40 Danielle LaPorte: Desire Creates Everything

Finally, another goddess on the School of Greatness. She's an author, speaker, entrepreneur and blogger who mixes self development with spirituality in a way that shines with purpose and passion. It's an honor to have the creator of the Desire Map, Danielle LaPorte. Get more from Lewis! Get my New York Times Bestselling book, Make Money Easy! Get The Greatness Mindset audiobook on SpotifyText Lewis AIYouTubeInstagramWebsiteTiktokFacebookX

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

• 0:01Lewis Howes?

  This is episode number 40 with Danielle LaPorte.

• 0:07Lewis Howes?

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

• 0:33Lewis Howes?

  What is up, greats? Thanks so much for tuning in today. I really appreciate all the love and the support with your promotion and your sharing of these episodes online. So continue to share and post pictures on Instagram of where you're listening to the show. And be sure to give me a shout out at Lewis Howes all over the place online when you do. Now, today's episode, we've got a great guest. Her name is Danielle LaPorte. And I've known Danielle for a couple of years, mostly through Marie Forleo, which I have yet to get on the show. And I'm gonna have to get Marie on sometime soon. But Danielle is an amazing, inspiring, beautiful, loving individual. And she just brings so much joy and passion

• 1:18Lewis Howes?

  and intuition to her work and to her information that she shares with the world. She's got amazing website over at DanielleLaPorte.com. And in today's episode, we're really tapping into goal setting in a whole new way that you've never thought about before. And it starts with understanding your desires, your desire to be fully alive, and how you need a vision to fulfill your desires. So I go pretty deep with Danielle today and get in some juicy stuff here in just a moment with her about really how to achieve your dreams,

• 2:00Lewis Howes?

  your desires, and be fully alive. So make sure to stick around for that and hang around to the very end so you can learn about the show notes and what I want you guys to do with this. But this is it. This is the moment. Tune in, listen with your heart, open it up. And I want to introduce you to the one and only Danielle LaPorte.

• 2:32Lewis Howes?

  Thanks again everyone for tuning into the School of Greatness and I'm very excited today to bring in a female guest. Yes, there's not that many that come on the show, but I'm very excited to bring in Danielle LaPorte. How's it going Danielle?

• 2:45Speaker 01

  Good. I think you need more chicks on your show, so I'm happy to be one of them.

• 2:49Lewis Howes?

  I'm looking constantly for more awesome chicks and to be honest, I just haven't found that many. So if you, if you know a handful of them.

• 2:57Speaker 01

  I hope that's not a metaphor for your life.

• 3:01Lewis Howes?

  Uh, that's a whole other conversation. Uh, but I'm very excited about this and I believe I met you a few years ago through Marie Forleo at her event. I heard you speak a couple of times at her events and we've been kind of Instagram buddies ever since and Twitter friends or whatever. So I feel like I know you, but we've only really talked for probably about 10 minutes in total. So I'm excited to, to learn more about all of your wise thoughts and the desire map is what I'm really excited about. Now, this is a program you've had for a while now, right?

• 3:36Speaker 01

  It's been out for about a year.

• 3:38Lewis Howes?

  Been out for a year and now you're repackaging it and turning it into a different type of traditional publishing, uh, book and audio program that's coming out in January. But one of the things that I like about this, the desire map is it's all about, uh, it's all you say right here, a guide to creating goals with soul. And for me as an athlete, I've been, um, I'm a big goal setter. It's all about the goals for the, the game, for my strength, for my speed, whatever it is, there's always a goal to reach. And I feel like you have a different approach to setting goals. Is that right? Than most?

• 4:18Speaker 01

  Uh, I do than most and, and the way I set goals might actually still work with being an athlete.

• 4:25Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 4:25Speaker 01

  So yeah, I think.

• 4:29Speaker 01

  For me, the bottom line is this, that the the approach to achievement has has got to be anchored to how you how you most want to feel. So, you know, I'm on to something that I call your core desired feelings. And what I see happen a lot is that we get in this mindset of enduring, not just physical endurance, but you know, we suck it up, we soldier on, and we've, you know, our first step to goal setting is to look at all of the external stuff that we want. And a lot of those external things are coming from messages that have been passed down from our families, that, you know, cultural things, and they may have nothing to do

• 5:13Speaker 01

  with who we actually are as a being. And we can spend, you know, this is the tragedy of the human spirit, we can spend a whole lifetime chasing dreams that aren't even ours. Dreams that like came down, you know, it's, you know, it's the classic of like the dude who goes to med school because, you know, he's been raised to carry that on, you know, and it's like, it has nothing to do, he wants to be a bass player. Or he wants to be a basketball player, right? You know?

• 5:42Lewis Howes?

  Right. Or the family business tradition where the father passes it on to the kids, but they really don't care about it.

• 5:48Speaker 01

  Yeah. So what you have happening is a lot of Prozac and a lot of emptiness. You know, you can hit it out of the park and you can reach your so-called goals and you don't feel that talking awesome when you get there. And that that's no way to live a life. And, you know, so sort of what's driving my theory is that I think everything that you're doing, whether you're hitting the court, or you're going to make your first six figures, or your first million, or fall in love, or whatever it is. Absolutely, everything you do is being driven by a desire to feel a certain way. And so why don't you get clear on how you want to feel? And then all of your aspirations are driven by that clarity.

• 6:31Speaker 01

  And it doesn't mean that, you know, you don't, nothing's guaranteed, but you, you exponentially increase your odds of feeling amazing when you get where you want it to go.

• 6:44Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, and I love your language of desire because, you know, going through your, your book, uh, there was a part where you said, you need desire to be fully alive. You need vision to fulfill your desires. And when I read that, I was like, yes. You know, you just made it very clear the way I've been feeling. I just didn't know how to explain it so simply. And I really loved, um, that you talked about that because let's talk about first, what is desire and how do you figure out what your desire is?

• 7:18Speaker 01

  Oh, those two big questions. Uh, I, desire is everything. Desire, you know, to put it in the grandest terms, desire, desire is an evolutionary impulse. It's, you know, anybody who's listening to this right now, you just like sit and look around, everything you see around you was created because somebody had a desire. First you have, you know, you can do this chicken egg, like what comes first? The idea or the desire, doesn't matter. Great art, great love stories, architecture, businesses, all the impulse of desire. And there's healthy desires and there's unhealthy desires, but it's all driven, it all goes back to wanting to feel something. I mean, we do unhealthy things because we want to feel good.

• 8:04Speaker 01

  Um, so desire is really, it drives everything. It's like the essence of creating, right? It is like, it is, it's creativity itself. And then how do you get clear? There's a couple of layers to that. One,

• 8:22Speaker 01

  You have to give yourself permission to start wanting what you want, right? So, you know, people can think right now, it's like, okay, I want, I want the money, I want the babe, I want the bucks, whatever it is. And what I've seen, so you know, I used to work a lot, one-on-one with entrepreneurs. And for one year, this is crazy, I almost died. For one year, I went to sixteen cities. I went where any, anybody who would have me, I just posted on my blog, like, who wants to jam? I will come to your town. And I did these, the, I called them firestarter groups. And I did them in people's living rooms, I did them in boardrooms, I did them in a pole dancing studio in Manhattan. Which was just totally weird.

• 9:06Speaker 01

  And after sixteen cities and a few thousand people, I saw this pattern, which was, you know, these are people who were like declared entrepreneurs. And they were still wanting permission to want what they wanted. And I was kind of shocked. I was shocked at like how often, how many living rooms I heard this in, I'm just like, well, should I want to quit my day job and be a photographer? Um, should I want to quit my photography business and go get an MBA? It's like, what do you mean should? Like, if you want it, just start there with like, I want it and I want it with all my heart. And once you're in that place, then your brain starts firing differently and you get ideas.

• 9:50Speaker 01

  And then I think, you know, in my belief system, I think you start like emitting a different energy. And synchronicities happen and the right people show up and, and you, you pull big shit off.

• 10:01Lewis Howes?

  Well, it's interesting, I mean, when you talk about desire, for me, I think dreams. I talk a lot about dreams, fulfilling your dreams, and to me, it really means the same thing. Correct me if I'm wrong. Um, but people want to fulfill this desire of being a photographer, or being an artist, or a bass player, whatever it may be. Or quitting their job to do something that they really desire, or they really dream about. And, but then the conversations jump in for a lot of people of fear, fear of failure, fear of doubt, fear of how people are going to or not going to accept them. So what do you talk about, or how do you lead people into fulfilling their desire and taking the action plan uh, to achieving their desires?

• 10:38Speaker 01

  Uh huh. I think, I think dreams and desires are, they're first cousins.

• 10:43Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 10:44Speaker 01

  I think, um,

• 10:47Speaker 01

  Fear is natural, so I don't buy into this ideology at all that fearlessness is is the goal. Because it's bullshit. You can't do anything without fear. I mean, even just like your basic primal stuff, like what Seth Godin calls your lizard brain, like it's there. And it keeps you, it keeps you out of dark alleys and it keeps you alert on the field and like it's there. So you're never not gonna be fearless. Um, I think it's about, you know, what I call fear leadership instead of fear management. So this is another bill of goods we've been served from motivational speakers around fear. Like, you know, fearlessness is the achievable. No, it's not.

• 11:29Speaker 01

  Um, and that, you know, what happens in all of that is is you end up, you end up repressing your fear. And that's, and when you repress your fear, it's gonna come up and it's gonna bite your ass just when you need to be free of it. So, so my approach to fear is you accept that it's gonna come. And that it's natural and it's part of it and you actually look for it. And then I analyze my fear when it shows up. Like, it's got something to tell you. It's like, you know, this great philosopher, Kurt Gartson, like anxiety comes with a message. So like, why don't you just ask your fear why it's there? And what's it gonna say? Okay, well, I fear looking bad. I'm afraid of losing.

• 12:12Speaker 01

  And you can drill down and like get to the real, like what the real fear is. And when you get there, you totally, you disarm it. You've seen it. You've brought it in light. You go, oh, this is just about father issues.

• 12:29Speaker 01

  This is about, you know, this is about me, I'm just so afraid I'm never gonna get the love I want. This is about, I'm terrified of looking bad because if I look bad, then all these other things happen. And then you go, wow, I get it. And then you put fear in the backseat. And then you put something else in the front seat, like emotions that are gonna be way more helpful, like enthusiasm and sexy and courage and creativity and whatever.

• 12:58Lewis Howes?

  Interesting.

• 13:00Lewis Howes?

  So how does someone disarm it then, though? So say like, I wanna go forward and go after this desire. But you know, I got made fun of on the playground when I was a kid. And I don't wanna get made fun of again, because that's what I'm really afraid of. Um, so how does someone like overcome that?

• 13:14Speaker 01

  No, that's when you have to like really, and this is like, you know, this may sound weird, but that's where the practice of presence coming, comes in. That's where you have to be a grown up and say, okay. You know, I have, I have the wound from the playground. I have the wound from not getting on the New York Times bestseller list before, or the whatever. Um, but I'm here now. And I'm, you know, this is me, this age, this city, and this is what I want. And then like this gets into the whole thing too. This is another thing, you know, another issue I have with like motivational new age stuff is a common answer to this question would be, well, then you affirm, right?

• 13:57Speaker 01

  Then you affirm, I've got this, we've won the game. Um, I've met the per, you know, I'm, I love, you know, you could be a size 14 and be saying, I'm so happy I'm a size five. And your, and your brain is saying to you, you're so full of shit. You're lying to yourself. And so that's where I think it's about presence and declaration. So you can say, I mean, to use the athlete's metaphor, uh, you can say, it's not about, I've won the game. It's about, I wanna win this game. I wanna win this game more than I wanted to win any game. And what happens there is you really like, uh, desire becomes your fuel.

• 14:40Speaker 01

  And you leave some room for doubt. And that's part of being whole. And when you leave room for doubt, you know, those voices are gonna come and say, you know, dude, you lost the last game. And you know what that does? Makes you stronger, because you will combat that thought. Lost last, yeah, it doesn't matter. Last game doesn't matter. I wanna win this game.

• 15:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, so I think it's like this creative tension that happens, which is brilliant.

• 15:06Lewis Howes?

  Sure. Now, something that, you know, in my teens and my twenties, I had a very, I would say, small vision. I could have, my vision was a couple of years ahead of me. It was like, okay, I want to graduate high school and be a, you know, a college athlete. I want to get a scholarship. And then it was, I want to be a pro athlete after college. And, you know, it was always like a few years ahead was like my vision. And I think a lot of people, you said, you need vision to fulfill your desires. So without vision, you can't fulfill your wildest dreams, your wildest desires. You can't really be fulfilled, it looks like, if you don't have a vision. So how does someone design their vision and create it if they have no clue what they want?

• 15:51Speaker 01

  It goes back to the feeling. So I think with a little bit of contemplation, most people can figure out how they want to feel. And now some of it, you know, it is a challenge for some people. So some people are totally numbed out. We're not conditioned. I mean, nobody in all of my personal development workshops, in all of my years of going to school, although I didn't go to school that long and every went to college, um, nobody ever asked me how I wanted to feel. So we're not trained, but I think with a bit of inquiry, um, you can at least begin to get some clarity that you want to feel courageous.

• 16:32Speaker 01

  You want to feel energized. You want to feel connected. You want to feel beautiful, whatever it is, right? And then, and then the next question, and I think this is the life enhancing, notice I didn't say life changing. I said life enhancing. This is the life enhancing question is, what are you going to do to feel that way? So it's like, you know, good example is lots of people want to own a home, right? And especially us North Americans, it's where this is drilled into us that owning a home is like this great achievement. Um, so let's say one of your desired feelings is connection. And you've had this longstanding goal to own a home.

• 17:17Speaker 01

  Maybe to feel connected, what you need to do is not have a mortgage and you need to travel the world and be free and meet new people and connecting cultures and see your friends in Italy. It's not about the mortgage and you let that goal die. Or maybe owning a home and having a mortgage is exactly what you need to do to feel connected because it's about nesting and it's about community and it's about all those things you do, you know, when you have a place. But you've got to measure all your existing goals against the clarity of how you want to really feel. And I know, like, I've asked enough people now, I can tell you, like, survey says five

• 18:00Speaker 01

  out of 10 people have never asked themselves how they want to feel. Like even, you know, I love getting all, you know, I get these great emails and stories and from people who are desire mapping and I love the stories with the couples, you know, the women who say, I sat down with my guy this week and he thinks he hasn't really asked himself how he want to feel since he was like 13.

• 18:22Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 18:23Speaker 01

  And, you know, he's got a big job and he's got a big team and, and this changes things and maybe now it's not about being the VP or maybe now it's about being president. But we can't go through life without this kind of clarity.

• 18:39Lewis Howes?

  Hmm, it's interesting. I don't think I've ever really asked myself, how do I want to feel? I think I just say, this is how I want to feel, so I'm going to create these feelings for myself on a daily basis. But I think there's probably a lot of people that don't even go there, like they don't even know what they, they want to feel something, but they're just, they continue to stay in the same patterns over and over, whether it be job or relationship or family or community, whatever it may be, same victim stories and these same limiting beliefs over and over. And it's interesting because I like your approach to this of how do you want to feel first, creating your desire to creating your vision as opposed to just saying what you, your, your dream is to do something in the world to create something, but if that's

• 19:24Lewis Howes?

  not going to create the feelings that you want, then you're going to be left empty, correct?

• 19:27Speaker 01

  That's right. That's exactly it. Yeah.

• 19:30Lewis Howes?

  It's very interesting.

• 19:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, so really the desired feeling comes first and the dream comes second.

• 19:33Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 19:34Speaker 01

  And, you know, and that victim mentality that you just mentioned, that is so much of what goes on. It, it, it's like. I'm gonna make this gross overgeneralization. It's like, you know, half of us are frantic and the other half of us are asleep. I mean, they're both a form of unconsciousness, but that frantic way is he's got that and she's got that and the Kardashians have this and and all these bloggers are doing that, you know, so I should, you know, fill in the blank. And then there's this other group of us who are just numb and we're just going through it, you know, and, and, and, oh, no, can't, don't, please, I'm begging, don't, wake up.

• 20:19Lewis Howes?

  This is really interesting, actually, now that I'm thinking about experiences that I've had, because my goal and my dream, I guess, or my desire, my entire life was to be an All-American, to be a pro athlete, to achieve these accomplishments as an athlete. And then I remember when I achieved them, I was, I felt so empty and sad. I remember I was an All-American in the decathlon and then right afterwards, my family was there and we like went out to dinner and I was just sad. I remember we like, I did not want to be at the dinner table. I was so empty feeling and I didn't know why. But now, looking back, I realize that the reason I wanted to be an All-American was because I really wanted love

• 21:01Lewis Howes?

  and I really wanted, I really wanted connection and I wanted to be accepted and I wanted to have these feelings of family. But, you know, my, my, I guess, the driver was coming from a negative place of like anger and resentment because I didn't have that as a child. And so it was like, I was coming from this negative place, this negative passion of trying to achieve something so that I could receive a feeling as opposed to just feeling that way constantly while I was doing it and, and going after the dream and the desire that way. So it's very interesting that you talk about this because it's kind of clicking for me about like why I felt certain ways my whole life. Um, it's very interesting.

• 21:45Speaker 01

  Louis, I mean, that's, I love you for that story. It's like, that's the eureka, right? And so you can, I mean, take that story.

• 21:55Speaker 01

  And that's the same story that the dude who like went for his MBA. You know, I have a friend who's like, I'm gonna get my MBA and my dad's gonna be at graduation and I'm gonna feel like I've arrived. And the father's there at graduation and you know what they get? Nothing. They get that empty feeling and they're like, God, I just did my whole MBA and yeah, uh, and I, and I can preach about this because I have my own stories of emptiness and how I chase things and now like, you know, in my, I don't even really call it my, my vocation. I don't really identify with career, but it's like before we do anything, I'm just like,

• 22:39Speaker 01

  that's not gonna make me feel the way I wanna feel. It's all, that's all glamorous and that's all cool, but you know, like one of my core desired feelings is communion. I really wanna feel connection. And, and that's eluded, it's, that's been elusive. And I realize it's because I've made screwed up choices about what was gonna make me feel connected. So now like one of my metrics is, one of the things that makes me feel most connected in my life is I am there most days at three o'clock to pick my kid up from school. And so bam, like my whole business works around that.

• 23:18Speaker 01

  And now it's there for like, you know, who you're gonna be with romantically. It's like, if it's, I'm like an eight second person. Is there in the first eight seconds or it's a no? So it's like be- because I'm committed to feeling my core desired feelings and.

• 23:35Lewis Howes?

  Are you talking about relationships?

• 23:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 23:38Lewis Howes?

  It's there in eight seconds or it's not? When you meet someone, you mean, or just when you're around them?

• 23:42Speaker 01

  Uh, well, both, right? I think.

• 23:46Speaker 01

  I mean, my eight second rule has been with me for a long time. And I have the the times I haven't followed it have been at my own peril. So it's like, you know, I hired a dude to be the CEO of my last company. And it wasn't there in the first eight seconds. And the first eight seconds, he I didn't like his handshake. He was late. The eye contact wasn't good. He was using like some negative just language. But I was like, oh, I I need you. I need you to run my company. Some people have spoken highly of you. I ignored the eight seconds. But you know, that did not turn out well at all. That turned into like a lot of bad legal stuff.

• 24:30Lewis Howes?

  Wow, so it's eight seconds really just your intuition, initial intuition? Gotcha. Interesting. I like that rule. I'm going to start applying it. And it's pretty much worked a hundred percent of the time for you?

• 24:43Speaker 01

  Well, the story doesn't always end in the way I think it's gonna end. You know, like I've hired people who like in the first, you know, the first that first eight seconds. It's a yes. My body is saying yes. The evidence say it like my intuition is just like, yes, you're awesome. Let's work together. And three months later, it hasn't worked out. But that like journey with that person always led to higher ground. It's like, oh, I get why we were supposed to work together. Cause you led me to that other opportunity. Or you learned what you needed to learn so you can go off and do your own thing.

• 25:15Lewis Howes?

  Right. Now, will you give me an example of your experience that you've had? Where um you weren't following the feelings? And you did something that really screwed up or really hurt you in a way that you didn't want to experience? Is there?

• 25:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, I got a few.

• 25:33Lewis Howes?

  Is there one that really sticks out that?

• 25:35Speaker 01

  Well.

• 25:35Lewis Howes?

  Maybe no one, maybe not everyone knows about that's really intimate and emotional for you?

• 25:40Speaker 01

  Uh, intimate and emotional? Well.

• 25:44Speaker 01

  Uh, I mean, really, honestly, the most clear examples for me are professionals. So, I mean, I've been in long-term relationships, romantic and otherwise, where I just overrode my feelings. It's like, this is not feeling awesome on a regular basis. I do not feel in communion. I'm not feeling in joy. I cannot be in my divine feminine. And, you know, you override that over time until you just go, like, nothing about this feels the way I want it to feel. And you make your hard choices. Professionally, um, for me, what's most relevant is, you know, the new version of the desire map is coming out. This is like, this is my third, fourth book.

• 26:27Speaker 01

  And I've had to have some really intense conversations with my, my new publisher, who's come on, about how we're gonna go after success with this and what success looks like. And for most authors, you know, like, success is the New York Times Bestseller List and, and how that shapes your career and all the doors that it opens, blah, blah. And I've played that game before. And when I, when I went after the New York Times list for the Firestarter Sessions, I had to do all sorts of things that did not feel good to me. And I did them because that was the, that was the goal. And I was gonna reach that goal no matter what and say what I needed to say

• 27:10Speaker 01

  and ask my audience to like, go in and buy this amount on this date. And it was killing me along the way. It was not a joyful process because I just wanted to be able to say, hey, everybody, buy as many books as you want. Buy them in any form you want. Buy the Kindle, buy the hardcover, buy it now, buy it next month.

• 27:30Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 27:30Speaker 01

  Buy it in a way that works for you. And you can't do that when you have to fit through, you know, this algorithm. And so I had to have that conversation recently with my new publisher and just say, you know, my goal is get this to as many people as possible and be in a state of joy doing that. And it conflicts with the old system. And I'm not doing it that way.

• 27:51Lewis Howes?

  But did you make the list, The New York Times and the Firestarter?

• 27:54Speaker 01

  No, I didn't make the list and I, and the, the pain point was we sold enough copies, I would have been in the top five that week. But this is a very common story, right? This is part of how the list works. It's part of the game of publishing and.

• 28:11Lewis Howes?

  How did they, how did they make you feel when you did not make the list and knowing that that was like your intention?

• 28:16Speaker 01

  I cried in my car, Louis. My editor called me and said, you know, you know, it's gonna happen at 5:30 Eastern Time on the Wednesday when they make the announcements. It's like getting nominated for your Oscar, you know? And I'm in my car and in this shocked voice, she's like, we didn't hit it. I was like, what? We sold how many copies? How many thousands of copies did we sell and we didn't hit the list? And I was just like, I gotta cry, I gotta go. And, cause you think your future is over. Oh my God, I'm not gonna get foreign rights deals and, and then this, this really wounded, you know, dark part of you is like, is the book even good?

• 28:58Speaker 01

  You know, like, which you get over really quickly. Like, I made something beautiful. I stand by it.

• 29:05Speaker 01

  But the after, the, the revelation of that was, you know what? I'm just gonna make what I make and hustle it in the way that feels good and it's so much better.

• 29:15Lewis Howes?

  Now, if you think you would have come from a different intention, launching the book as opposed to, I'm gonna do whatever it takes to become a New York Times bestseller to, I'm gonna go, I'm gonna promote this in a joyful way every single day because that's what I wanna do and I wanna get it out to the most people possible. If you would have done that and not hit the list, how do you think you would have felt?

• 29:36Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 29:37Lewis Howes?

  Would you still have cried or would you have been like, oh, that's kind of a bummer, but you know, I'm doing what I love?

• 29:41Speaker 01

  Oh, no, I wouldn't have cried because it wouldn't have been the goal.

• 29:45Speaker 01

  It wasn't the goal. Yeah, I wasn't attached. You know, the tears come from over attachment. And that's a metaphor for life.

• 29:55Lewis Howes?

  Interesting.

• 29:56Speaker 01

  And I wouldn't have been, you know, I, I felt at that point, I would feel.

• 30:02Speaker 01

  You know, I've crossed this finish line such as it was, and I'm exhausted, I'm depleted. I'm not in a happy state because I haven't been going about this in a way that's like, you know, life-affirming. Yeah, so it's a recipe for disaster. It really and guess, you know, many great things came out of it, which is, I really, really, at that point, analyzed my relationship to goal-setting. And that became the desire map and a million things have come out of that, yeah.

• 30:32Lewis Howes?

  Wow, interesting. Now, I want to take this off a little bit.

• 30:38Lewis Howes?

  Because I feel like you have this amazing feminine energy and this feminine wisdom. So I want to try to tap into this for a minute.

• 30:45Lewis Howes?

  What do you think is the difference-maker between the guy or the girl who has it all, who is successful in business, life, family, everything, but like to the next level, like super-successful on all levels? And predominantly financially-successful as well. That's very prominent that they're, you know, crushing it financially. But they have it all. What is the difference between them and just the average Joe? And I want to tap into, for some reason, like you're going to talk about a balance between feminine and masculine energy combined and knowing when to balance it, both emotionally and physically, but I'd love to hear what you think it is.

• 31:30Speaker 01

  Well, I mean, first we have to question your assumptions about success, right? So, um, so let's just say, let me put my qualifiers on that.

• 31:39Lewis Howes?

  Got it.

• 31:40Speaker 01

  Success is that, like, they're really fulfilled and they're doing something that's really meaningful for them, whether they're making fifty K a year or one point five million a year, they're There's like, there's a lot of joy happening. There's a lot of meaning happening. Okay, so, and then, so let me, let me throw another qualifier onto the average Joe. Let's just, I wanna reframe average Joe as like, you know, dude, person, woman is like not happy. There's not, they're not fulfilled. Okay, so we've got fulfilled, and we have unfulfilled.

• 32:14Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 32:14Speaker 01

  Um, and then we have.

• 32:16Lewis Howes?

  I would like, I would like to say fulfilled plus also has taken care of like on the financial means and things like that.

• 32:21Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 32:21Lewis Howes?

  Because there's some people who are fulfilled who are like poor. And that's fine, but I'm, I'm just wanna clarify the difference for what the, the question, I guess.

• 32:30Speaker 01

  Okay, okay, so they got, they're rocking the money. All right, I'm okay. So what's the question?

• 32:35Lewis Howes?

  So what does it take, what's difference maker, the X factor between someone who is fulfilled and not fulfilled, but someone who's fulfilled and crushing it on all levels.

• 32:45Speaker 01

  Courage.

• 32:45Lewis Howes?

  Courage.

• 32:46Speaker 01

  Courage. Okay, so, and this is where it does get down to the feminine and masculine. Um.

• 32:51Lewis Howes?

  Perfect.

• 32:52Speaker 01

  The difference is courage. And again, you know, and I think this has been said many times, like, it's not, courage isn't about not experiencing fear. It's about experiencing fear and about doing it anyway. So that means, you know, you pick up the phone, um, you show up on stage, you're the first person to say I love you, um, to say I'm scared, whatever. Okay, so it's all, those are all intimate acts, whether you're getting on stage to give a talk, or, you know. Um, and for me, and I can only speak about this really personally, for, for me and my career in business,

• 33:34Speaker 01

  I want to be who I am. And always, and who I am is a woman. And I, and what I identify most with is feminine energy. What feels best coursing through my system is what I would call Shakti, feminine energy, and that has to do with intuition, it has to do with inclusivity, it has to do with reception, it has to do with tenderness, it has to do with a, a knowing. And a knowing that holds the pace and holds the rhythm. And, um, so that means, you know, in terms of relationship, I love contrast, right? So.

• 34:16Speaker 01

  I'm not in, you know, I I went to a women's conference. And I was like five thousand chicks. And they have your classic keynote women and they're all, you know, they're all working for Fortune five hundred companies. And, you know, my typical experience is I'm just like, I'm, I'm, I'm disgusted. And aghast by the advice that they're giving this room full of five thousand women. They're basically standing up there, they look like men, they're all in black suits. And they're telling women how to get ahead by basically being men in disguise. And this is. And this is why we have economic problems. This is why women are depressed.

• 35:01Speaker 01

  And overweight and no one's having the sex they should be having. And we've got mediocre, a mediocre business climate. Because. First of all, you're asking women to forsake the most powerful part of themselves, which is everything I just called feminine. And you're asking them to play an old game in an old structure and keep this charade up. And that is not where a revolution is gonna start. A revolution starts when women show up as women, when they leave the business force. And start their own businesses, or when they show up and say, you know what? How about a triple bottom line, guys? And I'm not saying that this is easy. I mean, I'm talking about, I I talk to women.

• 35:45Speaker 01

  Every time I do a gig, I get, I get the corporate contingent comes up to me and says. But how am I gonna make this change on Monday morning in this Fortune X hundred company that I'm in? And all I can say is, first of all, you gotta decide how intensely you wanna make that change. Secondly, you gotta decide if you really wanna stay, because you might need to leave to to be who you are. And thirdly, it is not gonna be easy. And you're gonna be met with resistance, but. Are you not gonna, like, are we all gonna just act like we're men? And also in that, in that conversation, um, which is so classic now, this is, you know, act like men and you'll, you'll get there.

• 36:29Speaker 01

  I'm really tired of the men bashing that happens of the jokes about how men get things done. It's like, are you kidding me? I mean, the masculine is a big part of making things happen. The masculine executes, the masculine is focused. It really does know how to get from A to B. You know, the answer is that we need both, but I will say, I think the masculine should let the feminine lead more and let them keep, um, there's something that women want. There's a way that we wanna move through the world. There's a way that we wanna give. There's a way that we wanna include. We include the children. We include, we include the environment. We include nourishment.

• 37:11Speaker 01

  And that's what is missing in masculine business is that inclusivity.

• 37:16Lewis Howes?

  Now, if women are leading more, are they gonna turn into more masculine?

• 37:21Speaker 01

  Uh, well, you can't lead without it. I mean, you know, I just got off a call this morning and I really had to like, you know, I had to bring my masculine to bear. I gotta like be a warrior and I have to negotiate and I have to say, okay, who's doing what by when? But I don't wanna have to be that all the time. And if I am that all the time, I get brittle and I get cranky and I get unsexy. And I don't wanna live my life that way, so.

• 37:46Lewis Howes?

  So is a balance.

• 37:48Speaker 01

  Uh, balance is a tricky word. I, I wanna be like, I wanna be eighty feminine and twenty masculine. That's the proportion that works for me.

• 37:59Lewis Howes?

  Now, now, what's your biggest fear, Danielle?

• 38:02Speaker 01

  My biggest fear is not getting what I want.

• 38:05Lewis Howes?

  What do you want?

• 38:06Speaker 01

  I wanna, I want, uh, I want the communion. I want, um, I wanna be, I wanna reach my potential this lifetime. I wanna die having, I, I wanna die feeling full but having given it all.

• 38:25Lewis Howes?

  Used up, huh?

• 38:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 38:29Lewis Howes?

  So, do you feel like you're doing everything, you're being communion right now in order to receive it?

• 38:37Speaker 01

  I'm a work in progress, Lewis. So, um, you know, I'm, yes. Yeah, I'm sort of batting my eyelashes now.

• 38:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, at the end of the day, when I, like, literally at the end of my day, when I'm back in the routine of, you know, you brush your teeth and you're getting ready and all of that, I just think,

• 39:00Speaker 01

  was I, did I give it, was I useful? Was today any, this is really my question, was today any different than yesterday? And most of the times I can say, yeah, and some days it's a wash, you know?

• 39:14Lewis Howes?

  So, do you need that balance also every day? Do you always, can you always give it away, like, to the next level every day? Or do you need it sometimes just to, like, wash it out and lay around and be a bum?

• 39:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:26Lewis Howes?

  You know what I mean?

• 39:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm a total spahoe. Um, yeah, yeah, absolutely. I, you know, I kind of designed my life so there's lots of,

• 39:38Speaker 01

  well, there's lots of joy, right? So there's lots of, there's lots of girl time and there's time to dance and there's time to just, like, sleep. And I don't, I answer to no one. Like, I have a, I have a Tuesday 8:00 AM call with my staff, and I have deadlines, and I, and I meet all those because I love what I do.

• 40:01Speaker 01

  But yeah, I think more than being like a bum, you gotta have days where you just feel like, like a fucking loser and I'm not getting it and I'm needy and I want, you know, it's like, ah, you know, and that's where you have the text, you know, the text parade with your girl starts.

• 40:18Lewis Howes?

  The great texting, right?

• 40:19Speaker 01

  Right? And you go, am I gonna get it? And they go, you're go, you're doing it, you're doing it. And, yeah, that's why we need it. Yeah, that's why, that's why you have friends.

• 40:30Lewis Howes?

  Now, let me ask you this.

• 40:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 40:33Lewis Howes?

  Now, do you create this environment of, I'm needy and I'm not having a good day, just to have communion?

• 40:42Speaker 01

  That's a really profound question. No, no, no, I can commune around joy for sure. Because, you know, healthy chicks are great at, at um,

• 40:56Speaker 01

  at celebrating the stuff. So like, you know, you call your, you text your friends, you call your friends and say, I got it. Whether it's like, you know, I'm going on the show, or he called, or somebody just, you, you, or you just, whatever the joy is. And sometimes the joy, at least with my friends, I mean, the range is, you know, I got these great shoes too. I just had this revelation today about um, my relationship to God, or, or whatever. It's, it's like, it's like deep and shallow. It's the whole thing.

• 41:31Lewis Howes?

  Do you feel like you ever sabotage yourself some days in order to get that, you know, deeper desire of communion that I believe people get when they're in need?

• 41:43Speaker 01

  Yeah, this is a great conversation. So what you're saying ha- I happens and I can, and I see why that happens in my own life. Um, I would, it, it, that doesn't happen for me, you know, but I do have, I'm very aware of my upper limit problems. And, um, you know, I wrote about it earlier this year where

• 42:08Speaker 01

  I could tell you, I could tell you that out of, say, ten speaking gigs, I was sick onstage for seven of them.

• 42:17Speaker 01

  And so I was like doped up on Cinnab and asthma inhalers and painkill, you know, all of that. Because before, before big gigs, I would create, so I'd create a sinus infection or a lung thing or something. Yeah. And I finally got, oh, this is an upper limit thing. Because to-

• 42:40Lewis Howes?

  Why would you create that?

• 42:43Speaker 01

  Uh.

• 42:44Lewis Howes?

  Right before a gig.

• 42:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, um, because for me, being on stage is uh, it's the ultimate. I mean, there's, it's, it's not the uh, it, it's not the ultimate joy. I mean, there's other things that give me as much joy or more joy. It's the, but that's where I'm, I'm out. It's like the big event, you know, the big event in my work life is you get the heels on, you get on stage and you transmit for an hour to ninety minutes and you get paid well and you hope you've affected somebody and you get on a plane to do this and it's filmed, you better hit it out of the park. And, and, and, and also, and in that mix, a lot of projection happens.

• 43:29Speaker 01

  People project stuff onto you that is not yours. They project that you're wiser than you are. They project that you're this guru. They project that you're a bitch. Um, lots of stuff happens in that exchange. And, and then another layer is I'm getting up there and getting paid lots of money to do what comes most naturally to me. Like I, I don't prepare for my talks anymore. I'm, I'm ecstatic when I'm up there. It's total bliss for me. I'm high when I get offstage. And so why not get sick? So you can sabotage all of that. You can, you block yourself from, from the hard part of it and you're gonna block yourself from the joy of it.

• 44:15Speaker 01

  And I'm done with that. It's like, you know, I used to think that I wasn't gonna be on top of my game unless I was nervous before I was a gig, uh, before I did a gig. You know, I really, and I have this thing about rock biography. So I've read like, you name, you name a rock star, I've read their biography. And everybody says, you know, I was like, I was reading a scar tissue, Anthony Kiedis in the Red Hot Chili Peppers. And he's like, you know, if I'm not like rattled and totally nervous before a gig, I, it's not gonna be a good one for me. And I bought it. I had bought into that and I'm, I'm done. I'm done with that. I've graduated from nervousness because.

• 44:52Speaker 01

  I had to ask myself, was this because I just, you know, crush on Anthony Kiedis? Or is it because I think that that nervousness is serving me some way? And I realize it doesn't. Nervousness does not keep me on top of my game. What keeps me on top of my game is like absolute love and commitment to serve. So.

• 45:12Lewis Howes?

  Well, it's funny you say that. It's funny you say that because nervousness and passionate love create the same physical feelings. Your heart starts beating, you start sweating in your palms, you start. Your arms might be shaking. They create the same physical result. It's just a matter of like the feeling you have inside.

• 45:31Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 45:32Lewis Howes?

  So if you could come from joy and love, passion, excitement, you're still going to be sweaty and, you know, armpits like sweaty and, uh, you know, trembling potentially on stage. Or you can feel nervous and have the same physical result. It's your, it's your choice. So.

• 45:47Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's like my speaking coach would say to me, um, fear is excitement without the breath. Fear is excitement without the breath. So you have to reframe it. And so sometimes I go, I'm not afraid, I'm excited. And then, you know, all those physical manifestations that you're talking about, sometimes you actually need to, I make sure like I create those. So if I'm not feeling the adrenaline, then, you know, I do some Kundalini yoga in my hotel room before I get on. You know, you watch Anthony Robbins before he gets on a stage. He gets on his, um, what do you call the little trampolines? And he gets all jacked before he gets on. So, yeah, you gotta be there.

• 46:29Lewis Howes?

  Interesting. Now, let's talk about, I want to wrap it up here in a minute, but I want to talk about gratitude. For me, I,

• 46:39Lewis Howes?

  my whole being, every single moment, I feel like is geared towards gratitude. And.

• 46:47Lewis Howes?

  Every time I step up my gratitude and show my appreciation for everything, whether it's a seeming bad or good situation, you know, all situations to me are neutral and then we perceive the way we want it to feel. And any situation, I try to find gratitude in it, or any person, I try to find how grateful for them. And when I do that, when I'm being grateful constantly, it just seems to elevate my way of feeling. And it seems to elevate me getting what I want in my life in all areas. What's your thoughts on gratitude?

• 47:20Speaker 01

  Essential, transformative, um, uh, close to God. Uh, it's a secret sauce of presence, right? So even, um, you know, this is, you know, back to me always, I'm always sort of questioning new age stuff, but, and the irony is like, you couldn't get more new age than I am, but, you know, the, the, where gratitude goes wrong is when that's the only part of the conversation. So you gotta be really clear about what you're dissatisfied with. And then bring yourself back to what you have the capacity to be grateful for.

• 48:04Speaker 01

  And some people say to me like, well, what if my life is really like officially, truly sucking? Like my loved one is dying and the money isn't flowing, all that. It's like, that's like reach for anything. I'm grateful for the sun, that the sun is gonna rise. I'm grateful that my house is gonna be warm when I get home. I'm grateful for the medical system, whatever it is. And when you get there, I mean, really what I think the practice of gratitude does is it, it, it completely washes away any victim sentimentality and, um,

• 48:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, it just brings you into presence and there's a way to do it that isn't in denial. It's not saccharine. It really is like just super pure. Like I'm just, I'm just happy I'm here. And it changes everything.

• 49:02Lewis Howes?

  Interesting. I love it. I'm glad you said that. Well,

• 49:05Speaker 01

  Thank you for asking.

• 49:08Lewis Howes?

  Well, I want to wrap it up and I want to ask you the final question and it's what I ask all my guests. And it is, what is your definition of greatness?

• 49:17Speaker 01

  Kindness. Just be kind.

• 49:22Lewis Howes?

  I love it. Where can we find you online, Danielle?

• 49:26Speaker 01

  You can find me everywhere. You can find me. DanielleLaPorte.com and I'm on Twitter, same handle. I'm on Facebook, Instagram. I'm obsessed with Pinterest, like most women are. Desire Map launches on my site, December 3rd, and then on January 1st, New Year's Day 2014, it's launching in like most English speaking bookstores in existence. It's available. And we've got Desire Map book clubs are starting around the world as of January 1st. So they're happening in cities like, they're happening in Brazil and Prague and Chicago and

• 50:11Lewis Howes?

  Amazing. Thanks so much. I want to share with you how much I appreciate you and I'm so grateful for you coming on and sharing your wisdom today and expressing some more feminine energy on the School of Greatness. And

• 50:25Speaker 01

  You need a feminine faculty, Lewis.

• 50:28Lewis Howes?

  I do. I do. But I really appreciate it. It means a lot and I'm glad we got to dive into some, some deeper emotions here. So I really appreciate you and we'll definitely have to have you come back on sometime when your next book comes out.

• 50:43Speaker 01

  Likewise. And thank you for your story. Your story is such an important one to tell. Thank you.

• 50:57Lewis Howes?

  And there you have it guys, a big shout out and thank you to the lovely Danielle LaPorte. Make sure to go ahead and check out schoolofgreatness.com to learn about the show notes from where you can connect with Danielle and how you can tap in further into the desire map. Again, schoolofgreatness.com to check that out. And a big thank you from my heart to Danielle for coming on and sharing her information and really opening up. Again, I hope you guys enjoyed this episode and you know what time it is. It's time to go out there and make sure to do something great.