Revisited: Why Relationships Are the Secret to a Long, Happy Life with Psychotherapist Esther Perel

Hello from Team Simon! We’re taking a few weeks off and will be back with brand-new episodes of A Bit of Optimism on Tuesday, October 27. Until then, we’re revisiting some of our favorite conversations, including this one with a longtime friend of Simon’s: Esther Perel. For most of history, we stayed in marriages and jobs because we had to. Happiness was a nice bonus. Today we get to choose who we love and where we work, so happiness has become the glue that holds it all together. Few people have watched that shift as closely as Esther Perel. For four decades, she’s seen how love, family and work have been reshaped by no-fault divorce, the internet, and now AI. Her conclusion hasn’t changed: the quality of our relationships determines the quality of our lives. It’s a line she first said out loud years ago, in a WHY Discovery session with Simon. Esther is a psychotherapist, the bestselling author of Mating in Captivity and The State of Affairs, and the host of the podcast Where Should We Begin? Her card game “Where Should We Begin? At Work,” is built to spark real conversations between colleagues. In this conversation, Esther and Simon talk about why one partner can’t be our whole village, what kids lose when they stop playing in the street, and why an entry-level job may be the last great playground. Simon also shares a personal update: how he made peace with the question, "Why haven’t you been married?" In this episode you'll learn: ➡️ Why happiness went from a perk to the glue, in love and at work ➡️ The “relationship CV” everyone brings to work (+ how it shapes the way you handle conflict and authority) ➡️ Why we’re asking one person to give us what a whole village used to ➡️ How frictionless apps are changing what we expect from each other ➡️ Why entry-level jobs are the best place to scrape your knees ➡️ The number one relationship skill Gen Z should master before their first job ➡️ Why play is just risk that feels fun, and how it builds trust And remember, every relationship you treasure started as a conversation with a stranger. This… is A Bit of Optimism. + + + To learn more about Esther's work, visit: https://www.estherperel.com/ And check out "Where Should We Begin? At Work" here: https://game.estherperel.com/products/where-should-we-begin-at-work + + + Chapters Chapters 00:00:00 Why the Quality of Our Relationships Determines the Quality of Our Lives 00:03:43 The Dual Revolution: How Work and Romance Transformed Together 00:09:40 From Duty to Desire: When Happiness Became the Glue 00:17:11 The Death of the Playground: Where We Lost Our Social Skills 00:19:24 Why Lion Cubs Fight: The Mammal Lesson We're Ignoring 00:25:46 The Harvard Study Secret: Relationships Are #1 Predictor of Happiness 00:28:10 The Kindergarten Separation: A Cultural Moment That Reveals Everything 00:30:17 The Two CVs: Your Work Resume and Your Relationship History 00:31:04 The Predictive Technology Problem: Why Apps Are Ruining Human Connection 00:38:56 The Three Models of Relationships: Romance, Scaffolding, and Friendship Networks 00:42:49 Belonging vs Fitting In: Why Forcing Relationships Fails 00:44:23 The Workplace Revolution: When Psychology Entered Business 00:45:26 Where Should We Begin at Work: Using Storytelling to Build Connection 00:46:20 The Entry-Level Crisis: Why Young Workers Are Most at Risk 00:49:39 Remote Work Reality: Flexibility Without Dogma 00:50:40 The Transactional Trap: Why We Skip the Coffee and Go Straight to Business 00:56:20 Talk to Strangers: The Number One Skill Gen Z Needs 00:57:48 The Discomfort Doctrine: Why Comfort Has Become Too Central to Life 00:58:45 The Third Space: Finding Five Minutes Away From All Responsibility 01:00:22 The Voice Matters: Why We Misinterpret Text and Need to Hear Each Other 01:01:15 The Trojan Horses: Teaching Human Skills Through Work and Romance + + + Simon is an unshakable optimist. He believes in a bright future and our ability to build it together. Described as “a visionary thinker with a rare intellect,” Simon has devoted his professional life to help advance a vision of the world that does not yet exist; a world in which the vast majority of people wake up every single morning inspired, feel safe wherever they are and end the day fulfilled by the work that they do. Simon is the author of multiple best-selling books including Start With Why, Leaders Eat Last, Together is Better, and The Infinite Game. + + + Website: http://simonsinek.com/ Leaderful: https://simonsinek.com/leaderful Podcast: http://apple.co/simonsinek Instagram: https://instagram.com/simonsinek/ Linkedin: https://linkedin.com/in/simonsinek/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/simonsinek Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/simonsinek

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

• 0:00Speaker 00

  I'll give you a little anecdote. I don't think anecdotes describe a full reality, but it was a moment for me that was very interesting. My younger son was in kindergarten. He had a very best friend. I was convinced he would go into first grade with that same friend. No, I went to the principal. I said, why did you separate them? They were getting so along. It was such a beautiful friendship that could become, you know, my childhood friend like I have from age six. She said, they need to learn to make new friends each time. I said, it's not being trained for mobility. He's a five-year-old who is being trained for long-term relationships. It's not the same. And it was really clear, that was the idea. The idea is not how do you continue a longstanding friendship? It's how do you make new friends all the time?

• 0:45Speaker 00

  I thought that was just an amazing cultural encounter.

• 0:49Simon Sinek?

  Wow. So, wow. So we're actually training our young to suck it up and get over it and move on. The quality of our relationships determines the quality of our lives. This is an idea that Esther Perel has been trying to instill in us for decades. She is the guru of human relationships. And she's been trying to teach us in all of her work, how we can have successful romantic relationships. I've known Esther for years. And candidly, when we've gone out for dinner, I have definitely taken advantage of our friendship and asked her for relationship advice. And it's always been amazing. And we agree on so many things, which is why I was so excited to have her on the podcast. Our work overlaps so much.

• 1:35Simon Sinek?

  We both believe that the quality of our relationships determines the quality of our lives in our personal lives and the quality of our lives at work. Esther believes it so much, she's just launched a new product, a set of question cards called Where Should We Begin at Work? So we go deep. We talk about relationships, happy relationships, struggling relationships, all the kinds of relationships, and how we learn to navigate relationships, how it will benefit us in our personal lives and in our professional lives. This is a bit of optimism.

• 2:13Simon Sinek?

  Esther.

• 2:14Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 2:15Simon Sinek?

  You know you're one of my favorite people in the world, right?

• 2:19Speaker 00

  It is a mutual experience.

• 2:22Simon Sinek?

  You're one of those friends that, you and I have known each other a long time. I saw you a lot when I lived in New York. It's been more difficult since I've moved to LA. But you're one of those people, you're one of those friends that we don't talk as often as people think we do, but every time we talk, we pick up where we left off.

• 2:39Speaker 00

  That is true.

• 2:40Simon Sinek?

  It's as if no time has passed, every single time.

• 2:43Speaker 00

  Actually, before we talk, we look at each other and we smile. A kind of a smile of recognition and complicity.

• 2:51Simon Sinek?

  You're right. Every time I see you, whether it's in an event or even just on the screen, you're absolutely right. My first, my first reaction is a smile. It's like, it's like a baby being shown a toy.

• 3:05Simon Sinek?

  I was thinking this morning as I was getting ready, what, like, I, there's actually a very genuine question that I have for you that pretty much you and only you could answer.

• 3:17Simon Sinek?

  You've been doing what you do for a long time, which means you have been doing, helping couples and helping people in relationships and overcome difficulties that they have through many changes of culture and politics and world events. I'm so curious what the dynamic of relationships has changed over the course of a career.

• 3:43Speaker 00

  I mean, the arc is very full of changes.

• 3:49Simon Sinek?

  Yeah.

• 3:49Speaker 00

  So I arrived in the United States in eighty-three. And we are talking about just a few years since divorce has been legalized, no-fault divorce. That in itself is an enormous change to the structure of marriage and family life. Because the rate of divorce increases dramatically, primarily spurred by women. Women are enough often economically independent, even on every level of the scale, to decide that relationships and marriages in particular need to be emotionally fulfilling. Because it's not just a material reliance.

• 4:34Speaker 00

  Contraception has been democratized. So child, you know, reproduction is now controlled. And reproduction can be technologically assisted, and it can be technologically stopped. So on both, on both sides, sexuality fundamentally changes its meaning from the sole domain of biology to now becoming socialized and becoming a property of the self, something that you define, your sexuality, not just a part of your condition.

• 5:07Speaker 00

  People go from five, six, seven children to one, two, potentially, or even the choice of none. Sexuality shifts from a marital duty, and has already been, but now even more, to a marital, to a sexual duty, to a sexual desire, sorry, from duty to desire. So that's, that's just a few small things in the, in the romantic realm. Work at that time is shifting from, you know, is basically in the midst of what we call the service economy, from the production economy of the land and the agriculture to now a service economy. And by the way, so is marriage. Marriage becomes a service economy too.

• 5:51Speaker 00

  We want affection, we want trust, we want things that have to do with the quality of the, of the emotional connection between the people. And from there, gradually, these two units, which are really going parallel but also cross, we kind of have a dual revolution taking place at the same time. Work goes from production to service to identity, an identity economy in which we turn to work for a host of existential needs that used to be part of our religious lives and our communal lives, that now become part of work, purpose, meaning, belonging, community, things that had nothing to do with why, what we.

• 6:33Simon Sinek?

  You and I have both talked about this, how we used to get purpose from church. We used to get community from our neighbors. We had bowling leagues for our friends. All of those, you know, church attendance declines, bowling leagues disappear, and now we demand that work fulfill all of those needs.

• 6:48Speaker 00

  And we deferred really marriage, per se, marriage or committed relationships by ten years. So work is the primary hub for your social connection and for all these other needs. It's an amazing thing to, to, to observe. This is all before still the internet.

• 7:06Simon Sinek?

  Right.

• 7:07Speaker 00

  Then comes internet, then comes social media, then comes AI. I mean, at every level, relationships change, because I think it's all my work on relationships.

• 7:19Simon Sinek?

  What were the common, when you arrived in eighty-three and you started your practice, what were the common themes that, in, in the eighties, that, that, again, just common themes of the couples that would come see you in the eighties?

• 7:35Speaker 00

  I mean, themes were always, you know, communication, for example. It's always been a theme, or, or, or conflict. Or basically, the origins of couples, this is actually an interesting piece, the origins of couples' therapy.

• 7:51Simon Sinek?

  Yeah.

• 7:52Speaker 00

  Originally, people came to see you as a couple because somebody had said that there were issues with the child and that maybe they were not all about the child, but they were actually about the couple. But in fact, couples' therapy really became a discipline on its own when, for the first time, the survival of the family depended on the happiness of the couple.

• 8:16Simon Sinek?

  Right.

• 8:17Speaker 00

  Because as long as people were married for life and you couldn't get out and there was no exit, it didn't really matter if you got along, you didn't get along, it would be nice. But in any case, you were stuck. Once you could leave, you needed the relationship to really be much better. And this, and that meant that the only way the family will stay together in its original constellation is if the couple is relatively content. And so that brought couples more and more to come to couples' therapy, be it issues of conflict, addiction, violence, communication, sexuality, sexual incompatibility, you name it. You know, in my time, the, around it was the first conversations about family leave.

• 9:01Simon Sinek?

  Yeah.

• 9:02Speaker 00

  There was no, you know, there was no maternity leave or paternity leave in the US. The first presentations around infertility and fertility issues and different ways of, of conception. The first conversations in the office, I'm saying the first, not in the general, you know, around issues of non-monogamy and polyamory. So all of this, and, and the personal development movement, the growth movement of the sixties that completely seeped into every aspect of the way we think we deserve to be happy.

• 9:37Simon Sinek?

  This, this is, this is an amazing insight here, which is the, the correlation between being stuck in something and desire for happiness or, or, or pursuit of happiness. That when you're stuck in something, happiness is a nice to have, but you don't bother working on it because it doesn't actually matter, because you can't go anywhere. So happiness is not, not a glue. Happiness is a, is a perk. Where, when the ability to leave a relationship becomes now an option or an easier option,

• 10:13Simon Sinek?

  and there's less legal complications, there's less stigma, all of the things that go with it.

• 10:18Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 10:18Simon Sinek?

  Now happiness becomes glue, not, not a perk.

• 10:22Speaker 00

  Correct.

• 10:23Simon Sinek?

  And I, and I can't help but compare that to work as well, where, you know, We could argue, a strong argument could be made in the 1950s, for example, where 60s or even 70s, where people gave their whole lives to one company. And there was a, you know, there was a better deal where we looked after each other and the company would never think of laying you off. And that's all true. But the concept of like, happy at work, I mean, you worked for the company, the company worked for you, and it just sort of, I wouldn't call it stuck, I would call it stasis. But now you get to a modern day, and even when I compare the young generation to my generation, where I would never dream, when I was starting my career, we would never dream

• 11:07Simon Sinek?

  of quitting a job within less than a year because it would destroy your resume. Where now, young people are very comfortable quitting at any time. They're also very comfortable quitting without another job lined up, which for somebody like me is like mind blowing, right? And, and I think now, if the, if the, if the ease of getting out of it has lost the social stigma, it's not going to destroy your resume, et cetera, et cetera, go down the list. Now, where happiness was a perk at work, happiness is now a glue at work. And the question I'm asking is, are leaders focusing on keeping their people happy? And I don't mean giving them free lunch and putting ping pong tables.

• 11:43Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 11:44Simon Sinek?

  When I say happiness, I don't mean, you know, smiles, I mean fulfillment, I mean calm, I mean inspiration. And now these things are no longer a nice to have, which I think a lot of older executives actually still believe.

• 11:58Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 11:59Simon Sinek?

  It's a glue, not a perk.

• 12:01Speaker 00

  So I think that as a whole, if you really even step back a second, there's two, two ideas that accompany your question, that for me give it really a context. First of all, for most of history, happiness belonged to the afterlife. You know, it was in heaven. You suffered well on earth, and if you did a good job, you could be rewarded later. Right? Then it comes down, we bring happiness from the heavens to, to the earth. It becomes an option, and now it becomes a mandate. I deserve to be happy. I'm entitled, you know? And in that, in the name of that, a number of major changes occur. And I think one of the most important shifts that takes place in relationships, and that

• 12:46Speaker 00

  connects with your executive, is that, again, for most of history, and still in most parts of the world today, relationships are organized around duty, obligation, loyalty, structure. You know that you're happy when you're able to fulfill your duties, when you've been able to fulfill the roles that's expected of you as a father, as a son, as a boss, you know? And that is what produces the happiness, is the ability to fulfill those tasks. And you have a lot of clarity, you have very little freedom, if any, and very little personal expression, who cares? We switch that to a model where relationships become organized around choice and option.

• 13:30Speaker 00

  And you have more freedom than you've ever had, and you are more alone and more confused than you've ever been. Because all these decisions now rest on you, rather than being passed on through the structures of culture and religion and community. And that is underneath the sentences that the executives will say today about the younger generations, about, you know, people talk about wanting belonging, purpose, meaning, community, but you know, your example of the person who moves every year, how can you have belonging on a rotation of one year or even two? How can you have belonging when the notion is that if you leave, you really are a winner?

• 14:12Simon Sinek?

  Right.

• 14:12Speaker 00

  Because you actually have ambitions, you know, that the people who stay, you know, are the people who don't have enough oomph.

• 14:20Simon Sinek?

  Do you see that in relationships as well? Do you see relationships becoming more disposable amongst younger generations, where I'm going to keep moving relationships, like I keep moving jobs, to find the thing that's better and better, and will finally make me happy? But to your point, it's a, it's a fool's errand.

• 14:36Speaker 00

  I think I see different things. I see this, people who, I mean, this is a question people are asking me all the time, do we throw, you know, do we abandon the, the project too soon?

• 14:47Simon Sinek?

  Yeah.

• 14:47Speaker 00

  I don't know that I can answer it, because I also think that so many people have had to tolerate

• 14:53Simon Sinek?

  Yeah.

• 14:54Speaker 00

  circumstances of life that really, you know, I would put it that sometimes the people who need to leave stay too long, and the people who, who stay too long.

• 15:03Simon Sinek?

  Should need to leave, yeah.

• 15:05Speaker 00

  It's not a flat statement, it's that there are people who probably would do better by being a little bit more patient and enduring, and there are people who would do better by being a little bit more self-serving. That's probably a more nuanced answer to your question. But what I do see is a proliferation of creations of new types of bonding, new definitions of what is a circle of care, new micro-communities, new families of choice, new multiple co-parenting arrangements. And that I find is very creative, whereas for a long time, the family system was actually not one that dealt, that received much innovation. You know, it kind of followed a certain track all along.

• 15:50Speaker 00

  And now there is really a zeal of creativity around, what are other ways to make family, to make coupledom, to make intimacy? And in that sense, there are people who then may say, I need to move on. So we live what Zigmund Malmann used to call liquid life.

• 16:10Simon Sinek?

  Yeah.

• 16:10Speaker 00

  We went from relationships that were tight knots, from which you couldn't extricate yourself, to relationships that are loose threads, where you can go in and out very fluidly. And as a result, you can feel very free, and also very disposable, and very invisible, and very easily ghosted.

• 16:32Simon Sinek?

  So.

• 16:34Speaker 00

  Does that make sense?

• 16:35Simon Sinek?

  It does make sense. And again, my understanding from what I've read, I'd love for you to, you know, confirm this or not, which is, you know, younger people are dating less, they're having sex later, they're, they're, you know, Scott Galloway talks about this, just a lot less experience. And even the relationships they're having, you know, are not necessarily, they're not necessarily engaging in, in long-term relationships as quickly. A, is that true? And B, why?

• 17:11Speaker 00

  I think that wherever we go, having just spent quite a few weeks working abroad, we're hearing the same litany, even from Brazil.

• 17:22Simon Sinek?

  Yeah.

• 17:22Speaker 00

  All the way, I went from country to country, hearing the same conversation. I think that, and the conversation is about an increasing social atrophy. That's how I call it. It involves the loneliness, but it's more than that. It's also self-imposed isolation, as, as some people talk about. It's also a kind of a contactless living. It's, it's, I don't need to leave my house, neither to work, neither to exercise, neither to shop for food, I mean, I can just stay home. In every country, I ask this question that has become really quite significant to me. Actually, I asked two. One relates to what you said before.

• 18:06Speaker 00

  How many of you have grandparents who lived and worked in the same place their whole life? The majority.

• 18:12Simon Sinek?

  Right.

• 18:13Speaker 00

  How many of you have parents, they already moved? How many of you have changed jobs more than once in the last five years?

• 18:21Simon Sinek?

  Yeah.

• 18:23Speaker 00

  And then you begin to see this notion of, of fluidity. But the other question I ask is, how many of you grew up playing freely on the street? And the vast majority of an audience of thousands raised their hands, they grew up playing freely on the street. And how many of you know children or have children that are playing freely on the street today? And you get a sprinkle.

• 18:45Simon Sinek?

  Yeah.

• 18:46Speaker 00

  And I find that such an amazing, I see it visually. It's like, you know, when you draw a chart, this is a, a human chart in front of you. The loss of the primary ground of social negotiation that we used to grow up with. Where you met all kinds of kids, where you negotiate, where you make war, where you make peace, where you create alliances, where you make, you know, where you have repair. All of this specific place where you hone your chops of sociability.

• 19:19Simon Sinek?

  Yeah.

• 19:20Speaker 00

  Gone. And I think that that has a major effect.

• 19:24Simon Sinek?

  You know, I, I, I, as you were saying this, my mind immediately went to a nature documentary where you watch lion cubs. And they, they fight with each other. And the mom lets them fight with each other and slap each other around. And what they're doing is they're learning to hunt. They're learning to hunt as, as cubs fighting. And the question, you know, and it raises the question, we're mammals. We're supposed to learn all the things that we need to survive as a species when we're younger.

• 19:54Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 19:54Simon Sinek?

  And to your point, on the playground, we had war, we had peace, we had fights, we had negotiations, we had heartbreak, we had anger, we had success. And there, it was all a safe microcosm.

• 20:05Speaker 00

  Through play, by the way, and all, this is the mammal stories that we all learn this stuff through play.

• 20:11Simon Sinek?

  We all learn this stuff through play. And when we're taking the play away, and when I was, when we, you and I are talking about play, we mean very specifically interpersonal play.

• 20:19Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 20:20Simon Sinek?

  You know, when we take the interpersonal play away, it raises the question, where are we as, as homo sapiens, where are we as human beings? Going to learn these essential life skills and the essential life skills we're talking about are not how to code, how to prompt. We're talking about essential life skills like how to make a friend, how to ask for help, how to say I'm struggling, how to, how to fight, how to make peace. All of these things that, that are essential and, and, and now we're just looking to the machine to AI to, to fill those gaps. But the gaps they're filling should never need to be filled in the first place. Or they should be, they should be small gaps filled rather than huge, big, you know, chasms.

• 21:01Speaker 00

  I totally agree. I mean, you were asking about the workplace. I, people sometimes ask me, how did you get to be involved in the workplace? You're this couples therapist, you're this very, and I'm like, I didn't change. I mean, but work understood that relationships are no longer just soft skills.

• 21:18Simon Sinek?

  Yeah.

• 21:19Speaker 00

  You know, and, and forever, soft skills meant that they're not part of the promotion, they're not part of the evaluation. You don't get anything for being a good mediator, a good negotiator, a good peacemaker on your team. None. This is not what had are considered useful skills. It's, you know, relational skills used to be feminine skills.

• 21:38Simon Sinek?

  Yes.

• 21:38Speaker 00

  Nice, nice to have, idealized in principle and disregarded in reality. This is like, now, I think that the workplace actually, interestingly, because of AI. Is understand and because of tech in general, you know, that this is actually the cutting edge. This is the competitive edge. This is the stuff that people need a tremendous amount of help with. My hope is that people not only go to AI to ask how to write an apology letter. Because you can get a very nice apology letter these days and have no idea if the person experienced an ounce of remorse to begin with.

• 22:16Simon Sinek?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 22:20Simon Sinek?

  It's not the letter, it's the, it's the accountability.

• 22:23Speaker 00

  Yeah, of course.

• 22:24Simon Sinek?

  And, and, and this is where I think, um, most people don't realize that since you and I met. One of the reasons we get along so well is you and I are not talking about, um, uh, romantic relationships. And you and I are not talking about work. You and I are talking about human beings in every.

• 22:42Speaker 00

  You know that you helped me actually formulate what became my, the primary. Credo of my entire body of work. I remember this when we, very early on, you did with me a what, uh, you know, what's what?

• 22:59Simon Sinek?

  A Y discovery?

• 23:00Speaker 00

  Yes. And we were in a basement. I mean, my, Jack just reminded me this. And I, you said, what is it you are doing? Like, what is behind, why are you doing this? Why are you doing this? And I blurted out, because it is the quality of our relationships that determines the quality of our life.

• 23:19Simon Sinek?

  Amen.

• 23:20Speaker 00

  And you looked at me and I thought, I finally said it in one sentence.

• 23:25Simon Sinek?

  That's it.

• 23:25Speaker 00

  And this was with you, but I forgot who it was with today.

• 23:29Simon Sinek?

  Well, I'll take all the credit. Thank you very much.

• 23:31Speaker 00

  I did it back to you.

• 23:32Simon Sinek?

  And, and this is why you and I, like, you happen to come up through, um, uh, psychology and, and, and couples counseling. And I happen to come through the corporate world, but fundamentally, you and I meet in the middle where we've, we both believe that the quality of our relationships determines the quality of our lives. I'll tell you a quick funny story. So I did a, I did, um, something called a glycan age recently where they basically take blood. And they, I can't remember exactly what they do, but they look at, they look at inflammation in the body. They're looking at the cell coating and they can tell the inflammation. And you know, inflammation is this insidious thing inside us that if you have it, it is a, is a precursor to all kinds of health problems later in life.

• 24:13Simon Sinek?

  And so if you have less inflammation, you're, you know, what they call a glycan age, you're younger than your, than your chronological age. And what they were, what they're telling me is that if you're eight years younger, if your glycan age is eight years younger than your chronological age, they consider that very healthy. I found out that I'm 22 years younger than my chronic, chronological age. And they go through my lifestyle and everything. Now, I exercise, not obsessively. Sometimes I don't exercise at all for quite a while, you know, I eat well mostly, but you know, not great. I talked to one of the counselors and I go through all of the markers with me, but fundamentally, I want to be happy and I want to spend time with my friends.

• 24:52Simon Sinek?

  And those things that I do things for the, I want to have fun when I do things and I want to spend a lot of time with my friends, it reduces stress. And you look at the, you look at the health obsessed people, like the longevity obsessed people. They're putting themselves through such extreme stress by freaking out about the metrics every day and, and, and, and they're, they're doing cold plunges. And a hard workout and intermittent, intermittent fasting, which all of those things are healthy by themselves. But when you start stacking the stress, it actually makes, it actually creates inflammation and actually reduces lifespan. I learned that elite athletes actually don't live long. And so basically, when we say, when you say, the quality of your relationships determines the quality of your life.

• 25:38Simon Sinek?

  That is biologically true more than just what you eat, how much exercise you do, and whether you do intermittent fasting or not.

• 25:46Speaker 00

  I, I mean, you know, first you're describing.

• 25:51Speaker 00

  What the Harvard longitudinal study on men, by the way, that has been going on for decades. It's absolutely clear that relationships and meaningful relationships is the number one bar none for happiness. That doesn't necessarily mean that you live longer, but you live better.

• 26:09Simon Sinek?

  I want to live, I want to live a long, happy life, not just a long life.

• 26:12Speaker 00

  What we know is that all people who arrive at a certain age, as one of the great physicians said to me, I have yet to meet a man in his nineties who is alive alone.

• 26:24Simon Sinek?

  Oh, so good.

• 26:26Speaker 00

  Everybody who is there a long time is there because they have somebody right next to them. Doesn't have to be a spouse. But there are people right next to them that say, oh, it looks like you're limping a bit. Oh, you don't seem to be hearing me as well. Oh, have you considered, you know, getting eye surgery? Whatever. People look at you and are saying, I see you, how are you doing? You know, the, they know, for example, apropos relationships and health, that the, the growth of the lats, the living apart together. You know, the, the, the fastest growing configuration of couples in America today. Is actually correlated with the decline in health, especially in men.

• 27:09Speaker 00

  Who often don't pay attention to this and so who they, male partners or female partners, but it means in partnership, somebody says, should go see a doctor.

• 27:19Simon Sinek?

  Even, even Dan Buettner's work, you know, the Blue Zones, which is wonderful work and he's, he's fantastic. You know, a lot of, and he does talk about it, but a lot of the people that what they take from his work is walk every day, drink olive oil, eat vegetables. And they completely ignore the fact that these Blue Zones, that they live in commune, they live together, they eat together, they work together, they do things together, they walk together. And to your point, they're like, you're limping, you're not listening to me. And, and they, they, they know how to have effective confrontation, they know how to resolve. They're all those human skills that we talk about that should be learned in the playground, they learn them and they're using them into their old age. You're a hundred percent.

• 27:59Speaker 00

  Isn't it amazing that we need to be reminded of this, that we are social beings, that we are mammals, that we survive by the connection we have to others? That we are born to connect with people. I, I'll give you a, a little anecdote. I don't think anecdotes that describe the full reality, but it was a moment for me that was very interesting.

• 28:19Speaker 00

  And my younger son was in kindergarten, he had a very best friend. I was convinced he would go into first grade with that same friend. No, I went to the principal, I said, why did you separate them? They were getting so along, it was such a beautiful friendship that could become, you know, my childhood friend like I have from, from age six. She said, they need to learn to make new friends each time. I said, he's not being trained for mobility. He's a five year old who is being trained for long-term relationships. It's not the same. And it was really clear, that was the idea. The idea is not how do you continue a longstanding friendship? Is how do you make new friends all the time? I thought that was just an amazing cultural encounter.

• 29:02Simon Sinek?

  Wow. So wow, we're actually training our young to suck it up and get over it and move on.

• 29:09Speaker 00

  Yeah, I mean, they don't, it's not seen this way. It's seen as having the competence, the quality of being able to make new friends wherever you go. You know, and there is value to that, too. But at five, I'm thinking, you know, this is, you can see a value system that occurs, you know, two decades later and how it seeps into the mentality of early childhood, basically.

• 29:32Simon Sinek?

  One of the things we don't think about until, you know, we're looking in the rearview mirror is what are the experiences we have when we're children that mold us into the adults that we become? And like, we know the generation that grew up during lockdown. We're not sure what the impact is yet, but like, like our grandparents who grew up during the war, you know, and during rations, you know, for the rest of their lives, they saved every little piece of tinfoil and reused every jam jar, you know, and they would, they hated waste. And the reason is, it's not, there's nothing mentally wrong with them. It's because they grew up during a time of depression and war. You know, and so it marks them for the rest of their lives as an entire generation.

• 30:13Speaker 00

  I think that you have two things happening right now. One is that we all understand that people come to work with two CVs. They have two resumes. They have their work resume and they have their relationship history. Everybody comes to work with a relationship CV in which that determines your relationship to authority, to power, to powerlessness, to boundaries, to boundaryless, to communication, to conflict, to to implosion, to explosion. Every aspect of relationship takes place in the workplace and it has a resonance to the early relationships that where we learn things, family, community, cultural.

• 30:57Speaker 00

  In addition to that, you have now a whole generation that is basically learning to live with predictive technologies. And these predictive technologies who tell you where to go, what to eat, what to watch, you know, are giving you specific answers to every question that you have, erasing all complexity, erasing nuance, erasing the idea that in the realm of life, many problems are not problems that you solve, but paradoxes that you learn to manage. And so these people have learned, have transposed their expectations of how the apps respond to them to how people should respond to them. They want the same kind of smooth, frictionless, polished perfection.

• 31:41Speaker 00

  And when there is an obstacle or a frustration or a conflict, they are often stumped and they don't know what to do. And that entire thing is now entering the workplace, especially places that are tech oriented, where this is constantly on a reinforcement, on a daily, with a daily doses.

• 32:01Simon Sinek?

  This is what most people, I mean, I think they've appreciate now in this conversation, you know, which is you and I both have our own brand of Trojan horse.

• 32:11Simon Sinek?

  You know, which is you fundamentally believe that if you can teach people to resolve conflict and learn these human skills in their relationships, it'll fundamentally benefit everything that happens at work and all the relationships at work. And my Trojan horse is if I can teach people the human skills of conflict resolution and asking for help at work, it'll fundamentally improve their relationships and friendships outside of work. Because at the end of the day, what you and I peddle in is human relationships. It's actually irrelevant whether they're personal relationships or work relationships, they're relationships. And the reason your friends love you is the same reason your clients and colleagues love you. It's because it's you. And if one of those places, you act differently than in one of those places, you're lying. And, and the goal is to, and again, I'm agnostic as to where somebody learns the skills.

• 32:56Simon Sinek?

  I don't care if they learn them in couples therapy and I don't care if they learn them in a, in a, in a, in a listening class that their office gives them. I don't care. Just learn the damn skills somewhere, please.

• 33:08Simon Sinek?

  For the benefit of all your human relationships. And as we're learning, it's the quality of our relationships that determines the quality of our lives. And, you know, you know, our work lives, it, it's, this is all, these are all modern constructions that we're talking about. The way that the relationship exists, the way that the work life exists. But fundamentally, since the dawn of humankind, it's human beings who have to cooperate with other human beings in order to survive and thrive as a species.

• 33:32Speaker 00

  Correct.

• 33:32Simon Sinek?

  The rest of the stuff is just, is just, is just.

• 33:35Speaker 00

  Is the context. It's the specific context and that matters and it shapes things, but the fundamental dimension is universal.

• 33:43Simon Sinek?

  So, so, you know, we haven't talked in a while and you and I, because we're friends, we've both cheated in our lives, meaning, I should probably elaborate.

• 33:56Speaker 00

  I'm watching, I'm waiting, no, no, I'm like, where is he going?

• 34:00Simon Sinek?

  Where is he going with this? Exactly. Nobody knows.

• 34:04Simon Sinek?

  What I mean is, just as you said that I helped you with articulate the meaning of your work. So too, when you and I would go out for dinner, you know, I'd get free relationship counseling. You know, and, and you and I would, because you and I are genuinely interested in each other's work and in our own work. And so, you know, we, we, we open up to each other. It gets our relation, our conversations would be quite personal. And so I haven't talked in a while, so I need to give you an update. So what better place to give you an update than on a public broadcast? I had a huge profound shift in my thinking about my own relationships that I hope I think will make you proud. Which is, I, you know, I haven't had many long-term relationships in my life and I'm

• 34:50Simon Sinek?

  never been married. And in my dating life, very often, especially on a first date, a woman will say to me, what's wrong with you? Because they'll start quizzing me. What's your longest relationship? You know, they're, they're quizzing me. They're going through whether I, I'm capable. You know, and, and I'm honest. And then they literally, they say, well, how come you haven't been married or what's wrong with you? Or are you relationship phobic or are you commitment phobic? And, you know, it didn't sound right. But the empirical evidence would demonstrate that maybe I am. And I started to believe the evidence, even though it didn't feel right to me. And it caused me great insecurity. And, and then I started to realize when somebody says, how come you haven't been married yet? The answer was obvious. I haven't met the right person yet.

• 35:35Simon Sinek?

  But more important than that, more important than that was, is, is that I've recognized that I have focused on friendships and I have a very fulfilled and happy life. And I get a lot of what other people get from relationships. I get from very, very deep and meaningful friendships. And I have a friend, she, she was in a 16-year relationship. And she will freely admit that she should have been in that relationship for one year. It was very unhealthy, very toxic and mostly unhappy. And she says, I should have been in the relationship for one year, but she stayed in it for 16 years. And society looks at her and says, she did it right.

• 36:18Simon Sinek?

  That is correct. And society looks at me, where I didn't have one monogamous relationship, and they say, something's wrong with you.

• 36:28Simon Sinek?

  And I've, I've exercised those demons and I've recognized that so long as I am in happy, healthy, fulfilling relationships, the exact dynamics where there it fits society's definition of what I should or shouldn't be doing is irrelevant. Are, am I happy? Do people love me? Do I love people? Do I feel that I can go to someone and say I'm struck? Is there someone to say, you're limping? Go to the doctor. There's something in your teeth. Do I have those friends that are unafraid? And I think we, especially in this modern context, where the definition of relationship have changed so much, to your point, which is whether we're in these long-term, healthy, monogamous relationships has become yet another stressor in our lives.

• 37:12Simon Sinek?

  And the question is, are you in happy relationships? Whether they're work relationships or romantic relationships or friends, do you have successful relationships that you know how to manage and they, and they too have the skills of, of having? And I've recognized, whether it's just me because I'm a weirdo, maybe it's society, but I'm much more at peace with the fact that there's nothing wrong with me.

• 37:37Speaker 00

  So I'm gonna, if you allow me, I would, the personal one we'll do at dinner. But the broader one, I think, is a very relevant question, which is kind of what I was addressing earlier when I said there is a proliferation of new emphasis, new creations of of social bonds, new definitions of what is family, what is a family of choice, what is a circle of care. And I think that what you're describing among your friends is that.

• 38:07Simon Sinek?

  Yeah.

• 38:08Speaker 00

  What you're saying is, if I understand it well, is that we have over indexed on the romantic partnership as it being the one and only, the be all, the central one, the one that everybody needs to have one and fulfill. And it also happens to be a model in which one person has to be able to provide you what an entire village used to provide.

• 38:34Simon Sinek?

  Yeah.

• 38:34Speaker 00

  And that means that you have to experience with the same person, the sense of belonging, apropos what we described about work, a sense of belonging, of continuity, of safety, of predictability, and also of adventure, and of novelty, and of playfulness and risk, all of this in one relationship. I think there are three models, actually, in that sense. There is a relationship model that is romantic and intimate, in which people do experience the joy from the relationship itself. Then there are people, maybe this woman that you described, for whom marriage or committed intimate relationships or relationships

• 39:15Speaker 00

  are scaffolding. They basically provide a structure that enables you to go elsewhere and find different sources of meaning, activities, shared interests, purpose, you name it, desire, you know, but basically friends, because people find that if they are in the structure of a couple, they are, they have fulfilled the norm and it enables them to go and make friendship and things like that outside. And then there are people who basically are blessed with multiple friendships and multiple binds and bonds and connections, and they don't necessarily see the intimate relationship as the primary relationship

• 39:59Speaker 00

  to be in. And you are right, they are often seen from a normative point of view as the ones who didn't fulfill, you know, what's expected, the code of conduct, when in fact, not everybody finds the best of themselves in an intimate romantic relationship. Some people are way better as managers, as mentors, as friends, as teachers, than they are as life partners.

• 40:27Simon Sinek?

  It's really for me about stress, which is I love being in a relationship. I love having a romantic partner and a life partner. I really love being in a relationship. And in my last relationship-

• 40:38Speaker 00

  That's why I answered it less personally.

• 40:41Simon Sinek?

  And I, and I want, and I want another one.

• 40:43Speaker 00

  Right, but you don't want to be made to feel like there was something wrong with-

• 40:46Simon Sinek?

  But I don't want to be made to feel like there's something wrong with me because I'm not in one, or because I don't have a history of a, of a marriage. And that's the, those are the demons that I've exercised.

• 40:54Speaker 00

  Yes, that is the measurement stick that is used across the globe, by the way.

• 40:59Simon Sinek?

  This conversation, it goes right back to the beginning of this conversation, which is the norm. The norm may have been developed not because it was out of desire, but because people were stuck. And as you said, happiness was a, we discussed, happiness was a perk, not a glue. And it was the being stuck in something that defined the, the rules and roles and responsibilities of that, of that relationship, that when the, the flexibility to be unstuck changes the rules, roles, and responsibility in the relationship.

• 41:29Speaker 00

  Correct.

• 41:30Simon Sinek?

  And so, and so I think, as I said, for me, it's not a question that I want to, I, I absolutely want a relationship, but I, I don't feel there's anything wrong with me anymore. I believed, I believed the very sort of judgy questions that were asked to me, you know, over dinner, and I know, I now can smile and say, it's obvious why I haven't been married, I haven't met the right person yet. It's such a stupid question, isn't that obvious, you know?

• 41:57Speaker 00

  I think what you're highlighting, and, and, because that's the lesson for, for, for many people, is really, we need connection.

• 42:07Simon Sinek?

  We need connection. And, and my friendships, my friendships leave me not lonely.

• 42:12Speaker 00

  Yes, yes, exactly.

• 42:14Simon Sinek?

  While at the same time, of course, I'm meeting people and would like what, and the other thing that's changed is I would meet people and be like, try and make this person my girlfriend. Okay, it didn't work. Try and make this person my girlfriend. And of course, I'm putting, so I'm putting pressure on myself and the, and the poor other person. It's destined for failure because of this construction that I'm trying to force. Now, everyone I, everyone I meet, my only goal is see if there's a friendship here. See if there's a friendship here, foster friendship. And if one of those friendships blossoms into something more, then I'm open minded to that, but build friendship first.

• 42:47Speaker 00

  You know what you're highlighting?

• 42:48Simon Sinek?

  Into a relationship.

• 42:49Speaker 00

  What you're highlighting, which is very interesting, is the difference between belonging and fitting in.

• 42:55Simon Sinek?

  Say more.

• 42:56Speaker 00

  I mean, you wanted to try to fit in. You want to try to fit the person into the mold, you know, romantic love is fantastic. It's, it's one of the greatest inventions we have, but it doesn't come at the expense of every other type of bonding in a relationship. And I mean, what I have been saying for, for quite a while now is we need the spread of it. We need the mentorship. We need the teacher. We need the, the creative pair. We need the deep friendships. We need the peripheral friendships. We need the work friends. We need, because we don't have these ready-made, all-encompassing communities that we used to be part of, in which one community determined every aspect of our lives, as it is still

• 43:41Speaker 00

  in many other parts of the world, but not here, we need to create this. And this is a real creative endeavor, actually, but it's, it demands practice, it demands routines, it demands rituals, it demands continuity on a daily basis. You're right that your friends make you not lonely, hopefully. And you're right that many people who are in committed marriages or romantic relationships may often really experience a lack of friends and a deep loneliness while there's somebody living right next to them.

• 44:14Simon Sinek?

  Yep.

• 44:15Speaker 00

  It's not the numbers and the constellation that guarantees the quality of the, of your connection and the internal feeling.

• 44:23Simon Sinek?

  Yeah.

• 44:23Speaker 00

  You know, I, I got interested, you know, I mean, I've, I've written and spoken about this for decades on, on the personal front, but I got very interested in it, in the workspace, because when I, as we, when we began, I said, there is a kind of a dual revolution happening at once. The business terms have entered the romantic and the intimate relationships, but the psychology and the language of intimate relationships has entered the business world. Authenticity, vulnerability, trust, psychological safety. I mean, an entire vocabulary has entered the workplace and especially the business world that, you know,

• 45:05Speaker 00

  in the same breath, we talk about psychological safety as we talk about performance indicators. And we totally see the syncretism as, as normal. And so from that place, I thought, oh, maybe I can also, within the workplace, address not just our relationship to work, but our relationships at work.

• 45:26Simon Sinek?

  Yeah.

• 45:26Speaker 00

  And I started to create the card games and I started to create, and experiences of interaction when people know that storytelling is the bridge for connection. How do I make people share of themselves in that context? Because now we need as many contexts as we can.

• 45:45Simon Sinek?

  I, I wonder if the group that's at highest risk.

• 45:49Speaker 00

  Is the young people.

• 45:50Simon Sinek?

  But, but not kids in school, because kids, you, you know, the question is, do they play in the street? Maybe not. But they still play in the playground. They still go to school. And more and more schools are taking the phones away, or at least restricting their use. So there's still common experience at school and they still have fights on the playground.

• 46:08Speaker 00

  The post-high school or the post-college or the-

• 46:10Simon Sinek?

  And I, I, I think the highest risk is college and post, and post-college, where they start to have some independence, and especially post, you know, when they enter the entry-level workforce.

• 46:20Speaker 00

  Entry-level workforce is-

• 46:22Simon Sinek?

  I think entry-level workforce, that, that population is the most at risk, especially with the concept of remote work, because if they don't have to come to work, they don't want to come to work.

• 46:32Speaker 00

  If there will be work for them, it's a job, bloodbath.

• 46:35Simon Sinek?

  If there will be work for them. And, and the idea of like, the lion cubs learning the skills they need for, for adulthood, I would argue that, that first level workforce, that entry-level workforce, that, you know, entry level sucks. You know, you have to be good at everything. You, you, it's not about your unique talents.

• 46:55Speaker 00

  You think you have to be good at everything.

• 46:56Simon Sinek?

  You have to think you have to be good at everything, but, and you, and you have to, and you're, you're asked to do things you, like I, when I was entry level, they wanted me to be very organized. That's hilarious. But I had, I had to do it. And it's the stresses and strains, and the, and I had to learn who are my friends and who are my enemies, because there were people who stabbed me in the back for their promotion. And, and I, and you can't just stab them back. You have to like, learn to navigate. But it happened, the playground, the street was the office.

• 47:26Simon Sinek?

  And the politics and the egos and the insecurities, mine and theirs and the ambitions and all of this came into the pot that was the office place. And I fear that because it feels nice not to come to work and it feels nice to have all that freedom, that as you described, the liquidity, the liquid work-life balance, that the rigidity in the structure, even to the point where companies are saying, we'd like you to come back to work and it's not just for us, it's also for you. There's such a harsh pushback amongst particularly, I think, younger populations because it feels nice not to come in, but the question is, is it good for you? When I've spoken about this, you know, the comments in the sections are like, you're

• 48:10Simon Sinek?

  just saying that because you're an exploitive employer and all of this stuff. And I really am thinking about those lion cubs. I'm really thinking about the time, because you can't, when you're senior and you screw something up, it can be really bad. When you're junior, you're not going to bring the company down. I am who I am today, in large part because I was really lucky to have a really shitty boss when I started my career and then I got a really good boss and I learned how not to do things and how to do things that had significant molding and influence.

• 48:41Speaker 00

  One of my favorite cards is actually, I still remember the manager who, and what you hear is often either the best manager, the one that I adore, that trained me, that believed in me, da-da-da-da-da, that I want to emulate, either it's the manager like the boss that you're talking about, that the shitty manager who really made me sweat and who I learned from that person what never to do. It's an amazing revelatory card. Now, I also like the piece of feedback I wish I had received sooner, that too, because it goes back to your beginnings and what people did and did not tell you.

• 49:23Speaker 00

  I think instead of polarizing between remote work and physically present at work, the question for me at this moment, I don't want to engage with that conversation, the way where people can then be invited to. You know, I combine, I do my podcast online, it is a technology where people can listen live to sessions. I also see patients in person, I see patients on a walk, I see patients on a screen. I try to alternate it and I try to teach my students to not do their entire work on the screen, because some of the young therapists have never seen anybody work and have never been seen working.

• 50:08Simon Sinek?

  Yeah.

• 50:09Speaker 00

  And that, I think, is problematic, because supervision is the way you learn in my field, that's your feedback session with the manager, is a supervision session. So I would say, what is important is how we help people connect. It's what people used to say, like, meet them where they are. How do you elicit curiosity? How do you make people appear like they are three-dimensional people behind that screen? You know, what's going on in their life? How do you, and can we? Because what happens today is you open the screen, even us, we opened the screen and we basically started within a minute, you know? Because I couldn't say, can I get your coffee?

• 50:52Speaker 00

  Or you say to me, can I get, you know, that whole ritual of welcoming, of entering into each other's spheres, of saying, how have you been, of connecting, you know, that smile that we were talking about. It's so task-oriented.

• 51:05Simon Sinek?

  It's transactional, it's transactional. But again, I agree with you and I'm not making the for or against in-person versus online work either. I mean, I've had a virtual company before virtual companies were a thing and I still do. Like, my team is spread all over the country, if not all over the world. I'm making the case that it's not one or, it's one and, that I'm asking employers to be flexible, but I'm asking employees to be flexible too. That neither side should be saying, it's this or that. Both sides should be saying, we would like it blended, even if some of it makes me uncomfortable because I'm an introvert or I'm an extrovert, whatever. Because it's not just about, well, I'm an introvert, I want to stay at home. Well, think about your extrovert colleagues, they want to see you. So sometimes we have to make a little sacrifice for each other.

• 51:49Simon Sinek?

  This goes back to what it means to be in tribe, it means to be in relationship, which is we do things for each other so that we can grow, not just that I can be happy, but that we can be happy and we do things for each other. And so, like even my virtual company, like, I remember the...

• 52:05Speaker 00

  Do you meet? Do you have offsites?

• 52:08Simon Sinek?

  We do, we do, we do an annual offsite. I like when the team meets up as smaller groups throughout the year as well, that happens and I want it to happen more, if I'm honest. But the value of the in-person cannot be replicated and I think what you and I are both espousing is flexibility, not...

• 52:26Speaker 00

  And flexibility, but also, I think that in-person and then what? So I say, when I bring people in-person, I want to create connections that are fun, meaningful, elicit the desire for more. So, you know, any activity is good. I happen to do it with storytelling because I think that we are storytellers and relationships are stories. I think that one of our biggest challenges is how do you deal in relationships with the fact that somebody has a completely different story about the same relationship as you? And that's where a lot of conflict comes in, that's not what happened, I'll tell you what happened, because my brain is more accurate than yours, you know?

• 53:11Simon Sinek?

  Oh, that's worth repeating because it's just so funny and so true. That's not what happened, I'll tell you what happened. Oh my God, we've all done it, we've definitely all...

• 53:19Speaker 00

  Of course, I know. You know, my brain works, yours doesn't. And I do it, you know, with the courses, I do it with the podcasts, I do it with the card game. But the concept behind it is, how do I help people who don't go out enough and don't speak enough in serendipitous, impromptu situations, know what to say, ask questions, learn to listen, learn to tell stories about themselves, realize what it means to be revealing of oneself within limits in the workplace? And I think one of the things that the Lions did is play. So a card game is play.

• 54:01Speaker 00

  I wanted to use play to create these meaningful connections, which I know for fact improved the relationship culture in the workplace, which therefore for fact improves performance in the workplace.

• 54:15Simon Sinek?

  I mean, I think you said it best and I think it's a nice place, it's a nice button for us to conclude, which is, which is play doesn't necessarily mean, you know, a game of foosball or ping pong or something. Play is just, is bringing some sort of lighthearted interaction. When you and I go out for dinner, you and I have sometimes very intense conversations, we disagree sometimes, sometimes we pick at each other. And at the end of every time we get together, the end of every dinner, we both leave and say, I had such, so much fun, I had such a good time. And I think because...

• 54:49Speaker 00

  You know what is play is when risk is fun. And what you described was a concern about comfort and discomfort. I am less on the spending side, making sure people are not uncomfortable and all of that. I spend more time at this moment helping people take risks, because, you know, we tend to say that only when you trust can you take risks, but it is also true that when you can take risks, it increases your ability to trust, your abilities and other people.

• 55:22Simon Sinek?

  And when we can understand that we treat work as play and relationships as play and all of these things that don't have fixed rules and agreed upon outcomes, agreed upon finish lines, that the mindset must be play. And that in turn, to your point, reduces stress, increases productivity, increases the quality of our relationships, gets us to see each other as contributors rather than competitors. And it just makes cultures, relationships work better when you view as many aspects of your life as play, you're playing the infinite game.

• 55:57Speaker 00

  Another way for play would be engagement.

• 55:59Simon Sinek?

  Hundred percent, hundred percent.

• 56:02Speaker 00

  It's that. For those of us who don't like the word play, I just think, replace it with engagement and this will make a tremendous amount of sense. I like it, I like it a lot.

• 56:12Simon Sinek?

  What's the number one relationship skill Gen Z should master before starting their first job?

• 56:18Speaker 00

  Talk to strangers.

• 56:21Simon Sinek?

  Ooh, say more, didn't expect that one.

• 56:25Speaker 00

  I mean, when you spend all your time like this, you don't notice who's around you, you don't talk to people on a plane, you don't talk to people in a queue, you don't talk to people while you're waiting for your coffee, I mean, you don't talk to strangers. And talking to strangers is improvisation, spontaneity, serendipity, surprise, novelty, you know, an active engagement with the unknown, which is actually one of the definitions that Rachel Botsman gives to what is trust. Trust is an active engagement with the unknown. If you don't know to talk to strangers, you have less trust. And entering the workplace is talking to strangers. If you just came out of whatever school you done or not done and done any other preparation,

• 57:10Speaker 00

  but any first job is a series of conversations with strangers, without knowing what they really want from you, without knowing how they look at you, without understanding the codes. You know, you've just been 12 years in school, you kind of figured out what's the deal, what are the social norms. Find yourself in any job, any kind of job, you're looking around, it's like moving to a new country.

• 57:31Simon Sinek?

  Yeah. Which further highlights what we were saying about, which is the biggest at-risk population is not little kids, it's entry-level employees.

• 57:43Speaker 00

  Now, I will add, talking to strangers is sometimes a lot of fun and sometimes uncomfortable. And the discomfort piece is a part of life. The only way you deal with it is by repeating until it becomes practice. Any skill you will learn at first has an element of discomfort. I think that we've put comfort and discomfort so much in the center of life at this moment because all these apps are supposed to give us frictionless life that is so comfortable. And we bring those very expectations to places where that is not the norm. Life is complex and it is all of these other things. So I think talking to strangers, which is a thing that often parents say, don't talk to strangers.

• 58:26Speaker 00

  No, no, no, absolutely talk to strangers.

• 58:29Simon Sinek?

  So good, so good. What's one daily habit that leaders can use to stay true to their priorities when work and home demands collide?

• 58:40Speaker 00

  Oh, that's a beautiful one.

• 58:45Speaker 00

  What is one thing that leaders can be when they experience the tension between home and work? I think for some people, it's 10 minutes of meditation in the morning, 20, whatever. I mean, just quiet by themselves where you have to accomplish nothing. You don't have to meet the needs of home or work. You just have to be in your breath in the moment, you know, in thoughts or without thoughts, depending on the practice of meditation. But the meditation can also be movement. It can be biking, it can be walking, it can be, you know, so it's.

• 59:19Simon Sinek?

  It's active disengagement from the.

• 59:23Speaker 00

  From the responsibility, from the responsibility.

• 59:26Simon Sinek?

  Responsibility, yeah.

• 59:26Speaker 00

  You know, it's a moment where you don't have to, you don't have to answer anything. You don't have to solve any problem. You don't have to be accountable. And if it's only five minutes because of the reality of your life, let it be five minutes. But to have a moment that is in a third space away from the obligations, the duties, the responsibility, the accountability of each one, and it's how it pinges on you.

• 59:51Simon Sinek?

  And for people, and for people who are uncomfortable with the concept of meditation or don't know how to do it.

• 59:55Speaker 00

  Run, exercise, move.

• 59:57Simon Sinek?

  It doesn't matter what you do. The way I do it, every single morning, I sit in bed, I do Wordle, I do Connections, and I do the crossword puzzle in that order.

• 1:00:05Speaker 00

  Wordle, crossword, puzzle, and?

• 1:00:07Simon Sinek?

  Wordle, Connections, and then crossword, and always in that order.

• 1:00:11Speaker 00

  You know, I think meditation can be totally in movement. It's a, I'm using the word more metaphorically than in its literal sense. I think connecting is very important. I mean, I've asked many people high into tech and AI, you know, to connect with one person every day, different people if need be, but just brief and with voice, not just with text, even if it's a voice message.

• 1:00:37Simon Sinek?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:38Speaker 00

  I think that we need to really hear, the voice is the first thing we hear in utero. We need to listen to the voice of people. We will be misinterpreting each other a lot less if we hear the voice. So that's, but in all, every one of my examples.

• 1:00:52Simon Sinek?

  That's how you fix, you know, 55 misinterpretations on an email that escalates as you have one phone call and it's resolved in five minutes.

• 1:00:59Speaker 00

  Please, please, yes.

• 1:01:01Simon Sinek?

  You are, you are one of the most, you are one of the wisest, lucid, clearest commentators on the world as we know it today.

• 1:01:11Speaker 00

  Oh, wow.

• 1:01:12Simon Sinek?

  And I think.

• 1:01:13Speaker 00

  Thank you.

• 1:01:14Simon Sinek?

  I hope, I know, I know that your, your, your current work is bringing what you've learned from years of relationship therapy into the workplace, which as we've already determined is irrelevant in terms of the, the context, because it's about human relationships. The quality of your relationships determine the quality of your life and.

• 1:01:32Speaker 00

  At work and at home.

• 1:01:34Simon Sinek?

  And at work and at home. And, and you are, you are, you are the OG, you are the Mac Daddy, you are the, you're the best. I'm such a fan of you, your work, and I'm so glad I get to call you friend.

• 1:01:46Speaker 00

  It's mutual and thank you so much.

• 1:01:49Simon Sinek?

  I love you. I'll talk to you soon.

• 1:01:51Speaker 00

  Bye bye.