really clear
01:26:16
people who are more compassionate to
01:26:17
themselves
01:26:19
they're healthier they're happier
01:26:20
they're more successful at work we think
01:26:24
we think we've got to beat ourselves up
01:26:25
inside to do stuff
01:26:28
right it's a myth it's a short term when
01:26:31
it's a long-term fail and there are
01:26:33
simple things that we can do
01:26:35
quick one as we all know energy
01:26:37
independence and living a little greener
01:26:39
has never been more important for a
01:26:41
better future it's a journey i've been
01:26:43
on over the last couple of years that
01:26:44
i've shared with you sporadically ever
01:26:47
since i sold my range over sport and
01:26:48
bought an electric bicycle and there's a
01:26:50
lot of people out there that listen to
01:26:52
this podcast that are looking to make
01:26:54
that sustainable switch in the things
01:26:56
that run their daily life whether it's
01:26:58
their home their car their vehicles
01:26:59
whatever it might be so when a good
01:27:02
friend of mine at a company called my
01:27:03
energy called jordan told me she was
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interested in sponsoring this podcast i
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jumped at the opportunity so for those
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of you that don't know my energy are a
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uk renewable energy brand whose mission
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is to increase the usage of green energy
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sustainable switches in our lives so if
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this resonates with you and you're the
01:27:24
type of person that's been looking or
01:27:25
thinking about going on your own
01:27:27
sustainability journey i highly
01:27:29
recommend checking them out at my
01:27:31
myenergy.com
01:27:33
a lot of people when they talk about
01:27:35
health and happiness in those topics you
01:27:37
know they tend to focus on things like
01:27:39
what we eat
01:27:40
you know that seems to be a really big
01:27:42
um
01:27:43
factor in
01:27:45
health one of the things we've talked
01:27:47
about there that i also read about in
01:27:49
your in your work is you would actually
01:27:51
suggest that maybe the most foundational
01:27:52
thing to all of our lives and it's kind
01:27:54
of clearly one of the things that i've
01:27:55
i've not been so consistent with is
01:27:58
sleep
01:27:59
so why is sleep so foundational and so
01:28:02
so important i actually read that you
01:28:04
said if there was one sort of health
01:28:06
recommendation you would make to
01:28:07
everybody it would be to try and get
01:28:09
more sleep why do you prioritize that so
01:28:11
highly why is that so important
01:28:14
i think the reason why sleep is so
01:28:17
important for society at the moment is
01:28:19
because of how much we've lost
01:28:22
so depending on which study you read
01:28:25
you'll have a slightly different
01:28:27
results but essentially compared to
01:28:29
about
01:28:30
60 years ago
01:28:32
you know we may have lost up to 25 of
01:28:35
our sleep
01:28:37
right so on an eight hour
01:28:40
sleep cycle we may have lost
01:28:42
you know two hours of sleep
01:28:45
right now when you think about what
01:28:46
sleep does
01:28:48
for the body and the brain and the mind
01:28:52
you'd be like well actually that is
01:28:54
gonna have a consequence so in the short
01:28:57
term we all know what does that feel
01:29:00
like when we haven't slept well okay do
01:29:02
we feel like our best selves
01:29:04
no we're a bit irritable we're a bit
01:29:06
moody what
01:29:08
are we like with those close to us when
01:29:10
we haven't slept well are we
01:29:12
patient
01:29:13
and calm are we a bit ratty a bit angsty
01:29:17
what do you crave when you haven't slept
01:29:18
well you don't crave
01:29:21
fruit and vegetables and whole foods you
01:29:23
crave sugar and cakes and candy right
01:29:25
because your hormones change when you
01:29:27
haven't slept properly right you're less
01:29:30
able to resist temptation when you
01:29:32
haven't slept
01:29:33
right you're much more likely to get
01:29:35
emotionally triggered when you haven't
01:29:37
slept
01:29:38
so sleep is really really important in
01:29:41
the short term but in the long term
01:29:44
sleep deprivation is associated with
01:29:46
pretty much every single chronic disease
01:29:47
we have
01:29:48
heart disease alzheimer's
01:29:51
um autoimmune disease
01:29:53
all these things now we're pretty sure
01:29:55
are directly not just associated with
01:29:58
sleep deprivation is thought to be
01:30:00
causative
01:30:02
right so this is why we think i'm just
01:30:04
going to crush it in my 20s 30s
01:30:08
you know i'll sleep when i'm dead i'll
01:30:09
sleep later i get there are phases in
01:30:12
our life where we have to probably work
01:30:14
harder than we would ideally do
01:30:16
we we get opportunities we have to take
01:30:18
it we feel we have to take advantage of
01:30:19
them
01:30:20
fine i get that i'm not saying you're
01:30:22
gonna
01:30:23
sleep seven to eight hours every single
01:30:25
night i don't manage to and i do
01:30:27
prioritize my sleep
01:30:28
but by and large
01:30:31
the biggest problem we have with sleep
01:30:33
is that we don't prioritize it we've
01:30:35
never lived in a society where there are
01:30:37
this many distractions
01:30:39
from sleep a million years ago you
01:30:42
didn't have you know what you do it gets
01:30:44
dark you have a campfire you sit around
01:30:46
and chat
01:30:47
and then
01:30:48
yeah you could go off to bed aren't you
01:30:51
it's so true we live as if sleep is the
01:30:53
the only optional thing it's the thing
01:30:55
that can we could do one hour two hours
01:30:57
three hours but
01:30:58
we then over prioritize but i can't miss
01:31:00
that appointment i can't miss that work
01:31:01
commitment but the sleep can come and go
01:31:04
it's optional yeah and it's and i get
01:31:07
the temptation there's always something
01:31:08
you could do you could watch a youtube
01:31:10
video you could watch a new boss series
01:31:12
you know i understand that there are
01:31:14
distractions
01:31:16
i totally get that
01:31:18
but
01:31:19
if you are struggling in life if you
01:31:21
can't focus as much as you want to at
01:31:24
work if you've tried going on diets
01:31:26
before and you can't stick to eating the
01:31:29
right kinds of foods that you're trying
01:31:30
to choose
01:31:32
you may be better off
01:31:34
focusing on your sleep i've helped
01:31:36
people lose weight i've helped people
01:31:38
improve so many aspects of their health
01:31:40
by not changing their diet and i'm a big
01:31:41
proponent of whole food-based diets
01:31:44
right
01:31:45
but i've gone what's the lever i need to
01:31:47
turn here
01:31:49
not what can i lecture the patient about
01:31:50
what is the lever i need to turn here so
01:31:53
i talk about these four pillars of
01:31:54
health certainly for physical health
01:31:56
food movement sleep and relaxation
01:31:58
and when my first book came out talking
01:32:00
about this about five years ago people
01:32:02
say doctor where should i start
01:32:04
and i said well look
01:32:07
we're all different
01:32:09
ask yourself this question ask yourself
01:32:11
which of these four pillars
01:32:14
do i need the most help with
01:32:16
because we all kind of intuitively know
01:32:18
for me it's probably stress
01:32:20
like my diet movement's pretty good i'm
01:32:22
pretty good in my sleep but if i could
01:32:24
do more to manage stress that would have
01:32:26
a huge impact on my health but we don't
01:32:28
do that we go to our favorite bit right
01:32:30
so people who've already pretty good
01:32:32
with their diet they try and make it
01:32:33
five percent better negating the fact
01:32:35
that they're only sleeping four and a
01:32:36
half hours every night
01:32:38
but go to your weakest link make a small
01:32:41
change there i'm not talking about seven
01:32:42
eight hours if you can even sleep for 15
01:32:45
minutes more a night
01:32:47
you will have a noticeable and
01:32:49
measurable impact on your physiology and
01:32:52
the way that you feel
01:32:53
and the other thing we're now learning
01:32:54
about um sleep particularly i think it's
01:32:57
the rem the rem phase of sleep
01:33:00
is this what sleep researchers are
01:33:01
calling emotional first aid
01:33:04
why it allows you to
01:33:06
process and
01:33:08
you know kind of regulate emotions and
01:33:11
memories
01:33:12
so we are living in this time of the
01:33:13
mental health epidemic i'm very
01:33:15
concerned over what the impact of the
01:33:17
last couple years is going to have
01:33:19
on people's mental well-being
01:33:21
but a lot of people don't realize that
01:33:23
sleep
01:33:24
when you sleep
01:33:26
more when you sleep of better quality
01:33:29
you actually do emotional first aid you
01:33:31
actually are better at processing
01:33:33
emotions your relationships will be
01:33:34
better your mood will be better when you
01:33:37
slept more so
01:33:39
the number one thing we don't do is
01:33:40
prioritize it so for most people if all
01:33:42
they do is prioritize it
01:33:44
that would be a big start and then i
01:33:46
always think i need to say when i'm
01:33:48
talking about sleep i don't want to
01:33:49
stress people out because some people
01:33:51
may hear that stephen and go
01:33:53
um i know i'm stressed out right i've
01:33:55
heard what you just said sleep's gonna
01:33:57
do or i've got a young child i can't
01:33:59
sleep through the night that's okay we
01:34:00
all have phases like that this is day in
01:34:03
day out over a period of years i'm
01:34:05
talking about it as a chronic disease
01:34:07
but there are small things that you can
01:34:09
do
01:34:10
right getting outside in the morning for
01:34:12
even 10 minutes and seeing natural light
01:34:16
that will help you sleep better at night
01:34:18
that is free it is accessible to
01:34:20
everyone right
01:34:22
why
01:34:23
if you think about what i said about a
01:34:25
million years ago we've we have evolved
01:34:27
as humans to have a big differential
01:34:30
between our maximum light exposure and
01:34:33
our minimum light exposure right so
01:34:35
typically in the day we'd be outside and
01:34:38
at night time would be completely dark
01:34:40
right so so light is measured in a unit
01:34:42
of light called lux
01:34:44
right
01:34:45
completely dark room zero lux
01:34:49
if you go outside on a cloudy day
01:34:51
in the uk overcast cloudy day for 10 or
01:34:54
15 minutes you're going to get about 10
01:34:56
000 looks through your eyes
01:34:59
go back on a sunny day you're going to
01:35:01
get about 20 or 30 000 likes through
01:35:03
your eyes
01:35:04
go into the most brightly lit office
01:35:07
building in the uk
01:35:09
you're probably going to get between 500
01:35:11
and 700 lux it's not much even on a
01:35:14
cloudy day
01:35:15
you're getting so much more than you
01:35:17
would get inside so for some people
01:35:20
all they have to do is get outside in
01:35:22
the morning for 10 minutes or even at
01:35:24
lunch time go for a walk outside for 10
01:35:27
minutes that will help set what's called
01:35:29
your circadian rhythm which helps you
01:35:30
sleep better at night so that's a simple
01:35:32
one caffeine's a big one right you know
01:35:35
i love coffee
01:35:36
but i don't drink it after midday
01:35:39
right i'll drink it in the morning i
01:35:41
won't drink it after midday
01:35:43
there are genetic differences between
01:35:45
different people and how we process it
01:35:46
for sure
01:35:48
but you know by and large half life is
01:35:50
six hours so that means if you have a
01:35:52
large coffee
01:35:54
at
01:35:55
midday
01:35:56
at 6 p.m half of that caffeine is going
01:35:59
around your brain and it could be at
01:36:01
midnight a quarter could still be going
01:36:03
around your brain
01:36:04
so this is not about lecturing this is
01:36:06
about
01:36:07
hopefully empowering people to go oh
01:36:10
maybe that 3pm coffee i take to get me
01:36:13
through the afternoon
01:36:16
oh maybe that's why i can't sleep well
01:36:18
and then i'm even more tired the next
01:36:19
day and i'm stuck in this vicious cycle
01:36:21
where i need the caffeine to keep
01:36:22
getting me through and again if
01:36:24
someone's listening to this and they're
01:36:25
not sure
01:36:27
i would say okay
01:36:28
why not try for seven days
01:36:32
only having caffeine in the morning and
01:36:34
just see what happens observe do you
01:36:36
feel better
01:36:37
does it help do you have more energy
01:36:39
great and if you think you're somewhere
01:36:41
and you really think it's a problem you
01:36:42
might want to wean down and try seven
01:36:45
days without
01:36:46
i never tell my patient to stop drinking
01:36:49
coffee
01:36:50
or to stop drinking alcohol i want to
01:36:52
help show them the impact it's having
01:36:55
right so let's say a patient's um
01:36:58
drinking too much alcohol for their
01:37:00
health
01:37:01
i want to help persuade them to go for
01:37:03
seven days without and see how they feel
01:37:06
right
01:37:07
if they can experience how they feel
01:37:09
differently
01:37:11
and then they go yeah i love it but you
01:37:13
know what the amount of fun i get on a
01:37:15
friday night hanging out with my mates
01:37:16
having a few beers it's worth the
01:37:19
hangover and the fatigue and the
01:37:21
irritability on saturday
01:37:24
if they say that they're happy with that
01:37:26
trade-off okay
01:37:28
fine
01:37:29
but a lot of people are not aware of the
01:37:31
trade-off like with coffee a lot we are
01:37:32
drinking so much we are a nation of
01:37:34
caffeine addicts we're a world of
01:37:36
caffeine addicts frankly it's a
01:37:37
psychoactive stimulants
01:37:39
it's a beautiful one but it's a
01:37:41
psychoactive stimulant so i'm all i'm
01:37:42
saying is if you're struggling with your
01:37:44
sleep
01:37:45
you know you might want to reduce it you
01:37:46
might want to knock it back a bit and
01:37:47
there's plenty more we could talk about
01:37:49
with sleep but all i want to say to
01:37:50
people is
01:37:53
small changes to your sleep make a
01:37:55
difference don't set the goal that's
01:37:57
going to be eight hours a night sure if
01:37:59
you can do that wonderful but even 15
01:38:02
minutes more a day will absolutely make
01:38:04
a difference
01:38:06
one of the moments in your book that you
01:38:07
describe as being really pivotal
01:38:10
and you've referenced early as being
01:38:12
pivotal to your life was the moment your
01:38:14
child got ill
01:38:16
um your six month old child became
01:38:18
unwell and the kind of
01:38:22
that became a catalyst
01:38:24
in your life for
01:38:25
i guess
01:38:27
many things can you talk to me about why
01:38:29
that was so um pivotal and
01:38:32
and and why when your child became ill
01:38:33
you you know
01:38:35
that was in part what i understand is
01:38:37
part of the inspiration behind many of
01:38:38
the thoughts in the book
01:38:40
my son jainam um
01:38:43
getting sick at six months old
01:38:45
literally
01:38:47
changed the course of my career
01:38:50
but i wouldn't be doing what i'm doing
01:38:51
today had that not happened
01:38:55
so rewind 2010
01:38:57
i become a father for the first time
01:39:00
right super excited right it's amazing
01:39:03
we're new parents everything's going
01:39:04
well bloody blahdy blah and that
01:39:06
december
01:39:08
um the end of december we were we
01:39:10
decided to go on holiday for a week in
01:39:12
france
01:39:13
i've got friends out there one of them's
01:39:15
got a house out there we were going to
01:39:16
go and stay there
01:39:18
and we flew out just after christmas my
01:39:20
wife myself and my son
01:39:22
and we got to my friend's house they
01:39:24
weren't going to be there on the next
01:39:25
day
01:39:26
and we meant to sleep downstairs there
01:39:29
that was the room that we'd been
01:39:30
allocated at my friend's place
01:39:33
and normally my wife would have probably
01:39:35
gone and put him
01:39:36
to sleep but she said she didn't feel
01:39:38
she wanted to he was a bit sniffly he
01:39:40
wasn't um
01:39:41
[Music]
01:39:44
you know she mother's intuition called
01:39:46
whatever you will she didn't do it
01:39:48
anyway we're we're upstairs in this kind
01:39:49
of open plank kitchen i think i'm doing
01:39:51
some washing up and then she calls out
01:39:52
to me he says wrong and he's not moving
01:39:55
i drop everything turn around
01:39:58
see him
01:39:59
and um
01:40:00
i think he's probably choking because
01:40:02
he's had a lot of phlegm all day so i
01:40:04
take him turn him over i try and clear
01:40:06
his airway
01:40:08
nothing's happening
01:40:10
uh i probably froze i can't quite
01:40:12
remember now with clarity but my said
01:40:14
look we just got to get into the
01:40:15
hospital so we got to the hospital which
01:40:17
is two minutes away
01:40:19
we got in
01:40:21
and you could see how scared the uh
01:40:23
medics were because it's not uncommon
01:40:26
for children at the age of six months to
01:40:27
have a convulsion it's something we call
01:40:29
a febrile convulsion there's a fever
01:40:31
that causes the convulsion
01:40:33
but he had no fever they were like well
01:40:37
why on earth is a six-month-old kid
01:40:39
just stopped moving and had a convulsion
01:40:42
so he got blue lighted down there
01:40:45
because it was a little mountain resort
01:40:47
down to the valley my wife's going in
01:40:49
the ambulance i'm like following in the
01:40:50
car thing what on earth is happening we
01:40:53
get there
01:40:54
you know he's motionless we're super
01:40:56
scared we thought we might lose him that
01:40:57
night he had two lumbar punctures he had
01:40:59
all kinds of blood tests then it turns
01:41:01
out later that he had very low levels of
01:41:04
calcium in his blood which is why he had
01:41:05
a convulsion
01:41:07
like well why has that happened and i
01:41:08
said look we're still waiting for more
01:41:09
tests a few hours later it comes back
01:41:12
he's got no vitamin d in his body well
01:41:14
very low levels of vitamin d
01:41:17
that's why his calcium drops
01:41:20
thankfully he got a calcium infusion he
01:41:21
got vitamin d
01:41:23
five days later you know we get
01:41:24
discharged
01:41:27
but why did that have such a big impact
01:41:28
on me well hey of course i nearly my son
01:41:31
nearly died
01:41:33
but i
01:41:34
thought i'd let him down
01:41:36
that's the truth demon
01:41:38
i thought my my son has nearly died from
01:41:40
a preventable vitamin deficiency
01:41:43
i've gone to one of europe's most
01:41:45
prestigious medical schools edinburgh
01:41:46
i've got an immunology degree i've done
01:41:48
my specialist exams done my general
01:41:50
practice exams with all my so-called
01:41:53
qualifications
01:41:55
i was unable to prevent my son from
01:41:57
getting sick so i took it personally as
01:42:00
if i had messed up and actually weirdly
01:42:02
enough a few weeks before that i'd
01:42:04
become aware of vitamin d i'd gone i
01:42:06
remember thinking shouldn't my son be on
01:42:08
vitamin d this was years ago i remember
01:42:11
phoning my wife from work said hey can
01:42:13
you go and take him to the doctor we're
01:42:14
told as doctors not to make medical
01:42:16
decisions for our own family it's not
01:42:18
deemed good practice i sent her a
01:42:20
protocol to just show that to the doctor
01:42:23
say your husband's a gp you know he's
01:42:25
just thinking about
01:42:27
about this and the gp just laughed her
01:42:29
out said you could have just printed you
01:42:31
could just type this up on word this is
01:42:32
nonsense he doesn't need anything
01:42:35
anyway two weeks later he's in france
01:42:36
convulsion nearly dies
01:42:39
why does that have such a big impact on
01:42:41
me why has it had such a big impact on
01:42:43
me
01:42:44
because
01:42:45
i thought i'd failed
01:42:47
right my whole
01:42:48
identity is is around being perfect at
01:42:51
that point
01:42:52
so i want perfection in every aspect of
01:42:55
my life oh i wanted perfectionary
01:42:58
aspects of my life and of course my
01:43:00
darling son
01:43:01
i thought so guilty stephen i became
01:43:04
obsessed right modern medicine saved his
01:43:06
life
01:43:07
but
01:43:08
that's it modern medicine often stops at
01:43:10
that point i i was asking him well what
01:43:12
happens if he's not had victim and d in
01:43:13
a system
01:43:14
for the last few months which he didn't
01:43:17
vitamin d is critical for our immune
01:43:19
system it's critical could this be why
01:43:21
he's got eczema could this be
01:43:22
contributing fast there's a look he's
01:43:24
he's fine now and i thought this is not
01:43:26
good enough for me
01:43:27
so i made it my mission
01:43:30
i said to myself internally i don't
01:43:32
think i ever verbalized it out
01:43:34
i said i am going to get my son back to
01:43:37
full health as if this had never
01:43:39
happened
01:43:40
i became obsessed i'd read up about
01:43:41
vitamin d that led me to the gut
01:43:43
microbiome that led me to all kinds of
01:43:46
stuff that i never learned at medical
01:43:47
school that i've used to help him he is
01:43:51
a thriving happy healthy strong 11 year
01:43:54
old boy
01:43:55
okay
01:43:56
the principles and the tools that i've
01:43:58
learned are what i've been using with my
01:43:59
patients for years it's what i used on
01:44:02
doctor in the house on bbc one to show
01:44:03
people
01:44:04
all around the country and it's gone to
01:44:06
70 countries around the world that all
01:44:08
kinds of conditions type 2 diabetes
01:44:10
fibromyalgia panic attacks anxiety
01:44:13
irritable bowel syndrome can all be
01:44:15
either
01:44:16
reversed or significantly improved by
01:44:18
making small changes to our lifestyle
01:44:21
that
01:44:22
moment
01:44:23
drove me to learn all this stuff which i
01:44:26
now share
01:44:27
and help
01:44:28
you know arguing millions of people now
01:44:34
and
01:44:35
for years
01:44:37
i wished
01:44:38
it didn't happen
01:44:40
but i've i've changed my view
01:44:42
for two reasons one reason was
01:44:44
that guilt i felt stephen i carried in
01:44:47
as a dad
01:44:49
he doesn't need his dad feeling guilty
01:44:52
that doesn't make me a calm present
01:44:55
attentive father
01:44:56
that brings baggage into the
01:44:58
relationship and i i could see that
01:45:00
well i i'd like to think particularly
01:45:02
these days i've got a high degree of
01:45:04
self-awareness i could see that see
01:45:05
wrong this is guilt it's not his fault
01:45:08
he doesn't need a guilty dad so that was
01:45:10
a stimulus to go inward and figure some
01:45:12
of this stuff out to figure out where
01:45:14
does this come from but it all plays in
01:45:16
stephen or you know as we talk you can
01:45:18
see the theme
01:45:20
in the start of our conversation in the
01:45:21
middle now talking about my son
01:45:24
i have expected perfection of myself in
01:45:27
everything i've ever
01:45:28
done right that's been my identity with
01:45:32
my son i felt as though i let him down
01:45:35
now i've let go of pretty much all of
01:45:37
that
01:45:38
it
01:45:39
i say pretty much because it still pops
01:45:41
in so in my role as a father i think i
01:45:43
do a good job they're kind considerate
01:45:45
kids they're happy
01:45:48
but could i do a better job probably i'm
01:45:50
not going to beat myself up on that
01:45:52
anymore
01:45:54
but i want to work on that so
01:45:56
now i look back and i've now told myself
01:45:59
a different story
01:46:01
right this is true you can tell me if
01:46:03
you think it's true
01:46:05
i now think that was meant to happen
01:46:07
that happened so that daddy could learn
01:46:11
all of the
01:46:13
um tools that i've learned to help him
01:46:15
and now help
01:46:17
thousands of people
01:46:19
hundreds of thousands you know as i say
01:46:21
arguing millions
01:46:23
i wouldn't have had those learnings had
01:46:25
it not happen now when i started
01:46:26
thinking like that i would think yeah
01:46:28
but
01:46:29
why did he have to go through that
01:46:32
in order for me to learn this but again
01:46:33
that's me putting a story what do you
01:46:35
mean go through it maybe he doesn't know
01:46:37
he's been through anything maybe that's
01:46:39
his life journey maybe he's going to
01:46:41
learn loads from that experience
01:46:44
do you know what i mean and that's the
01:46:46
perspective choice i guess you
01:46:48
you talked about earlier it's almost
01:46:49
like making an incident a negative
01:46:50
incident the hero of your own life as
01:46:52
opposed to be
01:46:54
you know
01:46:55
shrouding it with guilt and blame and
01:46:57
resentment so yeah it's choosing a
01:46:59
happiness story about it because
01:47:01
ultimately i can't change the reality of
01:47:03
what happened
01:47:04
whether i wanted it to or not of course
01:47:06
at that moment would i want it to happen
01:47:08
no of course not but now
01:47:10
given that it can't be changed given
01:47:12
that it is has happened and is now in
01:47:14
the past
01:47:15
how now to show up
01:47:18
in my everyday life and be happy be
01:47:21
content help people serve people serve
01:47:24
my children as a good father well it's
01:47:26
to let go of that and move on choose a
01:47:29
happiness story we can all do it it's
01:47:31
hard sometimes but it doesn't mean it's
01:47:33
not possible
01:47:35
and what is your mission now as you look
01:47:37
ahead to the future you've achieved so
01:47:38
much
01:47:39
across such a diverse
01:47:41
a range of pursuits you know everything
01:47:44
from your tv to podcast to books and
01:47:46
everything in between your work as a gp
01:47:48
your medical practice everything what is
01:47:50
your mission now as you look ahead to
01:47:52
your future
01:47:54
the mission that i have stated publicly
01:47:57
for the last few years has been over the
01:47:59
course of my career
01:48:01
i want to help 100 million people
01:48:05
live better lives
01:48:07
i want to help them with their health
01:48:08
and their happiness
01:48:12
but you know
01:48:13
over the last few months that's not been
01:48:14
sitting that well with me anymore
01:48:17
i mean i'm really good friends with my
01:48:19
videographer gareth who films every
01:48:21
podcast that i do
01:48:24
and we've been chatting a lot about it
01:48:26
and
01:48:28
you know when i first stated that
01:48:29
publicly for the first time i was so
01:48:31
scared well people think he's got a big
01:48:33
ego you know i did i didn't i didn't
01:48:35
want partly didn't want to share that i
01:48:38
thought
01:48:39
what will people think of me
01:48:41
right why that's been so good for me
01:48:44
is it's helped me
01:48:47
make decisions as you know
01:48:50
the amount of incoming into our inboxes
01:48:53
and what we could be doing is
01:48:56
vast
01:48:57
so the hundred millifigure allows me to
01:48:59
think
01:49:00
okay is this going to get me closer to
01:49:02
100 million or not so i think it's
01:49:03
served a really good role
01:49:06
i think missions can do at particular
01:49:08
moments in life but we don't need to be
01:49:10
stuck to them forever
01:49:12
so
01:49:13
you know that figure you know i thought
01:49:15
well five million people each week are
01:49:17
watching doctor in the house in bbc one
01:49:19
okay
01:49:20
that means
01:49:22
if only one percent of people watch that
01:49:25
and make a change in their life that's a
01:49:28
lot of people right and now that's gone
01:49:30
to 70 countries around the world i'm
01:49:32
like okay
01:49:33
so this is how you can use the media
01:49:37
to amplify your message and help people
01:49:40
with hopefully a strong simple message
01:49:42
all over the world
01:49:44
right now i think
01:49:46
and and that's helped me do things like
01:49:47
you know i'll be honest like when i
01:49:49
started my podcast
01:49:50
it was just a bit of fun right i didn't
01:49:53
have a name i didn't have a logo um i
01:49:56
just thought okay this would be cool i
01:49:58
didn't know what the name was when i was
01:50:00
interviewing people
01:50:01
like the first six interviews
01:50:04
but it's evolved into
01:50:06
you know like your show i guess like a
01:50:08
juggernaut show which has a huge
01:50:09
following that impacts the lives of
01:50:12
hundreds of thousands of people each
01:50:13
week
01:50:14
right so
01:50:16
the mission served me but it's not sure
01:50:19
like i don't have a new replacement one
01:50:21
at the moment but i almost think 100
01:50:23
million is limiting well why why a
01:50:25
hundred million right that's not said
01:50:28
with any level of arrogance it's just
01:50:29
like well
01:50:30
every human has
01:50:32
unlimited potential you know this is
01:50:33
what i always try and do i want every
01:50:35
person who reads my books or listens to
01:50:37
my podcast to feel that they can be the
01:50:39
architect of their own health and
01:50:41
happiness
01:50:43
that's not me
01:50:45
diminishing the fact that your
01:50:46
environment that society plays a role
01:50:49
no but even if it does
01:50:51
i still want that person to feel that
01:50:53
they have agency and they've got an
01:50:55
element of control so
01:50:57
if i think about short-term goals
01:51:00
you know i very much want this book to
01:51:02
be a success not so that it can feed my
01:51:05
ego but because i genuinely think the 10
01:51:07
chapters the 10 life lessons are
01:51:09
universal so whoever you are
01:51:12
wherever you are in life i think these
01:51:14
10 chapters these 10 lessons hold true
01:51:17
for everyone if anyone disagrees i'd
01:51:19
welcome a conversation about it but i
01:51:22
really think they do and i think they're
01:51:24
sort of things that people can revisit
01:51:26
they use them then in a few months when
01:51:28
life goes off track they can come back
01:51:29
that's one immediate goal
01:51:33
but i think
01:51:34
going beyond that
01:51:38
the mission's about conversation
01:51:41
right conversation matters
01:51:43
long-form conversation like what you do
01:51:45
on this show like what i do on my show
01:51:47
that matters we need that now more than
01:51:50
ever everything is reduced down to that
01:51:53
that that smallest sound bite that we
01:51:55
can get out there
01:51:57
the problem is that comes at a cost
01:51:59
because
01:52:00
we lose perspective it doesn't make us
01:52:02
compassionate it makes us angry
01:52:05
right people are isolated there's a lack
01:52:07
of community people feel lonely it's
01:52:09
driving them to junk happiness habits
01:52:10
i've got so many young men who've come
01:52:13
to see me who've got pornography
01:52:14
addiction right they can't even look me
01:52:17
in the eye when they tell me they're
01:52:19
that ashamed and embarrassed they've not
01:52:21
told anyone they've not taught their
01:52:22
friends they've not told their parents
01:52:24
there will be someone stephen
01:52:26
listening to this right now
01:52:28
who's got
01:52:29
an issue with pornography and they don't
01:52:32
know where to turn
01:52:33
picking up on that point of loneliness i
01:52:36
think in our society we view loneliness
01:52:38
as a sad thing
01:52:40
in the sense that when someone's lonely
01:52:42
it almost feels like it's a sign of
01:52:44
their inadequacy or they're like lack of
01:52:46
attraction or then they're not a
01:52:47
compelling human being they weren't able
01:52:49
to forge interactions so
01:52:51
although i i've now come to learn that
01:52:53
it's in fact a signal to get back to our
01:52:55
tribes
01:52:56
we have we don't treat it like other
01:52:58
signals we don't treat it like thirst we
01:53:00
don't treat it like hunger we will say
01:53:01
if we're thirsty or we're hungry
01:53:03
but we won't say if we're lonely because
01:53:05
it's stigmatized right um
01:53:07
i came to learn from the research i've
01:53:09
done and i saw similar stats which were
01:53:11
terrifying in your work
01:53:13
is that loneliness isn't a sad thing
01:53:15
it's actually a really dangerous thing
01:53:18
so can you speak to the the negative
01:53:20
consequence of loneliness
01:53:23
the way
01:53:24
society is set up now is making us
01:53:26
lonely
01:53:27
we've moved away from work we've moved
01:53:29
away from our families we don't have the
01:53:30
tribes around us and it's
01:53:33
very very damaging for our health
01:53:36
right some research suggests that the
01:53:38
feeling of being lonely is as harmful as
01:53:40
smoking 15 cigarettes per day one five
01:53:44
right
01:53:44
increases our risk of heart disease
01:53:46
strokes
01:53:47
you're more likely to die earlier
01:53:50
if you feel lonely why is that
01:53:53
right think about it a million years ago
01:53:55
you're with your tribe you're with your
01:53:57
community
01:53:58
right if a wild predator
01:54:01
is
01:54:02
approaching the tribe your stress
01:54:04
response kicks into gear that's a good
01:54:06
thing it's going to help you take action
01:54:08
to keep you safe
01:54:10
brilliant all kinds of things happen in
01:54:12
the body when that happens
01:54:15
loneliness is also a signal think back a
01:54:17
million years ago if you were out by
01:54:19
yourself
01:54:21
you don't have your tribe around you
01:54:23
your body is clever your body knows you
01:54:25
are
01:54:26
at risk you are vulnerable to attack so
01:54:29
it activates your stress response your
01:54:31
blood sugar goes up your blood pressure
01:54:32
goes up your blood becomes more prone to
01:54:34
clotting right you're amygdala your
01:54:37
emotional brain goes on to high alert so
01:54:39
you're hyper vigilant you become anxious
01:54:42
right all these things happen when you
01:54:44
feel lonely right you have physical
01:54:47
changes in your body
01:54:49
now loneliness is hard
01:54:50
if people are suffering i understand
01:54:53
right i really understand
01:54:55
but small things make a difference
01:54:58
you can start off by saying hi
01:55:01
to the barista at the coffee shop
01:55:03
right but maybe you've got a friend you
01:55:04
haven't spoken to in a while
01:55:06
maybe you've got busy with your life
01:55:07
they've got busy with their life give
01:55:08
them a call
01:55:10
right that's all it takes it's a ripple
01:55:12
effect start small and i promise you
01:55:15
will start to feel the difference
01:55:16
dr ronan i i have to i couldn't thank
01:55:19
you enough for the wisdom and for the
01:55:21
time that you've given me today it's
01:55:22
really really really special i sit here
01:55:24
sometimes with guests and i think
01:55:26
um you know i think you know they've
01:55:27
written a book and it's very nice and
01:55:28
everything but
01:55:30
having
01:55:31
experienced the way that you've um done
01:55:34
the self-work and having
01:55:36
had a taste of the way that you have
01:55:40
empathy
01:55:41
in your approach to causing behavioral
01:55:43
and lifestyle change to people i i feel
01:55:46
like this book is just critically
01:55:48
important you know
01:55:50
it's funny because i was thinking i'm
01:55:51
going to end this podcast by giving the
01:55:52
book a compliment but i don't think i
01:55:54
have to i think if people see who you
01:55:56
are today the wisdom the empathy the
01:55:59
experience the vulnerability
01:56:01
i think any person that is sound of mind
01:56:04
and that wants to improve their life
01:56:05
will know
01:56:06
that this book is critically important
01:56:07
to them that it is inclusive that is
01:56:09
that is relatable and that it will hold
01:56:12
their hand through change in a in a way
01:56:14
which is empathetic and that's that
01:56:16
those are my favorite books and i was
01:56:18
sat here and i'm going to be completely
01:56:19
honest because i don't [ __ ] people i
01:56:20
just don't say things i don't believe
01:56:21
them i was sat here thinking [ __ ] steve
01:56:24
because i've only been i've only i was
01:56:25
only given a small taste of the book by
01:56:27
your publisher
01:56:28
i
01:56:29
need to read this book and if that's the
01:56:31
impact you've had on me
01:56:33
i know it's going to be the impact
01:56:34
you've had on my my listeners so thank
01:56:37
you because you know that really really
01:56:38
is you know
01:56:39
understanding where we are in the world
01:56:40
in culture we need more books like this
01:56:44
we have a tradition on this podcast
01:56:46
which is the last guest writes a
01:56:47
question for the next guest and i don't
01:56:48
actually get to read on my mother's life
01:56:50
i don't read it until i open the book so
01:56:52
i've just opened the book and seen what
01:56:53
our last guest has written so my last
01:56:56
guest
01:56:56
wrote the question and i've not read it
01:56:58
yet so here we go
01:56:59
but he's got great handwriting so
01:57:01
what is something that people value
01:57:04
that you no longer value
01:57:09
an attachment to truth
01:57:13
i no longer
01:57:16
value
01:57:18
being right
01:57:20
i no longer value having to know the
01:57:23
right answer i no longer value
01:57:25
thinking
01:57:26
this is the truth and i'm gonna hold on
01:57:29
to this at all costs
01:57:32
and i think many people do
01:57:34
i now value curiosity and being the
01:57:37
learner
01:57:38
i just want to learn i want to explore
01:57:41
i'm happy for pre-existing assumptions
01:57:44
i've had in my life to be shown to be
01:57:46
incorrect
01:57:47
i'm not attached to being right i'm not
01:57:49
attached to being wrong
01:57:51
what i am attached to
01:57:53
is learning
01:57:54
and that's working for me at the moment
01:57:58
dr rongan thank you you are simply
01:58:00
amazing and you are really the gift that
01:58:01
keeps on giving so i can't wait to read
01:58:03
the book in its entirety
01:58:05
happy mind happy life 10 simple ways to
01:58:07
feel great every day thanks for having
01:58:10
me thanks i can't wait wait to read the
01:58:13
book in its entirety
01:58:15
happy mind happy life 10 simple ways to
01:58:17
feel great every day thanks for having
01:58:20
me
01:58:22
[Music]
01:58:29
[Music]
01:58:35
[Music]
01:58:44
you
