00:00:01
I'm Adam Grant I'm here with Ariana Huffington author of the number one New
00:00:05
York Times bestselling book Thrive Ariana welcome thank you Adam great to be with you talk to me about how you
00:00:12
came to this idea you've obviously been running the Huffington Post for quite a
00:00:16
while what what made you think about redefining success well it was actually a rude awakening a personal wakeup call
00:00:24
S years ago when I collapsed from exhaustion burnout sleep deprivation and broke my cheekbone on the way down got
00:00:33
four stitches on my right eye and it started me on this journey of asking myself the big questions that we stop
00:00:41
asking ourselves when we leave College like what is a good life what is success and I realized especially when I
00:00:50
looked around at um colleagues and friends and the World At Large that we had Shrunk the definition of success
00:01:00
down to two metrics money and power and that we left out what I now call the third metric which includes our
00:01:09
well-being our wisdom our capacity to wander and bring joy into our lives and our capacity to give and without these
00:01:19
four pillars life is really reduced to our to-do list and we continue to neglect uh our own self and our own
00:01:31
health and well-being how is writing the book and thinking more about well-being
00:01:36
wisdom Wonder giving affected your own life you know it's been it's been really an Incredible Gift
00:01:46
because I feel that you know how they say you teach what you need to learn I feel that because I've kind of
00:01:55
delved into these ideas into the science behind the importance of sleep and slowing down and uh how these things are
00:02:03
connected with our creativity and productivity because I've delved into all the
00:02:08
details I have kind of begun to incorporate them in my life much more than I would have done otherwise and as
00:02:16
I'm on book two and I keep speaking about them I feel that I'm also reminding myself every day so I I'm very
00:02:23
blessed that that this book which I was not intending to write you know Adam you and
00:02:29
I share a fabulous literary agent Richard Pine and I had told Richard that I will never write another book this is
00:02:37
my 14th book it's the surprise baby I never thought I was going to have but it
00:02:41
has been very different and it has been very strengthening of my own commitment to live my life differently what are the
00:02:50
biggest changes that you've made to your daily habits and practices so um the biggest first change that I made
00:02:59
was sleep and at the end of each section of the book I have three little baby steps that
00:03:05
I recommend and they mirror very much the baby steps that I took the first one was I began taking getting 30 minutes
00:03:15
more sleep a night than I was getting before until gradually I got from four to 5 hours which is what I was getting
00:03:22
before I collapsed to 7 to8 hours which is what I'm getting now and the result
00:03:27
has been transformational and all the science now um demonstrates unequivocally that uh when we actually
00:03:35
get enough sleep everything is better um our health is better our um mental capacity and Clarity are better um our
00:03:47
joy and at life and our ability to live life without reacting at every bad thing
00:03:54
that happens and in everybody's life there are things that happen every day that we wish had not happened so how we
00:04:00
react to them very much determines the quality of our life and then I introd I mean I I used to meditate on and off H
00:04:11
ever since I was 13 years old but I actually introduced a daily practice which started by being five minutes and
00:04:19
is now at least half an hour H but I got to half an hour again gradually by by experiencing the rewards of those 5
00:04:29
minutes and in the book I've included you know meditation steps that people can take as
00:04:35
well as believe it or not apps that they can use to help them get started and then some form of movement
00:04:43
and yoga exercise even when I'm traveling you know in my hotel room just 10 minutes the importance of that the
00:04:51
importance of not getting stuck especially those of us who have jobs that you could spend your whole life
00:04:58
doing from your desk and um then giving in small daily ways has been really important leaving aside you know
00:05:14
what we give to charity or volunteering time just one of the first steps I recommend
00:05:19
and I practice myself is to make personal connections with people that otherwise we might take for granted you
00:05:26
know the checkout clerk the barista in the coffee shop the cleaning crew and the difference it makes when we actually
00:05:35
connect with people on an individual level and how present it makes us be so these are obviously individual changes
00:05:44
but you've also been rethinking a little bit of how you run the Huffington Post
00:05:48
in light of this perspective I know you've you've introduced two nap pods
00:05:52
are there other changes that you've been especially passionate about yes we we
00:05:56
introduced to nap rooms meditation classes yoga classes breathing classes healthy free snacks but one of the
00:06:03
recent changes we made that has been very significant has been making it clear that no employee is expected to be
00:06:13
on work email after hours so that when they are off they're off I mean we're at
00:06:19
24/7 media operations so they're always people on but not the same people and
00:06:25
people just tell us every day what a difference it's made how they can really
00:06:31
undistracted be with themselves their families their loved ones and and return to work recharged because you know we
00:06:39
don't pay people for their stamina we pay them for their judgment and increasingly H for their ideas their
00:06:47
creativity this is what's the lightning in the bottle you so you mentioned judgment
00:06:53
which is a big part of your pillar of wisdom what are some of the steps that you're recommending to become wiser
00:07:00
so first of all starting with the the the recognition that we all have wisdom in us that is not something that we have
00:07:09
to get from books or cram into us it's already there H every religion and every philosopher you know
00:07:19
talks about that in different language you know it's basically the kingdom of
00:07:22
God is within um Archimedes said give me a place to stand and I can move the world so when we tap into that Center of
00:07:31
wisdom strength peace that's where our capacity for wise decisions H for tapping into our
00:07:42
intuition comes from and it's like a muscle the more we visit that part of ourselves the more we exercise that
00:07:50
muscle and the more likely we are to be able to tap into it again and again with
00:07:57
ease that's one of the one of the things I enjoyed most in reading the book was
00:08:02
uh your personal narrative as really I guess on a journey to try to figure out how you can take these ideas seriously
00:08:09
and Implement them and I know that your family played a very big role in that um
00:08:13
what what effect did your mother have on your thinking about Thrive well my mother had the biggest impact because
00:08:20
she naturally lived a third metric life she naturally sort of thrived um long before I had incorporate these ideas in
00:08:30
my life and she constantly would tell my sister Agapi and me don't miss the moment and
00:08:40
she she was very clear that that's how you really were Fully Alive and that's
00:08:46
why she uphor multitasking long before modern science has confirmed that multitasking does not
00:08:54
really exist it's really task switching and it's the most stressful thing we can
00:08:59
can do and uh she also she would have loved you Adam because she was a natural giver and um I remember once when a lady
00:09:12
admired a little necklace she was wearing and my mother said here take it and the lady surprised said what can I
00:09:18
give you in return and my mother said it's not a trade darling it's an offering and uh she
00:09:25
also could not have an impersonal relationship with anyone um she really connected with people and
00:09:34
um if the FedEx man would come to deliver a Puget my mother would say oh come sit down I just baked something and
00:09:41
so she lived in that sense of of being fully connected with people in a deeper way than than we are which most of the
00:09:50
time is pretty shallow and often our connection to human beings takes second place to our connection to
00:09:58
our smartphone and this is something that you've not just been hearing is influential on the
00:10:03
family side but also professionally CEOs are are making Lifestyle Changes what are some of the biggest surprises that
00:10:09
you've come across well yes 2013 was an amazing year because we had CEOs one
00:10:15
after another coming out not as being gay but as being meditators Ray Dalo the SE of
00:10:21
Bridgewater Mark Ben of the CEO of Salesforce Mark bertolini the CEO of Etna etc etc so
00:10:30
suddenly um what was regarded as kind of new AG flaky Californian has gone mainstream and people see the
00:10:39
value of um quiet time reflection connecting with ourselves the value that they derive when it comes to their
00:10:49
professional success and their accomplishments so these things are not separate we used to think that there was
00:10:54
a tradeoff that you had to sacrifice um your professional success in order to achieve inner peace and now
00:11:03
we see no not at all and the science is so conclusive I mean I love this time we're living in because it's the first
00:11:11
time that modern science has so validated ancient wisdom in every respect including giving you know modern
00:11:19
science has really validated everything that um philosophers and spiritual teachers have said about how H giving is
00:11:27
a shortcut to happiness well now we have the data to prove it that raises a question that that I
00:11:33
wondered about when I read the book which is we have these money and power metrics which are the old way of
00:11:38
thinking about success you bring in well-being wisdom wonder and giving where does accomplishment fit as just an
00:11:45
intrinsic sense of progress or achievement in in your view of of success well I think actually that the
00:11:51
first two metrics when defined in a in a profound way are about accomplishment and um it can be accomplishment that
00:12:04
also brings a lot of money in or influence or it can be accomplishment that gives a lot of inner
00:12:11
satisfaction um so this the book is not against money and influence and whatever power really
00:12:20
means in the modern world um it's against shrinking ourselves to defining our lives and our
00:12:28
purpose in terms of these two metrics it's a question of what is in the foreground
00:12:34
and what is in the background of our lives and often when people step off a career
00:12:40
ladder because they were going to burn out or they had already burnt out they don't give up
00:12:47
accomplishment um I I I quote actually a w on graduate who burnt out after she had her first B
00:12:58
baby on her corporate job and left but went on to found a kindergarten co-found a synagogue H create a mom site so in
00:13:10
the same way if you go to etsy.com there are a lot of people who've taken what they love their crafts
00:13:16
their hobbies and turn them into a living so we need to sort of think accomplishment in a in a wider sense
00:13:24
than just beginning our career here and climbing up the ladder until until we get to the corner office or SVP position
00:13:33
or whatever it is that we determine is the ultimate well one note to close on I think at the very top of that ladder one
00:13:41
of my favorite parts of the book was when you talk about eulogies and what's
00:13:45
not in them and lighten us um yes because I I write a lot about death in the book not in a morbid way but because
00:13:54
it's hard to really um prioritize what um you spend time on and what your life is about if you forget that we die
00:14:06
and I quote The Onion headline that death rate Hold Steady at 100% so um I write how um I I was at a
00:14:17
friend's Memorial and listening to the eulogy while writing the book it dawn on
00:14:23
me that our eulogist have really nothing to do with our LinkedIn profiles and that uh in
00:14:31
fact our eulogies are about all the other things you never hear in a eulogy you know George was amazing he increased
00:14:40
market share by oneir or he made SVP at 35 it's all about how how we made people
00:14:48
feel um small kindnesses lifelong passions what made us laugh it's all the things that when we get really really
00:14:58
busy with our goals and we squeeze out of life you know what they call the exhaustion
00:15:05
funnel when little by little all the things that nurture us that feed our soul are
00:15:12
eliminated because we are so driven to achieve whatever that goal is and of course as soon as we reach
00:15:20
it it will not be significant until we reach the next goal and so it becomes this endless postponement of being fully
00:15:29
present and fully Alive thank you thank you so much [Music]