How To Overcome Insecurity And Love Yourself [MASTERCLASS] EP 1367

Today’s Masterclass episode is all about how you can start overcoming your insecurities and living a more peaceful and fulfilled life. Three experts share their knowledge and perspectives on what it means to be successful and the keys to happiness. In this episode,Lori Gottlieb, psychotherapist and author, explains the significance of revising the stories we’ve told ourselves about the past. Priyanka Chopra Jonas, multi-award-winning actor, producer, shares her mindset around confidence and her secret of gaining more. Bobby Hall, a.k.a. Logic, a Grammy-nominated, platinum-selling recording artist and author, elaborates on the difference between success and happiness and how both paths are up to you. For more, go to lewishowes.com/1367Full Episodes:Lori Gottlieb: https://link.chtbl.com/1013-podPriyanka Chopra Jonas: https://link.chtbl.com/1067-podLogic: https://link.chtbl.com/1163-pod Get more from Lewis! Get my New York Times Bestselling book, Make Money Easy! Get The Greatness Mindset audiobook on SpotifyText Lewis AIYouTubeInstagramWebsiteTiktokFacebookX

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  Recognizing that confidence is not something we are born with. It's a skill in any profession or any aspect of life. Confidence is.

• 0:10Lewis Howes?

  Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin.

• 0:34Lewis Howes?

  Welcome to this special masterclass. We've brought some of the top experts in the world to help you unlock the power of your life through this specific theme today. It's going to be powerful, so let's go ahead and dive in.

• 0:52Lewis Howes?

  You talk about rewriting your story from the past, and I believe that we, we hold on to our stories and we probably continue to write them in a more powerful way that keeps us trapped or traumatized. Is that fair to say that something happens in our past? We hold on to the story daily or whenever we're triggered and it's like amplifies the story in our minds.

• 1:13Lori Gottlieb?

  Well, it does. And, and the problem is that often whatever that version of the story is, we carry with us and we never revise it. And so you create a story when you're younger, for example, about something that happened in your life. And then as an adult, you've never looked at that story through the adult lens. You're still looking at it through the childhood lens. And so that's why I say that when people come in that we're all unreliable narrators.

• 1:38Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 1:38Lori Gottlieb?

  That we all tell a story through, you know, this lens. And, and the thing is, these are usually faulty narratives. So there's a, there's a broader version of the story that people haven't looked at. And so I feel like in a lot of ways, what I do as a therapist is I act as an editor and have of course, a writing background. And so I help people to revise their stories because the reason they can't move forward in the story, the reason they can't get to the next chapter is because of something is wrong with the story. They are stuck. And so it's almost like I'm helping them with writer's block.

• 2:12Lewis Howes?

  I mean, for me, life is an interpretation.

• 2:14Lori Gottlieb?

  Yes.

• 2:15Lewis Howes?

  Right? There's an instance that happens and we can interpret it as good or bad, or we can interpret as this is a neutral event and I'm going to make the most of this. Is that fair to say?

• 2:25Lori Gottlieb?

  Yeah, absolutely. And also, how we attribute other people's parts of the story, right? So who are the villains and the heroes in this story? You know, I talk in the book about the difference between idiot compassion and wise compassion. And idiot compassion is what our friends do. They back up our story, no matter what. We say, "This happened. This happened with my boss. This happened with my partner. This happened with my parent, right? This happened with my best friend." And we say, "Yeah, that was terrible."

• 2:51Lewis Howes?

  Screw them.

• 2:52Lori Gottlieb?

  Screw them. They're a jerk. You know, that's awful. You're right, they're wrong. Don't let anyone treat you that way." That's what we do. And if you've listened to your friends' stories, you start to realize over time that even though the situation and the names might be different, the kind of story they're telling is similar. It's kind of like if a fight breaks out in every bar you're going to, maybe it's you.

• 3:11Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, exactly.

• 3:12Lori Gottlieb?

  But we don't say that. That's idiot compassion.

• 3:14Lewis Howes?

  Idiot compassion is where we, as friends, say, "Yeah, you're the best person in the world. This person's horrible."

• 3:20Lori Gottlieb?

  Yep.

• 3:21Lewis Howes?

  Leave them, or let them go.

• 3:23Lori Gottlieb?

  Yes.

• 3:23Lewis Howes?

  Forget about them. Like, they're so bad at what they did. There's always two sides to every story.

• 3:28Lori Gottlieb?

  Well, right. And so the value of therapy is that we offer wise compassion. We hold up a mirror to you and help you to see yourself in a way that maybe you haven't been willing or able to do. And that's where the other version of the story comes in.

• 3:42Lewis Howes?

  So how do we have wise compassion for our friends? When they're like, "She cheated on me. He left me. They had an affair," whatever.

• 3:51Lori Gottlieb?

  Yeah.

• 3:51Lewis Howes?

  How do we change our story? And also show compassion that we're there for our friends? Not making, when they're in a vulnerable place, not making the other person right or wrong.

• 4:01Lori Gottlieb?

  Yeah.

• 4:02Lewis Howes?

  But being there for them, and also kind of giving them some tough love, I guess?

• 4:06Lori Gottlieb?

  I wouldn't call it tough love. I would just call it...

• 4:08Lewis Howes?

  Reality?

• 4:09Lori Gottlieb?

  Love.

• 4:10Lewis Howes?

  Love.

• 4:10Lori Gottlieb?

  It's love. It's much more loving to be truthful in a compassionate way. So I sometimes call them compassionate truth bombs.

• 4:19Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 4:19Lori Gottlieb?

  Because we need to hear them. But how do we do it? It has to do with timing and dosage. So the timing is when they're really raw, when something just happened. You know, now's not the time to say, "You know, this has happened with your last three boyfriends."

• 4:31Lewis Howes?

  Right. Maybe you're the problem here.

• 4:34Lori Gottlieb?

  Have you noticed that going through people's phones is not working well for you? You know, we are not going to say that maybe in that moment. So that's on timing. And then the dosage is how much are you going to say in a particular moment and in a particular conversation? It doesn't all have to happen in one conversation. So I think that that has to do with being a good listener. And a lot of us don't know how to listen. And I think it's really helpful. I see a lot of couples in my practice too. And if you can say to the person when they come to you with something, "How can I be helpful in this conversation right now? I know you're really hurting. Do you want to just vent? Do you want a hug? Do you want me to help problem solve with you? Do you want my honest opinion? Or do you want me to hold off and we can have that conversation another time?"

• 5:16Lori Gottlieb?

  Let them tell you what they want so you can give them something that is helpful to them in that moment. And then in another conversation, you might be able to offer them something more.

• 5:25Lewis Howes?

  When they're not completely raw or broken.

• 5:27Lori Gottlieb?

  Yes.

• 5:28Lewis Howes?

  And hurt.

• 5:28Lori Gottlieb?

  Yes.

• 5:29Lewis Howes?

  So what is that specific question? When anyone's come into you with a challenge or a complaint or hurt, what's the question you should ask them?

• 5:37Lori Gottlieb?

  "How can I be helpful to you right now? I know you're really hurting."

• 5:41Lewis Howes?

  What does that do for the person who's hurting when they hear that?

• 5:44Lori Gottlieb?

  It helps them to reflect on, "Oh, wait, what do I need?" Right? Am I just going to download all of this stuff? And then I'm not going to feel any different at the end? Or is there something else that I want right now? And maybe downloading it will make them feel different. Just make them feel seen and understood and heard, which is important. Or maybe they want something else, but let them tell you. And I think the other thing is these three words that are really helpful when they're talking to you are "tell me more." So instead of saying, you know, when they say like, "Oh, here's what's going on." And we say, "Oh, well," we try to cheer them up. Like, you know, "Here's what you can do. We try to fix it. We try to cheer them up. We try to make it seem like it's not so bad, whatever we do." Instead, just say, "Tell me more." We do this with our kids.

• 6:29Lori Gottlieb?

  I can say as a parent, we do this all the time, right? So your kid comes to you and says, "You know, I'm really sad about this. Or I'm really worried about this." And we say, "Oh, don't worry. No, it's not a problem." And we say, "Oh, don't be sad, right? Go have ice cream." Right, exactly. But the thing is that then you get the message as a kid that like, oh wait, I'm not supposed to feel this. And really what it is, is we get uncomfortable as parents with our kids' feelings.

• 6:56Lewis Howes?

  Why is that?

• 6:57Lori Gottlieb?

  Because we can't, we are uncomfortable with feelings. We grew up in a way where feelings were messy, feelings were uncomfortable, feelings were something that, you know, was, they were gonna be trouble.

• 7:09Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 7:09Lori Gottlieb?

  As opposed to feelings-

• 7:10Lewis Howes?

  Stop crying, stop crying as a kid, yeah.

• 7:12Lori Gottlieb?

  Yes, as opposed to just, you know, let's, feelings are actually a great thing. People say, oh, there are these negative feelings, like sadness, anxiety, anger, whatever, even envy. I always say, feelings are like a compass. They tell us what direction to go in. So with envy, for example, I say, follow your envy. It tells you what you want. If you are feeling envy, that's great because it says, what do I desire? It puts you in touch with your desire. What is it that I desire? And what steps can I take to get something like that in my own life? If you're feeling sad, if you're feeling anxious, what is not working right now that you can look at? If you stuff down that feeling, if you pretend it's not there, it just gets bigger. And here's what happens. It doesn't go away.

• 7:52Lori Gottlieb?

  It comes out in too much food, alcohol, drugs, insomnia, a short-temperedness, inability to function, distractibility, that mindless scrolling we all do through the internet. A colleague of mine said that the internet was like the most effective short-term, non-prescription painkiller out there.

• 8:15Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 8:15Lori Gottlieb?

  Right? And so what happens is your feelings are still there, but you're not dealing with them.

• 8:19Lewis Howes?

  What happens when we never deal with our emotions or feelings?

• 8:23Lori Gottlieb?

  Well, you, first of all, get sick.

• 8:26Lewis Howes?

  Physically sick, emotionally sick, mentally-

• 8:28Lori Gottlieb?

  Everything, everything, right? So we have, just like we have a physical immune system, we have a psychological immune system. And we have to take care of our psychological immune system. So it's just like, you know, what do you do to keep healthy with your body? Like, you're gonna eat right, you're gonna exercise, you know, you're gonna do all the things that you wanna do to take care of yourself. You're gonna get enough sleep. Those things also help your psychological immune system. They're not totally separate. The mind-body connection is profound. But at the same time, you know, are you going to be around people who don't nourish you? That's going to hurt your psychological immune system. That's going to make you sick. Are you going to stuff down your feelings? That's going to make you sick. And so, how do we take care of ourselves?

• 9:11Lori Gottlieb?

  And part of it is, instead of trying to numb out your feelings, because numbness isn't the absence of feelings. Numbness is a state of being overwhelmed by too many feelings.

• 9:21Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 9:21Lori Gottlieb?

  And then, not only do you not experience the feelings that you don't want to experience, but you don't experience the other feelings. You mute one feeling, you mute the others. You mute the pain, you mute the joy. So you're living in this state where you don't actually get to feel the range of feelings that make us human.

• 9:39Lewis Howes?

  What is that state called?

• 9:40Lori Gottlieb?

  I would say, I was going to say dead. I mean, I feel like you can be alive, but not living. And that's what happens to people, is that they're alive, they're going through the motions, they wake up every day, but they're not really living their lives.

• 9:54Lewis Howes?

  What's an assessment we could take for ourselves, if someone's listening or watching, to ask themselves how alive or how dead they are? And if the people in their life closest are actually good for them? Or are hurting their psychological states?

• 10:09Lori Gottlieb?

  Right.

• 10:10Lewis Howes?

  Is there a questionnaire we could take, like, just off the cuff? Is there an assessment? Is there a few things we could ask ourselves?

• 10:16Lori Gottlieb?

  Yeah, I mean, I think that it has to do with a sense of vitality, right? Which of course, like, vitality, the word, like, life is right in there. When you wake up in the morning, are you excited about what you're doing? Is there meaning in what you're doing? Do you feel connected to how you're spending your days? Because at the end of your life, are you going to look back and say, "What did I do that was meaningful?" You know, and maybe you should talk to someone. In my book, there's a woman that I treat. She's this young woman who goes on her honeymoon. She's newly married, she comes back, and she has cancer. And she says to me at one point, she says, "Why do we need a terminal diagnosis?"

• 10:53Lewis Howes?

  Type of wake-up call.

• 10:54Lori Gottlieb?

  Why do we need a terminal diagnosis to live our lives with intention? Why do we need, why do we need that to really pay attention? And I think that if we can keep the awareness of death on, sitting on one shoulder, and I don't mean in a morbid way or in a creepy way, it's not depressing. It's actually, again, going back to vitality, it helps us feel alive because life has 100% mortality rate, and that's not for other people. We like to believe that, right? And so, the thing is that if we know that we have a limited time here, I think we would pay more attention to what we're actually doing every day.

• 11:28Lewis Howes?

  Why is it so hard for people to pay attention?

• 11:31Lori Gottlieb?

  Fear.

• 11:32Lewis Howes?

  And but they're like, they feel like they're stuck sometimes for years.

• 11:35Lori Gottlieb?

  Yes.

• 11:35Lewis Howes?

  It's like, I stay stuck in a relationship that's, I know it's not right for me for years. I stay in a depressed state for years. I, you know, I stay in a job that I hate for years. It's all based on fear.

• 11:47Lori Gottlieb?

  Well, I think it is fear. You know, I think it's fear of uncertainty. This is gonna sound strange, but change is really hard because we cling to something that's familiar to us. So even though we may know, oh, this would help me, this would be a good change for me, we don't do it because it's unfamiliar. And so, if you grew up with a lot of chaos, if you grew up feeling sad all the time or anxious all the time, that feels like home to you, even if it's unpleasant or even miserable.

• 12:16Lewis Howes?

  She'll keep finding chaotic environments to stand.

• 12:20Lori Gottlieb?

  Right, recreating it. Yeah, and so, and so, you know, it was funny, because my own therapist gave me this great analogy. He said to me, he said, "You remind me of this cartoon, and it's of a prisoner shaking the bars, desperately trying to get out, but on the right and the left, it's open, right? No bars." So basically, the prisoner is not in jail. And that's what so many of us are like. We feel like we're trapped.

• 12:42Lewis Howes?

  We're not in jail.

• 12:43Lori Gottlieb?

  We're not in jail. We can change. We can just walk around the bars. But why don't we? Because with freedom, the freedom to walk around the bars, comes responsibility. And if we're responsible for our own lives, that scares us. We feel like, oh, I don't know if I can do that. I don't know if I'm competent enough to do that. Or now, I'm to blame if things don't go right. I can't blame it on everything else.

• 13:04Lewis Howes?

  Is this one of the reasons why inmates, after a long time being in prison, who get out, go back into prison because they feel like they need to be back in that environment? Or are there other reasons?

• 13:13Lori Gottlieb?

  I think there are other reasons. I think we don't give people the support when they come out. You know, they, the mental health issues that they needed to be treated for were whenever, you know, they never got that support. Then they come out, and they're back in the same situation where they don't have that community support.

• 13:31Lewis Howes?

  Why is it so hard for us to take responsibility for our own happiness?

• 13:35Lori Gottlieb?

  I think that if you grew up in a household where you were seen and heard and understood, those are the people who do take responsibility for their own happiness. I think for people who felt like they were ripped off in their childhoods, there's a part of them that's still in a fight. There's a part of them that still wants that redo. And so it's kind of like, they're not aware of this, but what they're saying is basically, "I will not change mom and dad until you give me the things that I did not get in childhood."

• 14:05Lewis Howes?

  So they'll go find a partner that emulates their environment from mom and dad and try to change them so they...

• 14:12Lori Gottlieb?

  Well, right, this is the irony of relationship, right? For those people who have not sort of worked through it. This is so common. And I think all of us have this piece in us, right? Because nobody had a perfect childhood. So what happens is people say, "Okay, when I'm an adult, I'm gonna pick a partner who really makes me feel nourished, who really gives me all those things that I did not get growing up." But what they don't realize is unconsciously, they have this radar for the people who are... who look very different from their parents on the surface. But then, once they get into that relationship, it's kind of like, "Uh-oh, this feels familiar." Right? And so what they did was their unconscious said, when they were picking their partner, "Hey, you look familiar, come closer." Even though, unconsciously, they thought,

• 14:57Lori Gottlieb?

  "Oh, you're totally different from my parents. I'm gonna... this is gonna work out great." But no, they have radar for that. If they haven't worked out the stuff that's sort of their unfinished business. There's this saying, "We marry our unfinished business." We actually do marry our unfinished business. So that is why it is so important as an adult to take responsibility and say, "You know what? I am going to have to grieve this loss of what I didn't get, and I'm going to have to work through this and assess where I am as an adult so that I pick people and surround myself with people who are healthy for me."

• 15:28Lewis Howes?

  What if you've chosen someone that you love deeply, but it's unconsciously your unfinished business? Is that the wrong person for you? Once you realize, "Oh, they're never gonna change." Or is that a point for us to reflect back and say, "Actually, I need to heal the past, accept this person for who they are, and be willing to flow within this relationship?"

• 15:50Lori Gottlieb?

  Well, what happens is so you married your unfinished business, but so did they. And so if you can both recognize that, if you realize, hey, wait, we have a lot of conflict in our relationship, or we're really avoidant in our relationship, or we don't feel connected in the way we want to feel connected, that's a great opportunity for both of you to work out your unfinished business.

• 16:09Lewis Howes?

  To heal together.

• 16:09Lori Gottlieb?

  To heal together, right.

• 16:11Lewis Howes?

  And so that relationship could thrive.

• 16:14Lori Gottlieb?

  If you both are willing to look in the mirror at yourselves and do the work, yes, that could be a really beautiful relationship, and it can be very healing for both of you, in fact.

• 16:25Lewis Howes?

  It could potentially be the strongest bond ever if you both were able to go through that.

• 16:28Lori Gottlieb?

  Yeah.

• 16:29Lewis Howes?

  But if you're unwilling to go through that, then what? You're gonna be in pain.

• 16:33Lori Gottlieb?

  Right, well, both people have to be willing, I mean, that's the thing. So it's like you may wake up one day and say, oh, wait a minute, I have all this unfinished business, and then your partner says, yeah, it's all you, you're the problem in the relationship. You know, it's kind of like in couples therapy, so often I'll see something like, someone will say like, you never listen to me, and I will say, how well do you listen to them?

• 16:51Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 16:52Lori Gottlieb?

  Right, it's always like...

• 16:53Lewis Howes?

  If you're just yelling at someone all day, are they gonna want to listen to you?

• 16:55Lori Gottlieb?

  Right, right, so, you know, there's this dance that we do in relationship, and what happens is people are doing these dance steps, and people become very, they become very ingrained, it's like, oh, here we go, you can script out people's arguments, you know exactly what they're gonna look like.

• 17:10Lewis Howes?

  It starts with one thing and then it goes back into many different things, you're like, oh, man.

• 17:13Lori Gottlieb?

  And you know exactly how it's gonna go, and who's gonna feel what, and who's gonna accuse the other person of what, and that's the dance. And so if one person changes their dance steps, the other person either is going to fall flat on the dance floor, or they're gonna have to change their steps too if they want to keep dancing.

• 17:28Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 17:28Lori Gottlieb?

  And usually, so we always say, you can't change another person, but you can influence another person.

• 17:34Lewis Howes?

  How?

• 17:34Lori Gottlieb?

  By changing your dance steps. So, for example, we like to say insight is the booby prize of therapy, meaning you can, people will come and they'll be like, oh, now I understand why I keep getting into that argument with my partner, and so then they go home and they come back the next week, and I'll say, well, did you do something different when you got in that argument? Well, no, but I understand why I did.

• 17:51Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 17:52Lori Gottlieb?

  So you have to be both vulnerable and accountable when you come to therapy.

• 17:56Lewis Howes?

  How do we fight better when we are in constant repeat pattern, every month or every week, it becomes an argument around something, for whatever reason, and it's a pattern, and couples start to notice it. How does one person or both people recognize and say, okay, I'm gonna change my dance steps and I'm gonna fight or dance better?

• 18:15Lori Gottlieb?

  Yeah, the first thing is to notice sort of what do you own in this? What is your reaction? So we have a choice every time someone presents us with something. There's a great quote in the book, it's a Viktor Frankl quote, where he says, "Between stimulus and response, there is a space and in that space lies our freedom to choose."

• 18:34Lewis Howes?

  Between stimulus and response, so between an action happening and your response to the action.

• 18:39Lori Gottlieb?

  So your partner says something.

• 18:40Lewis Howes?

  There's a window of opportunity.

• 18:42Lori Gottlieb?

  Yes, there's that space. Usually that space for us will look like a breath. The breath is everything. The breath, really.

• 18:50Lewis Howes?

  If you don't breathe, you're screwed.

• 18:51Lori Gottlieb?

  If you need to take the breath or you will just respond. It's sort of like we have these neural pathways that are wired, right? And someone says something and you react not just to what that person in front of you is saying, but it goes back to something that reminds you of something from a long time ago. People who aren't even in the room are in that moment with you. And so that's that neural pathway. And so what you need to do is you need to take a breath. It's like a big stop sign on that road that's your neural pathway. So hold up the stop sign. You can even picture a stop sign in your mind. Stop, breathe. Now you get to choose. How do I want to respond to this? Do I want to respond in the way I've responded the last gazillion times? Which has not worked out well?

• 19:35Lori Gottlieb?

  Or do I want to try something different? So that's part one. Part two is perspective-taking. A lot of people who are in really highly conflictual relationships have trouble with perspective-taking. They can't imagine that the other person has a valid perspective. Now, you might not agree with every piece of how they view this, but there's some overlap between how this person views it and how you view it, but you are not willing to see that. And so I have this new podcast called Dear Therapist and on the podcast, so much of what we do is we help people to take the perspective of the other person. There's something that you are not seeing right now.

• 20:22Lewis Howes?

  Oh, I love that sound. The sound of yet another sale on Shopify, the all-in-one commerce platform to start, run, and grow your business. And whether your thing is vintage teas or recipes for ghee, start selling with Shopify and join the platform, simplifying commerce for millions of your favorite businesses worldwide. With Shopify, you'll create an online store with your vibe, discover new customers, and grow the following that keeps them coming back. Shopify has all the sales channels sorted so your business keeps growing from an in-person POS system to an all-in-one e-commerce platform, even across social media platforms like TikTok, Facebook, and Instagram. And thanks to 24/7 support and free libraries full of educational content, Shopify's got you every step of the way. When you're ready to launch your thing into the spotlight, do it with Shopify,

• 21:07Lewis Howes?

  the commerce platform backing millions of businesses down the street and around the globe. Sign up for a free trial at Shopify.com/greatness, all lowercase. Go to Shopify.com/greatness to start selling online today. S-H-O-P-I-F-Y.com/greatness. Why is that so hard for people? To see someone else's perspective?

• 21:28Lori Gottlieb?

  Well, two things. One is because, you know, that unreliable narrator thing that we think that we are right and we don't want to be told. And so what we hear when we say there's another perspective, we're not saying you're wrong. We're saying there's more to the story. So there's a difference between their perspective is valid as well is not saying your version is wrong. We're saying there's more. So people hear it, though, as you are wrong. And the other part of it is that there's a lot of shame, that people are sticking to a certain story because if they allow that other part of the story to come in, the part that they're responsible for will probably come up, and they feel a lot of shame. So when I see individuals in therapy,

• 22:12Lori Gottlieb?

  they come in and they tell me a story, and they leave out the parts that they are embarrassed about, the parts that they feel like that was not my finest moment.

• 22:20Lewis Howes?

  Like what? Give me an example, like, oh, I screamed back?

• 22:23Lori Gottlieb?

  Yeah, yeah. Like, you know, here's what happened, or here's this is the situation, and my partner did this, or my mother did this, or my child did this, or my boss did this, whatever. And they don't tell you these other details, and they sort of trickle out. Later on.

• 22:39Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 22:39Lori Gottlieb?

  And they're very relevant to the story.

• 22:41Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 22:42Lori Gottlieb?

  But that's shame, right? And so, you know, that's why the therapeutic relationship is so important. Because you get to a point where you really trust the therapist and you're able to be really honest about what happened.

• 22:54Lewis Howes?

  How much does shame shape our stories?

• 22:57Lori Gottlieb?

  Oh, so much. I think that, you know, as humans, we want to belong. And what shame is about is, I'm not going to belong. I'm not going to be loved. The greatest human need is, you know, how can we love and be loved? And when you feel like, there's something I did that people will look upon badly. They might not like me if I tell them this. That's just, you know, wired into us.

• 23:23Lewis Howes?

  It's like the ego death to us. It's like the emotional death. If like, if someone knew this about us, they would not love me and I would emotionally die.

• 23:31Lori Gottlieb?

  And I would be alone.

• 23:32Lewis Howes?

  And I'll be alone, yeah.

• 23:33Lori Gottlieb?

  Yeah, and we need other people.

• 23:35Lewis Howes?

  I felt like this way for many years where I opened up about sexual abuse about seven years ago. And for 25 years, no one knew because I was so ashamed. And I felt like if anyone knew, how could they possibly love me?

• 23:48Lori Gottlieb?

  Yeah.

• 23:48Lewis Howes?

  Or accept me? Or how would anyone want to date me? Or my family, how would they not disown me? These were the stories that I was writing. I was a bad editor.

• 23:55Lori Gottlieb?

  Yeah.

• 23:57Lewis Howes?

  How does someone who's done something that they're not proud of in the past, who's had something done to them that they're not proud of? Whatever, they've been in a situation that they feel shame around. How does someone start to process that shame to heal so that it doesn't continue to run their life and keep them imprisoned?

• 24:16Lori Gottlieb?

  Yeah. Well, I think they do what you did, which is you started talking about it. And I think you have to choose your audience.

• 24:24Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 24:25Lori Gottlieb?

  Which is really important, especially as you're just starting out. So you want to make sure that...

• 24:29Lewis Howes?

  Don't tell your abuser.

• 24:32Lewis Howes?

  Who's the toxic relationship? Who's yet?

• 24:34Lori Gottlieb?

  Well, you know, I think you have to really choose someone who's safe. And, and, and if you don't have those people, you know, I think a therapist is a really good place to start. But I, I do think that it's harder for men to talk about any things, whether it's sexual abuse, or even, you know, just sort of like the, anything they feel vulnerable about. And so men will come into my office and they will say to me at some point, you know, I've never told anyone this before.

• 24:58Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 24:59Lori Gottlieb?

  And then-

• 25:00Lewis Howes?

  Do women say that?

• 25:01Lori Gottlieb?

  Yes, so, so here's the thing. Women will say that. They'll say, I've never told anyone this before, except for my mother, my sister, and my best friend, right?

• 25:09Lewis Howes?

  You're the only one who I don't know-

• 25:10Lori Gottlieb?

  You're the only one, right, right.

• 25:11Lewis Howes?

  Who I haven't told this to.

• 25:12Lori Gottlieb?

  I told my book club, I told, you know, whatever it is. They've told like a few people, but they feel like, because women, it's acceptable for women to talk about these things. And so they feel like they haven't told anyone because they still feel like there's some degree of privacy around it.

• 25:26Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 25:27Lori Gottlieb?

  Men literally have told-

• 25:29Lewis Howes?

  Have told, no one has.

• 25:30Lori Gottlieb?

  No one. And they might, even if they have like a great partner and they have close friends, you know, they have a great family, whatever it is, they feel like, I cannot tell anyone because vulnerability for men in our culture is not okay. Even though we say that, so, so this is funny-

• 25:46Lewis Howes?

  Even though women say, I wish she would open up, I wish she'd be emotional, I wish she would cry and be more sensitive, but then when they are, they're like, I, I need to be strong right now.

• 25:54Lori Gottlieb?

  Right, so this is exactly what happens in couples therapy. So I'll have two people sitting on the couch and I have a couple. And say it's a heterosexual couple and the woman says to the man, like, I really want to get to know you, I feel like we would connect so much more if you would just open up to me, I want to know what's going on inside there, right? And he does. And let's say he tears up. Let's say he actually starts crying in a way where like his body is convulsing, right? She looks at me like deer in headlights.

• 26:24Lewis Howes?

  Like, how do I, what do I do?

• 26:25Lori Gottlieb?

  And she's so profoundly uncomfortable.

• 26:27Lewis Howes?

  Gosh.

• 26:28Lori Gottlieb?

  And yet, this is the thing that she was asking for. So, so, so what she'll say is, I don't feel safe when you don't open up to me. And I don't feel safe when you're vulnerable with me.

• 26:40Lewis Howes?

  This is like-

• 26:41Lori Gottlieb?

  Like, there's a, there's like, it's like Goldilocks. It's like, not too much, not, not too little, but right in the middle, that's how vulnerable you can be with me.

• 26:48Lewis Howes?

  I've been saying this for a long time that I feel like this is one of the the main things that hurts all intimate relationships.

• 26:55Lori Gottlieb?

  Yes.

• 26:56Lewis Howes?

  When a person doesn't feel safe to share their emotions to the person that says they love them the most and actually makes them wrong for it or makes them less than or retracts their love when they're vulnerable. So I don't know the solution for this besides saying this all the time and besides saying ladies like if you want a vulnerable man who's emotional, you have to accept him when he's emotional.

• 27:20Lori Gottlieb?

  Well, not just accept, but embrace.

• 27:24Lewis Howes?

  What is the self-talk you do internally? If you don't have a mirror, if you're not alone in a bathroom, what's your process that you say to yourself? What are the reminders? What are the mantras, meditations that you think about before that?

• 27:37Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  It always helps me to voice it whenever I'm insecure. I either I'll write about it somewhere or I'll speak to somebody who I trust, my mom, my husband, my best friend.

• 27:53Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  But I find it easier to talk about it. So that's why I have a healthier relationship with my insecurities because I take away their power by discussing them. I choose not to live with them alone in the dark recesses of my mind because then they become monsters and then they become really, really large and and they're usually not real. So it's always been very helpful to me whenever I'm feeling crazy or insecure or afraid or even if I feel like I've made a mistake.

• 28:28Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  My dad told me this when I was very young, when I was, you know, 16, the first time he sat me down and he gave me a glass of champagne and I was like, what? And he was like, yeah, you're 16, you know, you can have a glass of champagne with me. You're gonna do it anyway.

• 28:44Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  He was like, and he told me, he was like, whatever happens in your life, you should feel free to be able to do it with your parents. There's nothing to hide from us. I'll always be in your corner. And you know? He told me that about feelings. I always had the freedom to talk to my mom or my dad as a kid about anything I was feeling. At least to my father, I wouldn't discuss the boyfriends, but my mom, she was like my best friend. She knew about every, um, you know, object of attraction that I ever had.

• 29:18Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  And I think that that sort of gives you um, the sense of confidence to be able to talk about it. And I just think it's a great first step to get rid of insecurities.

• 29:30Lewis Howes?

  I'm just a big believer, I love everything you're saying, and I'm just a big believer that if people really listen to this and understand, take it in what you're sharing, that it's hard to achieve anything without confidence. You could have the greatest experience, you could have the greatest degree, the skills, you could have the family, you could have the money, like you could have good looks, whatever it is, you could have the stuff, but if you don't know how to build confidence when it matters, it doesn't matter if the world believes in you, if we don't believe in ourselves, nothing's gonna happen.

• 30:01Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  The world won't believe in you if you don't believe in you. And I, I think like, as, as someone in the public profession, you know, my job is to be entertaining and be confident and in every step that I take and in every move that I make. But I think recognizing that confidence is not something we are born with. It's, it's a skill. It's like, you know, it's a muscle almost. If you think of it like going to the gym. And, you know, to, to have muscles and to be in shape, you gotta work at it, just like the vocal cords. People, the greatest musicians in the world, they use, you know, their, their vocal cords. They do riaz, like we call it in Hindi, but which is um,

• 30:47Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  warmups and stuff like that. So confidence to me is like that. You start you using that at a very small level. Um, everyday life, you know, when you're in school, there were times when I was in school where I used to take the other hall hallway because I didn't want to bump into someone else. When I started high school, by the time I was in 11th grade, I was walking in the middle of the hallway.

• 31:10Lewis Howes?

  You're stood around, you get people moving away, yeah.

• 31:12Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  I was like, excuse me, I didn't even have to say that, I was just walking. Because, and that's the same person, but I think that in any profession or any aspect of life, confidence is, perception is reality. Most people believe that, right? You know that how people perceive you is what they think reality is. So give them something perceivable.

• 31:33Lewis Howes?

  Hmm. Amen to that. What would you say are three things on a daily basis that you do to build confidence that you think anyone could apply for their life, even if they feel like they have no confidence?

• 31:44Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  When I wake up in the morning, I take time in the bathroom. Like, I, I shower, I will, you know, pick the outfit that I'm feeling today. I will, um, you know, sort of doing my makeup and my hair sort of helps me, uh, or my skincare routine, actually. Night helps me be sort of introspective. Otherwise, through the day, I'm very erratic. I have, you know, multiple balls in the air. Um, professionally, I'm doing a lot of things. I'm always behind on time. I'm always playing catch up. So at the end of the night and the beginning of the day, I really give myself some silence. I play music and, you know, um, I put my creams on and I really think about

• 32:25Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  what the day is going to be like and how my first step outside room is going to be. When I take that first step outside my safe space, it sets the tone for my day. So I try not to have it be erratic or scary or like, you know, if I'm late and if I'm running, that always sets the tone for my energy through the day. So I try to really, you know, start my day on the tone I want to have and the confidence I want to have. And at every given step during, um, the day, I remind myself of the things I have instead of the things I don't have.

• 33:01Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 33:02Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  Like insecurity comes from, a lot of it sometimes I think comes from, oh my gosh, I don't have this, it's not good enough, or I'm not good enough, or. Particular scenario or a particular situation or, you know, we start judging ourselves. And this was another lesson, actually, and activity that my mom and I used to do is we used to count our blessings. And, you know, me and my husband do it too. Whenever we're feeling crazy because our schedules are insane. We're, you know, always in different parts of the world. Um, we do that. We count our blessings about just five things that whenever you're feeling sort of crazy and unstable. That, um, you know, you have that you're really grateful for. And I'm not even saying this superficially.

• 33:43Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  This was, um, like truly an exercise. No matter how badly off you are, someone else is worse off than you. That makes it so easy to count your blessings.

• 33:55Lewis Howes?

  I mean, especially watching this, uh, this latest movie that you're in, I mean, White Tiger. It, I've been, I've only been India once. I went there four years ago and studied meditation in Chennai. Uh, for a couple of weeks, but I went to Delhi and, you know, kind of traveled around a little bit. I didn't see everything, but I saw a lot of, uh, dark things and a lot of things that were constantly reminding me, wow, I have a lot to be grateful for every moment. So I think it's important to have that perspective in our lives that we always have something to be grateful for. Even when it's the darkest time, there's something to be grateful for.

• 34:29Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  Absolutely. And that's so empowering. That to me is my greatest mantra is, you know, truly and tangibly do it on your fingers. Do it like just five things. Um, and it's, it's a great exercise to do with someone as well, your kids, your family, you know? Um, anytime it's just like five things, then you have to just say, rattle it out. Um, the five things that you can think of at that point. But, um, you know, the, the crazy part about the White Tiger is that it's based in India and you probably reacted to it because it's, it's shot so authentically. But if you think about it. The majority of the world lives in those conditions.

• 35:09Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  You know, and the socioeconomic divide that exists right now is only increasing. Like even the Sustainable Development Goals have been set to eradicate extreme poverty because it's such a big problem. There's such a large population of the world. And we as privileged society, we as privileged people, anyone who has a roof above their head and meals on their table is privileged. And as privileged people, like that's something that's our concern. You know, there's a large generation of children who don't have a choice in their future or in their lives. They don't know if they can have aspirations or dreams.

• 35:53Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  And how desensitized we, where last time, you know, you've driven past a homeless shelter and you've not even looked at it. Or a homeless person and not even looked at them. It's the desensitization that we as people who have.

• 36:10Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  And that's the differentiation between the have-nots. But it's also a reality and it's a reality every, everywhere in the world.

• 36:17Lewis Howes?

  I don't want to give away the whole movie. I want everyone to watch it because it's really powerful and inspiring to see someone come from, you know, poverty to essentially become, you know, an entrepreneur and be successful in their own way. And the story is really powerful, but you took on a role that is, I found fascinating because that's probably not, I don't know if that's how you would react in real life. Because I know you have such a giving, grateful heart, caring about humanity. But your character does something that's very controversial. And you essentially, from my opinion, don't take accountability. And, and how, how did you feel?

• 36:57Lewis Howes?

  Doing a role that is probably against your morals, your values and the way you live your life right now.

• 37:03Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  I never judge my characters, um, you know, like I never judge people. Live and let live, each person is individual to their decisions. And if I started to judge, I would never be able to play bad guys and I love playing bad guys.

• 37:21Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  But um, I think what was most interesting for me when I was playing Pinky is she's an American. You know, she and I'm an Indian who's grown up in India and understands the complexity of the diversity of that country. There is no one India, there is multiple Indias and you can spend your whole life trying to get to know it. And you'll still never know her. So this is one aspect of India that is showcased in this movie, but it's also. It's more than that, it's the story of this one man and everyone else from his perspective. So it's not us looking at him or the country, it's him looking at all of us saying, oh.

• 38:03Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  You know, and especially with my character, she's woke, but she's fake woke, right? She's one of those girls who's like, why don't you pull yourselves out of your circumstances? I, my parents worked in a bodega, you know, and I pulled myself out, why don't you do it? He doesn't have a roof over his shoulders. His pa- his family doesn't have food, it's a completely different complexity that. Most woke people don't have the ability to understand, including me, I lived there and I can't claim to understand it because. You know, I um, have had um, you know, basic lively life rights uh, since I was a child. I've been to school, I've had an opinion of about where my future is going to be choices.

• 38:48Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  Um, and that's what's so amazing to me about this movie was that I I leaned into playing a character that was fake woke and, you know, pivoted when it wasn't convenient. Me and my husband both, uh, in the movie, not my real husband.

• 39:03Lewis Howes?

  Right, right.

• 39:03Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  Um, my cha- the character in my, um, in the movie. Both of us sort of like were like, this is not the right thing, but you know, when it wasn't, when it was inconvenient, we kind of stood back and watched. And that's a very human testament, which is why this bu- this movie, which was originally a book by Arvind Adiga, uh, which came out in two thousand eight. It was a Man Booker Prize winner. It was a New York Times bestseller. When this book came out, that's exactly what it did. It was such a human sort of transcript, human behave, you know, flawed, not black or white, living in gray, all of them, living in gray, which is truly how we live. And it's sort of self-reflective.

• 39:48Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  It's in, it, it should make people feel introspective and think about the last time we behaved like that. Um, plus it's clever and it's sarcastic. I, sarcasm is my favorite language, so I really enjoyed the tone of the movie as well.

• 40:04Lewis Howes?

  Speaking about sarcasm, was it pretty easy for you to, to, uh, to step into that character, living in L.A. then, with all the, uh, woke, fake woke people here?

• 40:15Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  Um, I mean, I will say that I, I may have been inspired by my surroundings, just a little bit.

• 40:22Lewis Howes?

  I'm curious, excuse me, I'm curious about, um, your evolution as a, a woman in this industry. Typically, younger women are more desirable for opportunities in their late teens, early twenties. And it's like when you're twenty-six, twenty-seven, it's almost like you're old as a woman and you may not be the young sexy one anymore or something in this industry. How do you feel after getting into your late thirties now? How have you evolved personally to not allow that stigma to hold you back from being who you want, who you want to be, from accepting yourself, from loving yourself, from innovating and reinventing yourself that you've done so many times? How do you not let that stigma hold you back?

• 41:06Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  I can't say that I don't. I just am hoping that it doesn't happen to me, you know? We live in a world where anything is possible right now, as we've seen in the last few year, a few months, years as well. And I, I think that, I remember when I was in my, when I was twenty eight, um, my mom sat me down one day and she said, you know, you, uh, girls have a shelf life and you're reaching that where, you know, the older boys, um, they're always looking for the younger girl to act with. And even if they're in their fifties, you know, they're still gonna be working with twenty year olds, but you're gonna be old and you need to think about a business.

• 41:50Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  Uh, if acting opportunities stop coming your way, that's how I actually started my production house. Because I was like, you're right. What if I'm like, I need to be financially independent in my life. But at the same time, while this was happening to me, I recognized that innovation and reinventing who I am, even for me, is so important and being true to the craft that I'm doing and the, the service that I have to provide, which is my job. So I started trying new things. I started wanting to grow. I didn't want to stagnate into doing the same kind of roles. I didn't want to stagnate in, you know, similar kind of parts or even languages and borders. And

• 42:34Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  I did music. I was signed as a record, recording artist to Interscope, Prem and Bose. Um, I pivoted from that into television that I'd never done, English language TV. Then I moved into features in America. Now I'm producing in India and America and acting in both these countries, which are two of the greatest movie industries in the world. But if I sat down to think about the glass ceiling that was built for me, um, I would never have a trajectory powerful enough to break it.

• 43:04Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 43:05Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  Cause I didn't make that glass ceiling. So I don't want to think about where it is. You know, it's been made by other people. So you just kind of have to have, you know, speed and run towards your end game and, you know, have a goal and be ambitious and fuel that ambition every single day.

• 43:22Lewis Howes?

  What is the end game?

• 43:24Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  To have a legacy, I think. I want my um children to be proud of, you know, the the legacy that I've had. I wanna be, hopefully, you know, part of um, you know, the history books of entertainment where I may have contributed to the arts in some way. Um, with the work that I have done, or the work that I create, or the work that I will do. So I wanna be able to, as a woman, you know, um, leave a better world for the girls after us. Like the women before me did for me. I don't think about voting today. I don't think about driving today. I don't think about aspiring to have the same job as a man.

• 44:07Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  And all of those fights um were fought by women that came before me. So it's my responsibility and our responsibility as a generation to leave it better for the next one. So those are broad strokes of my end games.

• 44:23Lewis Howes?

  And what, I mean, I'm sure you get this question a lot. I'm just curious because my audience is a lot of high achievers. They they're big dreamers. They're going after what they want. They're learning the skills, the tools to become more confident, more more giving, all those things. It sounds like you're doing everything all at the same time. How do you navigate intimacy, connection, love with, you know, you know, your husband, your family, your friends, the people that matter the most to you? How do you navigate relationships with such a busy, full plate?

• 44:52Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  It's not easy. Um, you know, there's not as much face time as you would possibly want, but I, when I made the deal with the devil about, you know, running at this fast pace many years ago, I realized that there would be sacrifices that are required and um, you know, when you have, there's no free lunch in the world. And when you have ambitions, you've got to sort of pay for it and um. But I overcompensate, or I try and compensate um with making sure even if I don't have FaceTime or if I've like for a very long time in my life, I missed um you know birthdays and Diwali and New Years and I would always be working and all I could do was apologize and my family

• 45:37Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  always understood because you know I was I was working at something. But um I think that uh I I I made sure that I always call. I never forget birthdays. I will always call on a birthday. If I go to a city, even if I can't meet someone, my family, my friends, I'll make sure we FaceTime. We'll call. I'm I'm very, it made me very thoughtful about the people I love. I love loving the people I um that I care about. I love making them feel special and I love being empathetic. And I I I think it's very important um to leave the baggage of the job behind when you walk into your house and just be true to what you're feeling.

• 46:22Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  I I think it's it's important to choose relationships when you're really busy because we can all be caught up in life and you know, life is like a really fast river. You know, you don't know what the currents are going to be because it's just moving. You don't know what you're gonna bump into because it's just moving. But you have to choose to hold on to something when you wanna take a breath, right? Just like that, you have to choose to hold on to a relationship, whatever that might be, with your children, with your family, with your parents. You have to make the time and you have to tell the people you love that you love them. Don't just assume that they know.

• 47:00Lewis Howes?

  You've got some wisdom, Priyanka. I love this.

• 47:02Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  Uh, thank you.

• 47:03Lewis Howes?

  I'm I'm curious about, I know how uh meaningful the relationship was with your your father. And he obviously got to experience a lot of your success and I'm sure he was extremely proud of you for, you know, the three thousand movies and all the projects you worked on. But I'm curious, what do you think personally he would be most proud of that you've done in your life since his passing?

• 47:28Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  Um, that I didn't give up, um, you know, that I didn't rest on my laurels. He used to always push me. He would always push me to never be satisfied with what I have. He pushed my ambition. He flamed my ambition. He was always like, what's the next thing? What are we doing? He loved hearing stories about the next movies that I was doing. I used to literally narrate them to him in the hospital bed as well. This is my character and I used to break down my characters with him or movies that I wanted to make. Um, and you know, there were phases in my life, like that a little bit of a dark phase, especially after my dad died, where I felt like I don't know if I could keep up with the life that I had built.

• 48:12Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  Um, and what was expected of me by then, um, because I personally took a hit. And I personally was feeling sad and, you know, sadness sort of. Sadness is strangely seductive, you know, it kind of sucks you in and you're, it's like. It feels comfortable. It feels like you're floating and it's easy. Light might be harsh a little bit, but the joy that you feel when you choose light, when you choose to let go of the seduction of sadness, um.

• 48:51Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  I think my dad was afraid that, because I'm very sensitive, that I would have been seduced by sadness for a long time. He was very afraid of that. Um, even before he died, he still always talked to me about, don't be sad, do not be sad. That's, I'm not going away. I'm always with you, you know? But I was, I was tremendously sad and, but it, it take, it takes choosing yourself. And I've done that multiple times, um, in my life. And I think it's such a powerful tool. Because the longest relationship you have is with yourself.

• 49:24Lewis Howes?

  I read somewhere about you sharing that you come into this place alone, you leave this place alone, you've got to, you know, build that relationship with yourself. I love that you keep saying choose yourself. A friend of mine wrote a book called Choose Yourself. His name is James Altucher, and it's a really powerful book. It's about, you know, going after you want it and choosing yourself and not allowing someone else to dictate what you can and can't do and all that stuff. But I love that you keep using that phrase because I think it's important for people to be reminded that we need to choose ourselves when no one else will choose us. We need to be there for ourselves when we're sad.

• 49:59Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  It's no one's job. It's no one's job to choose someone else. You know, your parents will do it for a while, your spouses will do it for a while, maybe your children will do it for a while. But you are no one else's responsibility but your own.

• 50:14Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 50:14Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  And what you do with your life and the choices you make dictate the sum of your life. It's such a, it's such simple math, actually. We are the sum of all our choices. And, you know, if you want to achieve something, if you want to achieve greatness, and I'll give you a small example. The White Tiger, the movie. I was never attached to it. I was never approached for it. I read about it on Twitter that it was being made. I read in a trade magazine, I read, you know, Deadline, actually, that The White Tiger is being adapted by the director, Ramin Barani, and for Netflix. And I was like, I have to be a part of this movie.

• 50:57Priyanka Chopra Jonas?

  I called the agents. I called my agents. I made them call the producers. I chased Ramin from Mumbai to New York to LA. I met him three times. I auditioned with him three times. I offered my services as an executive producer because I wanted the material. Because I want to align myself with good content, and I believe that would be good content.

• 51:24Lewis Howes?

  So many young kids feel that way about the followers and engagement, the likes, and they tie it to their self-worth. And if they don't get that engagement, it's emotionally messing with them. So what advice would you give to people on the internet right now who are constantly on Instagram or Twitter or wherever it is, TikTok, and it affects them?

• 51:47Speaker 03

  The advice I would give them, they're not going to listen to. It's don't be on it. Completely get off of it, erase it, delete the account as a whole. Don't just, "I'm gonna delete the app." That's the biggest thing I hear.

• 51:58Lewis Howes?

  They'll come back out three days later.

• 51:59Speaker 03

  "Oh yeah, I'm gonna take a break." Yeah, bro, come on, like, forget about it. Sometimes I do certain posts if I want it to be very personal, but I don't have it on my phone. My assistant does. So I'll be like, "Hey, like, let me, I don't know, tweet Lil Nas X or something." And so I'll do that from myself. And then sometimes I'll like see something and I'll be like, "Oh, oh wow, oh my God." And then I'm like, "Holy, what am I doing? I'm scrolling. What is this?" And then I literally, I'm like, "Get this away from me." I say it every time, which is really funny. But you know what it is, man? One, it's also a different era. So when social media started to become a thing, I was 17. This is 2007. I remember this because I remember watching that The Dark Knight was coming out

• 52:42Speaker 03

  and everybody was gonna hate on what's-his-face for being Joker, Heath Ledger. And I thought he was gonna do great, and he did. And that was awesome. And so I just remember Ashton Kutcher had like the most amount of followers.

• 52:53Lewis Howes?

  Yes, on Twitter.

• 52:54Speaker 03

  And it was a million.

• 52:55Lewis Howes?

  It was a big deal, yeah.

• 52:56Speaker 03

  It was such a thing.

• 52:57Lewis Howes?

  Was he the first one to a million or something?

• 52:59Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah. And so this was for me, it kind of happened later, right? Like, I didn't really catch myself like online like all the time until like 20, 21. So I was a little older. But what I'm saying is these kids are literally born with a phone in their hands. So it's difficult. Yeah, because so much of their socializing actually isn't really even in person. And when they are in person, they're still on their phones. So there's no connection, right? So because of this.

• 53:32Lewis Howes?

  My nephew nieces, my nephew nieces up. We were, we were on a vacation. They were literally on their phone the whole time. And I've been with one of them before where they're with their friends. And they're all friends, they're chatting with each other on the phone next to each other. Go, what are we doing here? You're chatting with each other through the phone. But you're next to, it just makes no sense to me.

• 53:57Speaker 03

  It's fricking weird. Now, the issue is that we know, the issue is that we can't relate.

• 54:03Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 54:03Speaker 03

  Because that wasn't our childhood, right? So in many ways, even though it's definitely not healthy. There's things that we can relate to about kids, right? Like, I don't know, you're in seventh or eighth grade and you're in your first kind of real relationship. And you've been dating for like three weeks and it's amazing. And then this guy or girl breaks your heart. And then you go home and you act a certain way and your parents find out. And the parents are like, oh, don't worry. Like you'll, you're gonna be over this. You don't understand. And it's like, oh, I do understand. Like it, this ain't.

• 54:36Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 54:36Speaker 03

  But it's okay. Like da, da, da. So, but we can't do the same thing when it comes to social media. Because we don't know what that's like. We haven't been there. We haven't been bullied online and in person. We haven't had a crush on somebody face to face and then accidentally liked, you know, their picture. And it's like this thing. And then I don't, you know what I mean? Like there's a whole world of online bullying and just things that I could, I, I can't understand. And I, I, or, or put myself in if I was, I was a kid. So I don't really know what I could say. Um, to a child that's constantly on social media. I will say it is, I, I, I do believe it is very similar to the. This guy or girl broke your heart, like you're gonna be alright. Like if you get off of this thing, like you'll be okay.

• 55:20Speaker 03

  But our society is headed to the metaverse, dude. Augmented reality, next 10, 15 years. Phones are gonna be obsolete. Everybody's gonna be wearing glasses. We're gonna be having this conversation without any gear, any camera. It's gonna, it's crazy, which I think is good and bad. I think it's gonna connect people in a very positive way. And there's also gonna be repercussions for trolls. You're not just gonna be able to say the most gnarly shit in your mouth, because you'll be one banned from that person's metaverse, or possibly reported and then deleted, you know, from the metaverse as a whole. It's funny, I almost sound like, like a conspiracy theorist. The metaverse. It's a real thing, bro. Look it up.

• 55:58Lewis Howes?

  You know, for, for people listening, especially the younger generation that's saying, you know, Bobby, this is great and all, advice to get off, but you, you know, you made $30 million in a year. You've got your life now. You've got to sit up. You made your art and expression to the world because of the internet potentially. You know, you're able to get it out there in a big way. Uh, so, you know, for people that are trying to express themselves through their art, their business, their sports, whatever their talent is, their gift, and use the internet. How could they do without wrecking their mental health, without wanting to commit suicide, without, you know, feeling unworthy every moment of every day? And also use it as a powerful tool to advance their dreams.

• 56:43Speaker 03

  What a great question. Um, I think in my previous statement, that was just to the average person, particularly, you know, young kids, teenagers, but honestly, like even adults, like straight up. If you wanna be happier, if you want to be happier, just get off the internet, like, you know, like do other, like, or at least these apps, these social media apps,

• 57:06Speaker 03

  which you're wasting your time in. When it comes to entertainment and dreams, which I totally get, uh, yeah, you have to destroy yourself physically and mentally. If you really, truly like wanna do, you have to be a psychopath, man. Like, all I did was music, music, music, music all the time. I didn't go to parties, I didn't drink, I didn't this. Not to say that you need to drink, but I just, I didn't have, I didn't, I didn't get drunk till I was 26, which is great. I mean, that's really cool. It's just, maybe I was 25, but it's like, that was my path, but it's just like, and I'm glad I did it, but what I'm saying is there's just certain things that I missed out on, opportunities, experiences, this, that. You have to be willing to do that, and you have to be on, on social media all the time. Now, that's a real thing.

• 57:51Speaker 03

  If you wanna blow up and you wanna make it and you wanna utilize this, uh, you know, this, this device to your advantage, you have to basically sacrifice your twenties. Here's, here's a big thing, okay? If you are doing something where you truly do need education, of course, go, get your diploma, do your thing. But if you're starting up a business, college, straight up, I'm gonna tell you that, you don't need it. Um, like, th- this formal education is such bullshit, because you could be taking time and educating, educating yourself, going out, getting in the field, whether you're interning, you're this, you're that, and making it happen. Rather than, rather, cuz it's like, okay, here's another thing, okay, cool, you get your diploma,

• 58:31Speaker 03

  and then you, you go to some place that you wanna, you know, work at, but then they tell you, oh, you need three years' experience. Well, how the am I gonna get three years' experience if I'm out of college and I just got a degree to do this thing? So it's like, you have to make it your everything, and most people can't actually do that. Um, and I wouldn't take, take it back, though. My, my twenties were the most, my twenties were harder than my childhood. Like, easily, and it was more so mentally and, and, and, and just what I had to deal with physically and going on tour and just, I mean, relationships, forget about it, it was so, dude, grinding, like, literally, it was the hardest thing in the world.

• 59:16Speaker 03

  Uh, but now here I am, and it's like, dude, I'm 31, and you said it yourself, like, yeah, I can do whatever I want, like, and that is kinda weird to say, it's a really weird thing, but like, bro, I earned it. And that's not me trying to sound arrogant, like, I earned it, dude, like, I remember being alone in very dark places, in hotel rooms, like, And I got through it somehow, and I'm so glad I did, like, I earned it. So that's what anyone listening now has to do. They have to earn it and they have to be prepared. I would say get therapy, get a therapist. And try to find balance as best as you can. But it's, when it comes to dreams, there really is no balance. It's kind of just a hundred percent

• 59:58Speaker 03

  this thing constantly until you reach a peak because there is a I, the, my biggest thing was like, okay, how many number ones can you have? How many this, how many that, da, da, da. I was in this hamster wheel. And for so long, I had these goals and had these goals and had these goals. And then I just did, I had no more goals. I mean, my, the

• 1:00:18Lewis Howes?

  You reached them all.

• 1:00:18Speaker 03

  The only real, yeah.

• 1:00:21Speaker 03

  Exactly. So like the only real thing that I haven't done yet is won a Grammy, but like, who gives a And I realized that that's just a glorified pat on the back. So that's not even really a goal to have a bunch of people in a committee who don't even really understand me or my music, tell me, you know, why it's worth something or not, or this or that. And that's not me saying that is like, well, you don't have a Grammy, like you sound salty, like no, this is me realizing, like, that doesn't matter. I'm not going to kill myself for years and years to try to get a Grammy. So with all that, um, yeah, I mean, balance, focus.

• 1:00:56Lewis Howes?

  Would there, would there have been a, would there have been a ritual that you would have added in the last decade? Knowing what you went through, knowing the ups and the loneliness, the darkness, would there have been like, you know what? Every week I'm going to talk to a therapist for my twenties or every week I'm going to get seven hours of sleep a night or would there have been anything you would have tried to shift that could have been like, you know, I'm going to get off the internet for one day a week and just sit in nature. Like what could you have done in a ideal world?

• 1:01:26Speaker 03

  You just said it. You said it all. Like that, all of that would have been amazing. But there's just no way you could have told this guy that.

• 1:01:34Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:34Speaker 03

  Like, there's just no way. I'm gonna get off the internet. If I'm off the internet for one day, that's followers. I'm in my head like followers that I'm not getting, or fans that aren't gonna come to a city, or this, or da-da-da-da-da. And in many ways, it's true. So that's why it's like, you have to be willing, like me, I wanted ultimate success. I wanted the biggest success you could have, and I got it. I did it. And the reason I did that is because I sacrificed everything to get it. Now, I don't think that's healthy. But once again, in retrospect, personally, I am glad I did it. But I also somehow, common sense and God, just like when I was a kid, made it out the other side of all of this, and realized my self-worth, and that I don't need to do this, and da-da-da-da,

• 1:02:18Speaker 03

  and all these other things. I did. I did need to do that, not for self-worth, but to build a brand and a fan base around the world, where I could tour for the rest of my life if I want, and be financially okay. I had to do that. And now I'm just at a place where I'm like, okay, I could continue to do that. I could keep having thirty million dollar years, or I could have a couple million dollar years.

• 1:02:41Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 1:02:42Speaker 03

  And enjoy your life. Right? And what is that? Like, it doesn't really change my, yeah, my quality of life. And you know what is even more important, is I can do the thing my parents did, and I can spend time with my child, and I can be a good dad. And that's what's more important to me now. Yeah.

• 1:02:57Lewis Howes?

  You grew up in a poor household, and my, my audience is really curious about optimizing their life in many different ways, their, their health, their mindset, their spirituality, their relationships, and financially. And, and you grew up in this poor household. What was your mindset around money, growing up? And how did you shift your mindset at some point to really start building wealth, manifesting and attracting money, and also not blow it? You know, just like spend it all and be like broke, you know, two years later?

• 1:03:33Speaker 03

  Wow, okay. So I don't, I don't even remember ever seeing money in the household. I remember when food stamps weren't on a card, on an EBT card, and they were actual food stamps that looked like Monopoly money. Um, I knew nothing of money. I knew no concept of saving it, what that meant. I mean, we had just enough to get by, like, literally.

• 1:03:50Lewis Howes?

  Day by day, yeah.

• 1:03:52Speaker 03

  Yeah, for real. And it's like, the first of the month, like, that Bone Thugs song, "Wake up, wake up, wake up, it's the first of the month." It's like, "Yeah, motherfucking food stamps, we eating chicken tonight." And then by the end of the month, it's powdered milk and sh** and like gross gizzards and sh**. And so, yeah, for real. So, um, I, I never understood that. I never got that. I never knew any of what that meant. I think that the, the, uh, understanding fundamentally, like, how to use and utilize money and save money, didn't come till I was seventeen and I got two jobs. So I left home at seventeen. Um, I got two jobs. I worked at a flower shop and I worked at Jiffy Lube. And I'm making like seven fifty an hour, dude, like, so it's like you're not even, this is Maryland.

• 1:04:37Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:37Speaker 03

  Yeah, so it's like a suburb of DC. And there's no-

• 1:04:41Lewis Howes?

  Nothing. You can't save anything. Yeah.

• 1:04:44Speaker 03

  Exactly. You can't really save anything. So I'm enjoying like, uh, Kenny's Chinese Chicken and like that, like, like I'm enjoying it. You know, Starving Marvin subs and maybe an occasional video game or something like that. But for the most part, that was it. Um, it wasn't until I really signed, so I signed my deal with Def Jam in 2012. And I went from having like twelve dollars in my bank account to, uh, a hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars overnight.

• 1:05:08Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 1:05:09Speaker 03

  The first thing I did was I went to Taco Bell because that was like Ruth Chris of-

• 1:05:14Lewis Howes?

  Those are luxury.

• 1:05:18Speaker 03

  Yeah, so I'm like, here we go. And, um, I, I, I bought my homies, you know, some, some stuff. I got my producer some sh** and I got my, uh, my videographer a new camera. I hooked up my mom's, uh, my, my homie's mom's car that we used to drive all, all around because it was broken down. But besides that, I saved every, every dime that I had and I put it into myself and in my craft. And then I moved to LA, um, and I was paying rent and we were staying kind of in the hills, but it was like, yeah, it was, it was, it was an all right house. Um, and- I did all that and then I I went on tour and I literally like it was just investing my money in myself.

• 1:05:58Speaker 03

  So I would like, I would pay for the merchandise, we'd haul it around in trash bags, we'd go to these uh these do these shows.

• 1:06:07Speaker 03

  I'm selling these tickets, things are going good, I'm making my money back, making a bit of a profit. And then I remember for the big tour, we needed a tour bus and this was for my debut album, Under Pressure in two thousand fourteen. And by the time I fronted all the money, I only had twelve hundred dollars in my bank account. Ooh. So it's like, I'm just like, you know, I made it, my album's out, my but there's always something else that you don't really realize. And um, that was crazy, but I made my money and then I I did good and you know, I remember getting my first million dollar check from a merchandise company, which is crazy. Wow. Because we were selling such merch and such good merch and things were going well, well, well.

• 1:06:48Speaker 03

  And then even when I had that thirty million dollar year, like people were like, invest your money, make your money, make money for you. And it's not until now, you know, recently, that I've actually started, you know, investing certain things like crypto and whatever. And but I'm still like that poor kid that's like, no, mine. Right. Like if it's if it's in this account, if it's in this account, it's not going anywhere. So like, no, like, no. But you know, I I I'm at a place now where I want my money to make me money. So. Yeah. It it I think it's trial and error.

• 1:07:20Speaker 03

  And once again, God and common sense, something, but don't get me wrong, man, I've had some fun, man. I went to I went to Vegas and blew a hundred and twenty grand. Oh. Like I I knew I was gonna lose it and I and people were like, you're crazy, you're crazy, you're just gonna, you're gonna, you know, you're gonna put forty grand on red? And I'm like, yep, and then I made eighty and then I lost it and then I back and forth. Because for me, as insane as it was, it's like this made up for every Christmas I didn't have, every birthday gift I didn't get. Like I'm having a blast, I am paying a hundred and twenty thousand dollars right now to have the best fucking time in the world. And I don't do this all, it's not like I do this all the time, it was like, I only ever did it the one time. You know, I bought a Bronco for a quarter million dollars, I I bought a bunch of nerds, you know, guitars, things like that.

• 1:08:04Speaker 03

  Yeah, for sure. But at the end of the day, it's like, yeah, dude, like I I did, I saved my money and and that's. Because I never got into it like just in those and boats and like I wasn't like rap is what it's gonna be this thing. I was like, no, I'm gonna utilize it and realize that this is a business and spend, spend my money where it should be.

• 1:08:24Lewis Howes?

  For young artists, entrepreneur, athletes, anyone who's building their thing, whatever their thing is, what would you say are the three greatest investments they should be making? Uh, you know, once they start making a little bit of money, more than day by day, but it's like, okay, I've made, I, I've got an extra thousand or five thousand dollars a month. That's, that's a lot of money for, for younger people, but I've got some extra cash. Yeah. What should I invest in? Three, three things that they should be investing in, whether it's back in themselves, whether it's in their merch or their products or their, you know, and hiring a coach, whatever it is, a trainer, a therapist, like what would you say are those three things they should be investing in at an earlier age?

• 1:09:05Speaker 03

  I feel like if they're making pretty decent money, they're already investing in their, in themselves. They're, they're being smart enough to know that whatever their brand is or their sport or their career, like they, they are spending that money to make sure that they can do it well, whether they're in the gym and they're getting pre-workout powder and like, oh, like, you know, so they, they are already spending their money where it, where it needs to be.

• 1:09:29Speaker 03

  It's funny because like I said, I'm the guy that was like mine. So I was just saving my money. So number one, I would say like, save your money, like for sure, but put it in a savings account that's gonna at least, you know,

• 1:09:40Lewis Howes?

  Make a little bit.

• 1:09:41Speaker 03

  Build, yeah, compound interest and, and all this other stuff. So that's number one. Number two, have fun. I didn't have fun. I didn't have fun at all and I, and um, I, I wish I did. I wish I had a little more fun. Um, nothing crazy, but like, that's one regret I do have is that I was so focused that I didn't really even just have like, like dude, I would go on trips with, it'd be like, oh yeah, we're gonna go to Big Bear, man. And I'd be like, all right, I guess I'll go. Cause it's like my best friend's birthday. So I'm like, okay, but like,

• 1:10:16Lewis Howes?

  I have to go.

• 1:10:17Speaker 03

  As soon as I get there, as soon as I get there, I got the laptop and the microphone set up and like, I'm like still recording and working like, I wish, I guess what I'm saying is for a day or a weekend or whatever, that I would have. At least just enjoyed those precious moments with like family because they are my family. I don't really have family, so that was family and it's like, oh, man. But low key, it's like my best friend's my producer, so it's his birthday and he's like, yeah, and he's making beats with me. He's just, he's just doing it drunker than usual.

• 1:10:47Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 1:10:47Speaker 03

  So it's like, because so, so that's another thing. And then third, I don't know. I'm not sure.

• 1:10:53Lewis Howes?

  No worries. What do you think are the biggest lies around success? That you wish people understood more because you've accomplished pretty much every goal there is for yourself. Made the money, all the, you know, platinum, ah, ten time, all this, all this stuff. What's the biggest lies around success you wish people understood more?

• 1:11:12Speaker 03

  Well, one, it's all fleeting. So, uh, one, uh, the biggest cliche, money doesn't make you happiness. Success can't make you have, like, it's just so true. Uh, but at the same time, it's a bit of a double edged sword because

• 1:11:24Speaker 03

  we all want to feel worthy. We all want to feel accomplished. Um, and you have to,

• 1:11:33Speaker 03

  you know, like, I want to be the best dad in the world, but as, as good of a father as I want to be, I still have my own dreams. And if I don't chase those dreams and follow those dreams, even very, um, responsibly to make sure that I'm making time, like, I'm not going to be happy. And if I'm not happy, I'm not going to be a good dad. Um, so I would tell people, I mean, the biggest thing is like, just do it because you love it. Like if, if you're, if you're doing, if your goal or motivation is like money and success, you're not going to be happy. You'll be successful, but you won't necessarily be happy. So with music, my goal for sure, I was like, I do want to make a bunch of money. I do want to be really famous. I do want this. But none of that mattered when I was writing my raps. None of that mattered when I was making beats.

• 1:12:18Speaker 03

  When I was actually in the studio with my friends, all that mattered is that we were creating something genuine from our heart. We were having fun. We were making the music we liked and loved. So whether it's a sport you love to play, don't just be like, oh, I'm a beat the best running back. Or, you know, I don't know about sports. I'm going to be honest, I'm watching anime, but whatever that is, it's like, cool, but like, do you love the game? Is it just something that your dad like drilled you to do? And you're like one of the baller brothers or whatever, you know? Do you love it? I mean, I, I'm not hating. Maybe they love it. I don't know, but I'm just, you know, it's like Joe Jackson. It's like, do you really actually love this thing? So make sure. Whatever it is, you enjoy it. And honestly, you could enjoy making money. Like, that's a real thing. You could be like, I'm gonna start an investment company.

• 1:13:03Speaker 03

  And I'm gonna do this, da, da, da, and like, it gets me excited. And I'm gonna make people their money and make money from their money. And that, like, for sure. Like, you can do that. But just know at the end of the day, okay, you got that money. Now what? When somebody's like, hey, what do you like to do? And you're like, oh, make money? Like, come on, get the [__] out of here. Like, you're gonna sit down at a date. Cool, yeah, you got, you got the bread. You can take her to the, you know, him or her to the nice, uh, restaurant. And then, but then what, fool? Like, do you like golf? Like, what do you, do you, you know, you wanna go drive go-karts? Like, life is so much more than just this thing.

• 1:13:34Lewis Howes?

  I hope you enjoyed today's episode and it inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today's episode with all the important links. And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me personally, as well as ad-free listening, then make sure to subscribe to our Greatness Plus channel exclusively on Apple Podcasts. Share this with a friend on social media and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts as well. Let me know what you enjoyed about this episode in that review. I really love hearing feedback from you and it helps us figure out how we can support and serve you moving forward. And I want to remind you, if no one has told you lately, that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter.

• 1:14:18Lewis Howes?

  And now it's time to go out there and do something great.