4 Strategies to Identify Your Values & How They Can Guide Your Daily Decisions

Can you identify who you are, or are you chasing someone else’s dream? Jay explains how easy it is for people to become wrapped up in what they think others think of them and lose themselves in the process. Listen in to hear him share his wisdom on how to find your true self. Learn how to clear away outside distractions and apply your guiding values to your life. Train your mind for peace and purpose everyday. Grab a copy of Think Like A Monk, or listen to the audiobook now! Book: https://books.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewFeature?id=1532264534&mt=11&ls=1&itscg=80048&itsct=js_httlam_book Audiobook: https://books.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewFeature?id=1532264062&mt=3&ls=1&itscg=80048&itsct=js_httlam_audiobook See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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

• 0:00Jay Shetty?

  This episode is brought to you by Vinted. Value can be found anywhere, even in the clothes sitting untouched in our closets. That's where Vinted comes in. Vinted is a secondhand marketplace app where you can sell clothes you no longer want and get more value out of them. Whether you're running out of space, moving, or simply updating your wardrobe. Listing items is a quick and simple process, and once something sells, Vinted creates a prepaid shipping label for you. And the best part, there are no seller fees, so you keep what you earn. It's a simple way to clear out your closet, be less wasteful, and maybe make some extra money along the way. And if you've been thinking about a wardrobe refresh, this can make it feel a little more worthwhile. You're not just letting go of clothes, you're getting more value from what you already have.

• 0:43Jay Shetty?

  Give your clothes a second life with Vinted. Download the Vinted app for free to start selling with no seller fees, so you keep every dollar you earn. This episode is brought to you by AG1. Are you feeling September reset too? Shorter days, longer to-do lists, earlier alarms, all those routines you promised yourself you'd pick back up. It can feel like your whole life is recalibrating. And when everything around you is changing, it helps to have a few things you can rely on. AG1 Next Gen is one of those easy habits to keep. It's the clinically-backed, comprehensive daily health drink that supports your gut health, energy production, and foundational nutrition all in one scoop.

• 1:26Jay Shetty?

  AG1's ingredients are sourced from quality partners for absorption, potency, and nutrient density to deliver the foundational nutrition your body needs. And alongside a proper diet, AG1 Next Gen meets 94% of nutrient requirements, and it's clinically shown to enrich the gut microbiome. For a limited time, save 20% on your first subscription order of AG1 Next Gen or AG1 Pro at drinkag1.com/onpurpose. That's drinkag1.com/onpurpose.

• 2:01Jay Shetty?

  This episode is brought to you by AG1. Are you feeling September reset too? Shorter days, longer to-do lists, earlier alarms, all those routines you promised to yourself you'd pick back up. It can feel like your whole life is recalibrating. And when everything around you is changing, it helps to have a few things you can rely on. AG1 Next Gen is one of those easy habits to keep. It's the clinically-backed, comprehensive daily health drink that supports your gut health, energy production, and foundational nutrition all in one scoop. AG1's ingredients are sourced from quality partners for absorption, potency, and nutrient density to deliver the foundational nutrition your body needs. And alongside a proper diet,

• 2:45Jay Shetty?

  AG1 Next Gen meets 94% of nutrient requirements and is clinically shown to enrich the gut microbiome. For a limited time, save 20% on your first subscription order of AG1 Next Gen or AG1 Pro at drinkag1.com/onpurpose. That's drinkag1.com/onpurpose. Hey everyone, so I've got an extremely, extremely special treat for each and every one of you today. What I'm going to be sharing with you is chapter one of the audiobook for my book, Think Like a Monk. Now, if you've been reading along, you can hear this chapter for absolutely free today. And if you love it, you can go and grab yourself a copy

• 3:30Jay Shetty?

  at thinklikeamunkbook.com. It's on Apple Books, Audible, audiobooks. I can't wait for you to listen to this. It's one of my favorite chapters in the book and I can't wait to share it with you. So listen in, share your best insight and thank you so much.

• 3:51Jay Shetty?

  "I am what I think I am. It is better to live your own destiny imperfectly than to live an imitation of somebody else's life with perfection." Bhagavad Gita 335. "In 1902, the sociologist Charles Horton Cooley wrote, 'I am not what I think I am, and I am not what you think I am. I am what I think you think I am.'" Let that blow your mind for a moment. Our identity is wrapped up in what others think of us. Or more accurately, what we think others think of us.

• 4:33Jay Shetty?

  Not only is our self-image tied up in how we think others see us, but most of our efforts at self-improvement are really just us trying to meet that imagined ideal. If we think someone we admire sees wealth as success, then we chase wealth to impress that person. If we imagine that a friend is judging our looks, we tailor our appearance in response. In West Side Story, Maria meets a boy who's into her. What's her very next song? "I Feel Pretty." As of this writing, the world's only triple-best actor Oscar winner, Daniel Day-Lewis, has acted in just six films since 1998.

• 5:18Jay Shetty?

  He prepares for each role extensively, immersing himself completely in his character. For the role of Bill the Butcher in Martin Scorsese's Gangs of New York, he trained as a butcher, spoke with a thick Irish accent on and off-set, and hired circus performers to teach him how to throw knives. And that's only the beginning. He wore only authentic 19th-century clothing and walked around Rome in character, starting arguments and fights with strangers. Perhaps thanks to that clothing, he caught pneumonia. Day-Lewis was employing a technique called method acting, which requires the actor to live as much like his character as possible

• 6:03Jay Shetty?

  in order to become the role he's playing. This is an incredible skill and art, but often, method actors become so absorbed in their character that the role takes on a life beyond the stage or screen. "I will admit that I went mad, totally mad," Day-Lewis said to The Independent years later. "Admitting the role was not so good for my physical or mental health."

• 6:34Jay Shetty?

  Unconsciously, we're all method acting to some degree. We have personas we play online, at work, with friends, and at home. These different personas have their benefits. They enable us to make the money that pays our bills. They help us function in a workplace where we don't always feel comfortable. They let us maintain relationships with people we don't really like, but need to interact with. But often, our identity has so many layers that we lose sight of the real us if we ever knew who or what that was in the first place. We bring our work role home with us, and we take the role we play with our friends into our romantic life

• 7:18Jay Shetty?

  without any conscious control or intention. However successfully we play our roles, we end up feeling dissatisfied, depressed, unworthy, and unhappy. The "I" and "me," small and vulnerable to begin with, get distorted. We try to live up to what we think others think of us, even at the expense of our values. Rarely, if ever, do we consciously, intentionally, create our own values. We make life choices using this twice-reflected image of who we might be without really thinking it through. Coolly call this phenomenon "the looking-glass self."

• 8:04Jay Shetty?

  We live in a perception of a perception of ourselves, and we've lost our real selves as a result. How can we recognize who we are and what makes us happy when we're chasing the distorted reflection of someone else's dreams? You might think that the hard part about becoming a monk is letting go of the fun stuff: partying, sex, watching TV, owning things, sleeping in an actual bed. Okay, the bed part was pretty rough. But before I took that step, there was a bigger hurdle I had to overcome: breaking my career choice to my parents.

• 8:42Jay Shetty?

  By the time I was wrapping up my final year of college, I decided what path I wanted to take. I told my parents I would be turning down the job offers that had come my way. I always joke that as far as my parents were concerned, I had three career options: doctor, lawyer, or failure. There's no better way to tell your parents that everything they did for you was a waste than to become a monk. Like all parents, mine had dreams for me, but at least I had eased them into the idea that I might become a monk. Every year since I was eighteen, I'd spend part of the summer interning at a finance job in London and part of the year training at the ashram in Mumbai. By the time I made my decision,

• 9:27Jay Shetty?

  my mother's first concern was the same as any mother's: my well-being. Would I have health care? Was seeking enlightenment just a fancy way of saying "sitting around all day"? Even more challenging for my mother was that we were surrounded by friends and family who shared the doctor-lawyer-failure definition of success. Word spread that I was making this radical move, and her friends started saying, "But you've invested so much in his education, and he's been brainwashed, and he's going to waste his life." My friends too thought I was failing at life. I heard, "You're never going to get a job again,

• 10:13Jay Shetty?

  and you're throwing away any hope of earning a living." When you try to live your most authentic life, some of your relationships will be put in jeopardy. Losing them is a risk worth bearing. Finding a way to keep them in your life is a challenge worth taking on. Luckily, to my developing monk mind, the voices of my parents and their friends were not the most important guidelines I used when making this decision. Instead, I relied on my own experience. Every year since I was eighteen, I had tested both lives. I didn't come home from my summer finance jobs feeling anything but hungry for dinner. But every time I left the ashram, I thought,

• 10:58Jay Shetty?

  "That was amazing. I just had the best time of my life." Experimenting with these widely diverse experiences, values, and belief systems helped me understand my own. The reactions to my choice to become a monk are examples of the external pressures we all face throughout our lives. Our families, our friends, society, media. We are surrounded by images and voices telling us who we should be and what we should do. They clamor with opinions and expectations and obligations. Go straight from high school to the best college. Find a lucrative job. Get married. Buy a home. Have children. Get promoted.

• 11:43Jay Shetty?

  Cultural norms exist for a reason. There is nothing wrong with a society that offers models of what a fulfilling life might look like. But if we take on these goals without reflection, we will never understand why we don't own a home or we're not happy where we live, why our job feels hollow, whether we even want a spouse or any of the goals we're striving for. My decision to join the ashram turned up the volume of opinions and concerns around me. But conveniently, my experiences in the ashram had also given me the tools I needed to filter out that noise. The cause and the solution were the same.

• 12:25Jay Shetty?

  I was less vulnerable to the noises around me telling me what was normal, safe, practical, best. I didn't shut out the people who loved me. I cared about them and didn't want them to worry. But neither did I let their definitions of success and happiness dictate my choices. It was, at the time, the hardest decision I'd ever made, and it was the right one. The voices of parents, friends, education, and media all crowd a young person's mind, seeding beliefs and values. Society's definition of a happy life is everybody's and nobody's.

• 13:08Jay Shetty?

  The only way to build a meaningful life is to filter out that noise and look within. This is the first step to building your monk mind. We will start this journey the way monks do, by clearing away distractions. First, we'll look at the external forces that shape us and distract us from our values. Then, we will take stock of the values that currently shape our lives and reflect on whether they're in line with who we want to be and how we want to live.

• 13:43Jay Shetty?

  This episode is brought to you by Whole Foods Market. If you're talking about quality food, you can't forget Whole Foods Market, who've been holding themselves to the highest standards since they opened in 1980. That means you'll see thousands of organic products across their stores, from the produce department to the aisles. It also means you'll never see certain ingredients. They've banned artificial sweeteners and colors, high fructose corn syrup and more, so you can shop with peace of mind. Shop Whole Foods Market in-store or online. This episode is brought to you by Wayfair. Home should be a place that feels like a sanctuary, a space that truly reflects who you are. But it can be challenging to balance style, budget and endless options.

• 14:28Jay Shetty?

  I was looking to create a dedicated calm space for my morning meditation and reading, but I was struggling to find pieces that felt grounding but could also stand up to daily use. I went on Wayfair and found a beautiful, solid wood accent chair and a bookshelf. Now, that corner is my favorite place to anchor my day. The quality is incredible, it's built to last, and it completely shifted the energy of the room. Plus, you can shop with Wayfair Verified, where product specialists carefully vet items for quality and functionality, so you can shop with more confidence. And if putting it all together sounds like a headache, Wayfair can handle delivery, installation and assembly. Join Wayfair Rewards today to get 5% back on every purchase and start saving on your next home upgrade.

• 15:11Jay Shetty?

  Head to wayfair.com to shop all things home. That's W A Y F A I R dot com. Wayfair, every style, every home.

• 15:21Jay Shetty?

  This episode is brought to you by State Farm. We talk a lot about intentional decision making, and that extends to the practical stuff too, like making sure your coverage actually works for your life. State Farm is there to meet you where you are, and they know how sweet it is to feel good about your decisions. Talk to a State Farm agent today to learn how you can choose to bundle and save with a personal price plan. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Prices are based on rating plans that vary by state. Coverage options are selected by the customer. Availability, amount of discounts and savings, and eligibility vary by state.

• 15:56Jay Shetty?

  Is this dust, or is it me? Korongadas offered me a beautiful metaphor to illustrate the external influences that obscure our true selves. We are in a storeroom lined with unused books and boxes full of artifacts. Unlike the rest of the ashram, which is always tidy and well swept, this place is dusty and draped in cobwebs. The senior monk leads me up to a mirror and says, “What can you see?” “Through the thick layer of dust, I can’t even see my reflection.” I say as much, and the monk nods. Then he wipes the arm of his robe across the glass.

• 16:41Jay Shetty?

  A cloud of dust puffs into my face, stinging my eyes and filling my throat. He says, “Your identity is a mirror covered with dust. When you first look in the mirror, the truth of who you are and what you value is obscured. Clearing it may not be pleasant, but only when that dust is gone can you see your true reflection.” This was a practical demonstration of the words of Chaitanya, a 16th century Bengali Hindu saint. Chaitanya called the state of affairs “chaito darpana marganam,” or clearance of the impure mirror of the mind.

• 17:24Jay Shetty?

  The foundation of virtually all monastic traditions is removing distractions that prevent us from focusing on what matters most, finding meaning in life by mastering physical and mental desires. Some traditions give up speaking, some give up sex, some give up worldly possessions, and some give up all three. In the ashram, we lived with just what we needed and nothing more. I experienced firsthand the enlightenment of letting go. When we're buried in non-essentials, we lose track of what is truly significant. I'm not asking you to give up any of these things, but I want to help you recognize and filter out the noise of external influences.

• 18:08Jay Shetty?

  This is how we clear the dust and see if those values truly reflect you. Guiding values are the principles that are most important to us and that we feel should guide us: who we want to be, how we treat ourselves and others. Values tend to be single-word concepts like freedom, equality, compassion, honesty. That might sound rather abstract and idealistic, but values are really practical. They're a kind of ethical GPS we can use to navigate through life. If you know your values, you have directions that point you toward the people and actions and habits that are best for you. Just as when we drive through a new area,

• 18:52Jay Shetty?

  we wander aimlessly without values, we take wrong turns, we get lost, we're trapped by indecision. Values make it easier for you to surround yourself with the right people, make tough career choices, use your time more wisely, and focus your attention where it matters. Without them, we're swept away by distraction. Where values come from? Our values don't come to us in our sleep. We don't think them through consciously. Rarely do we even put them into words. But they exist nonetheless. Everyone is born into a certain set of circumstances, and our values are defined by what we experience.

• 19:35Jay Shetty?

  Were we born into hardship or luxury? Where did we receive praise? Parents and caregivers are often our loudest fans and critics. Though we might rebel in our teenage years, we're generally compelled to please and imitate those authority figures. Looking back, think about how your time with your parents was spent. Playing, enjoying, conversation, working on projects together? What did they tell you was most important? And did it match what mattered most to them? Who did they want you to be? What did they want you to accomplish? How did they expect you to behave? Did you absorb these ideals? And have they worked for you?

• 20:21Jay Shetty?

  From the start, our educations are another powerful influence. The subjects that are taught, the cultural angle from which they're taught, the way we are expected to learn. A fact-driven curriculum doesn't encourage creativity. A narrow cultural approach doesn't foster tolerance for people from different backgrounds and places. And there are few opportunities to immerse ourselves in our passions, even if we know them from an early age. This is not to say that school doesn't prepare us for life. And there are many different educational models out there, some of which are less restrictive. But it is worth taking a step back to consider whether the values you carried from school feel right to you. The media mind game.

• 21:06Jay Shetty?

  As a monk, I learned early on that our values are influenced by whatever absorbs our minds. We're not our minds, but the mind is the vehicle by which we decide what is important in our hearts. The movies we watch, the music we hear, the books we read, the TV shows we binge, the people we follow online and offline. What's on your news feed is feeding your mind.

• 21:33Jay Shetty?

  The more we are absorbed in celebrity gossip, images of success, violent video games and troubling news, the more our values are tainted with envy, judgment, competition and discontent. Observing and evaluating are key to thinking like a monk, and they begin with space and stillness. For monks, the first step in filtering the noise of external influences is a material letting go. I had three stints visiting the ashram, graduated college, then officially became a monk. After a couple of months of training at the Bhaktivedanta Manor, a temple in the countryside north of London,

• 22:16Jay Shetty?

  I headed to India, arriving at the village ashram in the beginning of September 2010. I exchanged my relatively stylish clothes for two robes, one to wear and one to wash. I forfeited my fairly slick haircut for no hair, our heads were shaved, and I was deprived of almost all opportunities to check myself out. The ashram contained no mirrors, except the one I would later be shown in the storeroom. So we monks were prevented from obsessing over our appearance, ate a simple diet that rarely varied, slept on thin mats laid on the floor, and the only music we heard was the chants and bells that punctuated our meditations and rituals. We didn't watch movies or TV shows,

• 23:02Jay Shetty?

  and we received limited news and email on shared desktop computers in a communal area. Nothing took the place of these distractions except space, stillness and silence. When we tune out the opinions, expectations and obligations of the world around us, we begin to hear ourselves. In that silence, I began to recognize the difference between outside noise and my own voice. I could clear away the dust of others to see my core beliefs. I promised you I wouldn't ask you to shave your head and don robes.

• 23:42Jay Shetty?

  But how, in the modern world, can we give ourselves the space, silence, and stillness to build awareness? Most of us don't sit down and think about our values. We don't like to be alone with our own thoughts. Our inclination is to avoid silence to try to fill our heads to keep moving. In a series of studies, researchers from the University of Virginia and Harvard asked participants to spend just six to fifteen minutes alone in a room with no smartphone, no writing instruments, and nothing to read. The researchers then let them listen to music or use their phones. Participants not only preferred their phones and music, many of them even chose to zap themselves with an electric shock

• 24:27Jay Shetty?

  rather than be alone with their thoughts. If you go to a networking event every day and have to tell people what you do for a living, it's hard to step away from that reduction of who you are. If you watch Real Housewives every night, you start to think that throwing glasses of wine in your friends' faces is routine behavior. When we fill up our lives and leave ourselves no room to reflect, those distractions become our values by default. We can't address our thoughts and explore our minds when we're preoccupied, nor does just sitting in your home teach you anything. There are three ways I suggest you actively create space for reflection.

• 25:09Jay Shetty?

  First, on a daily basis, I recommend you sit down to reflect on how the day went and what emotions you're feeling. Second, once a month, you can approximate the change that I found at the ashram by going someplace you've never been before to explore yourself in a different environment. This can be anything from visiting a park or a library you've never been to before to taking a trip. Finally, get involved in something that's meaningful to you. A hobby, a charity, a political cause. Another way to create space is to take stock of how we are filling the space that we have and whether those choices reflect our true values.

• 25:55Jay Shetty?

  Try this. Where did your values come from? It can be hard to perceive the effects these casual influences have on us. Values are abstract, elusive, and the world we live in constantly pushes blatant and subliminal suggestions as to what we should want and how we should live and how we form our ideas of who we are. Write down some of the values that shape your life. Next to each, write the origin. Put a checkmark next to each value that you truly share. Here's an example. Let's say the value you wrote is kindness and the origin is your parent. Is it true to me? Is it something that resonates?

• 26:40Jay Shetty?

  Yes. Now let's look at another value or what you've chosen to value, a specific type of appearance. What is the origin? Maybe it's media. Is it true to me? Do I really want to look that way for me? Not in the same way. Now let's look at another value of wealth. Where did our values around wealth come from? Maybe the origin is our parents. Is it true to me? No, maybe I don't value wealth in the same way my parents did. And let's take a look at a few more. Let's say you value good grades and the origin comes from school. And is it true to me? It's interfered with real learning.

• 27:26Jay Shetty?

  The value of knowledge, how you value knowledge and to what degree, what's the origin? School. Is it true to me? Yes. And the value of family? The way you perceive family, where does that come from? The origin is tradition. Is it true to me? Family, yes, but not in the traditional way.

• 27:48Speaker 01

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• 28:18Speaker 02

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• 28:21Speaker 03

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• 28:22Speaker 02

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• 28:27Speaker 03

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• 28:34Speaker 04

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• 28:38Speaker 03

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• 28:42Speaker 04

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• 28:43Speaker 03

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• 28:49Speaker 05

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• 29:18Jay Shetty?

  Audit your life. No matter what you think your values are, your actions tell the real story. What we do with our spare time shows what we value. For instance, you might put spending time with your family at the top of your list of values, but if you spend all your free time playing golf, your actions don't match your values, and you need to do some self-examination. Time. First, let's assess how you spend the time when you're not sleeping or working. Researchers have found that by the end of our lives, on average, each of us will spend thirty-three years in bed, seven years of which will be spent trying to sleep,

• 30:03Jay Shetty?

  a year and four months exercising, and more than three years on vacation. If you're a woman, you'll spend one hundred and thirty-six days getting ready. If you're a man, this number drops to forty-six days. These are just estimates, of course, but our daily choices add up. Try this: audit your time. Spend a week tracking how much time you devote to the following: family, friends, health, and self. Note that we're leaving out sleeping, eating, and working. Work, in all its forms, can sprawl without boundaries. If this is the case for you, then set your own definition of when you are officially at work

• 30:47Jay Shetty?

  and make extra work one of your categories. The areas where you spend the most time should match what you value the most. Say the amount of time that your job requires exceeds how important it is to you. That's a sign that you need to look very closely at that decision. You're deciding to spend time on something that doesn't feel important to you. What are the values behind that decision? Are your earnings from your job ultimately serving your value? Media. When you did your audit, no doubt a significant amount of your time was spent reading or viewing media. Researchers estimate that, on average, each of us will spend more than eleven years of our lives

• 31:32Jay Shetty?

  looking at a TV and social media. Perhaps your media choices feel casual, but time reflects values.

• 31:41Jay Shetty?

  There are many forms of media, but most of us aren't overdoing it on movies, TV, or magazines. It's all about devices. Conveniently, your iPhone will tell you exactly how you're using it. Under Settings, look at the Screen Time Report for the last week, and you'll see how much time you spend on social media, games, mail, and browsing the web. If you don't like what you see, you can even set limits for yourself. On Android, you can look at your battery usage under Settings. Then, from the menu, choose Show Full Device Usage. Or you can download an app like Social Fever or My Addictometer. Money. Like time, you can look at the money you spend to see the values by which you live.

• 32:24Jay Shetty?

  Exclude necessities like home, dependence, car, bills, food, and debt. Now look at your discretionary spending. What was your biggest investment this month? Which discretionary areas are costing you the most? Does your spending correspond to what matters most to you? We often have an odd perspective on what's worth it that doesn't quite make sense if you look at all your expenditures at once. I was advising someone who complained that the family was overspending on after-school classes for the kids until she realized that she spent more on her shoes than on their music lessons. Seeing posts on social media that compared spending and our priorities

• 33:07Jay Shetty?

  got me thinking about how the ways we spend our time and money reveal what we value. A 60-minute TV show? Flew by. A 60-minute lunch with family? Will it ever end? Everyday coffee habit. Four dollars a day, almost $1,500 a year? Need it. Fresh, healthy food choices? An extra $1.50 a day? About $550 a year? Not worth it. 15 minutes of scrolling social media? Me time. 15 minutes of meditation? No time. It's all in how you see it. When you look at a month of expenses, think about whether discretionary purchases were long- or short-term investments.

• 33:52Jay Shetty?

  A great dinner out or a dance class? Were they for entertainment or enlightenment? For yourself or someone else? If you have a gym membership but only went once this month and spent more on wine, you have some rethinking to do. Curate your values. Doing a self-audit tells you the values that have crept into your life by default. The next step is to decide what your values are and whether your choices are in alignment with them. Contemplating monk values may help you identify your own. Our teachers at the ashram explained that there are higher and lower values. Higher values propel and elevate us toward happiness, fulfillment, and meaning.

• 34:35Jay Shetty?

  Lower values demote us toward anxiety, depression, and suffering. According to the Gita, these are the higher values and qualities: Fearlessness, purity of mind, gratitude, service and charity, acceptance, performing sacrifice, deep study, austerity, straightforwardness, non-violence, truthfulness, absence of anger, renunciation, perspective, restraint from fault-finding, compassion toward all living beings, satisfaction, gentleness or kindness, integrity, determination.

• 35:17Jay Shetty?

  Notice that happiness and success are not among these values. These are not values, they're rewards, the end game, and we will address them further in Chapter 4. The six lower values are greed, lust, anger, ego, illusion, and envy. The downside of the lower values is that they so readily take us over when we give them space to do so. But the upside is that there are a lot fewer of them. Or, as my teacher Gorongadas reminded us, there are always more ways to be pulled up than to be pulled down. We can't pull a set of values out of thin air and make sweeping changes overnight.

• 36:00Jay Shetty?

  Instead, we want to let go of the false values that fill the space in our lives. The ashram gave us monks the opportunity to observe nature, and our teachers called our attention to the cycles of all living things. Leaves sprout, transform and drop. Reptiles, birds and mammals shed their skins, feathers, fur. Letting go is a big part of the rhythm of nature, as is rebirth. We humans cling to stuff, people, ideas, material possessions, copies of Marie Kondo's book, thinking it's unnatural to purge. But letting go is a direct route to space, literally, and stillness.

• 36:46Jay Shetty?

  We separate ourselves, emotionally if not physically, from the people and ideas who fill up our lives. And then we take time to observe the natural inclinations that compel us. Choices come along every day, and we can begin to weave values into them. Whenever we make a choice, whether it's as big as getting married or as small as an argument with a friend, we are driven by our values, whether they are high or low. If these choices work out well for us, then our values are in alignment with our actions. But when things don't work out, it's worth revisiting what drove the decision you made.

• 37:31Jay Shetty?

  Try this: Past values. Reflect on the three best and three worst choices you've ever made. Why did you make them? What have you learned? How would you have done it differently? Take a close look at your answers. Buried in them are your values. Why did you make a choice? You may have been with the right or wrong person for the same reason, because you value love. Or maybe you moved across the country because you wanted a change. The underlying value may be adventure. Now do the same thing for the future. Look at your biggest goals to see if they're driven by other people, tradition or media-driven ideas of how we should live.

• 38:16Jay Shetty?

  Try this: Value-driven decisions.

• 38:20Jay Shetty?

  For the next week, whenever you spend money on a non-necessity, or make a plan for how you will spend your free time, pause and think. What is the value behind the choice? It takes only a second, a flash of consideration. Ideally, this momentary pause becomes instinctive, so that you're making conscious choices about what matters to you and how much energy you devote to it. Filter OEOs, don't block them. Once you filter out the noise of opinions, expectations, and obligations, OEOs, you will see the world through different eyes. The next step is inviting the world back in. When I ask you to strip away outside influences,

• 39:03Jay Shetty?

  I don't want you to tune out the whole world indefinitely. Your monk mind can and must learn from other people. The challenge is to do so consciously by asking ourselves simple questions. What qualities do I look for or admire in family, friends, or colleagues? Are they trust, confidence, determination, honesty? Whatever they may be, these qualities are in fact our own values, the very landmarks we should use to guide ourselves through our own lives. When you're not alone, surround yourself with people who fit well with your values. It helps to find a community that reflects who you want to be,

• 39:47Jay Shetty?

  a community that looks like the future you want. Remember how hard it was for me to start living like a monk during my final year of college? And now, it's hard for me to live in London, surrounded by the people I grew up with and their ways of living. I'm tempted to sleep in, gossip, judge others. A new culture helped me redefine myself, and another new culture helped me continue on my path.

• 40:13Jay Shetty?

  Every time you move homes, or take a different job, or embark on a new relationship, you have a golden opportunity to reinvent yourself. Multiple studies show that the way we relate to the world around us is contagious. A 20-year study of people living in a Massachusetts town showed that both happiness and depression spread within social circles. If a friend who lives within a mile of you becomes happier, then the chance that you are also happy increases by 25%. The effect jumps higher with next-door neighbors. Who you surround yourself with helps you stick to your values and achieve your goals. You grow together. If you want to run a 2:45 marathon,

• 40:56Jay Shetty?

  you don't train with people who run a 4:45. If you want to be more spiritual, expand your practice with other spiritual people. If you want to grow your business, join a local Chamber of Commerce or an online group of business owners who are similarly driven toward that kind of success. If you're an overworked parent who wants to make your kids your priority, cultivate relationships with other parents who prioritize their kids, so you can exchange support and advice. Better yet, where possible, cross groups. Foster relationships with family-oriented spiritual entrepreneurs who run marathons. Okay, I'm kidding. Yeah, in today's world, where we have more ways to connect than ever, platforms like LinkedIn and Meetup,

• 41:41Jay Shetty?

  and tools like Facebook Groups make it easier than ever to find your tribe. If you're looking for love, look in places that are value-driven, like service opportunities, fitness or sports activities, a series of lectures on a topic that interests you. If you're not sure where others fit in relation to your values, ask yourself a question. When I spend time with this person or group, do I feel like I'm getting closer to or further away from who I want to be? The answer could be clear cut. It's obvious. If you're spending four hours at a time playing FIFA soccer on PS2, not that I've ever done that, versus engaging in meaningful interactions that improves the quality of your life. Or, the answer could be more vague.

• 42:26Jay Shetty?

  A feeling like irritability or mental fuzziness after you spend time with them. It feels good to be around people who are good for us. It doesn't feel good to be around people who don't support us or bring out our bad habits. Try this, companion audit. Over the course of a week, make a list of the people with whom you spend the most time. List the values that you share next to each person. Are you giving the most time to the people who align most closely with your values? Who you talk to, what you watch, what you do with your time, all of these sources push values and beliefs. If you're just going from one day to the next without questioning your values,

• 43:10Jay Shetty?

  you'll be swayed by what everyone else, from your family to hordes of marketing professionals, wants you to think. I remind myself of the moment in the storeroom all the time. A thought comes into my mind, and I ask myself, does this fit my chosen values? Or those that others have selected for me? Is this dust, or is it me? When you give yourself space and stillness, you can clear the dust and see yourself. Not through others' eyes, but from within. Identifying your values and letting them guide you will help you filter external influences.

• 43:55Jay Shetty?

  In the next chapter, these skills will help you filter out unwanted attitudes and emotions.

• 44:14Speaker 01

  Now, more than ever, we need someone on our side. But Rob Whitman? Whitman's votes drove up costs, cut Medicaid, and risked 350,000 Virginians' health care to pay for tax breaks for himself and his donors. He's not on our side. Shannon Taylor will fight corruption, cut taxes, and bring down costs. This November, vote for Shannon Taylor. She's for us. Paid for by HMP, theHouseMajorityPac.com. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.

• 44:43Speaker 02

  Mr. President, my company told me of the explosion on our rig.

• 44:46Speaker 03

  On October 2nd.

• 44:47Speaker 02

  Causing massive water displacement and triggering a tsunami. They all heap the blame on me.

• 44:52Speaker 03

  Tom Cruise is. Digger got us into this mess, and Digger's gonna dig us up. From the director of Birdman and The Revenant.

• 44:59Speaker 04

  What would happen if I stopped drilling? You're stalled, you're freezing there, that's what.

• 45:04Speaker 03

  With great power comes great deniability.

• 45:07Speaker 04

  I'm not the first daddy.

• 45:08Speaker 03

  Digger. See the trailer online. Only in theaters October 2nd. Rated R. Under 17, not a minute without parent.

• 45:14Speaker 06

  This episode is brought to you by EA Sports FC27. Welcome to the world's game. FC27 is introducing The Grounds, where the streets meet the stadium. Connect with friends, go pro, and express yourself, on or off the pitch. Play FC27 with the ultimate edition September 18th. Learn more at EA.com. Rated E for everyone, includes in-game purchases including random items. The Grounds is only available on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, and SPC and Nintendo Switch 2 versions.