The Daily Habits To Prime Your Brain For Productivity, Happiness & Confidence EP 1263

In a world filled with overwhelm and burnout, it’s crucial to set mental boundaries and create space for yourself so you can focus on reaching your full potential. One of the ways I do this is by priming my brain for productivity and happiness throughout the day. Believe me, it’s easier said than done, and some days are harder than others. So, for this episode I’m bringing back guests who provide key insights on avoiding mental burnout, and perfecting the art of priming the brain for success. In this episode we discuss:How to develop a routine for peak performance with Neuroscientist Andrew HubermanHow to refocus on living the life you deserve with Tony RobbinsSteps to repairing brain function with Psychiatrist Dr. Daniel AmenThe best techniques for using language to build confidence and gain respect with Former Secret Agent Evy Poumpouras For more go to: www.lewishowes.com/1263Andrew Huberman's Episode: www.lewishowes.com/1204Tony Robbins' Episode: www.lewishowes.com/1107Dr. Daniel Amen's Episode: www.lewishowes.com/1120 & www.lewishowes.com/1121Evy Poumpouras' Episode: www.lewishowes.com/1092 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.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Once every 24 hours, you're going to get a peak in cortisol, which is a healthy peak. You want that peak to happen early in the day because it sets up alertness for the remainder of the day.

• 0:09Speaker 01

  You probably have to work on both your business or financial side and some personal side. I would be working on both. And to me, the way to attack that, if you're not sure which area, is to start with the body.

• 0:20Lewis Howes?

  Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, a 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.

• 0:44Lewis Howes?

  In a world filled with overwhelm and burnout, it's crucial to set mental boundaries and create space for yourself so you can focus on reaching your full potential. And one of the ways that I do this is by priming my brain for productivity and happiness throughout the day. Trust me, it's easier said than done, and some days are harder than others. So for this episode, I'm bringing back some of the most inspiring people that I know who provide key insights on avoiding mental burnout and perfecting the art of priming the brain for success. In this episode, we're going to discuss how to develop a routine for peak performance with neuroscientist Andrew Huberman, how to refocus on living the life you deserve with

• 1:25Lewis Howes?

  Tony Robbins, steps to repairing brain function with psychiatrist Dr. Daniel Amen, and the best techniques for using language to build confidence and gain respect with former secret agent Evy Poumpouras.

• 1:44Lewis Howes?

  In this first section, neuroscientist Andrew Huberman details a routine that you can implement daily to eliminate brain fog and start each day with mental clarity. So what's the routine, then? The ultimate morning and evening routine to set your brain and your mind up for optimal performance and not getting brain fog?

• 2:03Speaker 00

  Okay. I will describe that by listing out the protocol first, and then I'll give some of the scientific mechanisms, second. Because in the past, what I've tended to do is give the mechanism and then give the protocols. I know some people, it's like, you know, enough of these academic guys, just give me the, give me, just tell me what to do. But if people want the mechanism, I'd be happy to flesh that out.

• 2:25Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 2:25Speaker 00

  I should say that what I will mention is not everything I do. Um, so for instance, uh, I get up and like most humans, I use the restroom and I have a glass of water. I do those things. So if I, I'm not listing every, in every right foot, left footstep through the morning. Yes. But the things that are geared towards getting the mind into a proper place. For me, I'll describe it as my routine. Uh, I generally get up somewhere between five thirty and seven in the morning, depending on when I went to sleep. I'm not super regular about when I go to sleep, um, but generally that's between ten thirty and midnight. Yep. You know, I try and avoid that midnight hour, but, um, happens.

• 3:05Speaker 00

  So I get up, obviously I use the restroom, I drink some water. I do think that hydrating is very important. Yes. Uh, so I will, I'll drink some, some water. And then the fundamental layer of health is to set your circadian rhythm. The simplest way to do that is to go outside for 10 minutes and get some bright light in your eyes. I'll just list off some of the things that people always ask, what if you wake up before the sun rises? Well, simple rule, if you want to be awake, turn on as many bright lights in your house as possible. But then when the sun goes out, it comes out, excuse me, get outside and see some sunlight. You do not have to look directly into the sun, but you do want to get outside out of shade cover if you can. Don't wear sunglasses if you can do that safely.

• 3:48Speaker 00

  Don't try and do this through a window. Don't try and negotiate with me on this point. Go outside. What about a window? Well, the filtration of the, of the important wavelengths of light through the window is just too high. And so it would take hours for you to set your circadian clock that way. You want to do this because once every 24 hours, you're going to get a, a peak in cortisol, which is a healthy peak. You want that peak to happen early in the day because it sets up alertness for the remainder of the day. Hmm. There are really nice studies done by my colleagues in Stanford Psychiatry and Biology Department showing that if that cortisol peak starts to drift too late in the day, you start seeing signs of depression. It's actually a well-known marker of depression. So you want that cortisol, almost stressed out, kind of, ah, the day's beginning, I have a lot to do feeling. That's a healthy thing. You want that happening early in the day. Hmm.

• 4:33Speaker 00

  The sunlight will wake you up and what's really cool is that over time, you'll start to notice the sunlight waking you up more and more. The system becomes tuned up. If you miss a day, it's not the end of the world. Because it's a, as we call it, a slow integrating system, but don't miss more than one day. And if you live in an area where it's very cloudy outside, just know that the sunlight, the photons coming through that cloud cover are brighter than your brightest indoor lights. Now, if you live in a very dark region of the world, or it's unsafe, or purely impractical to get outside in the morning, then it might make sense to get a sunrise simulator or one of these lights, but they tend to be very expensive. What I recommend people use instead is just a ring light, a ring blue light. This is a case where you can blast your system. Wow.

• 5:18Speaker 00

  So get that morning light. This is, it sets a number of things in motion, such as your melatonin rhythm to happen 16 hours later to help you fall asleep. I would say this is the fundamental step of any good morning. And if you don't do this enough, you are messing yourself up in a number of ways. Does this mess with digestion also? Yeah, so every cell in your body has a 24-hour clock. All those clocks need to be aligned to the same time. So imagine a clock shop with lots of different clocks, and you don't want them alarming off at different times. This sunlight viewing, or bright light viewing, early in the day, I would say within 30 to 60 minutes of waking up, for about

• 5:59Speaker 00

  10 minutes, or if it's very cloudy, maybe 30 minutes or so, that activates a particular type of neuron in the eye called the intrinsically photosensitive retinal ganglion cell, if people want to look that up, signals to the circadian clock, which is right above the roof of your mouth, but that is the master circadian clock, that then releases a bunch of signals into your body. This all happens very fast, and every cell in your body gets tuned to the exact same time reference point, so that your system can work as a nice concert of cells, as opposed to add a whack. Your gut has a clock, your liver has a clock, your heart cells have a clock, every skin cell has a clock. And for those that are not incentivized enough by the cortisol stuff and all the other things, actually, the replenishment

• 6:43Speaker 00

  of stem cells in the skin, hair, and nails is activated by the system. So hair grows more readily. Skin turns over and nails grow more quickly. Because you have stem cells, literally cells that release more cells that become new hair cells, or new skin cells, and new cells that make up the nails. So, skin, hair, and nails also benefit, and it has to be light exposure to the eyes. When we talk about all these things like the gut and the skin, etc., it's tempting to say, "Oh, it's sunlight on the skin." No, it's actually, only can be signaled through the eyes. Because the clock lives deep in the brain, that master clock, and you need the signal to get to that master clock.

• 7:22Lewis Howes?

  So, don't wear sunglasses.

• 7:24Speaker 00

  If you can avoid, if you can avoid wearing sunglasses safely, right? There are people, for instance, who have macular degeneration, who have to avoid bright lights, and they know this because their ophthalmologist tells them. If you wear corrective lenses, contacts, even if it has UV filtration, that's fine. In fact, if you think about what a, what an eyeglass or a contact lens does, is it focuses light onto the eye, actually onto the retina on the back of the eye. Whereas, looking through a window filters it. It, it, it blocks a certain amount of light coming in, even if it's a very clear window. So, go outside. If you wear glasses, fine. If you wear contacts, fine. And if you can get out on a porch and be, you know, east facing in the morning when the sun comes up, great. You don't need to see the sun cross the horizon.

• 8:08Speaker 00

  But ideally, you see the sun when it's at what we call low solar angle. It's not directly overhead. If you wait two or three hours after waking up to get bright light in your eyes, you are setting yourself up for a complicated sleep-wake cycle that leads to a lot of what we call insomnia.

• 8:25Lewis Howes?

  So, this is important to do in the first 60 minutes of waking up. Get outside 10 minutes. You don't have to be in the sun, but you want to be able to look and see the sun, right? Or is it okay to be in the shade, or you want the sunlight hitting your skin also?

• 8:38Speaker 00

  It depends on how bright it is. So, for instance, this morning, I woke up, because of where I live, there's a lot of tree cover. But I saw that the sun was, was, uh, there were a lot of shadows, but it was casting a nice patch of light in the street right in front of my house. So, I'm the weirdo that walked out there. With my coffee. Uh, actually, I delayed my coffee. It was with my water in the morning. I'll talk about why I delay coffee. And I, um, and I, you know, I'm leaning against a tree. I confess, I was text messaging it part for part of that, you know? Forgive me, I'm human. And catching the sunlight coming in through my eyes for a few minutes, I allow myself to blink, obviously.

• 9:11Lewis Howes?

  You want to look directly at the sun.

• 9:13Speaker 00

  You know, I'll, you'll, there's a safety.

• 9:15Lewis Howes?

  I guess if it's a lower, lower horizon.

• 9:17Speaker 00

  It's not that intense. We have a built in safety mechanism, which is if you need to blink and close your eyes, close your eyes. Yeah. But yeah, I've got sunlight in my eyes. I get the weird looks from my neighbors, but they know me. And they do it too. Sometimes they'll join me. Animals will naturally do this. They'll migrate to the sun. So then I go inside. It's 10 minutes or so. It seems like a long time, but it is so beneficial. And then inside, if I want to be awake, I try and turn on as many bright lights as I can. One of the big mistakes that we've made in the last few years as a, as a culture is assuming that blue light is bad. During the day, lots of blue light is great because it, that's the best signal for these cells that wake up your, your system. It activates all sorts of important hormone pathways and wakefulness pathways. Interesting.

• 10:02Speaker 00

  It can reduce brain fog in some sense. Sure. It's in the evening that you want to avoid blue lights and bright lights of any kind. We can talk about that. But so then I come back inside and then I do not drink caffeine right away. It's important in many ways to delay caffeine enough so that you can clear out some of the chemical signals in the brain and body that lead to, that lead to a feeling of fatigue. So the longer you're awake, the more a molecule called adenosine builds up in your system. And when you sleep, you push that adenosine level back down. When you wake up in the morning, that adenosine level can be zero, but oftentimes there's still some hanging around. Caffeine is an adenosine antagonist. It blocks adenosine function.

• 10:46Speaker 00

  It's a little more complicated than that, but that's effectively what it does. So if you wake up and you've got, let's say 20%, let's make, this is arbitrary, but 20% of your adenosine has still hasn't been cleared out. That's sort of a drowsiness that you woke up with. Then you go and you drink your coffee and you crush that, that ability of adenosine to have that effect, but it hasn't gone away. So that when your coffee wears off mid morning, now that adenosine is there and you feel like there's a mid morning crash or an afternoon crash. So I delay my caffeine intake. For about ninety and ideally a hundred and twenty minutes after I wake up. Because in that way, you bring your adenosine level down very, very low to zero. And then you don't get this rebound crash in the afternoon.

• 11:29Speaker 00

  For years, I would get this post lunch crash. And I thought, maybe I'm eating too much for lunch, which I probably was, or maybe I'm eating the wrong foods. Turned out, it was all related to my timing of caffeine.

• 11:39Lewis Howes?

  Gosh.

• 11:39Speaker 00

  So, and your system learns how to wake up naturally.

• 11:41Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 11:42Speaker 00

  You get the natural cortisol and adrenaline.

• 11:44Lewis Howes?

  Give it the time.

• 11:45Speaker 00

  Give it the time. And people hate this one because it's a little painful for the caffeine addicts. But I'm a pretty serious caffeine addict and I embrace that. And I'll tell you, it also makes the joy of the coffee so much greater.

• 11:56Lewis Howes?

  Waiting for that, you're savoring it like, ah, my first sip.

• 11:59Speaker 00

  It tastes so much better. And that relates to the dopamine system, which I know we're gonna talk about later. I sometimes will drink yerba mate instead of.

• 12:06Lewis Howes?

  I love mate.

• 12:07Speaker 00

  Mate has a.

• 12:07Lewis Howes?

  Do you put honey in it or anything?

• 12:09Speaker 00

  I don't.

• 12:09Lewis Howes?

  Sweet TV or something?

• 12:10Speaker 00

  I don't really like sweet stuff too much.

• 12:12Lewis Howes?

  I wish I had that disease.

• 12:13Speaker 00

  Yeah, it's.

• 12:14Lewis Howes?

  You know, I wish.

• 12:15Speaker 00

  I like savory things and salty things. I, I like yerba mate for a number of reasons. I don't like the really smoky mates. And my dad's Argentine, so I grew up drinking mate, but.

• 12:26Lewis Howes?

  You don't speak Spanish, though, do you?

• 12:27Speaker 00

  I speak four words of Spanish and those I speak poorly, so.

• 12:32Lewis Howes?

  Your dad's fluent?

• 12:33Speaker 00

  He's fluent.

• 12:34Lewis Howes?

  Come on.

• 12:35Speaker 00

  I know. Parents who are.

• 12:36Lewis Howes?

  How do you, that's a crime, isn't it?

• 12:38Speaker 00

  It's a crime. Well, it's not a crime I committed. I love my dad.

• 12:41Lewis Howes?

  Your dad committed, yeah.

• 12:42Speaker 00

  Bilingual parents, please encourage your children to learn multiple languages. Musicians, parents.

• 12:49Lewis Howes?

  Teach your kids the instrument.

• 12:51Speaker 00

  Have you ever seen, the people who play guitar in college? Let's just say their lives are better than everyone else's.

• 12:56Lewis Howes?

  What are the benefits, as we're just, as a side point here, I was talking about mate. What are the benefits of learning two languages in early childhood development over only learning one?

• 13:07Speaker 00

  Well, probably multiple benefits, in addition to the practical benefits in life and jobs and opportunities. Opportunities, relationships. Absolutely. And there's, well, and relationship opportunities, if you're with, ever with someone, I was in a relationship for several years with somebody who was from France and spoke French. And I eventually picked up some French and I could understand, but I could never really understand the subtlety of the humor. And so there was a lot that we couldn't share, unfortunately. So there are multiple reasons to do that. I mean, there are many, many reasons to learn languages, but from a brain perspective, I mean, you've got this, as we say, neural architecture, these areas of the brain that are devoted to language, primarily on the left side, but really, it's, there's functionality

• 13:52Speaker 00

  on both sides. And those areas are like a template for whatever language you're exposed to. You can pack a lot more into that neural real estate if you learn multiple languages, and that affords you a flexibility at better language learning for new languages. So, you know, the languages that are Latin-based, so you could learn French as a child and speak English, and then find it easier to speak Italian. Or learn Italian and find it easier to learn French, just like if you learn how to play the oboe as a child, the guitar is actually going to be easier for you just because of the neural circuits for understanding scales and pitch and these kinds of things. You can tell I'm not a musician. Those are there. So I think there's a tremendous utility to it.

• 14:37Speaker 00

  Yeah, okay. But the mate is for the caffeine. The mate also tends to be, and it's never a pleasant topic, but it's somewhat of a laxative, which I think keeping digestion, flushing your system, and it contains something called glucagon-like peptide one, GLP-1. GLP-1 is something you're going to hear a lot more about in the years to come. It's actually now in clinical trials for the treatment of diabetes and obesity. It enhances lipolysis, the conversion of fat into energy. And It's just a

• 15:07Lewis Howes?

  So does that mean it helps you burn fat?

• 15:08Speaker 00

  It helps you burn fat. It helps you, we should be careful because sometimes this gets tricky. It helps you utilize fat as an energy source.

• 15:16Lewis Howes?

  And not needing the sugar.

• 15:17Speaker 00

  Right. Whether or not you visibly lose fat or not will depend on whether or not you're in a caloric deficit. But, but it helps shuttle the, direct the metabolism, let's say, toward using fat stores as an energy resource. Which is very good and it also has some indirect effects on blood sugar regulation through the insulin management pathway.

• 15:39Lewis Howes?

  And that's, and mate is caffeinated or no caffeine?

• 15:42Speaker 00

  Oftentimes it's caffeine and oftentimes it can be very high caffeine. The one that I like

• 15:46Lewis Howes?

  I thought you said no caffeine until 90 minutes after, right?

• 15:49Speaker 00

  Right. So I'm not touching mate until 90 to 120 minutes after waking up. It was, we were talking about coffee. Sometimes I'm drinking coffee, sometimes I'm drinking mate.

• 15:56Lewis Howes?

  Gotcha, gotcha, gotcha.

• 15:57Speaker 00

  And if I'm really get going for it, I really have this

• 16:00Lewis Howes?

  Doing both.

• 16:01Speaker 00

  I like to see the mate and the coffee. And I like to just sip one, then the other. Mate is kind of nice too because it contains electrolytes, so it's not as depleting.

• 16:12Lewis Howes?

  Dehydrating?

• 16:13Speaker 00

  Yeah, well, your neurons run on sodium, magnesium and potassium. That's how neurons fire. Sodium ions rush into the cell. If you're low in sodium or you're dehydrated, your brain isn't going to work as well. So caffeine in the form of coffee is great, but you should probably drink two volumes of water for every one volume of coffee you drink in order to hydrate. And a lot of people feel jittery when they drink caffeine. Or they feel lightheaded or they suddenly get hungry. Oftentimes that's because they're sodium depleted. I think 2022, I think we're also going to hear a lot about the value of salt. Salt is an essential nutrient. Obviously, people with hypertension should not be consuming too much salt. But there's a lot of good science now to support the fact that if you're feeling

• 16:58Speaker 00

  lightheaded or you feel like you have quote unquote low blood sugar. Oftentimes taking a little pinch of salt, putting it in some water and drinking that, maybe with some lemon juice to adjust the taste. All of a sudden, you're shaking, stabilizes, you feel more alert. Why? Because salt and water have an interesting relationship. It increases blood volume and oftentimes then you're getting more blood flow to the brain simply by increasing your sodium intake.

• 17:24Lewis Howes?

  In this section, the inspiring Tony Robbins breaks down the importance of removing mental clutter and focusing on the life you deserve. It seems like what I'm seeing and hearing from a lot of people that this past year, everything has fallen apart for them. Their health, their relationships, their finances, their mission or purpose, and their spiritual awareness, like every area of life has been in breakdown mode for some people. Not everyone, some people have had incredible lives and have stepped up to the occasion and broken through on all these things. But I'm seeing a pattern of a lot of people breaking down in many areas. Hypothetical scenario, let's say you could only focus on one thing to get you started. You only had the time and energy to focus on one of these areas.

• 18:07Lewis Howes?

  Your health, your relationships are all breaking down, your finances are failing everywhere. Where should people lean into first to kind of create that foundation so that everything else can start to rise as well?

• 18:18Speaker 01

  I think before you answer what to do, you've got to answer while you're there.

• 18:24Speaker 01

  It is not because of the pandemic.

• 18:27Speaker 01

  I remember when 9/11 happened and people tell, "Oh my God, my life was destroyed because of 9/11." And there were people in the same building who turned their life around, grew spiritually, grew closer to their family, made their businesses larger, and the same building burned down. Right? I know in my case, you know, 9/11 comes, if you can imagine, you know, I'm fortunate to have now more than 80 companies in all these different industries and obviously, you know, done pretty darned well by most people's standards of business and life. But my core mission is what I do for a living. It's why I'm here talking to you right now. It's getting people to be free and alive and have a level of fulfillment that they deserve to have. I know they desire, but I also believe they deserve to have. But to deserve to have it, you've got to do certain things. Right? And so you're not in a place of being overweight because you lost your job.

• 19:12Speaker 01

  So stop the bullshit blame. Blame is not a strategy for a meaningful life. Blame is not a strategy for greatness. So you've got to resolve that, number one. And then your question was, what's the one thing to focus on if you only focus on one? I think it's smart to focus on one thing primarily. Focus on too many can be overwhelming. Other people, it's good to focus on multiple things. It depends on your personality. So I wouldn't presuppose. But then the answer would be whichever thing you're most desirous of changing. Whatever thing is giving you the most pain. So if it's your relationship, I'd go full force on that. Now, in the world we're in today, you know, you don't usually have the privilege of going, okay, I want to work on just being happy. Well, I can train to be happy while hell's breaking loose.

• 19:55Speaker 01

  You can sit in this chair and be totally euphoric. But if you do that in a Western culture, people come and take your furniture. Right? So you probably have to work on both your business or financial side and some personal side. I would be working on both. And to me, the way to attack that, if you're not sure which area, is to start with the body. And I know you can relate to this, Lewis, because you and I both share this in common. It's like, I always teach physiology first, as you well know. If you change the body, you'll change the emotions. If you change the emotions, you'll change your decisions, you'll change the quality of your life. Because the quality of your life is your emotions. It's not what you get, and you have a billion dollars and commit suicide. People have done it. Right? You can have beautiful relationships and commit suicide. You can have people loving you and be sad all the time.

• 20:39Speaker 01

  Our pattern of emotion is our home. And you have to upgrade your home. You have to train it. And one way to train it is the emotion comes from the way you move, the way you breathe, the way you speak. So if I said to your listeners, there's a depressed person behind the curtain over here, and I'll give a hundred thousand dollars to their favorite charity if they had to describe their body, their posture, and they're depressed, you tell me. I'll just use the example. What's that person look like?

• 21:05Lewis Howes?

  They're slunched down, they're looking down at their feet, they're not looking upward, their shoulders are over, they're...

• 21:12Speaker 01

  Are they breathing full or shallow, do you think?

• 21:14Lewis Howes?

  They're shallow.

• 21:15Speaker 01

  Are they talking fast or slow?

• 21:17Lewis Howes?

  They're talking... If they're depressed, they're probably talking fast because they're not calm.

• 21:22Speaker 01

  Well, no, that's usually stressed. Depressed is different than stressed.

• 21:26Lewis Howes?

  They're slow, they're probably talking low volume, slower than...

• 21:30Speaker 01

  And all those physical characteristics change your biochemistry towards this feeling of being depressed. And in a depressed state, you won't do anything. When I used to be depressed, and I don't get it anymore. I just took it out of my life. I even took the language of it out of my life. Because the words you create, create a biochemical response. But when I did that decades ago, because I was like, having those thoughts like, is there a reason to still be here? That kind of crazy shit in your head. I got out of it by using anger originally. I'd much like, sometimes if somebody's really sad or depressed, I'll make them angry. People like, what's he doing to make him angry? Because anger is much more resourceful than depressed. From anger, I can get you the laughter, I can get you the taking action. So, and then gradually, I got why I didn't need anger. It was about growth. It was about contribution. It was about meaning. So there's like stages to go through. But to answer your question,

• 22:14Speaker 01

  they should work on both their business side of their life and personal, one of each. And in order for either one of those to work, you need to be in a strong emotional state. And if you start with your body, like you know, I start every morning in my cold water, start every morning with my workout. I start every morning by feeding my mind, right? So there's certain things you gotta do physically. So you're strong enough to remember the truth. Because remember, fear is physical. You feel your throat or your gut. So is courage. Courage doesn't mean you're not afraid. It just means you're strong enough, you push through in spite of the fear, right? And courage feels different in the body. So when you go lift, or you go for a sprint, or a strong run, or you jump in that freezing water, when you push your mind, you go beyond what's comfortable, you feel a strength inside you, and that strength will help you to change your body, your emotions, your relationships, whatever.

• 22:56Speaker 01

  But then the other thing I gotta say is, model someone who's successful. Don't just do this shit by trial and error. Like, find somebody who has what you want. Ideally, maybe more than one person, two or three. And see what are they doing different than you in their relationship? What do they believe different than you about relationship? If it's their body, what are they doing different? They're not lucky. They're doing things differently. You might be slightly biochemically different, but there's patterns there that you can see. And so, instead of learning by trial and error, which can take decades, you may never learn, Jim Rohn taught me, success leaves clues, man. Find someone's got what you want, study what they do, every aspect of it, and then add yourself to it. And that's the pathway to speed of transformation. So now, like, you know, I've done it. I'm not the only person. There's so many companies

• 23:41Speaker 01

  that went from worse off than they'd ever been in their history, to the best off because they found a way to pivot. But that required a psychological piece of not blame. So maybe it's time for you to think for yourself, and model what works, instead of just what you're told. That's something to consider for yourself.

• 23:59Lewis Howes?

  It's one of the reasons you've got millions of people that model after you, just like myself in many areas of my life. I've got three final questions. Is that okay to ask?

• 24:06Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 24:06Lewis Howes?

  Three final question?

• 24:07Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 24:07Lewis Howes?

  Okay. Want to be respectful of your time since we're at the top of the hour. Just want to make sure I'm good.

• 24:13Lewis Howes?

  You mentioned, I had the opportunity to go to Fiji with you and Dean Graziosi and a group of people about a year and a half ago. And you mentioned that winter was coming. This was in 2019, I guess. Or, yeah, right before 2020. And you mentioned winter is coming. I don't know how, where, what? What type of crisis is happening? But something's gonna happen. It may be in six months, it may be in the next few years, but something is happening. And from people that went through 9/11 to the housing crisis of 2008, 2009, to then 2020, what would you say if people want to prepare themselves

• 24:54Lewis Howes?

  to create more financial abundance over the next 10 years? With winter coming, maybe again sooner than later, what should people be focusing on in order to earn more and invest more so that they're not overwhelmed financially with the next winter?

• 25:12Speaker 01

  Well, first of all, I want to acknowledge that every generation, there's a book everyone should read. It's called The Fourth Turning. It's not a great read. I'll be honest with you in advance. I read it 25 years ago. One of the most seminal books I've ever read because what it will show you is that every generation goes through different stages. A winter time, a really, really rough time. A springtime, like after the rough times, we usually see this easy growth. You know, a summer where, God, I'm working hard, doesn't seem to reward. And then a fall where all the rewards show up in a major level. But those seasons, which may be 10, 20 years are a way of thinking. For some people, those seasons happen in their youth, some midlife, some later, because there's a cycle of history. It's 1,000 years of history you can study. It's fascinating. I'm not gonna try

• 25:55Speaker 01

  to explain it to you right now, but if you want perspective, it's there. The generation you're speaking of, the millennial generation, very special generation. I don't mean special like you're so special. Special because they have a unique place in human history. They've experienced certain shocks at a certain time. They are an archetype of one of the four seasons of life. The last one is called the great generation. Think about this, if you were born in the year, say nineteen hundred, nineteen oh one, nineteen oh two, something like that. When you're coming of age, twenty years old, when you want to think about your life and where it's going and all that stuff. Right, I'd say nineteen ten, excuse me. When you're coming of age, if you're born in nineteen ten, the stock market crashes. The biggest depression in human history, at least that we're aware of, modern history, happens. You know, fifty percent of people seem to be losing their jobs.

• 26:40Speaker 01

  There seems to be no hope whatsoever, right as you're coming to your early prime, gonna make things happen. Also, that's nineteen twenty nine. What happens a decade later when you're about to turn thirty? Another seminal time in your life. World War Two breaks out. Holy shit, the whole world wants it's gonna get over. We're talking about world war all over the earth, and it looks like Hitler's gonna win. And that we're gonna have Nazism everywhere, and countries are dropping like flies, and the economy's going through the floor. And you just turn thirty.

• 27:12Speaker 01

  But guess what? At forty, the greatest bull market in the history of the world began for that generation. But they were so tested and so strong from everything they've been through. But then they were tested by their own kids, who didn't have to go through that suffering. Who thought life should be easy for them and said, look at you, you're not balanced, you aren't fair to women, and they weren't. But they were busy fighting wars to get to the part where you'd have time to do that. It's like, see, people say, you know, art, for the sake of art's sake, is for the well-fed. Right, you know, it's like, you know, these people have a different journey. And so, it's not like challenges disappear. But they're called the great generation because they found their way through those things. Because it was a generation that was not taught to look for excuses.

• 27:55Speaker 01

  I think the millennial generation is the next great generation, if they play their cards right. And I think there's enough great people in that generation to help lead a new direction for it. And I think there's, technology allows them to connect in new ways, but technology unfortunately also pits them against other people. Because if you've seen The Social Dilemma, you know there are people manipulating your brain and your biochemistry and your dopamine right now. So, but I think they'll figure that out. I think they really will. Now, the answer to your question. I want to give that context because without the context, all this is about survival or doing okay for yourself. And I think you're not going to feel a great life just trying to take care of yourself. Don't get me wrong. It's like,

• 28:34Speaker 01

  if you know the Indian tradition in India, that they teach the these four aims of life. The first aim is Artha, A R T H A. And what that means is prosperity and security, but it's important to take care of that because when that prosperity and security is there, it's not like that's not spiritual. Taking care of yourself and your family is part of life. And so you need to do that. And then the next level of development, next aim of life is Kama, K A M A. And that means pleasure. And it's good to find pleasure. Like if you've found good work that serves more than yourself, you're going to prosper. But then do you enjoy it? And do you enjoy your life? And do you appreciate things? And it's like finding that appreciation. It isn't just sensuality or sexuality. It's music, it's art, it's family, it's all these things. It's the history of your own country and finding the good, right?

• 29:20Speaker 01

  And then the third level for that most people have heard of is Dharma, which is, you know, your purpose or your truth. But notice you really don't have a real clear Dharma in most people unless they got some level of prosperity or security, some level of enjoyment of life, but they get to the point of thinking broader. Now, some people early on are trying to find their purpose. What's my purpose? What's my purpose? I gotta find my ultimate purpose. Who said there's one frickin' purpose?

• 29:43Speaker 01

  Where did you get that delusion? And why does it have to be so huge? I know like when I was a young kid, I had this purpose statement, the purpose of my life is to be a passionate, loving, incredible creation of what God shows is possible by serving all its humanity and lifting them. And I went on and on and on. Now, like, what's my purpose? How can I help? I mean, serving is what my purpose is. I don't need all this bullshit. And that means I can do it when I introduce, when I say hello to the mailman, I can do it in front of 50,000 people. I can do it with my child. Right? And there's lots of different purposes as you go through your life. But most people are trying to get that. They haven't even figured out what the hell they're gonna do. They haven't even figured out, enjoy their life. Your purpose will unfold if you do the right thing.

• 30:27Lewis Howes?

  In this section, Dr. Daniel Amen discusses some of the most common habits we should kick to increase daily brain function.

• 30:35Daniel Amen?

  I'm gonna ask you some controversial questions about brain health. How much, is it a third of Americans are obese? Or is it two thirds?

• 30:45Lewis Howes?

  Two thirds of Americans?

• 30:46Daniel Amen?

  Seventy-two percent of Americans are overweight.

• 30:49Lewis Howes?

  Are overweight?

• 30:50Daniel Amen?

  Forty-two percent of us are obese.

• 30:53Lewis Howes?

  Obese.

• 30:53Daniel Amen?

  I published three studies. In fact, I did an NFL study. One of them was an NFL study. I took players at the same position who were at a healthy weight versus those that were overweight. The overweight had sleepy frontal lobes. They had decreased activity in the frontal lobe. I just published a study on 35,000 people. It's one of the largest imaging studies ever done. And there is virtually a linear correlation between as your weight goes up, the function of your brain goes down.

• 31:26Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 31:26Daniel Amen?

  Oh, morbidly obese was worse than obese, which was worse than overweight, which was worse than healthy weight.

• 31:35Lewis Howes?

  So healthy weight versus?

• 31:37Daniel Amen?

  So healthy weight would be the best activity, and then overweight, and then obese, and then morbidly obese.

• 31:44Lewis Howes?

  What consists of overweight versus obese? Is this body fat percentage?

• 31:50Daniel Amen?

  Well, it's something called BMI, or Body Mass Index, which in NFL players, actually, doesn't correlate very well. For them, it's their waist to height ratio. So your waist should be half.

• 32:06Daniel Amen?

  Your height or less. So if you're six feet tall but seventy-two inches, your weight, your waist, and you gotta measure, you can't go by your pant size. Because the clothing industry knows that we're unhappy. And so you guys gotta put a tape measure right around your belly button. And so if you're six feet, your waist should be thirty-six inches or less. That's good. If it's not, then it's good to work on. Right? And just see it as a problem to solve. But if you wanna keep your brain healthy or rescue it, if it's headed to the dark place, you have to prevent or treat the eleven major risk factors. I have a mnemonic for that, I read about it in the books, called bright minds.

• 32:48Daniel Amen?

  Well, if you're overweight, that automatically means you have five of the risk factors. Really? Because being overweight decreases blood flow, that's what my studies showed. It increases inflammation. It stores toxins, fat stores toxins, like if you smoked pie. It actually stays in your body for thirty days. Wow. It changes your hormones. And this is like shocking for me and my NFL work. That these big, strapping, virile men are almost all low in testosterone. Because when you have subconcussive blows, it damages the pituitary gland, which turns off the production of testosterone.

• 33:29Daniel Amen?

  And so belly fat especially takes healthy testosterone and turns it into unhealthy, cancer-promoting forms of estrogen. And so, you know, you have the diabetes, risk factor, blood flow, inflammation, toxins, and hormones. And so... That's all from being overweight. That's all from being overweight. It's just a thing we should be working on. And what I often say is the real weapons of mass destruction. ISIS has nothing on our food industry. Right. They're highly processed, pesticide-sprayed, high glycemic, low-fiber food-like substances

• 34:13Daniel Amen?

  stored in plastic containers. This is what's really killing the health of America.

• 34:20Lewis Howes?

  Okay, so obesity is a, what I'm hearing you say obesity is a big factor to mental health stresses and brain stresses.

• 34:30Daniel Amen?

  And Alzheimer's disease.

• 34:31Lewis Howes?

  And Alzheimer's.

• 34:32Daniel Amen?

  Yeah, I mean, they're all, it all sort of goes together from depression to problems in school to memory problems later in life.

• 34:42Lewis Howes?

  What's your thought, I mean, I'm all for people loving themselves where they're at, where they're at in their life and loving their bodies for where they're at and not shaming themselves and the self-love movement of accepting yourself for where you are. But that's only going to hurt our brains if we're not actually saying, okay, I accept and love myself where I'm at and the decisions I've made to be here, but I've got to start working on these things. Otherwise, there's going to be some challenges emotionally, mentally, anxiety, depression, if I don't work on it, right? My health.

• 35:13Daniel Amen?

  The don't worry, be happy people die the earliest from accidents and preventable illnesses. And I want people to love themselves, but doing the right thing is an act of love. Like, if you're really unhealthy, walking is an act of love. And so, so it sort of catches me in this funny place. I remember I was on a plane once and, and I'd figure out this connection between, as your weight goes up, the size and function of your brain goes down.

• 35:55Daniel Amen?

  And I was sitting next to someone who was very overweight and we were on a tiny plane going to Des Moines, Iowa for public television. And in my head, I'm like, oh, you want to talk to her about that? And then I, I talk to myself all the time, it's like, no, you don't want to say anything. Don't need to upset her day. And, but then I went to Pittsburgh and I went to GNC, you know, the supplement company.

• 36:27Daniel Amen?

  One of my core values is being authentic. I live the message of my life and the message of GNC is health.

• 36:35Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 36:35Daniel Amen?

  And their number three guy, their marketing director, took me to dinner, was morbidly obese.

• 36:41Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 36:41Daniel Amen?

  And, and that thought in my head is, you should talk to him about this. And, and he made the comment, he opened the conversation, he's like, you know, I don't know why I'm overweight, but my numbers are okay. And I'm like, Tom.

• 36:59Lewis Howes?

  What numbers?

• 37:00Daniel Amen?

  And I'm like, Tom, you don't want to be a dinosaur. Cause I had figured out, big body, little brain, you're gonna become extinct. And we had this great conversation because my favorite verse in the New Testament is John 8:32. Know the truth and the truth will set you free. I'm like, do you not want to be like the number two guy or the number one guy? You're not gonna do that if your brain's not healthy. And that conversation, the next year, he lost 80 pounds.

• 37:33Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 37:34Daniel Amen?

  Most people don't know that this is a serious health, mental health, brain health risk. And I just want to tell people the truth and I want them to get healthy. And people go, but I don't like any of, one of my NFL players, but I don't like any of the foods that are healthy for me. And I'm like, none, not one? And we did this great exercise and it turned out he liked like 70 of the foods that were. It's like, you only want to love food that loves you back. It's a relationship, right?

• 38:15Daniel Amen?

  I don't know if you've ever been in a bad relationship, but I've been in a bad relationship. I was in a 20 year marriage with someone who didn't like me very much. I'm never gonna do that again. I'm just not, it's a boundary for me. And I'm damn sure not gonna be in a relationship, a bad relationship with food. I want to be in a good relationship. I mean, I love food, I just want it to love me back.

• 38:40Lewis Howes?

  What are the five foods that we should have to help our brain the most?

• 38:45Daniel Amen?

  Salmon, wild salmon, blueberries, walnuts, olive or avocado oil.

• 38:57Daniel Amen?

  Yeah, healthy protein, chocolate. Uh, I make this great, brain-healthy hot chocolate. Every night for my family.

• 39:05Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 39:05Daniel Amen?

  I just look at the six of them that live at home. I'm like, okay, who's up for it tonight? So Costco, of all places, organic vanilla, unsweetened almond milk, raw cacao, it's a superfood. Uh, so organic raw cacao. And a little bit of Sweet Leaf is a company that makes flavored stevia. They make chocolate-flavored stevia. And put it in the blender, heat it up. Phenomenal. Good for me, I love it, and it loves me back.

• 39:40Lewis Howes?

  It loves you back. So salmon, blueberries, walnuts, avocado, or avocado oil, raw chocolate are some of the top favorite foods for the brain.

• 39:49Daniel Amen?

  For the brain.

• 39:49Lewis Howes?

  Why are these foods? Is it high in antioxidants? Is it proteins that they have?

• 39:55Daniel Amen?

  So blueberry, it's the phytonutrients. They've actually done studies showing cognitive enhancement with blueberry juice. Uh, salmon, it's the omega-3 fatty acids. And the complete protein, avocados, it's the healthy fat, uh, especially omega-3 fatty acids. Same with walnuts. Your brain is fat. Low-fat diets are bad.

• 40:22Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 40:22Daniel Amen?

  For your brain. People who go on low-fat diets actually have an increased incidence of depression.

• 40:28Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 40:28Daniel Amen?

  Yeah. So, now you don't want bad fats, fried fats particularly. You want healthy fats, avocados, nuts and seeds, green leafy vegetables.

• 40:39Lewis Howes?

  Olive oil is in there too.

• 40:40Daniel Amen?

  Olive oil, avocado oil, damienet oil.

• 40:44Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. So how much?

• 40:49Lewis Howes?

  How much food should the brain have? Is it, you know, your buddy, our buddy, Dave Asprey talks about fasting a lot. A lot of people are in this fasting craze. If we're not giving the brain food or nutrients for a day, three days, five days, does that help the brain? Does it reset the brain? Does it hurt the brain?

• 41:08Daniel Amen?

  So intermittent fasting, where you go 12 to 16 hours from dinner to breakfast or lunch, is good. They've actually found your, there's a term called autophagy. Where your brain begins to clean up some of the trash.

• 41:25Lewis Howes?

  So it works in the brain too, not just in the fat cells in the body?

• 41:28Daniel Amen?

  It works on the brain as well. Now, I grew up Roman Catholic and long suffering was one of the gifts. And I never got that one. I'm not a fan of long suffering. I'm not doing a marathon. It's like way too much stress for my brain. And I'm not fasting for three days. But I can go 12 hours. I mean, like, that's not a big deal. And it helps people lose weight. It helps them be healthy. And I come from a family of fat people. My dad used to hate when I would say that. But I have a brother who's 150 pounds overweight, despite me loving him, nudging him. And you just have to be thoughtful. Know your vulnerability in bright minds.

• 42:13Daniel Amen?

  And G is genetics. So know what you're genetically vulnerable to. And, you know, I have to work on it.

• 42:19Lewis Howes?

  Right, right. How, you mentioned you don't do marathons. If you're not traumatizing the brain through contact sports, but you're an endurance junkie. You love to run marathons. You run them every year. You do triathlons. You do ultra marathons. You're doing mountain climbing. Are these activities good for the brain? To put some extreme stress on it, even if it's not physical contact to the brain? Or does it long-term hurt the brain?

• 42:49Daniel Amen?

  The scans I have of extreme athletes are not good.

• 42:52Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 42:53Daniel Amen?

  Yeah, I think it's too much stress for the brain. I love HIIT training, high intensity training. That's been shown to increase mitochondria and cells. I'm not a fan of putting your body under a lot of stress. It's just not good for it. Some stress is good. We call it eustress, a little bit, so your fibers grow. That's why weight training is important. The stronger you are as you age, less likely are to have Alzheimer's disease.

• 43:27Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 43:28Daniel Amen?

  But you wanna love your brain. You wanna make sure you're sleeping for your brain. That's the S in Bright Minds.

• 43:35Lewis Howes?

  So if someone's like, you know what? Okay, I hear what you're saying, but I really love to do a marathon or two a year. And a few times in my life, I wanna do, you know, I wanna climb Everest or something like that. I wanna do something to challenge myself.

• 43:49Daniel Amen?

  And I go, like, awesome.

• 43:50Lewis Howes?

  Is that gonna hurt the brain long term?

• 43:52Daniel Amen?

  It's not gonna, if you're doing everything else right. So one of my NFL players just signed an $80 million deal.

• 43:59Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 43:59Daniel Amen?

  So he's gonna play. And he's going to play. And, but if you're gonna do something that is potentially damaging to the brain, make sure you're doing everything else right. So for example, being a firefighter is a brain damaging profession. We need to own that, just like we need to own playing football is a brain damaging profession. It's like, own it, everybody knows it. Now, when I started my work in 2007, very few people know it. Now, everybody knows it.

• 44:35Daniel Amen?

  But they don't know that being a firefighter, because there are heroes. Those are the people we need when we need them, and we need them healthy. But because of the toxins they breathe, because of the emotional trauma they see, day in and day out, because of the head traumas they experience, they have a higher incidence of depression, a higher incidence of suicide, and a higher incidence of early death. We should not be okay with this. But it doesn't mean we're not gonna have firefighters. What it means is we should put their brain in a rehabilitative environment.

• 45:12Daniel Amen?

  All the time. We should be teaching them about brain health like with NFL players. Currently, we should be teaching them, "Look, if you're gonna do this, own it. It's a brain damaging sport, so let's just do everything else right."

• 45:27Lewis Howes?

  What are the other things right that you talk about? Are there a few main keys? Is it nutrition? Is it sleep?

• 45:32Daniel Amen?

  Well, we think about bright minds. It's such a good model. So, blood flow, B is blood flow. So, exercise and foods like beets that increase blood flow or supplements like Ginkgo that increase blood flow. The R is retirement and aging. New learning is absolutely critical. You know, your work and studying greatness, you're always learning something new, which is great for the brain.

• 46:01Lewis Howes?

  Retirement plus aging, is that what you said?

• 46:02Daniel Amen?

  Retirement and aging.

• 46:04Lewis Howes?

  So continuing to learn in those stages?

• 46:06Daniel Amen?

  And always putting yourself in an anti-aging environment. So, the food you eat, the exercise, new learning, being passionate, never retiring, right? I mean, maybe you go and do something else you like better because you have enough money, but never retirement. Because when you start, when you, when you start not doing things, your brain actually starts to disconnect.

• 46:31Lewis Howes?

  In this final section, Evy Poumpouras shares techniques used by the Secret Service to help build confidence and poise in high-stress situations.

• 46:41Evy Poumpouras?

  Find alternative ways to let people down.

• 46:45Lewis Howes?

  Why is that? Why not?

• 46:46Evy Poumpouras?

  To preserve the relationship.

• 46:48Lewis Howes?

  Because when you say no to someone, even if it's a friend, they might take it personally?

• 46:51Evy Poumpouras?

  It stings, right? Why are you saying no to me? Why do you have to say like that? You can say, you can reject people in a thoughtful way, in a professional way. It just, it depends. Like, do you care about the relationship? And if you do, your no, your hard no can hurt people's feelings. People become sensitive because you're rejecting them. And so, I'm gonna think of a different way to say no that's not gonna impact you as much. It's really using language thoughtfully. So, for example, you brought up lying. I love that. And you said, "You know, when I was a kid, I lied." So, I would never say to you... Louis, you're a liar. Or Louis, no, Louis, you're lying to me. I would say Louis, I know you're not being truthful with me. Louis, you're holding something back from me.

• 47:36Evy Poumpouras?

  Sounds different. So it's the same way with language. We don't. We throw our words out and we don't realize that they land on someone. And so then we scratch our heads, heads wondering, why did this conversation not go well? It's this person's the problem. When we don't have that ability to think about, how did I deliver this? So if it's a business relationship that's important to you, but you want to say no to this, you want to think of a great way to say no. So we want to think about how do we let people down? Without hurting their identity. Going back to identity.

• 48:13Lewis Howes?

  Was there ever a time when you were interviewing or interrogating someone? And you didn't believe them, ever? But they were telling 100% the truth.

• 48:23Evy Poumpouras?

  Oh my God, you just reminded me of this case.

• 48:26Lewis Howes?

  You're just like, I know this person's lying to me, but at the end of the day, everything he said was pretty true or almost 100%.

• 48:32Evy Poumpouras?

  This was, this was, I've never, I had, it was such a simple case and it was even, it was not even for a lot of money. It was an ATM scam. This man was going to ATMs and he was taking, stealing money. Somebody would go in, use their credit card, he'd come from behind, take money. Very simple. On the ATM.

• 48:49Lewis Howes?

  With like a gun or something?

• 48:50Evy Poumpouras?

  No, no, no, no, just follow them in. There's these little skimmers that they put on top of the machine so when you scan your card, that it would pick up your information as well and then you could go. There's all these different scams. So, but when you go to the ATM, there's a camera there. It's got your full picture. So I have a picture of this guy, my perpetrator. It's a picture of him. I see him, his face, he's wearing a hat. He's wearing a New York Knicks hat. And I was like, here's my guy. All right, you know, I've got it. All I gotta do is lay the picture on. So he shows up for his interview, wearing the same New York Knicks hat.

• 49:28Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 49:29Evy Poumpouras?

  So I start speaking to him. I don't take out my evidence, right? Because I'm saving that.

• 49:32Lewis Howes?

  She knew this was a slam dunk.

• 49:34Evy Poumpouras?

  This is slam dunk. I was like, and he didn't even steal a lot, $500, it was something.

• 49:38Lewis Howes?

  Small.

• 49:38Evy Poumpouras?

  I don't know how it landed in my lap, but it did. And sir, you took the money. No, no, miss. I swear to God, I would never do that. Sir, we have this. So I'm doing this with him for like 15 minutes. And this was a mistake on my part.

• 49:51Lewis Howes?

  We have evidence, we have proof, we have

• 49:53Evy Poumpouras?

  You know.

• 49:53Lewis Howes?

  Video footage of you at the scene.

• 49:56Evy Poumpouras?

  Never me, never me. And I pull out, I think I'm being slick, and I pull out my photo of him. Boom, right on the table. Who's that, sir? Right now, I'm sitting there, I'm all smug, I'm like, I got this guy. And he takes it, and he looks at it, he's like, Looks like me. Yeah, he looks like me. He's not me.

• 50:22Evy Poumpouras?

  I was like, what? That's you. He's like, it looks like me, that's not me. Same hat, New York Knicks hat.

• 50:30Lewis Howes?

  You're wearing it right now.

• 50:31Evy Poumpouras?

  Yeah, no. And I, it was a crazy interview, and I remember it was for money, it was not for a lot of money. In fact, when it came to financial crimes, crimes that had to do with money, it was actually harder to get people to confess to those.

• 50:46Lewis Howes?

  Why?

• 50:47Evy Poumpouras?

  Less guilt.

• 50:49Lewis Howes?

  Less guilt. They didn't hurt someone physically.

• 50:51Evy Poumpouras?

  Yes.

• 50:52Lewis Howes?

  They might have hurt them financially.

• 50:53Evy Poumpouras?

  Yes. I'm at home, I'm sitting behind my computer, I'm in my fuzzy slippers.

• 50:58Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 50:58Evy Poumpouras?

  Or even if I'm doing it at the ATM, I'm not stealing from you, I'm stealing from the bank.

• 51:03Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 51:04Evy Poumpouras?

  But it's different when I walk by you and actually put my hand in your pocket. It's different when I go into your home and I assault you.

• 51:11Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 51:12Evy Poumpouras?

  So there's, there's that level of guilt, when it's money, and especially if you steal it from an institution.

• 51:17Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, who cares?

• 51:18Evy Poumpouras?

  Zero guilt. Those were the hardest to get. But yeah, that was my guy. I will never forget it, that's why I started last night.

• 51:23Lewis Howes?

  Was it him or was it not him?

• 51:24Evy Poumpouras?

  It was him. We arrested him anyway, because we had the proof. But it's always great to get, it's always helpful to have a confession. Because it really just kind of seals everything. You've got the evidence, you've got this, the person said it.

• 51:37Lewis Howes?

  But he never agreed to it?

• 51:39Evy Poumpouras?

  No, no, no.

• 51:39Lewis Howes?

  He said, "Looks like me, but it's not me."

• 51:41Evy Poumpouras?

  No, same New York Knicks hat. Yeah, I don't know, I guess he's from New York. Who doesn't like the Knicks? He just, nothing. And you could see his face. Looks like me. I got nothing from him.

• 51:50Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 51:51Evy Poumpouras?

  Yeah.

• 51:51Lewis Howes?

  So he never actually told the truth, but it was in fact him?

• 51:54Evy Poumpouras?

  It was him. I mean, we had evidence, we had prints, we had all that stuff. But yeah, no, he, you know, to the end. No, not me.

• 52:01Lewis Howes?

  Could you tell, like?

• 52:02Evy Poumpouras?

  I couldn't tell.

• 52:03Lewis Howes?

  You couldn't tell he was lying or not?

• 52:05Evy Poumpouras?

  I couldn't tell. No, he was so believable. But I knew going in that he was my guy.

• 52:10Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 52:10Evy Poumpouras?

  So that's why I was like, I know it's him, but it was just like, shh, stoic. And there's a moment, I'm like, isn't that him? These are so good. You're like, am I seeing this right? Turn the photo around. I'm like, no, no, it's him, it's him, it's him. No, no, this is you. So some people are that good. Some people are that good. They will, some people, and I think this is, look, this was also somebody who committed a lot of crimes. And

• 52:34Lewis Howes?

  He was used to it. He knew how to get out of it.

• 52:37Evy Poumpouras?

  So certain people who are, who lie a lot usually become better at it. Or they, or they don't feel bad. It becomes, become better at masking it. You obviously have a great conscience, and so it bothered you, and so all your tells were shown. You couldn't conceal it.

• 52:54Lewis Howes?

  Your heart is pumping, like your chest is tight, like your throat is clenching, you're like, ah.

• 52:59Evy Poumpouras?

  It bothered you.

• 53:00Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 53:01Evy Poumpouras?

  Which is a healthy thing. It's actually a healthy thing when it bothers you. We tend to see in people who are, who have sociopathic tendencies or antisocial tendencies, those people don't tend to be bothered. And so they can lie and can be quite calm about it. Uh, because they don't feel that guilt. The majority of people will feel guilt. So the majority of people will feel the way you feel. Because you know it's wrong, you feel it. Whereas those individuals with those tendencies, they don't care.

• 53:35Lewis Howes?

  What about, um, a situation that?

• 53:41Lewis Howes?

  You lied your way through where someone believed you. Is there a situation like that in the last three to five years where you lied about something you're not proud of maybe? Or that people believed, but people believed you and more than just, oh, I'm having a good day lie?

• 53:57Evy Poumpouras?

  You know what I did? I could probably confess that this is just so long ago. I went and got, it was back in the day, I got a money order from.

• 54:06Lewis Howes?

  Western Union?

• 54:07Evy Poumpouras?

  The post office.

• 54:08Lewis Howes?

  Post office.

• 54:08Evy Poumpouras?

  And you know, I was like young, I was a kid, I wasn't making a lot of money, I was in college. And so I asked for a money order for like three ninety-nine. I pay, I get it. And then as I'm leaving, I see four ninety-nine and I'm like, oh.

• 54:21Lewis Howes?

  Hundred bucks?

• 54:22Evy Poumpouras?

  Hundred bucks and I took it and to this day, I remember it, it bothered me.

• 54:26Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 54:27Evy Poumpouras?

  Yeah, it bothered me.

• 54:29Lewis Howes?

  Did it bother that you didn't tell the truth right then and say, hey, you guys gave me?

• 54:32Evy Poumpouras?

  No, I took the money.

• 54:33Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 54:34Evy Poumpouras?

  I took the money.

• 54:35Lewis Howes?

  It bothered you that you lied about it?

• 54:36Evy Poumpouras?

  Statute of limitations, I think I'm okay.

• 54:39Evy Poumpouras?

  I took the money. It bothered me afterward because I knew it was, um, I knew it was wrong. I will tell you this one story. We went.

• 54:47Lewis Howes?

  Did that come up in the Secret Service interview? Did you ever steal something like money when you were younger?

• 54:51Evy Poumpouras?

  You know what I did lie about and did come up in my Secret Service interview? I'll tell you that I, when I applied for the job, when I went to, um, when I went to college, my parents, and I love my family. They weren't very supportive. They weren't very supportive of my decisions. My dad was a bit difficult, like they didn't really want me to go. And so when you apply for college, you need their paperwork, their tax paperwork. I needed aid. They couldn't afford it.

• 55:17Lewis Howes?

  Right, right.

• 55:18Evy Poumpouras?

  And so my dad was so upset with me, he wouldn't give me his tax paperwork.

• 55:23Lewis Howes?

  To go to college?

• 55:24Evy Poumpouras?

  Yeah. They didn't agree with my decisions because I was going to private school that, um, they could not afford. And I was like, I'll figure it out on my own. But either way, and so I lied, lied. When I went to the school, I said, I can't get this tax paperwork. You know, the main person was there is like, well, you think you can't get aid? And so I went back to the school later on and I said, I'm not living at home. I'm alone. Can I get aid? I can't get access to this tax paperwork. And then I got aid. So I flat out, I, yup, I lied and I spilled the beans in my polygraph. I was like.

• 55:59Lewis Howes?

  You told them this is what happened.

• 56:00Evy Poumpouras?

  I said, I lied to get financial aid. I could, because I couldn't qualify for aid. And so I was like, you know, they didn't care that I was like, look, my dad, my mom, they won't give me their tax paperwork. They're so upset with me. They don't agree with my decision to go to this school to do this. And they're like, no, unless you don't have your parents in your life. And I was just like, I was like, I'm going to college.

• 56:23Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 56:24Evy Poumpouras?

  And I lied, but in my polygraph, I was like, I have to tell you something. Actually, I said it before they hooked me up and I said, look, I did, I lied about this. I did this, you know, like, why did you do it? I was like, I wanted to go to college. I couldn't get money to go to school. So I was okay. I got the job.

• 56:37Lewis Howes?

  Wow. How many things did you tell, did you confess to before you took the polygraph?

• 56:43Evy Poumpouras?

  That was my biggest thing.

• 56:44Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 56:44Evy Poumpouras?

  That was my thing. Drugs, like I didn't, I never had, I, despite growing up in New York. I never had any issues. I, I always stayed away from it. I think because I saw so much around it, of that around me. And the more people kind of put it in my face, the more I was kind of like, I'm not doing that. But probably it would have been the opposite. If nobody did it, I'd be the one to be like, oh, I'm gonna try this. I think that was the biggest thing. It weighed the heaviest with me because I was like, I did this bad thing. I lied on my financial aid paperwork to get aid. I'm hoping the statute of limitations has expired on that as well. I paid back all my loans.

• 57:22Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 57:22Evy Poumpouras?

  I paid back all my loans.

• 57:24Lewis Howes?

  When you're, when you're in an interrogation or an interview, or you're on a first date, or you're at a, a job interview in your career, or any type of first interview with any situation, what's the best way to build command, authority and credibility?

• 57:43Evy Poumpouras?

  Yeah. So you can do very simple things, like when you greet someone, hi, how are you? Come on in. Why don't you use the bathroom before we get started? So I'm not asking you, would you like to use the bathroom? I'm telling you, why don't you go use the bathroom? Why don't you have something to drink? What, what can I bring you? Right? So I'm, I'm in this subtle way, I'm telling you to go to the bathroom and you're gonna go. Because of the way I said, why don't you go to the bathroom? No, no, go before we get started. You just said authority. Um, why don't you have something to drink? Oh, no, I'm good. No, have something to drink.

• 58:16Lewis Howes?

  We're gonna be here for a little bit.

• 58:19Evy Poumpouras?

  So now I'm, I'm, I'm planting these little seeds telling you. I'm in control. I'm not telling you, but I'm doing it subtly. Have a seat there. You know, you can show me where to where to sit. Or on the flip side, you could also practice something called autonomy, where you let somebody choose their own seat. And that's a different tactic. So there's two tactics.

• 58:40Lewis Howes?

  Where would you like to sit?

• 58:42Evy Poumpouras?

  Where would you like to sit? So you may use that on me if you want to talk about a topic that I don't want to talk about. And so autonomy makes me feel like I have a choice. You let me choose where I'm gonna sit because you're gonna let me have it later. You're gonna try to push me on something later.

• 58:58Lewis Howes?

  I gave you something now, the law of reciprocity means you give me something later.

• 59:02Evy Poumpouras?

  Exactly. But also autonomy, though, it's not, it's actually also not reciprocity. It's actually more of I feel in control. Because we don't like to feel like we're not in control. So if you want to talk about something where I'm really uncomfortable, I don't feel like I'm in control. I will give you control elsewhere. So I will give you control in picking where you want to meet. I will give you control in what time. I will give you control in where you want to sit. Little things like that you can do where that person has autonomy to choose. We can do it, we can do it here. We can talk about this or we can talk about this. Which would would you prefer? That's um, nobody likes to feel like they don't have control.

• 59:45Evy Poumpouras?

  So a way that you can deal with a resistant person is by giving them some level of control.

• 59:53Lewis Howes?

  When you're going on a first date, how is, and you've been maybe in an abusive relationship in the past where you were a doormat. You were walked on, you had no control, no authority. The person that you were in a relationship with walked over your boundaries, took advantage of you, all that. And you've had time to heal and now you're getting back out there.

• 1:00:13Evy Poumpouras?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:14Lewis Howes?

  How can that person create a great dating experience in that first date to put themselves more in the driver's seat with some authority and not a doormat mentality?

• 1:00:25Evy Poumpouras?

  Alright, so there's two things. I think the first thing is, don't take out on that person what was done to you by somebody.

• 1:00:33Lewis Howes?

  That's the worst.

• 1:00:34Evy Poumpouras?

  They're just, you know, because we've all been victims of things to some degree, right? And let's say even if it was, it was abusive, it was horrible, it was that. It is also not fair to take that out on an innocent person. Like to take your trauma out to someone else and sometimes we can feel trauma elsewhere and then project it on to someone else who didn't cause that to us. So I would say that's the most important thing because it will allow you to connect. The other thing I will say is, the majority of people tend to trust. When we have relationships with people, we tend to go and trust people. So when someone says something to you, you tend to believe it.

• 1:01:17Lewis Howes?

  Believe it.

• 1:01:17Evy Poumpouras?

  The average person.

• 1:01:18Lewis Howes?

  Why is that?

• 1:01:19Evy Poumpouras?

  We're just engineered that way and I don't even know why that is, but we tend to to sway towards trusting the person. In law enforcement, actually, it's the opposite. Law enforcement officials are notorious for thinking people are deceitful. So the average person believes people are honest. Law enforcement believes people are deceitful. Because they deal with more people who lie, but that causes a problem elsewhere because when you do have innocent people.

• 1:01:47Lewis Howes?

  We're telling the truth.

• 1:01:48Evy Poumpouras?

  They're telling you the truth and then you get false confessions. You get problems. You're looking at the wrong person because you're confirmation biased. That's a whole other animal over there. But knowing that we tend to give people, we tend to believe people automatically, just hold a little bit of that back. Don't.

• 1:02:08Lewis Howes?

  Believe less?

• 1:02:09Evy Poumpouras?

  Just be more reserved in how much you trust.

• 1:02:12Lewis Howes?

  Discerning about it, yeah.

• 1:02:13Evy Poumpouras?

  Yes, just don't put it all out on the table. Oh my God, this guy's great or gal's great. I just connected with them. And then what we do, we go nose in. And so you don't want to give unconditional trust. So unconditional trust is like I give you now trust across the board. I trust you in everything. When you start dating someone or any new relationship, even in business, always conditional trust. I'm not going to trust you all the way. I'm going to trust you part of the way. So now here's the thing, we love to trust unconditionally, which is probably why we tend to just want to give people trust. It's less work. I could just turn my brain off. I can trust you Louis.

• 1:02:54Lewis Howes?

  Great story, yeah.

• 1:02:55Evy Poumpouras?

  Louis, ask me anything you want, because you asked me in the beginning, is there anything off the table? I'm like, no Louis, go ahead and ask. But you give that person unconditional trust and I don't have to think so hard. I don't have to worry if you're gonna manipulate me, I don't have to be on my guard. It's easy. It's easier, that relationship. Conditional trust means I have to be a bit more careful. So it's like me going to buy a car. I know, I'm dealing with a car salesman. I know I should be careful. It's just understood that they try to get you to buy certain things, they use certain language. So when I go in, I go in with conditional trust. And so I'm better protected. That's why there you're less likely to get hurt in those situations where you understand, I can't fully give everything to this person, I can't fully trust them conditionally.

• 1:03:40Evy Poumpouras?

  I can, um, so I, excuse me, unconditionally, so I have to just be careful. The thing is, that's work. It's a lot of work, we get tired. We access a specific part of the brain when we do that, a more complex part of the brain. So that's why unconditional trust, you don't wanna give it right away. And that is why when we get betrayed by people close to us, that's why it hurts more.

• 1:04:05Lewis Howes?

  The most, yeah.

• 1:04:06Evy Poumpouras?

  It's usually by people who betrayed us on, uh, who we give unconditional trust to.

• 1:04:11Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:11Evy Poumpouras?

  That's my advice for dating.

• 1:04:13Lewis Howes?

  That's when it stings. Would you use the same approach if, let's say you're, you know, I haven't been on a first date in forever, but let's say you're on a date, your first date, with someone, would you say, hey, why don't you have some water? Why don't you use the restroom first? Where would you like to sit? Would you do the same approach there?

• 1:04:30Evy Poumpouras?

  I, I would not, because I don't wanna establish authority there.

• 1:04:34Evy Poumpouras?

  That's not, if you're looking to have a relationship, I would not do that. That's not, that's, that's creepy.

• 1:04:42Evy Poumpouras?

  That's a controlling unhealthy relationship.

• 1:04:43Lewis Howes?

  What should you establish, trust?

• 1:04:45Evy Poumpouras?

  I think rapport and trust. And I think probably the best thing you can do is just not talk about yourself and listen to that other person. Just ask about them.

• 1:04:53Lewis Howes?

  What would be the, the?

• 1:04:55Evy Poumpouras?

  You did that to me when I walked in.

• 1:04:56Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:57Evy Poumpouras?

  It was like, Evy, boom, boom, boom, boom, I was like, ah!

• 1:04:59Lewis Howes?

  What would be the three question, three most fascinating questions someone could ask on a first date? That would not be interrogational, but be, uh...

• 1:05:10Lewis Howes?

  Connecting questions.

• 1:05:12Evy Poumpouras?

  Ted, tell me, tell me about yourself, explain to me what your dreams are, describe to me what your, you know, what your hopes are. Don't, don't create a question because you may ask a question that you think is fascinating and they're gonna look at you like that's the dumbest thing I've ever heard. You don't, right? Because we, you don't know what they think like, what they, what their, what their aspirations are, what their...

• 1:05:33Lewis Howes?

  We're on a hypothetical first date, what would you say to me? Using the tech-

• 1:05:36Evy Poumpouras?

  Tell me about your podcast, I'd love to hear all about it.

• 1:05:39Lewis Howes?

  Oh, okay.

• 1:05:40Evy Poumpouras?

  Explain to me how you got into that.

• 1:05:43Evy Poumpouras?

  Describe to me like what it's like when you interview all these different people. I'm gonna shut up and I'm gonna let you go, Louis. Because now I get to hear you, I get to see what you, you're like, your values, your beliefs, what excites you, what doesn't excite you. Excite you, you're gonna tell me about why you started it, you're gonna tell me about your background, what got you into it, any, uh, growing pains or heartaches or how this happened, you're gonna tell me about your favorite guests. You're not favorite guests, you're gonna tell me about the amazing things you learned, or maybe some of the things that you were like, I can't believe I brought this guest on. And so now you just opened up this world and I had to do no work and I can just listen.

• 1:06:17Lewis Howes?

  These are more indirect questions, is that right?

• 1:06:20Evy Poumpouras?

  Open-ended questions.

• 1:06:21Lewis Howes?

  So don't ask a direct question. Who is your favorite guest? Don't say that.

• 1:06:26Evy Poumpouras?

  I would tell me about, tell me about your guests. And then I would allow you to naturally tell me on your own because you feel like you're in control and it's more likely that you will tell me on your own. But if I ask you directly and if you wanna protect the integrity of the people you interview, because you don't wanna say this is my favorite guest to make it public, because then that's, it's gonna hurt the people that come on the show, right? Your clientele, so to speak, your guests. So I would, you're not gonna answer it, you're gonna be reluctant. Oh, Evy, I love everybody.

• 1:06:57Lewis Howes?

  It's like my kids, you know, you can't say your favorite kid, it's all your kids.

• 1:07:01Evy Poumpouras?

  You're gonna say that. It's like when people ask me, who's your favorite president? I always say, I love them all. They're all, I, I love protecting all of them. But if somebody says, tell me about the people you protected, or tell me about the presidents you protected, now, I feel comfortable, I'm in control, I'm talking. The more we talk, the more we leak. I'm less guarded, it's less direct, I don't even know you're trying to find that and I may naturally on my own get there.

• 1:07:28Lewis Howes?

  Tell me about a characteristic of a president that wowed you the most.

• 1:07:36Evy Poumpouras?

  You know.

• 1:07:36Lewis Howes?

  You like that opener? You like that opener?

• 1:07:38Evy Poumpouras?

  Oh, you might use Ted on me.

• 1:07:40Lewis Howes?

  A characteristic from one of the presidents that you were just like, obviously that they're all inspiring in some way, I'm assuming, for you, but tell me about a characteristic or a a belief, a mindset, an approach, a strategy that one of them used that wowed you.

• 1:07:57Evy Poumpouras?

  I liked, there's a couple, there's like little things. I'll tell you, President, former President George Bush Senior, he used to write note cards to everybody. He had a little, he wrote note cards, "Thank you so much." He would just send little note cards to people. And I saw what an impact that made to people to receive a handwritten note. He handwrote it from someone saying, "Thank you, I appreciate you." And to this day, I do that. And I, and I took that, I took that from George, President George Bush. Because I saw that and I was like, what a wonderful thing. And I saw how much of an impact that did. It was a very little thing, but I, I took that from him. So whenever I meet someone, or there's an exchange or something,

• 1:08:42Evy Poumpouras?

  I will write a handwritten note card. "Thank you for your time, I appreciate it." And it, it does a lot.

• 1:08:48Lewis Howes?

  Did he write you a card?

• 1:08:49Evy Poumpouras?

  He did not write me a card. He wasn't my full-time protector, but I watched.

• 1:08:53Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, you watched him actually write it for other people?

• 1:08:56Evy Poumpouras?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:57Lewis Howes?

  Or you saw other people get it?

• 1:08:58Evy Poumpouras?

  Both. You would see them when they would work and you would know what they did or didn't do. But that's what he did.

• 1:09:04Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 1:09:05Evy Poumpouras?

  And another characteristics, I think, I liked President Obama. I liked the way he spoke.

• 1:09:14Evy Poumpouras?

  And for me, that was very, I appreciated that because I, although I was an agent and an interviewer, I didn't know how to speak for myself. It's weird, right? I could speak on behalf of the government and the law and all that. Um, but I never paid attention to the way I spoke to people. And what I loved, you could hear him, you could hear him. Usually you call Renegade, I could say it, it's public, it's in his book, Renegade on the Move, right? You could, you could hear the agents say that. But you could hear him. You could hear him, you could, I love the way he echoed his voice and projected his voice and didn't hold it back. And how he took his time to speak.

• 1:09:57Evy Poumpouras?

  Where a lot of people speak very fast because we feel that we're not worthy of somebody's time. I don't want to take up too much of your time, so I'm going to speak fast. We do that. We feel like, let me just hurry up and say this. This person's probably busy. He has things to do. And then he really projected his voice.

• 1:10:15Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 1:10:16Evy Poumpouras?

  Like it boomed through the hallways. And that was a person who was not shy of being present, of taking taking us a space and letting you know, I'm here and my voice is relevant. I like that.

• 1:10:30Lewis Howes?

  Hmm, that's powerful.

• 1:10:31Evy Poumpouras?

  Yes.

• 1:10:32Lewis Howes?

  Any other characteristics from anyone else?

• 1:10:36Evy Poumpouras?

  Hmm, there's so many.

• 1:10:39Lewis Howes?

  The ones that wowed you, that stood out?

• 1:10:40Evy Poumpouras?

  They all did, like, they were all great. George Washing- George Washington, oh my god.

• 1:10:44Lewis Howes?

  All right, how old are you?

• 1:10:47Evy Poumpouras?

  Um.

• 1:10:50Evy Poumpouras?

  GW, President George Bush. He, like, I love going to the ranch with him. I'm from New York City. I go to Texas. And I was just like, what the, you know? It was like, we were out in the wild. He's like, we're going, we couldn't make trails. I was like, why are we gonna make trails? There's a road right there. You know, we'd cut trails and hike. And he was very authentic. Who he was on camera was who he was off camera and vice versa.

• 1:11:17Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:11:18Evy Poumpouras?

  He was very just real. And so you'd see these qualities with different people and you know, it's kind of interesting. I just thought of it. I was almost like in my own school of greatness.

• 1:11:30Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:11:30Evy Poumpouras?

  By being in the White House. And then over all the years of about, you're around all these people, these influential leaders, despite, forget politics, it still takes a person of some

• 1:11:43Lewis Howes?

  To get there.

• 1:11:43Evy Poumpouras?

  To, yes, to get there. And so you watch them, and they're not just them. They've got cabinet members, other individuals who, you know, you watch and you listen to, you see how they problem solve.

• 1:11:56Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 1:11:56Evy Poumpouras?

  And I was in my own school of greatness where I just got to be front row. And you're doing your job, but at the same time, you're like You're listening, you're watching, you're absorbing. I loved it.

• 1:12:08Lewis Howes?

  Were there any strategies you witnessed or watched or observed from them telling you or not telling you on how they commanded respect and authority? In just their way of being, tonality? Was it touching people, you know, on their hand, is it, you know, whatever it is, eye contact? What were the things that they did or that some of them did that really stood out to you?

• 1:12:31Evy Poumpouras?

  So I'll tell you this, they didn't have to work as hard.

• 1:12:34Lewis Howes?

  Because they're already the authority.

• 1:12:36Evy Poumpouras?

  They're already the authority. So you don't, so I want to say that, like, they don't, a person can look at you and be like, hey, how you doing? And then like blow you off and you're like, oh my God, I got like a whole solid second. Whereas when they're talking to me or you, it's just like, you only gave me a second, right? So they don't have to work as hard. So even the little attention they give you lands on you. However, though, eye contact is huge. When you talk to someone and you want to convey, you want to convey, hey, trust me. And rapport, this is huge. In fact, if you go to the supermarket and you look at cereal boxes. They have cartoon, the characters on the cereal boxes.

• 1:13:15Lewis Howes?

  Looking at you.

• 1:13:16Evy Poumpouras?

  You know where a lot of them look down? They're looking down. You know who they're looking down? You'll see cereal boxes where the character looks down.

• 1:13:22Lewis Howes?

  At the cereal?

• 1:13:23Evy Poumpouras?

  No, I'm a cereal box, right? I'm the Trix Rabbit or whatever, right? Now, you go shopping, I'm not looking at you, I'm looking down. Why am I looking down?

• 1:13:32Lewis Howes?

  The rabbit's looking down.

• 1:13:33Evy Poumpouras?

  Right, the rabbit's looking down. Thank you.

• 1:13:35Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 1:13:36Evy Poumpouras?

  Because the kid's the consumer.

• 1:13:37Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, not the adult.

• 1:13:38Evy Poumpouras?

  No, the kid's gonna say, Mom.

• 1:13:40Lewis Howes?

  Come grab me.

• 1:13:41Evy Poumpouras?

  Mom, buy that for me.

• 1:13:42Lewis Howes?

  Oh my gosh.

• 1:13:43Evy Poumpouras?

  So they designed them to actually look down and they also put them at a certain level. And so maybe in adult cereal, they'll have the person looking at you higher up because they're looking at the adult. Eye contact is huge. It conveys, "Trust me. Talk to me. I'm here. I'm connected with you." Even when you want to listen to people. Normally, we do break eye contact, but good communicators will lock in. They're not uncomfortable. They're there. I'm with you. I'm connected with you. That is huge. But you touched on, literally touching people. And you would see a tactic. I don't want to say a tactic, but a... No, it's a tactic.

• 1:14:22Lewis Howes?

  It's a strategy.

• 1:14:23Evy Poumpouras?

  It's a strategy. Is, you know, "Hey, you know, Louis," and, you know, maybe I like to touch your forearm.

• 1:14:29Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:14:29Evy Poumpouras?

  You can do that. But I will say today...

• 1:14:31Lewis Howes?

  You can't do that.

• 1:14:32Evy Poumpouras?

  Today is very different. You know, they would teach us that. They're like, "Hey, you can touch the top of a person's knee and just be like, 'Hey.'" And I could be like, "Whoa, unwanted touch." So now, I would actually go against that. I would actually encourage people not to do that just simply because you don't know how it's going to be received. And now today, it's, you gotta be a little bit... Less is more with that.

• 1:14:53Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, I mean, shaking your hand, maybe that's it for...

• 1:14:55Evy Poumpouras?

  I think so.

• 1:14:56Lewis Howes?

  A second hand on the top, like a genuine heartfelt for two seconds and then let it go.

• 1:15:00Evy Poumpouras?

  Yeah, I think so. I think so. You want to respect people's space. It's a little bit different. I think we have more... Well, we do have more social space now. It's interesting how that's going to change the dynamics of how we interact in the future.

• 1:15:12Lewis Howes?

  Interesting. How do you build that trust without being present and more connected and touching and...

• 1:15:17Evy Poumpouras?

  Right, and you have a mask. You can't even see the lower portion of a person's face, which conceals their expressions, their gestures. So it's even harder to read them.

• 1:15:27Lewis Howes?

  Thank you so much for listening. 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 show with all the important links. And also make sure to share this with a friend and subscribe over on Apple Podcasts as well. I really love hearing feedback from you guys, so share a review over on Apple and let me know what part of this episode resonated with you the most. And if no one's told you lately, I want to remind you that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And now, it's time to go out there and do something great.