5 Ways To Upgrade Your MINDSET & Get Out Of A Rut! EP 1131

“The one piece of life I was missing was having the courage to face myself.” - David Goggins Today’s episode is a special one. Over the years we’ve had guests share incredible stories about creating a new life for themselves and developing the motivation and discipline to follow through. So today we wanted to bring together some of our favorite moments from episodes to inspire you and show you how to take your life to the next level whether you’re in a tough spot right now or starting to feel complacent. We believe in you and we're excited to share these messages with you. In this episode Lewis and the guests discuss how to unlock your potential with David Goggins, the 5 second rule to change your life with Mel Robbins, how to go from rock bottom to living a life of purpose with Lisa Nichols, the mindset model to become limitless with Jim Kwik, how Rich Diviney trained himself to be motivated as a Navy Seal, and so much more! For more go to: www.lewishowes.com/1131Previous episodes of each guest:David Goggins: www.lewishowes.com/715Mel Robbins: www.lewishowes.com/970Jim Kwik: www.lewishowes.com/947Lisa Nichols: www.lewishowes.com/979Rich Diviney: www.lewishowes.com/1058 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.

• 0:00Lewis Howes?

  This is episode number 1,131 on how to upgrade your mindset. Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week, we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin.

• 0:27Lewis Howes?

  Sarah Blakely said, "Don't be intimidated by what you don't know. That can be your greatest strength and ensure that you do things differently from everyone else." And Will Rogers said, "Don't let yesterday take up too much of today." Today's episode is a special one because over the years, we've had guests share incredible stories about creating a new life for themselves and developing the motivation and the discipline to follow through. So today, I wanted to bring together some of my favorite moments from episodes to inspire you and show you how to take your life to the next level, whether you're in a tough spot right now or starting to feel complacent. I'm excited to share these messages with you, and I believe in you so much that I want you to have this information.

• 1:09Lewis Howes?

  And in this episode, we discuss how to unlock your potential with the great David Goggins, the five-second rule to change your life with Mel Robbins, how Rich Devine trained himself to be motivated as a Navy SEAL, how to go from rock bottom to living a life of purpose with Lisa Nichols, and the mindset model to become limitless with Jim Quick. And if you're inspired at any moment throughout this episode, make sure to copy and paste the link wherever you're listening to this and text it to a few friends during this interview. Post it on social media. Make sure to tag me as well. And we'll have more about each guest that's in here in the show notes over at lewishouse.com/1131. Okay, in just a moment, it's time to transform your mindset and create a greater life.

• 1:57Lewis Howes?

  I firmly believe that every human was born to create, even if you don't think of yourself as creative. Whether the last time you picked up a paintbrush was in grade school or yesterday, exploring your creativity and being inspired is not limited. And I recently took a Skillshare class from Gary Vee on social media strategy in a noisy online world, and I learned so much. Every time Gary's talking about strategy, he's always teaching me one or two things that'll help me grow and improve. And there are tons of other topics to explore through Skillshare besides social media marketing. And you can dive into classes on creative writing, productivity, freelance and entrepreneurship, and so much more. Whether you're a dabbler or a pro, a hobbyist or a master, you're creative.

• 2:39Lewis Howes?

  Discover what you can make with classes for every skill level. Experience real improvement with hands-on projects and classes designed for real life. Explore your creativity at skillshare.com/greatness and get one month free trial of premium membership. That's one month of a premium membership at skillshare.com/greatness.

• 3:05Lewis Howes?

  In this first section, former Navy SEAL David Goggins shares how he went from having nothing and a rough childhood to unlocking his full potential. David's story is incredibly inspiring and is one of the best examples of changing your mindset to change your life.

• 3:23Lewis Howes?

  Workout every day, you haven't missed a day?

• 3:24David Goggins?

  I did it for the last 20 some years of my life.

• 3:27Lewis Howes?

  20 years? Or they said two years?

• 3:29David Goggins?

  No, 20 some years of my life.

• 3:30Lewis Howes?

  Every day you work out?

• 3:32David Goggins?

  So I used to take one day off a week. I used to take one day off a week.

• 3:38Lewis Howes?

  For the body to recover, right? Makes sense.

• 3:39David Goggins?

  But that one day off was an active recovery day, where I would get on a trainer and ride for like two hours. But at a zone one heart rate, very low heart rate. And I replaced the carbohydrates in my body while I rode. Because the best way to recover for me is to do something at a very low heart rate, because therefore your blood's flowing through your body. As your blood's flowing through your body, refuel it with the nutrients. Because then your blood's flowing, the nutrients is going through all your cells in your body. All that glycogen is now flowing at a low heart rate. So it's not burning it, it's refueling it. So every Sunday used to be that. And it kind of snowballed into, as human beings...

• 4:22David Goggins?

  We believe, like, so many people, before I give them a workout plan, they're talking about recovery. Everybody, everybody that hears me speak, they wanna go straight to recovery.

• 4:33David Goggins?

  Workout first. Huh. Workout first, before you talk to me about recovery. How to recover, yeah. Workout first. We are always looking for, like, whenever I talk to people, people take my words, and they, and they, and they put it in a way to where they wanna feel comfortable. This guy, you know, they, they, they wanna put you in a box. They wanna put a title on you. No, you're putting a title on me to make yourself feel better about yourself. If you read this book of mine, and you see where I came from, this person was, this, this person was not built. This, this, this person was not made by God. Mm-hmm. This person, sorry, this person was built. I made this person.

• 5:16David Goggins?

  I made this person by diving into the insecurities that life gave me. Cause now they're yours. They're yours to own. If you're not smart, call yourself dumb. It's okay, cause you are. But take that not as you're putting yourself down, if you're fat, call yourself fat, I used to be 300 pounds. Hmm. We, we wanna talk so soft to ourselves, we're looking for that recovery day. And that recovery day is everything in your life. Everything in your life is a recovery day, we're looking for it. It's not coming. It's not coming. Mm-hmm. Get over that recovery day. And that's the mentality I took with me. And what happened through that process was all the frivolous things of life started to float away.

• 5:59David Goggins?

  I used to tell people lies so they would like me. Hmm. Cause I was so insecure. When you start to build yourself up, and start to have, the one thing that we don't have is confidence. Yep. Real, authentic confidence from hard work. Everything else goes away, you, you no longer look to other people for your self-esteem. For validation, for, yeah. You now know. I walk in a room now, and I know the hours and years and decades I put into David Goggins. That's something, it's not on the wall. It's not a trophy on the wall, it's not a medal on your neck. It is actually a feeling in your heart, and people, why don't you ever smile? I don't have to.

• 6:41Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 6:42David Goggins?

  Yeah, I do have a strong look on my face. I'm a very focused person. But the thing I have in my soul and in my heart. That's why I need to smile. I don't need to smile. I don't need you to look at me and say, oh, my God, you look happy. Because half of us aren't happy. We're giving you something that we think you want to see. I don't do that anymore. I don't care how you perceive David Goggins. Because through my journey, I figured out the one piece I was missing. I thought it was cars. I thought it was women. I thought it was money. I thought it was everything. The one piece I was missing was me having the courage to face myself. And once you do that on a daily basis, it's not about the running. Where people are going to be, you have to start working out. Where I got my work ethic from?

• 7:28David Goggins?

  Was the hours I had to spend learning this.

• 7:33David Goggins?

  When you sit down and you're not smart. You have a disability.

• 7:36Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 7:37David Goggins?

  And you still want to be at the top of your class. I didn't want to just get by. When I realized that I can learn through hard work. And I can beat the valedictorian in the school, but I got put in ten hours more a day than he does. You know what kind of strength comes from that? When you're sitting down and that guy, that valedictorian's standing for an hour, and you know, I caught you. I caught you, and I am dumb. But I have the work ethic to catch you. That's where David Goggins got really invented.

• 8:09Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 8:09David Goggins?

  Was at a kitchen table with twenty spiral notebooks that were empty. And then, three months later.

• 8:16Lewis Howes?

  Down, yeah.

• 8:17David Goggins?

  They were full. And when you can go through that, I still have them in my storage unit. You go through these spiral notebooks of your life. And you're like, this is how I learned. This is unbelievable. There's no miles. It's not about the miles. It's that. Having a discipline every day to say, for me to learn this one math problem, it's gonna take me ten hours.

• 8:37Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 8:38David Goggins?

  And that's where it, and you realize through hard work. You can do, you can outwork anybody, no matter how bad they are. But that's the part people don't want to dive into.

• 8:50Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. When someone's lacking confidence in themselves, what's the answer you would give them if they're like, how do I gain more confidence?

• 8:57David Goggins?

  It starts with yourself, man. You gotta start diving into those things that you are afraid of. You don't gain confidence by going to the spot that makes you feel good. It could be a false reality. In the second life gives you that challenge? All you wanna do is go back to what made you confidence? Or, or, or, or what gave you confidence? Is that happy spot? No. What gives you confidence? What gave me confidence? Was spending years at a kitchen table? Trying to learn how to read and write all my own. Realizing, I can't learn the way you learn. I can't. But I can learn. What gives you confidence? Not being afraid. Is overcoming the fear.

• 9:42David Goggins?

  I used to stutter severely bad. So right now, I don't know how many people are gonna watch this. You know what gives me confidence? Is knowing I no longer care. If I start stuttering to you.

• 9:51Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 9:52David Goggins?

  That's what gives me confidence. Is facing these things, overcoming them. And maybe not overcoming them every day. But facing them. And facing them, and facing them. Pretty soon like this, you know what, man? This is where it's at. It's not in that comfort zone. It's in the discomfort zone. Is where my confidence is getting built.

• 10:10Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 10:11David Goggins?

  That's where it's getting built. But people wanted, they want an easier answer.

• 10:16Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 10:16David Goggins?

  There has to be an easier way. There's not. I'm sorry. I searched for it my entire life.

• 10:22Lewis Howes?

  You cheated, you lied.

• 10:24David Goggins?

  I lied, I did everything. And I still felt empty. I coach a lot of people nowadays, billionaires. Who call me on the phone and say, Matt, I'm still missing something. It's because they did what they were good at. And they had this beautiful family. Two, three houses, cars, everything. Has everything to work. On the outside looking in, like, my God, man, how can you be unhappy? I walk around with the backpack with all my stuff in it, with no car.

• 10:53Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 10:54David Goggins?

  And I walk around, happiest person in the world. Have nothing. Happy as hell. It's because I found out the whole key to life. It's not in all that. You have to face yourself. So many people live to be a hundred years old. And they die miserable, having everything. Because they never examined. I call it my live autopsy. You never examine this.

• 11:21David Goggins?

  Happiness, peace, enlightenment, it's all up here, man. It's all up here. If I start talking like this, people will, man, you know, I don't know, it's the truth, man.

• 11:32Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, it is true.

• 11:33David Goggins?

  It's all up here. You just gotta be willing to go and face it. And that's the hard part.

• 11:38Lewis Howes?

  What's your biggest insecurity today?

• 11:43David Goggins?

  I'm, not to be arrogant, I don't have one.

• 11:46Lewis Howes?

  What was the last one you had and when was that?

• 11:48David Goggins?

  The last one I had was probably, um,

• 11:54David Goggins?

  still me. Me, still living, cause I, I always talk about, I, I pay rent, so we live, we used to live in a seven dollar a month place when I was growing up.

• 12:05Lewis Howes?

  This is in Buffalo or is this?

• 12:06David Goggins?

  This is in Indiana.

• 12:07Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 12:07David Goggins?

  So, like, we had a lot of money in Buffalo.

• 12:09Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 12:10David Goggins?

  And when my mom left, my dad, we went to nothing. For a period of time before she got on her feet.

• 12:15Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 12:15David Goggins?

  And that seven dollar a month place used to be, it was my, it was who I was. I was no one. I was in the sewer. My mom lived there. I had nothing. And you always feel like you have nothing. I, I achieved so much. I was a Navy SEAL. I've gone through Ranger School. I've gone through Delta Force Selection Training. I, I, I done so much. I, I run two hundred miles, pull-up records, everything. Learned to read and write, became pretty intelligent. And I still was like, man, what is wrong with me? It wasn't until I got real sick, and I talked about in the last chapter of that book, I got real sick, and I was about, um, thirty-eight years old.

• 12:58Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 12:59David Goggins?

  I'm forty-three now. And my life got real quiet. I, I went from running two hundred and five miles in thirty-nine hours to I couldn't get out of bed. The doctors couldn't figure out what was wrong with me, but once again, it was the best thing that ever happened to me.

• 13:13Lewis Howes?

  Why is that?

• 13:15David Goggins?

  In that moment, where my whole life changed, I went from a guy who worked out every day, trained every day, to a guy who couldn't get out of bed. My life was taken from me. The one thing that kept me going was my training.

• 13:28Lewis Howes?

  Now, you didn't have that.

• 13:28David Goggins?

  I didn't have anything.

• 13:29Lewis Howes?

  Now, you just had to sit alone.

• 13:30David Goggins?

  Alone.

• 13:31Lewis Howes?

  And not train.

• 13:32David Goggins?

  And that's what changed me. And that's when I realized. I hadn't thought, hadn't taken time to think about what I'd done in my life.

• 13:42Lewis Howes?

  You hadn't reflected yet.

• 13:43David Goggins?

  I hadn't reflected. I'd done all these things, but there was no finish line. I still believe that, but you must have time to reflect.

• 13:49Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 13:49David Goggins?

  I was just going. I wouldn't even, I'd finish a race of life and I wouldn't even receive my medal. I'd go on.

• 13:56Lewis Howes?

  You're like on to the next.

• 13:57David Goggins?

  I'd get in the car and I'd go.

• 13:58Lewis Howes?

  You wouldn't even take the medal?

• 13:59David Goggins?

  Gone. Don't care about it.

• 14:00Lewis Howes?

  Like I'm not gonna waste an hour sitting around for this ceremony?

• 14:02David Goggins?

  Most people sit around and that's what they like. They, they need the ceremony if I accomplished something.

• 14:08Lewis Howes?

  Validation.

• 14:09David Goggins?

  I haven't done anything. Let's go. Let's go. Let's go.

• 14:11Lewis Howes?

  I'm just getting started.

• 14:12David Goggins?

  I'm just getting started. It's like, when I started figuring out life, that I was leaving so much in the tank. I call it my forty percent rule.

• 14:19Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 14:20David Goggins?

  I was leaving so much in the tank. Once I realized, my God, man, I was this dumb, fat kid being bullied and now I'm a hundred and eighty pound person who lost a hundred and six pounds in less than three months. Learned to read, learned to do this, learned to do that. I was like, I need more.

• 14:34Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 14:35David Goggins?

  I was fueling my mind with everything. And I never took time to say, my God, you came from this hell and you're here. So those insecurities,

• 14:45David Goggins?

  and this is how I explain it the best way. SEAL training became pretty hard and a lot of guys weren't getting through it. So they designed a SEAL pep prep program.

• 14:55Lewis Howes?

  Hmm. Like a boot camp for the boot camp.

• 14:57David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 14:57Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 14:58David Goggins?

  And it was two months. In my last two years before I retired from the military, they sent me there to train these kids.

• 15:04Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 15:04David Goggins?

  To get ready for BUDs.

• 15:05Lewis Howes?

  Eighteen, nineteen, twenty year olds.

• 15:06David Goggins?

  Yeah, young kids. So when they get to Navy SEAL training, man, they were physical studs. They were running, swimming. I mean, they were, they were hybrids.

• 15:16Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 15:17David Goggins?

  But they get to BUDs and the same amount of people would quit.

• 15:21Lewis Howes?

  Why is that?

• 15:22David Goggins?

  This is why.

• 15:25David Goggins?

  We were training bigger, stronger, faster quitters.

• 15:29Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 15:30David Goggins?

  It's not about.

• 15:31Lewis Howes?

  Not the mind.

• 15:32David Goggins?

  That's right. We weren't diving into the sewer. Everybody's got a story. We don't share it on social media. We share our nice life on social media. We have, we all have a dungeon. I'm just willing to talk about mine. Yeah. Most of us aren't willing to talk about it. I'm gonna talk about my dungeon. I wasn't getting into the dungeon of these guys' minds. I wasn't building that so-called mental toughness. Mental toughness isn't something that you sample. It's something that you live in every day. So when something hard would happen to these kids, like in Hell Week, it would draw on something that made them very insecure. And they look for comfort. Whenever hardness comes, and you don't know what it is,

• 16:17David Goggins?

  it may be different for you than it is for me, but you go back to your insecurities. And then when you go back to insecurities, you then look for comfort within those insecurities. And we all look for that cookie that your mom used to give you Right. when you were sad. Yeah. when you were sick. We look for our wife or our husband. We look for comfort. It's in those moments, you must retrain your mind Hmm. to think differently in hell. I wasn't training them to do that. Why weren't you training them? I wasn't training myself to do it, because at that time, I was doing what I was told. Hmm. These guys needed to meet a standard. Physical standard. A physical standard. The physical standard is not what they need to meet.

• 17:02David Goggins?

  It's a mental standard you must meet in life. So going back to when I was sick, I was hitting the physical standards.

• 17:13David Goggins?

  I wasn't meeting the mental standard. The mental standard is you must know how far you've come. Wow. I wasn't, I, I had come eight thousand miles from where I started. But if you never know that, you're still in a seven-dollar-a-month place. When I was sick, I was able to slow it down and reflect back on my entire life. And in that bed, and I thought I was dying, because that story is long, that, that sick portion of my life is long.

• 17:46David Goggins?

  I didn't care if I died or lived.

• 17:48Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 17:49David Goggins?

  Cause I was for the first time in my life, happy.

• 17:51Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 17:52David Goggins?

  And at peace. Cause I reflected back on where I started.

• 17:55Lewis Howes?

  You said, wow, I have come a long way.

• 17:57David Goggins?

  That's right. And no one saved me. It wasn't like someone came down here and guided me through life. When you figure this out on your own, the amount of pride and dignity and self-respect you have. That's why I walk around the streets with a backpack and just like, I don't need anything else.

• 18:16Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 18:17David Goggins?

  You figure it out by going inside yourself, by callusing over the victim's mentality. You're always a victim. Even if you have everything in life, until you realize what you've achieved. You have to first realize what you've achieved and my mom has accomplished so much in her life since my father. But she hasn't done that one step.

• 18:39Lewis Howes?

  Really? She doesn't acknowledge it and reflect back?

• 18:42David Goggins?

  She continues to go back to the dungeon of her past life.

• 18:47Lewis Howes?

  And live in that space?

• 18:48David Goggins?

  And live in that space versus living the space that she's in now and reflecting back on, my God, this is what I've done with my life. So.

• 18:57Lewis Howes?

  Have you talked to her about this?

• 18:58David Goggins?

  We talk about it all the time and you have to be willing to go there. You have to be willing to really go there, not, not surface. I don't, I don't live on the surface of anything.

• 19:08Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 19:09David Goggins?

  Surface is what got me where I was at. It got me from a hundred and seventy-five pounds to three hundred pounds. Telling everybody I'm good. I don't, I don't give a damn. I'm good. No, they're, they're hollow words.

• 19:21Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 19:21David Goggins?

  A lot of us speak in hollow words. I used to speak in hollow words. I don't do anymore. Everything that comes out of my mouth has substance, is real. And we all have these feelings in our bodies, in our minds, in our souls. I act on mine. A lot of us who are afraid of something, we allow our minds to choose the path of least resistance, so we go a different route. When I'm afraid of something, it's telling me, you must conquer that. You must do that.

• 19:49Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 19:49David Goggins?

  You have to go that way. And most of us don't understand that mentality. We go left and we wonder why we haven't fulfilled something in our lives. It's because we continue to take the journey that is mapped out. And how I look at it is I, I, I talk in life like. A lot of us in life want to take the four lane highway. That has road maps and all this other stuff on it, man. Tells you where to go, gas stations. The next 10 miles up, you're gonna see a McDonald's or Cracker Barrel.

• 20:20Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 20:21David Goggins?

  It's the easy route. Very few of us want to go to the right side.

• 20:24Lewis Howes?

  That Cracker Barrel is that Midwest life.

• 20:26David Goggins?

  That's right, that's right.

• 20:27Lewis Howes?

  I'm from Ohio.

• 20:28David Goggins?

  It's all about it, man. Indiana, Cracker Barrel everywhere.

• 20:32Lewis Howes?

  Dude, that's amazing. Bringing back memories. This is powerful, because I've been telling people this. I've been living that way unknowingly my whole life of like, whatever the thing is I'm afraid of. When I was in high school, I started doing those things.

• 20:47David Goggins?

  Right.

• 20:47Lewis Howes?

  And it was just like, I'm sick and tired of feeling afraid.

• 20:50David Goggins?

  Right.

• 20:50Lewis Howes?

  So I need to do the things that scare me the most.

• 20:52David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 20:53Lewis Howes?

  You know, I've talked about this a lot on the podcast. Tiffany's heard me share these stories, but I was afraid to talk to girls when I was a teenager. I was afraid of dancing. I was afraid of like singing and playing music in front of people. I was afraid of all these different things. And so I said, I want to do this. I'm gonna give myself a challenge every single day until the fear goes away.

• 21:10David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 21:11Lewis Howes?

  And I feel like that's what more of us should be doing. I'm hearing that that's what you, how you live your life.

• 21:16David Goggins?

  That's all it is, man.

• 21:17Lewis Howes?

  And it helps me feel so much more confident. When you overcome that fear of saying, this doesn't have control over me anymore.

• 21:22David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 21:23Lewis Howes?

  It's like you can get such more peace.

• 21:25David Goggins?

  It's 100%.

• 21:26Lewis Howes?

  In your life.

• 21:26David Goggins?

  Most of, like, for instance, I never thought in my wildest dreams I could be a Navy SEAL.

• 21:33David Goggins?

  It's until you opened your mind, open mindedness creates that. We all shut down our mind. Like for instance, when I broke the pull-up record. Everybody around me who heard the pull-up record was 4,020 pull-ups. That's the first thing they did. Oh my God.

• 21:48Lewis Howes?

  4,024 hours or was this?

• 21:50David Goggins?

  Yeah, it's 4,020 pull-ups in 24 hour period.

• 21:52Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 21:53David Goggins?

  The first thing I did versus closing my mind, you're like, oh my God, that's crazy.

• 21:58David Goggins?

  I went and got a pin in.

• 21:59Lewis Howes?

  And say, how many is that every minute?

• 22:00David Goggins?

  Exactly.

• 22:01Lewis Howes?

  Every hour, every second.

• 22:02David Goggins?

  Instead of taking life and making it out to be this grandiose thing, start breaking it down. Start breaking it down. And most of us, we live in a box. And we don't want to go outside that box at all, ever.

• 22:19David Goggins?

  Outside that box is all these possibilities of life. What we do is we shackle our mind. We are a prisoner in our own mind that this is all I can do. This is all I'm good at. And we, we, we take away the possibility that you could be this, you could be that.

• 22:35Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 22:36David Goggins?

  You could be all these things. And I never thought at three hundred pounds I could be Navy SEAL.

• 22:40Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 22:40David Goggins?

  So if my mind was shackled, me and you would never meet. There'd be no book.

• 22:46Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 22:46David Goggins?

  There'd be no book.

• 22:47Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 22:49David Goggins?

  There'd be nothing. So what people understand is that they live for themselves, not knowing that you have the power within yourself to change millions of lives.

• 23:00Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 23:00David Goggins?

  By facing life, by facing yourself. And through that, I, I would die never knowing that I had the power to change millions of lives. It will haunt me the most. People ask me, what, what haunts you the most? What haunts me the most is that if I would have died at three hundred pounds, let's say I was seventy-five years old. I got to heaven and God has a chart like that on everybody's life. God knows all, let's say that. I don't care what you believe in, doesn't matter. I'm not judging anybody. But let's say my thing is God. You get to heaven, I'm three hundred pounds, I sit down, I was a cockroach, terminated my whole life. And we're sitting down just like this, you're God and I'm David. And he gives me that chart and he says, look at this.

• 23:43David Goggins?

  Now, look at this chart and on the chart it has all these different things, but my name's on it. But these things aren't me. I was gonna change the world. I was gonna, I was gonna set records. I was gonna be a Navy SEAL. I was gonna be all these things in the military that I accomplished. You're gonna get the VFW award. You're gonna be honored here, honored there. And I'm like, God, I was, this isn't me. Like it says, David Goggins. I was an Ecolab guy, sprayed for cockroaches and I'm three hundred pounds. It says here, I'm one eighty-five. It says here, I got a, a bachelor's and a master's. It says all these things.

• 24:20David Goggins?

  And God goes, no, that's who you were supposed to be.

• 24:23Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 24:25David Goggins?

  My biggest fear in life is if there is a final resting place in this world and there's a final judgment. And you talk to something much bigger than you. I don't want to sit down and have a conversation with someone with something that says, you're in heaven. This is what you should have been on earth. And are you really in heaven now or are you in hell?

• 24:49Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 24:49David Goggins?

  Thinking about how much I left on the table for fear. For not willing to go over the wall and over the next wall and over the next wall. So in my mind, I believe that and God knows all, at least I believe that.

• 25:05David Goggins?

  I want God to be up there right now as we're speaking, writing stuff down, saying, my God, he exceeded even my expectations. That's how I live my life. I now know that there is no cap on the human mind. There's no cap. We cap it ourselves.

• 25:25Lewis Howes?

  Wow. Is there a cap on the human body?

• 25:27David Goggins?

  That's right.

• 25:28Lewis Howes?

  Is there one?

• 25:29David Goggins?

  There. I.

• 25:34David Goggins?

  I don't believe so.

• 25:35Lewis Howes?

  Mm hmm.

• 25:36David Goggins?

  Because one thing I found out was I didn't, for several years, I gave myself a way out.

• 25:43Lewis Howes?

  When you were three hundred pounds?

• 25:45David Goggins?

  No, I was three hundred pounds when I was, all the way up to I was twenty four years old. I would climb a mountain, I'd fall back down. I'd start climbing, I'd fall back down for the first twenty four years of my life. I went to my first hell week, my second hell week, and then my third hell week came in SEAL training. And the CO, Captain Bowen, looked at me, I'm on crutches, I'm all jacked up. He says, hey, this is your last time you're gonna go through butts. This is it. I had several stress fractures. I had double pneumonia, I was jacked up, and he gave me a few months to heal. And he said, this is your last time going through. I shouldn't even let you go back through.

• 26:22Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 26:23David Goggins?

  I started Navy SEAL training with stress fractures. Stress fractures, not shin splints.

• 26:30Lewis Howes?

  That's hard to finish.

• 26:30David Goggins?

  Stress fractures, starting the hardest training, arguably the hardest training in the world with stress fractures.

• 26:36David Goggins?

  And this is when I started to not put a cap on the body. If the mind is there. Every morning I would wake up at 3:30 in the morning, 4 o'clock in the morning. Go to my dive cage. Go in there before anybody saw me. I'd get duct tape. And I would tape from my forefoot all the way up to the middle of my calf. And I would put two black socks on. And so I ran not using the pivot.

• 27:01Lewis Howes?

  Oh, my gosh.

• 27:02David Goggins?

  And I ran my hip flexors. So for the first 45 minutes to an hour, I was in absolute excruciating pain. But what motivated me through that whole process was the fact that this kid came from that. I'm in the hardest training in the world, in the worst shape of my entire life. What if I can graduate amongst these studs?

• 27:28Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 27:29David Goggins?

  All these guys around me are studs. They're stallions, they're gladiators in my class. They're all healthy, most of them. They're not broken like this. They may have some, you know, everybody's sick going through that training. But if I can graduate, it would change everything for me. If I can start the hardest training in the world, broken, and graduate. So my mind fed off of that. You are now, from the weakest man, you are now the hardest man to ever live. If you can do this. If you can do this. Life is one big mind game. And you're playing it with yourself. Is it true? I don't care.

• 28:11Lewis Howes?

  In this section, bestselling author Mel Robbins shares the five-second rule that she's become known for that turned her entire life around. And every time I hear this story, it inspires me to bring this practice back into my life.

• 28:26Lewis Howes?

  Wait, first off, when did you discover the five-second rule?

• 28:29Mel Robbins?

  Okay, so 2009.

• 28:30Lewis Howes?

  This is when you first tried it or discovered it or?

• 28:33Mel Robbins?

  Oh, it's a total horror show mistake. Yes. So 2009, I was unemployed.

• 28:41Mel Robbins?

  And feeling like-

• 28:42Lewis Howes?

  You unemployed? How?

• 28:44Mel Robbins?

  Well, okay-

• 28:44Lewis Howes?

  You have too much charisma, too much passion.

• 28:47Mel Robbins?

  Uh, yeah, cuz everything's working right now. That's why. I'm not like this when things are not working. Ask my husband of 22 years. Um, uh, well, what had happened is, um, I had had all these career changes and I got into the media business, again, by mistake. I had a coaching business and, um, Inc. Magazine was writing an article about coaches and they featured me in it and CNBC called.

• 29:12Lewis Howes?

  Got it.

• 29:13Mel Robbins?

  And that led to me doing some stuff with CNBC and, um, I spent a year still coaching people and then doing some stuff for CNBC and then Fox called and they were interested in having me host a television show. Now, you gotta understand, I'm from North Muskegon, Michigan.

• 29:30Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 29:31Mel Robbins?

  I mean, the media business, Fox, LA, the closest thing I had ever seen to a celebrity, Louis, was the Muskegon lumberjacks, the farm team, right?

• 29:41Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 29:41Mel Robbins?

  From our, for the Pittsburgh Penguins.

• 29:43Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, the double A team or whatever.

• 29:45Mel Robbins?

  Yeah, my dad was the hometown doc for the hockey team there.

• 29:47Lewis Howes?

  Right, right, right.

• 29:48Mel Robbins?

  So I thought-

• 29:49Lewis Howes?

  The mayor was a celebrity.

• 29:50Mel Robbins?

  Wow, my life's about to change. I'm about to be a celebrity. Wow, we're gonna solve all, this is amazing, you know? So, um, I was originally going to be hosting a show for Fox where we were making over small businesses.

• 30:04Lewis Howes?

  Nice.

• 30:05Mel Robbins?

  Yeah, pretty cool, right? We show up, we like do extreme home makeover for the office, everybody's happy, we all know that doesn't solve business problems, but it makes for a nice television show. By the time I get to LA, um, they've changed the format. It's now called Someone's Gotta Go and I'm gonna be firing people on national television from real jobs.

• 30:22Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 30:23Mel Robbins?

  Uh-huh.

• 30:23Lewis Howes?

  That sounds fun.

• 30:24Mel Robbins?

  Horrible.

• 30:25Lewis Howes?

  Oh, my god.

• 30:26Mel Robbins?

  Plus, we haven't told the offices that this is what we're doing.

• 30:29Lewis Howes?

  Oh, my gosh.

• 30:29Mel Robbins?

  So you show up in act one and you've got everybody all like this because they're gonna think they're gonna get new IKEA furniture and a paint job and this is gonna be the best thing in the world for their small business. Now meanwhile, I'm a fourth-generation small business owner, so that's like my people. Grew up at a kitchen table with farmers and, you know, my mom at a retail store and my other grandparents were bakers and so when it comes to like the heart and soul and what's so important when you launch your own business and how personal it is, I mean, this was like gut-wrenching. So I show up, the first act, you kick out the owner of the company who then freaks out, then all the employees freak out. Act number two, we announce that somebody's getting fired and then that's, that's the, the bad news. The good news is that I'm not picking. We're gonna have you vote somebody out, so it's Survivor in an office place.

• 31:14Lewis Howes?

  Oh my goodness.

• 31:15Mel Robbins?

  So, when I learn all this, I have a panic attack, even though I'm unzoloft, and I call the guy that got me the gig and say, "You gotta get me out of this." Like, this is the worst thing that's ever happened to me. And he said, "Well, I'm sorry, but they've already cast the entire show, and you're out there for five weeks, and you don't have a choice. They're gonna sue you." And I said, "Then, fine, get me some Xanax, cuz I don't think I can get through this thing." Like, this is awful. Luckily, we taped two episodes, and legal tabled it. But here was the problem. I was attached to the show. And I only got paid if the show was shooting. And, being an entrepreneur, I also kinda put, yes, put all my energy into this,

• 31:57Mel Robbins?

  shut down the coaching thing, really thought that the... Also kinda negotiated a deal that was sort of a backend deal, thinking I'm a, you know, entrepreneur, always thinking about, gotta have a piece of the action.

• 32:09Lewis Howes?

  Take a little less upfront, the more...

• 32:10Mel Robbins?

  Yeah, that was a dumb move. And I was in a contract for a year while they figured out what to do.

• 32:16Lewis Howes?

  So you couldn't do another show, yeah.

• 32:18Mel Robbins?

  So, you know, I just felt like I had made a huge mistake, and I felt really embarrassed. And I didn't know, at the age of 41, what I should be doing with my life. And while it's neat that I had jumped careers so many times, I started to feel like somebody that actually wasn't successful at all. Cuz I didn't have a career track. I had a bunch of jumps from one thing to another. Now, looking back, it makes perfect sense, but standing in the middle of the mess, it just felt like everything was caving in. Probably just like when you were sleeping on your couch, feeling injured, and like, everything I thought that was about to happen isn't happening now. Meanwhile, my husband had opened up a restaurant business. It had been his dream. He worked in high-tech, and came home one day after getting laid off,

• 32:59Mel Robbins?

  and said, "I'm never gonna get on a plane and do a PowerPoint presentation for a company. I don't care about our own." And I said, "Great, what's your plan?" And he said, "I'm gonna open a pizza restaurant." And I looked at him, and I said...

• 33:12Mel Robbins?

  Was there a trust fund that was part of this marriage that I was unaware of? Cause I'm not quite sure how we're gonna pay.

• 33:17Lewis Howes?

  Cause where you get the money?

• 33:18Mel Robbins?

  Exactly.

• 33:19Lewis Howes?

  Did someone die? You got an insurance policy?

• 33:21Mel Robbins?

  Yes, and he said no. And um, I then said the most famous lines of our 22 year marriage. Louis, I looked at him and I said, listen buddy, inspiration is for strangers. You get your ass back to that job and you pay the mortgage and you forget the stream. You're not going to this.

• 33:40Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 33:40Mel Robbins?

  Well, cause change is scary.

• 33:43Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 33:43Mel Robbins?

  So we fought and he won and the first one was a real homerun.

• 33:48Lewis Howes?

  You opened a pizza store.

• 33:49Mel Robbins?

  Oh, he did. Yeah. Forty, forty seats, right outside of Boston, Massachusetts. He and his best friend and they won best of Boston. It was incredible. What do you do when everything's?

• 33:57Lewis Howes?

  Did they make money though?

• 33:58Mel Robbins?

  They did on the first one. So what do you do?

• 34:00Lewis Howes?

  Let's do another one.

• 34:01Mel Robbins?

  Woo, let's go all chips in. Let's put in the home equity line. Let's put in the, the kids' college savings. Let's get friends and family. And because you're so excited, you, you think it's gonna work. So you go big, big, big. Well, the second one did not work at all. And it did not work at all so badly that when it was finally closed, it was close to an $800,000 loss and it meant our entire home equity line, kids' college savings, everything went right down with it. That was right when I lost the Fox show. So I'm unemployed. The liens start hitting the house. Um, the phone starts ringing all the time and it's collections calls.

• 34:41Mel Robbins?

  So you unplug the phone?

• 34:41Lewis Howes?

  That would stress me out.

• 34:42Mel Robbins?

  Well, you just unplug the phone. I mean, that's how you deal with that. But I, I, I, I remember, like there were, I remember two things from that period of my life that were really painful and one was having to call the town and tell them that we could not afford the 175 bucks for our sixth grader to play soccer. So we needed to pull her out. And I remember there being times, cause I was so afraid to look at the checking account, that I would stand at the grocery store and items would scan and I could just feel that wave of anxiety rising, thinking, I don't, I don't think the check card's gonna go through. And so I would stand there. I always had an excuse and it was to look at the person and go, oh, that's strange. It just worked at the gas station.

• 35:23Lewis Howes?

  Oh my gosh.

• 35:25Mel Robbins?

  Because I, what would have been more empowering is to probably say, oh, well, I guess I don't have the money for this. Let's take this, this and this. And just kind of like the easiest thing to do is to tell the truth. But I was so filled with shame.

• 35:36Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 35:37Mel Robbins?

  So I started to develop this habit of hitting the snooze button. Because what would happen is the alarm would go off in the morning and the first thing I would think about is all the problems that we had and how awfully things had gone off the tracks.

• 35:54Lewis Howes?

  You didn't want to deal with them?

• 35:55Mel Robbins?

  No, and I also didn't know, I didn't know, I didn't think I could. And this goes back to the feelings. Like you, you think that you need to feel confident or courageous in order to get started. You don't. You actually just have to start and that's the riddle of life. That lying in bed, hoping that you wake up some morning motivated to change, that's not the answer. You actually have to learn how to push yourself. You have to learn how to, how to leverage the power of your decisions and you've got to learn how to take action when you don't feel like it. Because every morning when I woke up, I did not feel confident. I felt like a loser. I felt

• 36:35Mel Robbins?

  like the world's worst parent. I felt like I had failed at every single turn. I did not know if Chris and I could pull out of the spiral. I did not know if we were going to go bankrupt and lose the house and move from our community. I did not know if our marriage would survive. I knew I wanted it to. And see, this is the knowledge action gap. You can know what you want, you can know what you should be doing, but how do you make yourself do it when the feelings and the motivation isn't there? When all you got is fear. And so every night I would, I would lie in bed and I would say to myself, "All right, that's it Mel. Tomorrow, it's the new you. Tomorrow, you're gonna wake up and be motivated, you're gonna, you're gonna get up, you're gonna exercise

• 37:20Mel Robbins?

  like everybody says you should, you're gonna meditate, you're gonna get those kids on the bus, you're gonna screw Fox, you're gonna look for a job, you're gonna cold call Cox Media and you're gonna, you're gonna do auditions. Come on girl, let's go, let's go, let's go. You're gonna take a cold shower. Woo! You know, here we go. And I meant it when I was saying it. Maybe it was the alcohol that was talking, but, but then I would wake up and I didn't feel any of those things. So I would hit the snooze. And I would hit the snooze. Now, why was I hitting the snooze? When I knew it wasn't the right decision. I'm gonna tell you why. And this is something that I was blown away by when I discovered it. You don't make decisions with your goals. You don't make decisions with your prefrontal cortex. You don't make decisions with logic. Do you know how we make decisions? I didn't invent this.

• 38:05Mel Robbins?

  A neuroscientist by the name of Damasio, who does his research in Brazil, who gave an incredible TED Talk and wrote about this forever and ever and ever. We make decisions with feelings. 95% of our decisions are made by how you feel in the moment. And that is the problem. You need to take control of the moment and leverage the power of your decisions and make them up here. Because when I was lying in bed, I wasn't saying to myself, "I should get up because that's gonna help me start my day right." I was saying, "Do I feel like getting up?" No, you don't. No. Do you feel like making that cold call? No, you don't. Do you feel like doing that third set of reps? No, you don't.

• 38:49Mel Robbins?

  Do you feel like having that hard conversation? No, you don't. Do you feel like ending this relationship, whether it's in business or in your life, that is sucking you dry? No, you don't. We make decisions based on our feelings, and that is robbing you of joy and opportunity. And it is blinding you from the fact that all... How you change your life is one 5-second decision at a time. One push at a time. And if you accept the fact that you may never feel ready, and you may never feel motivated, and you may never feel confident, you may never feel courageous, and that's okay, but you can still push yourself forward. What happens over time is, as you start to see yourself becoming the person that takes

• 39:32Mel Robbins?

  action, that you start to see yourself becoming the kind of person that speaks even though your voice is shaking, you're the kind of person that has a bias toward moving instead of a bias toward thinking. Guess what happens? You build the skill of confidence and courage. And so what happened for me is, I was stuck. Louis, I mean, I was so stuck. I was on... I mean, we were heading straight for divorce. We were heading for bankruptcy. I knew I wanted to change things. And so one night, I see this commercial. This is the stupidest story on the planet, but this is what happened. I see this commercial.

• 40:09Mel Robbins?

  And, you know, again, I also was drinking too much. I mean, I probably had a couple of Manhattans in me. That's my drink. I'm from the Midwest, just like you. All right, little Manhattan there, a little bourbon. And there was a rocket ship launching.

• 40:22Lewis Howes?

  On a commercial?

• 40:23Mel Robbins?

  Yeah. And I had this instinct, this innovation, this disruptive idea, right? Oh, my God, Mel, that's the answer. Tomorrow morning, you're gonna launch your ass out of bed like a rocket ship. You're gonna move so fast, you can't even think about your problems. Dumb, right? Totally dumb. Seems like this is the dumbest idea I've ever heard. I cannot believe I have this chick on my podcast.

• 40:49Lewis Howes?

  I understand. I understand it. You gotta get moving first.

• 40:51Mel Robbins?

  Yes.

• 40:51Lewis Howes?

  That's the thing. You just gotta wake up at 6:00 a.m. or whenever it is, and go into the gym. And when you're in the gym, you're gonna start moving the first weight, and then you'll start moving the second weight.

• 41:00Mel Robbins?

  Actually, people use the five-second rule at the gym, because you know how much time people waste at the gym, standing around thinking about the next thing?

• 41:06Lewis Howes?

  Probably 70% of the time.

• 41:07Mel Robbins?

  5, 4, 3, 2, 1. So the next morning, the alarm goes off, and nothing had changed in my life. I woke up to the lean on the house, the fighting with Chris, the unemployment, the lack of confidence, the lack of courage, the, like, the whole thing. But I did something I had never done before. I went 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Just like NASA. I actually counted. And then I stood up, and I was like, "What the hell just happened?"

• 41:33Lewis Howes?

  Uh huh.

• 41:34Mel Robbins?

  "Wha- what? That is the dumbest thing I've ever heard!" The next morning, I used it again. It worked. The next morning, I used it again. It worked. And then I started to notice something. And this is, this is one of those things. So we have a, we have an 11-year-old son who has dyslexia. And when they finally diagnosed him, it was as if, of course, it was as if, like, how could we have possibly missed this? Are we the worst parents in the world? I mean, the kid can barely write. He can't cut his food. He doesn't read. Like, no wonder he doesn't do team sports. It was right under our nose. And what I'm about to tell you is right under everybody's nose. There's a five-second window between the instincts, the shoulds, the urges, the inner wisdom, the things that can change your life if you

• 42:18Mel Robbins?

  listen to it. Got a five-second window from the moment you feel that instinct to move. And if you don't, your brain is actually designed to kill it. Five seconds is all you have. The second you hesitate, it's action, and you feel yourself hesitating, that is a moment of huge power, because what's happened is you've just started to pull back from something that you need to lean into. And if you count backwards, five, four, three, two, one, and this is the neuroscience behind why this stupid little trick works, counting is an action. Counting backwards requires focus. It's also not a habit for you yet. So when you feel yourself hesitate, you're triggering your mind that something's up. Like Louis didn't hesitate when he pulled on his pants, he didn't hesitate when he's drinking his coffee, he didn't hesitate when he walked out the door to the gym, but now

• 43:03Mel Robbins?

  he's hesitating to make that call? Your mind now goes into a cognitive bias called the spotlight effect. It magnifies whatever it was that you hesitated doing. The moment. The moment, yeah. Like, all of a sudden, you're like, eh, I don't feel like it, like, I don't, I don't know, maybe I'll do it later. And your mind is doing it because your mind's trying to protect you. Hesitation signals a red flag to your mind that something's up. Just that small hesitation, it's a habit that we all have. Should you hesitate if you're getting a tattoo? Yes. Should you hesitate if you're gambling? Yes. Should you hesitate if you are signing a legal document? Yes. You need your prefrontal cortex for those things. You need to interrupt it, make a power, make a decision. Should you hesitate on making a phone call? No. Should you hesitate on speaking up in a meeting? No.

• 43:48Mel Robbins?

  Should you hesitate when you feel yourself starting to procrastinate, and you know you got work that you should get done? No, you shouldn't hesitate at all. Should you hesitate in saying the thing that you really feel in your heart? No, you shouldn't. Should you hesitate and edit yourself when you're talking? No, you shouldn't. But we've all trained ourselves to. So it's actually this habit of hesitating, you start catching yourself, it's a huge moment of power because you have a decision to make, and you gotta make it in the next five seconds. Are you gonna go on autopilot and get trapped in your mind? Or are you gonna five, four, three, two, one, and awaken your prefrontal cortex and drive forward? So, I started to use this rule as I noticed that every day, all day long, I had these moments of inner wisdom where...

• 44:31Mel Robbins?

  I would know that I needed to pick up the phone and stop isolating myself. I would know that I needed to call a bunch of media companies and start auditioning for radio show hosting gigs. I knew that I should get out of bed on time. I knew I should stop myself before I snapped at Chris. Right? Self-monitor. I knew I should not let the frustration be the things that was driving me. And so I started to use the rule all day long. Whenever I felt this, I should do this, 5-4-3-2-1, and I would make myself do it. And slowly, five seconds at a time, my entire life started to change. And my husband used it in his business, and he and his business partner dove in. They went on to open seven more restaurants.

• 45:13Mel Robbins?

  I went on to launch and sell two businesses and get recruited by CNN and join their team. I had a syndicated radio show that ended up winning the Gracie Award, which is kind of the female media, you know, awards for the number one talk show in the country. And, you know, I never intended to tell anybody about the five-second rule. First of all, because it's stupid.

• 45:35Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 45:35Mel Robbins?

  I mean, come on, count backwards? That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard.

• 45:38Lewis Howes?

  Not stupid to me, though. Anything that works, works for me.

• 45:40Mel Robbins?

  That's true.

• 45:41Lewis Howes?

  You know what I mean? I'll take any stupid thing.

• 45:42Mel Robbins?

  That's true. And so, but I also was like, how do you start talking about something like that? Right? So, I was asked to give a TED Talk, like, six years ago. And TED, six years ago, not the brand that it was today. They weren't even putting the talks online yet.

• 45:56Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 45:57Mel Robbins?

  Yeah. The TEDx Talks were not online yet. And so that was the first speech I'd ever given in my life. If you want to see what somebody looks like having a panic attack for 21 minutes straight, watch that speech. I was backstage, and it was like one PhD after another going out there. I'm like, what the hell have I gotten myself into? This is the dumbest thing! And so, at the very end, I wasn't even planning on talking about it. I say, oh, by the way, there's this thing I do. That's it. I don't even explain it. And you know why I didn't explain it, Louis? I didn't know why it worked.

• 46:28Lewis Howes?

  So you didn't have the science, the research?

• 46:29Mel Robbins?

  Zero. Zero. And then something crazy happened. They put that talk online a year later, and people started to write. We've heard from more than 100,000 people in 90 countries that have written to us.

• 46:44Mel Robbins?

  That are using the rule in ways big and small to change their lives, to change their marriages, to change their thinking patterns, to grow their businesses. We know of 11 people that have stopped themselves from killing themselves.

• 46:56Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 46:57Mel Robbins?

  In the moment, there's a gentleman that we talk about in the book and you can see his social media posts in London. He was a veteran and he was suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and he boarded a ferry with the intention of jumping overboard. And he got to the railing and he was standing there and his inner wisdom kicked in. And this is another thing I want everybody watching to understand. I don't care what you're facing, or how low you get.

• 47:25Mel Robbins?

  Your inner wisdom is always there. It is. And the thing is, is that we often don't listen to it.

• 47:34Mel Robbins?

  And so he's standing there intending to kill himself and that inner wisdom kicks in. And he remembers the five-second rule. And he goes 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, and he turns and physically moves away from the railing and finds the first person working on the ferry and tells him that he's suicidal. Saved his life.

• 47:51Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 47:52Mel Robbins?

  He saved his life because he listened to the inner wisdom. And this is the other thing I love about this rule. It's not something to think about. It's a tool to use. So the part of the problem with a lot of the advice that I've found, for me personally, is that a lot of advice is all about kind of doing mental battle. And if I go upstairs, I'm behind enemy lines and I tend to get hijacked. So I love this tool because 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 interrupts those patterns. It actually prompts the part of the brain that I need in order to change. And it makes changing easier because I've now got my mind working for me instead of against me. And it gets me out of my head.

• 48:33Mel Robbins?

  And so I'm, I'm super excited to share this rule with people because I now know, not only that it's working, just not, not for me. It's working for people around the world. And, you know, in the book, it took me three years to write it. It's all the science behind the rule. It's got more than 150 social media posts in it. So you see stories from around the world of people using it to end procrastination, to build confidence, to deepen their relationships, to launch businesses, to explode the sales. Why does it help with sales? I'll tell you why. Because you can't sell by thinking.

• 49:11Mel Robbins?

  Selling is about action. We have, we have groups from companies around the world, sales teams that put 54321 up on the wall. I'm sure they hate me.

• 49:20Lewis Howes?

  That's cool.

• 49:21Mel Robbins?

  Yes, because what, cold calling, it's a momentum thing. If you stop and think, the phone is not getting, the dialing is not happening when you're thinking.

• 49:28Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. If you're thinking about all those no's you've been getting, you're not gonna wanna do it again. It doesn't feel good.

• 49:33Mel Robbins?

  Yes. And if you're in the middle of a negotiation, or you're in the middle of a really difficult conversation, and again, remember what we said earlier, you cannot control your feelings that rise up, but you can always control how you think.

• 49:46Lewis Howes?

  In this section, brain expert Jim Quick shares his mindset model for becoming limitless with your learning and knowledge. Every time I hear Jim speak, I feel like he's putting my brain to the test, and I know you'll find it just as valuable.

• 50:02Lewis Howes?

  There's a method that you give, or a model for how to become limitless. And if we don't follow this model, then something's gonna be broken in our life. Isn't that right?

• 50:11Jim Kwik?

  Yeah. This model really is a framework for learning anything faster. So for people who are listening and watching, and they wanna learn a language, they wanna learn Mandarin, music, martial arts, management, marketing, math.

• 50:24Lewis Howes?

  Anything, any skill.

• 50:25Jim Kwik?

  I think if there's one skill to master in the 21st century, it's our ability to learn faster. Like, if there was a genie, and a genie can grant you any one wish, but only one wish, what would you wish for? If there's only one wish, what would you wish for?

• 50:38Lewis Howes?

  You know, most people would say money or this or that, but you think learning is the key?

• 50:42Jim Kwik?

  I mean, I think a lot of people go for...

• 50:43Lewis Howes?

  I think being the matrix, like downloading the matrix, so I could learn jujitsu in a second. If I could learn a language in a second, if I could have this skill.

• 50:53Jim Kwik?

  So I think the hack a lot of people would do is if it was any one wish, they would wish for more wishes, right? They would ask for infinite wishes. So the equivalent, if I was your learning genie, and I could grant you any one wish to learn any subject or any skill, just like become a master at it, the equivalent, what's the equivalent of the answer of asking for infinite wishes? It would be learning how to learn. Because if you can learn how to learn, the world is yours. Especially today, because nobody who's listening or watching... Gets paid for their brute strength, it's their brain strength. It's not your muscle power, it's completely your mind power. And the challenge is your brain doesn't come with an owner's manual, it's not user friendly. And that's the reason why I wrote this book. But the limitless model is an explanatory schema, a framework for learning anything faster.

• 51:38Jim Kwik?

  And not only that, but really for accessing our human potential. Because I think if there's one infinite limitless resource on planet earth, it's human capability. There's no limit on our determination, there's no limit to our imagination, there's no limit to our creativity. And yet, we're not shown how to be able to access that. And so this framework is a three-part framework. And what I would offer everyone to do is, I love to turn this into like a little master class. Make it really engaging, and so don't listen passively, because we don't learn through, the human brain doesn't learn through consumption. It learns through creation and creativity and getting involved in things. I know a lot of us learn faster when we actually roll up our sleeves and do it.

• 52:19Jim Kwik?

  So I would encourage everybody as they're working out or cleaning the house or whatever they're doing at the same time, to try to get involved in this.

• 52:26Lewis Howes?

  Well, I think as an athlete, I can speak to that because for me in school, it's really hard to remember or learn things. Because I didn't feel like I was participating in a way that worked for me. But as an athlete playing basketball, when a coach would tell me, okay, I want you to watch this video. And then automatically shoot in a certain way with your hand position this way and fall through this way. Just by watching a video and not actually implementing and practicing it. He would take me out on the court and we would practice it and do it over and over again. And he would correct me and I would learn through muscle memory as opposed to just watching something. And then thinking I can do it without actually practicing.

• 53:02Jim Kwik?

  Right.

• 53:02Lewis Howes?

  So putting it into practice quickly for me is how I learned sports. And it's how I try to apply it in other areas of my life. As opposed to just, I'm gonna learn and then, okay, I know it, I feel like I need to work in it.

• 53:14Jim Kwik?

  I feel you.

• 53:15Lewis Howes?

  Get dirty, you know what I mean?

• 53:16Jim Kwik?

  I do, I do. I think a lot of people, this is the thing, it's not how smart you are, it's not, literally not how, like how smart you are, it's how are you smart? It's not how smart you are, or how smart your kids are, or how smart your business partner is, it's how are they smart, or how are you smart?

• 53:32Lewis Howes?

  What's the difference?

• 53:33Jim Kwik?

  So you are smart through experiential learning. Like in the book, we talk about-

• 53:37Lewis Howes?

  Oh, how are you smart?

• 53:37Jim Kwik?

  Exactly. It's not how smart somebody is, like their IQ or their intelligence, it's how are they smart? And it's always context dependent. And so, some people learn, we talk about learning styles in the book. It's like, have you ever been interested, just like you were saying, you're interested in a topic, but you're not getting it? Because sometimes the way you prefer to learn is different than the way the teacher prefers to teach. And it's like you're two ships in the night, and you pass each other. And you don't even realize, there's no connection. You don't even realize the other one is there. And it feels uncomfortable. Like if I asked everybody as an exercise to take out a piece of paper, I encourage everyone to take notes, because I'm gonna drop a lot of like, practical methods. When you're taking, if you were to write your name, first and last, on a piece of paper, actually, you could do it right now, first and last. And everyone encourages you to just, to do this.

• 54:21Jim Kwik?

  Or imagine you're writing your name, first and last, on a piece of paper. And then when you're done, I want you to switch hands. And in your opposite hand, right below it, write your first and last name with your opposite-

• 54:33Lewis Howes?

  I don't even know if I could, it'd take me 10 minutes.

• 54:35Jim Kwik?

  And so while people are doing it, you'll notice, when you're doing it with the opposite hand, as we're doing it, that's actually pretty good. That if I was to ask you, which one is the, which one was easier, first or second? And you would say, the first was easier. Which one is, is more comfortable, first or last?

• 54:54Lewis Howes?

  The first one?

• 54:55Jim Kwik?

  The first one. So not only was it faster, it was easier. And then, which one was higher quality? Let's check that out.

• 55:00Lewis Howes?

  This, the first one, the first one for sure.

• 55:03Jim Kwik?

  Hopefully, the first one's higher quality also as well. And so, here's the thing, that means the second time, it took longer. The second time, it also was not as comfortable. And the second time also, the quality wasn't quite as good. And here's the thing, when I'm saying it's how you learn, some people are trying to learn something with the opposite hand. So it takes longer, it feels weird, and the quality is not quite as good, as opposed if you're using your dominant hand.

• 55:30Lewis Howes?

  So how do we know how to learn with our dominant hand, as opposed to the opposite hand?

• 55:34Jim Kwik?

  Yeah, and that's a metaphor for how we like to take in information. Some people like to learn by reading. Some people, they just cannot get through a book, though. They have to listen to that audio or that podcast. Other people.

• 55:45Lewis Howes?

  Or watch someone lecturing and or talking.

• 55:47Jim Kwik?

  Exactly, and so we all have different styles and it's not right or wrong. Now, we can actually improve our ability to read. We actually can improve our ability to listen and apply. So if there are areas where we feel weak, you know, this book is a guidebook to be able to level up those areas. So you could be more of a whole-brain learner also as well. But really, when it comes to accelerated learning, it's not, again, how smart you are, it's how are you smart? And that honors us and it takes the judgment out. Sometimes in school, it's like the top 10% get As, another 10% get Bs, and then 80% were like you and I. It's like we're failing school as opposed to the way school maybe is failing us. Because school teaches you what to learn, what to focus on,

• 56:32Jim Kwik?

  what to think, what to remember, but not how to learn and how to think.

• 56:37Lewis Howes?

  Well, it teaches you how to think and learn in one way.

• 56:39Jim Kwik?

  Exactly, and when I talk about in the book, I talk about the four supervillains that are holding you back in your work, in your schooling, in your life. It's driven by technology, but one of them is digital deduction, where we're depending on technology to tell us what to think. We're not even using the children right now. They're finding that their reasoning abilities, their ability to analyze, critical thinking, is not as sharp as where it should be because of technology, because technology is doing the thinking for us. And our mind, I'm gonna say this repeatedly, is like a muscle. It's use it or lose it. And just like when you go, you have your personal trainer to make your muscles stronger, more energized, more flexible, more pliable.

• 57:22Jim Kwik?

  You know, more, you want your mental muscles to be stronger, more energized, more pliable, more flexible. And so many people refer to me as a brain coach because what I do is I train your brain because I think we're in the millennium of the mind. And it's really about mental fitness, our ability to adapt, our ability to think, our ability to solve problems, and this really is everything. When people see me wearing brain shirts all the time or pointing to my brain, the reason why I do that is because what you see, you take care of. You see your hair, you take care of your hair. You see your skin, you take care of your skin. You see your clothing, you take care of your clothing.

• 57:57Lewis Howes?

  You don't see your brain.

• 57:58Jim Kwik?

  Exactly, and that controls everything. And so when I point to the brain or honor what they're sure it's just like people have their emotions on their sleeve. You know, I have my brain on my chest because I want to put it forefront to remind people to love their brain, to care for their brain.

• 58:13Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, I think it's, I mean, that's why a lot of people, doctors and nutritionists are talking about gut health. It's like we can't see it, but we can start to feel rashes or we can start to feel the effects of it. It's also heart health is a big thing right now. It's just like the emotional health. Self-care, self-love, you know, mental health and emotional health kind of tied together.

• 58:32Jim Kwik?

  And I love your work because you bring that to, to everybody, to the world. And it's all connected. I talk about in the book, you know, there's this heart intelligence and also your gut, as you mentioned. A lot of people call it your second brain. It's the second highest concentration of nerve cells.

• 58:48Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 58:48Jim Kwik?

  And so, and it's connected too. And then sometime what you eat affects what, how you think. We know that because of the guests we've had on our shows and everything else that when you eat junk food, which is not, it's not really a thing. There's junk and then there's food.

• 59:03Lewis Howes?

  There's sugar and there's food.

• 59:04Jim Kwik?

  Exactly. And what you eat matters, especially for your gray matter. I remember in our previous episode we did years ago, I showed people how to memorize the brain foods and all of the best neuroprotective. It's the area of neuro-nutrition. It's really fascinating that your brain has different nutritional requirements than, than the rest of, rest of your body. But I'm going back to the limitless model. There are three keys to reaching your goals. And this is my distinction here because originally, I remember years ago when you prompted me to write this book. You're like, Jim, you know, it's been, you know, over two decades.

• 59:36Lewis Howes?

  You gotta do something.

• 59:37Jim Kwik?

  You put something in this book. And so because, you know, fundamentally I'm a reading teacher. And, you know, somebody has decades, why I love reading, if somebody has decades of experience and they put it into a book like you. And all of a sudden people could read that book in a few days, they could download decades in the days. And readers are leaders. We know that. Reading is to your mind what exercises your body. It's the best mental fitness. And so the limitless model as an exercise, what I want everyone to do. So it's not hypothetical because in part of the book I demystify the three, the seven lies of learning. There are seven lies that hold you back to learning and one of them is knowledge is power. We hear that all the time. I've even said it also as well, but when we think about it, is it really true? Right?

• 1:00:22Jim Kwik?

  Is knowledge, just knowing something give you power? No, not unless you act on it, not unless you apply it. So knowledge times action equals, equals power. And so I would encourage everybody as you're listening to this to take immediate action. And there are three questions I want you to ask as you're listening to this episode to make it very valuable and I would encourage you to write these down. Three master questions. You know, we were talking about some of the famous actors that I work on before we started filming and we were, you know, Will Smith did the cover endorsement of the book that says, you know, Jim Quick, you know, gets the maximum out of me as a human being. I've learned so much from this, this man, just being around, so many around, around clients and What have you learned from Will?

• 1:01:03Jim Kwik?

  So one of the things is this, this idea of, we were in Toronto and I help actors speed read scripts, help them to memorize their lines faster. I mean, you imagine like 30 pages of scripts, there's a lot in I can't remember a sentence. There's a lot, right? And some of them have their strategies and, and no matter how great somebody is, you know this because you study, you make, you know, your life about studying and researching greatness. It's, they always know there's another level and they get really good at the fundamentals and the basics. But one of the things when we're, when we're there, we spent the day together and it was winter time in Toronto, they were filming from 6:00 PM to 6:00 AM, which can you imagine? So hard overnight. Like at nighttime, that's very difficult, but during the day I went, we went through

• 1:01:45Jim Kwik?

  an exercise and I believe, so in there I talk about how we have 50 to 70,000 thoughts a day, right? And these thoughts are controlling our lives and a lot of those thoughts are questions that we ask ourselves. You know, thinking is that process of asking and answering questions. And if people are asking, is that true? Notice you had to ask a question to define if it's true or not, right? And there are certain questions we ask more than any other question. Like what? So, so here's the thing, I talk about dominant questions that you have one, two, three questions that you ask a lot and I want everyone to think about what your dominant questions are, including you, and I'll give you a couple of examples to get you started. So for example, One of my friends, we went through this exercise of meditating and writing, journaling down.

• 1:02:27Jim Kwik?

  We found out her dominant question is, "How do I get people to like me? How do I get people to like me?" Now, she asks that question all the time, and you don't know anything about her. You don't know her age, you don't know her background, you don't know what she does for a living, you don't know what she looks like, you don't know where she lives. You don't know anything about her, but you know a lot about her. If you ask yourself, "How do I get people to like me?", hundreds of times a day, what's her personality, what's her personality gonna be like? What's her life gonna be?

• 1:02:54Lewis Howes?

  Well, I guess it could be, it could be either side of the spectrum. She could be super outgoing and super adventurous to try to get people to be more attracted to her, or she could be super shy and introverted because she's so worried about what people think about her. So that's the first thing I thought of, but I'm not sure if that's true.

• 1:03:11Jim Kwik?

  And it's absolutely true. She actually does both of those things.

• 1:03:13Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 1:03:14Jim Kwik?

  I mean, if you ask yourself, "How do I get people to like me?", then what are you doing? You're people-pleasing all the time, you're a sycophant, just say yes to everything. Yeah, you people take advantage of you because you're martyring yourself, because they're always trying to do, they're making themselves less than, or their personality is never consistent because their personality changes.

• 1:03:34Lewis Howes?

  The chameleon, the change for people.

• 1:03:36Jim Kwik?

  Exactly, and you know all that about her, and you only know one question she asks herself, and that's one of her dominant questions. I would, I would offer everybody who's listening to this, what do you think your dominant question is? Because questions are the answer. You know this from the work that you do in high performance and greatness, that the questions you ask determine what you focus on. You have part of your brain called the reticular activating system, RAS for short, and it's your filtering system. So at any given time, there's a billion stimuli that we could be paying attention to. And primarily, your brain is a deletion device. It's trying to keep information out. Otherwise, you would go crazy, right, if you paid attention to everything?

• 1:04:13Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:14Jim Kwik?

  So what gets in? So, for example... Years ago, my little sister started sending me emails and postcards and pictures and photographs of a very specific kind of dog. It was a pug dog. You know those little...

• 1:04:27Lewis Howes?

  Pug dogs, a men in black dog, right?

• 1:04:29Jim Kwik?

  Yes, exactly. Very smushy faces, they're very compliant, you could dress them up as ballerinas and they don't care. And she starts, and I didn't know why, so my question was like, "Why is she sending me these pictures all the time?" That became a dominant question of the day. And then I realized her birthday was coming up. So she's a smart marketer, right? Planting those seeds. And here's the magic, though. I started seeing pug dogs everywhere. I would go to the grocery store, I'd be checking out, and I swear to you, a woman's carrying a pug dog at the register. I would be running and jogging in my neighborhood and somebody's walking six pug dogs. Now, my question for everybody is, did these pug dogs magically appear all of a sudden in the world? No, they were always there, but they were not, I wasn't paying attention to them because they weren't important

• 1:05:13Jim Kwik?

  because I wasn't asking that question. Once you ask a question, you start to pay attention to those things. And that focus determines how you feel, determines your behaviors. And primarily, it's so interesting, it's kind of like social media. There's an algorithm to your mind, like there's an algorithm to Facebook and Instagram, that what you engage with the most, you like and you share, you comment, you start seeing more of those kind of things. Right? And so, just like your mind, what you start engaging with, if you start watching all this news about fear and all the things that are going on, you start paying attention. And your mind just starts focusing automatically, it becomes a reaction, a reflex.

• 1:05:48Lewis Howes?

  And you start to attract more of the fear and anxiety or worry that's in the world, that's being posted.

• 1:05:53Jim Kwik?

  Very much so.

• 1:05:53Lewis Howes?

  You start to subscribe to whatever that is, to receive more of it.

• 1:05:56Jim Kwik?

  Exactly.

• 1:05:57Lewis Howes?

  You're thinking about it.

• 1:05:57Jim Kwik?

  So just like on social media, if you start just liking all the cat stuff and everything else, they'll just start feeding you cat stuff. And same thing with negativity and same thing with opportunity also as well. So the questions make a difference, so questions are the answer.

• 1:06:09Lewis Howes?

  What are the two questions you've been, that are dominant in your mind over the last five years the most?

• 1:06:15Jim Kwik?

  Yeah, so for learning, because I grew up with the broken brain, many people know my story from the last episode. When they see me do these demonstrations at Summit Series or it's... You know, Vince, you and I have Remembering a thousand people's names. Right. Ten minutes. All of that kind of stuff. I say that I don't do this to impress you. I do this to express to you what's possible. Because the truth is, we could all do that and a whole lot more. We just weren't taught. If anything, we're taught a lie that somehow our intelligence is fixed, like our shoe size. But I do it as a demonstration because I grew up with learning difficulties, right? I had my brain injury when I was five. I fell, had a very bad fall when I was in kindergarten. Rushed to the hospital. Before, I was curious and very energized, my parents would say, but then I became very shut down.

• 1:06:58Jim Kwik?

  And my superpower growing up was being invisible. It was shrinking. Because I didn't want the spotlight. I didn't want to be called on. So I was, literally physiologically, I was always trying to look smaller to protect myself so teachers wouldn't call on me or I wouldn't be bullied or something like that. I would do that as well, except for I was just a giant in the class. Right, right. So I was always picked on. So for me, I would actually be sitting behind you and I would be guaranteed no one would be able to see me. But going back to my question, my question became all the time, first of all, when I was nine years old, I was slowing the class down and a teacher pointed to me and said, "That's the boy with the broken brain." And that label became my limit. And so we have, if they think about, when you're listening to this, what are the labels that we put on ourselves?

• 1:07:43Jim Kwik?

  It's like, we're not born, we're born with a blank slate, right? But through experience, through expectations of other people, through our environment, we learned that we are limited. And the good news is, we can unlearn it. And that's the point of the book. But because I was in the broken state, I would always ask myself, you know, why am I broken? Why am I the stupid one? And I started getting answers of why I'm so stupid, right? Every time I did badly on a test, I would be like, "Oh, because I have the broken brain." Right? If I was picked in sports, I'd be like, "Oh, because I'm the broken one." And that became my self-talk. Adults have to be very careful with their external words because they become a child's internal words. But later, I started to get so frustrated, I started asking, getting curious.

• 1:08:26Jim Kwik?

  And when you're curious, you start to ask different questions. I was like, "Why is that person so, why are they so smart? And how come I'm studying three times harder?" And getting less grades than than them, right? And I started getting answers. My primary question started, my dominant question ended up being like, how do I make this better? But the three questions that I focus on, and let me tell you first what Will's is. Will Smith's, one of his dominant questions when we went through this exercise is, how do I make this moment even more magical? How do I make this moment even more magical? It used to be-

• 1:09:01Lewis Howes?

  Every moment or like in acting alone?

• 1:09:04Jim Kwik?

  This moment. Any moment. And it shows up, right? In his, in his life. Because later that night when we're filming, it was like 2 o'clock in the morning, and his family, we're all outside for the superhero movie that many people know of. And it was, it was really cold because it was in Toronto and it was, it was winter time. And we're all just waiting and just waiting and waiting and waiting. Because people think that, and you meet all these people all the time on your show. And they think it's so glamorous.

• 1:09:32Lewis Howes?

  Hurry up and wait.

• 1:09:33Jim Kwik?

  Exactly. And I, and I asked him this question because I believe genius leaves clues. I was like, you know, how do you, how do you prepare? How do you get ready? When the director, you're just sitting here for hours and then the director calls on you. How do you get ready? And he was like, Jim, I don't have to get ready. I stay ready. And I'm like, wow, that's, it's good to be Will Smith.

• 1:09:51Lewis Howes?

  It's hard to stay ready for six hours.

• 1:09:52Jim Kwik?

  Yeah, exactly. But that's just who he is. Because I believe the life you live are the lessons you teach. The life you live are the lessons you teach others. But going back to his dominant question, his family was there also at the same time, visiting the set. And, you know, from West Philly, you know, you know, the song. And we're all outside and shivering. And when he wasn't shooting, he would, he would bring us blankets. He would make hot chocolate and bring it to us. He would crack jokes. He would live that, that dominant question. Because the life he lives, he like, how do I make this moment even more magical? Now, before it was like, how do I make this moment magical? Then we, we played with it like even more magical. Presuming it is already magical and amazing. And so these questions we ask are very important.

• 1:10:35Jim Kwik?

  Now, there are three questions when I said there's turning knowledge into power that I want everyone to obsess about. I mean, this will make you a master. And if you get a, this is a, three questions to turn knowledge into power. Because knowledge alone is potential power. Number one, how can I use this? When you're listening to this podcast moving forward- Every time you listen to it, I want you to ask yourself, how can I use this? Get obsessed about this, like even write it down. And this is where your mind can be very creative. Because in here, I teach a power of note-taking. Because people don't realize this. When you listen to a podcast, or you go to a summit, or an event, or have a great conversation with somebody, within two days, 80% of it is gone. We forget it. They call it the forgetting curve.

• 1:11:17Jim Kwik?

  And one of the ways to retain it is by taking notes, exactly what you're doing. Now, I encourage people to take notes a very specific way, is to take, put a line right down the page. And on the left side of the page, I want you to take notes. And on the right side, I want you to make notes. So on the left side of the page, you're taking notes. So you're gonna list the quotes. Right, you're capturing information. You're like, this is how Jim remembers his name. This is how Jim reads a book a day, or whatever it is. So you're, on the left side, you're capturing. But on the right side, you're creating. Now, that's a subtle difference. On the left side, you're note-taking. On the right side, you're note-making. What's the difference? Again, on the left side, you're taking notes. You're writing down the quotes, and the strategies, the processes.

• 1:12:02Jim Kwik?

  But on your right side, what you're doing, the right side creativity, instead of your mind being distracted when you're listening, have it be distracted on, focused on, how can I use this? On the right side is where you're writing your impressions of what you're learning. How can I use this? Another great question, second dominant question I would ask, is not only how can I use it? Because you come up with all these answers. Just like I see, you start seeing pug dogs everywhere. It's like, oh, this is how I could use this in my relationship. This is how I could use it in my career. Second question I would ask is, why must I use this? Why must I use this? You know, we know, one of the people that endorsed my book, he's on your show, is Simon Sinek. And, you know, one of my favorite books, I'm gonna mention a lot of books,

• 1:12:46Jim Kwik?

  including your own, start with, you know, his is Start with Why, right? And so, why must I use this? So once you have all these ideas of how can I use this, why must I use this? Because if you don't have the reasons, you won't get the results. Right, you won't care enough about it. Exactly, reasons reap results. I'm gonna give a lot of people a lot of quick Because it goes from your head to your heart to your hands. You could affirm things in your head all day, set goals in your head all day. But if you're not acting with your hands, you're procrastinating, putting things off, check in with your second age, which is your heart, which are the emotions, right? Because we are not logical, we are biological. Dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin, endorphins, this chemical soup drives us to act. Just like people don't buy logically, they don't fall in love logically,

• 1:13:31Jim Kwik?

  they do these things emotionally. So find your emotions. And in this book, we do, we really uncover and I decode motivation. Not motivation, getting hyped up and dancing on chairs and then the next day not changing. We figured out this formula of sustainable motivation in this book. But the second question is, go back to, why must I use this? Because if you don't have the why, you won't do the what. And then finally, the third question. First question, how can I use this? Write all the answers down, think about that. Second question, why must I use it? Gives you the energy and the fuel and the drive to do it. And finally, when will I use this? When will I use this? Because we know that one of the most important performance productivity tools that we have is our calendar.

• 1:14:16Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:14:16Jim Kwik?

  Right? If it's not in our calendar, it just doesn't get done.

• 1:14:20Lewis Howes?

  In this section, bestselling author Lisa Nichols shares how she was able to change her mindset from scarcity to abundance at one of her lowest points that led her to all of her future success.

• 1:14:34Lisa Nichols?

  Don't count the number of times you've been knocked down. Get attached to the number of times you get up.

• 1:14:39Lewis Howes?

  Hmm, alright. I'm gonna get these truth bombs all day.

• 1:14:42Lisa Nichols?

  Right, right, boom, boom, boom, boom.

• 1:14:45Lewis Howes?

  I love it. I'm curious now, because you didn't start out, you know, with a lot of money and with a lot of abundance mindset, did you?

• 1:14:51Lisa Nichols?

  Right. It wasn't just not a lot of money. You know, it's one thing to be fiscally broke, it's another thing to be emotionally broken. Two very different things. And I was broke and broken. And in 1994, I had to go get on government's assistance just to feed my newborn baby. I had to get on WIC, Women, Infant and Children. And I still say it, and you know, I say it often. I'm interviewed, I was interviewed 155 times in five months for my previous book, No Matter What, and it still hits me in the same place.

• 1:15:29Lisa Nichols?

  I I was ashamed to stand in line with all the other mothers, some fathers, to get free butter, free cheese, free milk, free pasta. But at the same time, I was grateful that there was such a service to help people like me that I knew this wasn't where I was going to stay.

• 1:15:50Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 1:15:50Lisa Nichols?

  But it was where I was in that moment. I wasn't committed to take up real estate there, but it was my current address and broke and broken. It kind of hit the, I I I felt like I hit the bottom. Sometimes you feel your back on the bottom, like, I think that's the bottom, right?

• 1:16:08Lewis Howes?

  And then there's always a deeper.

• 1:16:09Lisa Nichols?

  Yeah, right, right, right. So when I was getting, uh, uh, when I was getting, uh, food stamps, I thought I was at the bottom.

• 1:16:16Lewis Howes?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:16:17Lisa Nichols?

  And then.

• 1:16:17Lewis Howes?

  But you went deeper.

• 1:16:18Lisa Nichols?

  Right. Uh, I went to the ATM, I ran out of Pampers for my son Jelani, and I went to the ATM to get money to go buy Pampers. And it said insufficient funds. And I had eleven dollars and forty two cents in the bank.

• 1:16:34Lewis Howes?

  What's the minimum, you can take out twenty bucks in the ATM?

• 1:16:35Lisa Nichols?

  Exactly, you need twenty in to get twenty out. And, um, I had eleven dollars and forty two cents. And so I went home and I had to wrap my son Jelani for two days in a series of different towels. That?

• 1:16:53Lisa Nichols?

  That was my rock bottom. And that was because as a parent, all you want to do is provide. That's it, it's simple. I just want to provide safety and food for my baby. Somebody else was providing my food and I didn't even have Pampers. And I remember on the second day of wrapping my son in the towel, Louis, I put my hand over his stomach and I said, "Don't worry, Jelani," with tears streaming down my face. I said, "Don't worry, son. Mommy will never, ever be this broke again."

• 1:17:27Lisa Nichols?

  And so you talk about having financial resources. I realized that I needed to first believe that I could do something different, that wherever my mindset was, my bank account was gonna follow.

• 1:17:38Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 1:17:39Lisa Nichols?

  So I needed to change my mental zip code.

• 1:17:41Lewis Howes?

  What was your mental zip code then?

• 1:17:43Lisa Nichols?

  Scarcity, lack. I was born and raised in South Central LA. I grew up between the Harlem Crip 30s and the Roland 60s. I had three fights a week to get home from school. My highest grade in school was a C plus. In 12 years of school, my highest grade was a C plus. And so if you ever tell this story to anybody, don't forget my plus. Don't forget, y'all don't forget my plus. It's very important to a C student, to an A student.

• 1:18:04Lewis Howes?

  I was a, I was a C and D student.

• 1:18:06Lisa Nichols?

  Right, right, right. So to an A student, it doesn't matter. Like plus, plus, whatever. But to a C student, the plus matters, man.

• 1:18:13Lewis Howes?

  I get it.

• 1:18:13Lisa Nichols?

  So, um, so I struggled. Everything in my life was about a hustle. Everything, nothing was easy, except the love for my family. That was easy and effortless and graceful and bountiful and, but everything else outside of that, it was a hustle, get her, get God. It was the environment I grew up in. And I'm not saying that you have to grow up in that rough environment to have an amazing future. People always say, well, Lisa, I didn't have it rough. Could I have a, listen, I would have traded my background in for anybody. Like, don't think I chose that so I can have this. And so I didn't know abundance. I didn't know abundance existed. I didn't know abundance could happen to people who look like me. A woman, geographically from my neighborhood, I didn't know abundance can be that. I didn't see it around me. I didn't know abundance could be for someone

• 1:18:56Lisa Nichols?

  that were, that was in my culture. Everything was about survival and hustle. So, so many things. And spiritually, I didn't know that someone who loved God, who had a spiritual foundation can also have prosperity without being perceived as greedy. I mean, everything in my environment said, not me. Everything said, not me, if I listen to the sound effects.

• 1:19:16Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 1:19:16Lisa Nichols?

  And sometimes you've got to turn the volume down and listen to your heart.

• 1:19:19Lewis Howes?

  Right. So what was the conversation you would tell yourself during this time, when you're in this scarce zip code?

• 1:19:26Lisa Nichols?

  Someone like me can't have it.

• 1:19:28Lewis Howes?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:19:28Lisa Nichols?

  Them over there, that that guy right there, he comes from the right family. That girl right there, her skin color is the right complexion.

• 1:19:35Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 1:19:36Lisa Nichols?

  That I'm full figured, a a a moka skin, full lips, round hip, kinky hair girl, nah, not me. Not, nah, I get other things. I get, I get a bountiful family. I get a, I get great children if I want. I get closeness to God, but I don't get abundance. And and and I realize that so much of that conversation was embedded in me before I was, I was five. I mean, it just comes with the territory. I would watch my grandmother make a dime go in twenty different directions. And I never wondered about having twenty-one dimes. I just wanted to grow up and make my dime go in twenty different directions to be like grandma. And so so much is culturally inherited, gender inherited. As a gender, as a woman, you're not raised to make millions.

• 1:20:19Lisa Nichols?

  You're raised to either get a good job or get a man with a good job, you know, and so that's.

• 1:20:24Lewis Howes?

  Especially in the eighties and nineties.

• 1:20:25Lisa Nichols?

  Absolutely, absolutely. And that's how we were raised. Spiritually, you're taught, you know, in my background, my religious background, now I'm spiritual. I'm not attached to a religion at all. But growing up in the Mount Tabor Missionary Baptist Church, it was, you know, money is the root of all evil. Well, who would want a lot of that? And that, uh, good people. Exactly. Who wants evil? And if that's what you say, then I learned that I don't need it. And Sister Brown, I watched Sister Brown, and Sister Brown was the most godly woman in the church. And she was always selling fish dinners and and barbecue dinners to make sure she had enough money. And so unconsciously, I wanted to be like Sister Brown because that woman can pray the heavens down. And so then again, I'm looking at that. And then in my neighborhood, it was the moment you get a little extra, you give it away.

• 1:21:11Lisa Nichols?

  You give it away. Still to this day, I kid you not. I want, one of my last opportunities, I call, I don't call them challenges, opportunities, is I'm, I'm in the top one percent earners in America. And I say that humbly, I'm grateful. And my job now is to learn how to keep it and grow it, because I love to give it away. And I know it's a learned behavior. It's a learned, and I, and I give it away to good things. I just put eighty-two thousand dollars and revamped my grandmother's whole house. Because I knew she wasn't gonna move, she gonna listen, she gonna, that's what she gonna rest in peace. She's gonna stay right there, she's been at that house since nineteen sixty-eight. She's not going anywhere. So I just redid the entire house, gutted out the entire house. And, and, and spent close to a hundred thousand dollars doing it. And I'll do that over and over and over and over again, because I also was taught, give it away.

• 1:21:54Lisa Nichols?

  So now, I'm going to people who are more powerful in money, in terms of, I know how to make a lot. I know how to keep a lot. Now I'll learn how to grow a lot.

• 1:22:02Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:03Lisa Nichols?

  You know, and being willing, and being humble enough to say that's where I am. I got the first two down, because money has three levels. How do, how do you earn it? How do you keep it? And how do you grow it?

• 1:22:11Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:12Lisa Nichols?

  And so, you know, um, I, I had a conversation for a long time in many different ways. And then it's the conversation as a woman, if I make so much, it's gonna be hard to be de, de, de, de, de-datable.

• 1:22:25Lisa Nichols?

  That big D word, you know, and so as an African American.

• 1:22:29Lewis Howes?

  You're unapproachable now.

• 1:22:29Lisa Nichols?

  Exactly, and men are taught, as I'm taught as a woman about money, you're taught as a man, be the provider. Well, you know, it's kinda hard to provide for a G like me, you know? When I come in, I go, how about we just put it together? Because I'm kinda cool on the provision thing.

• 1:22:43Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:22:43Lisa Nichols?

  You know, and so I realize that men have to also feel comfortable with the fact that, that that's an eighties conversation. And in twenty fifteen, she might make millions.

• 1:22:52Lewis Howes?

  Twenty sixteen now.

• 1:22:52Lisa Nichols?

  Right, twenty sixteen, right, right.

• 1:22:54Lewis Howes?

  You're in the book tour, you're still, you're still last year.

• 1:22:56Lisa Nichols?

  I started the book tour, and I have like, you have to at every moment tell me the date that we're, we're living inside of right now.

• 1:23:03Lewis Howes?

  I feel you, I feel you.

• 1:23:03Lisa Nichols?

  Right, you know, you just, you just.

• 1:23:05Lewis Howes?

  I'm just recovering, I'm finally just like.

• 1:23:07Lisa Nichols?

  Tell me there's something on the other side of recovery is true, right?

• 1:23:10Lewis Howes?

  There's a clear voice, there's sanity, yes, there's a healthy body again.

• 1:23:15Lisa Nichols?

  Right, right, right.

• 1:23:15Lewis Howes?

  Uh, there's your freedom of time. Um, so I'm curious, what was this moment then, that you realized, okay, I need to shift the way I'm thinking? The conversations I'm having, uh, how I'm showing up, who I'm being in every moment? From living in this scarce environment that I've lived in for twenty-something years? To all of a sudden shifting into an abundance mindset and way of being? What was the moment you experienced the, the thought, the idea, the catalyst that broke that?

• 1:23:44Lisa Nichols?

  I like how you say a moment. Like I got a, oh, the ceiling opened up and the lights came in and the angels came, no.

• 1:23:51Lewis Howes?

  Maybe it was over time.

• 1:23:52Lisa Nichols?

  Right, it was, there was a moment when, there was a moment when suffering became too painful.

• 1:23:59Lewis Howes?

  There you go.

• 1:23:59Lisa Nichols?

  So mine didn't necessarily come at a glory moment. It came with eleven dollars and forty-two cents. And watching my baby wrapped in a towel, a towel, I, I felt like I was being unfair to him. See, because thirty days before the towel, I'm really telling my stuff, for, thirty days before the towel, his father called me, and when I answered the phone, I'll never forget, I said hello, he said, Lisa, I'm in LA County Jail.

• 1:24:32Lisa Nichols?

  Well, I don't do jail, and I don't do people in jail, and I don't do people who have a possibility of going. So how did you get there? Cause I met you in corporate America and you were a professional. How he got there is his business, I don't know. But now I'm a single mom of a son whose father's now in prison. Boom, boom, boom, rock bottom, rock bottom again. So thirty days later, when I had my son wrapped in a towel, I was done. I was just done.

• 1:24:58Lewis Howes?

  You were sick and tired of being sick and tired.

• 1:24:59Lisa Nichols?

  I was done. So you know, the concept of bankrupt is there's nothing left.

• 1:25:03Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:25:04Lisa Nichols?

  That's the concept of bankrupt. So I like to explain it, I was bankrupt in my mess.

• 1:25:08Lewis Howes?

  Uh huh.

• 1:25:09Lisa Nichols?

  I was bankrupt in my chaos, and I was bankrupt in every sexy, cause my excuses are sexy, by the way. I've been a linguistic specialist for years. I could talk my teachers into doing things right. I mean, that's just been my gift. My father used to say, Lisa, please, promise me you will use your powers for good. And so I was bankrupt in all of my excuses. So if you ask when, it was probably about three hours after I told my son we'll never be here again on day two of being wrapped in a towel in nineteen ninety-four. And then I said, how? The next question was how.

• 1:25:47Lisa Nichols?

  If I'm done with this, I'm not even sure what that looks like. I just know over there are a bunch of abundant thinkers, living an abundant life, having abundant memories with a surplus of everything. Because abundance is to be an overflow of the things that you have. Abundance is just about overflow. It's about overflow. That means that if there were a saucer under this cup, abundance would be everything. This tea flows over into the saucer and I can feed you from my saucer because I have filled my cup up enough. I use my cup for me and I feed you from my saucer. And abundance is saying, I have a saucer in my relationships filled with great experiences. There's a saucer in my health and wellness. I have so much bountiful health and vitality that I can show up for you.

• 1:26:32Lisa Nichols?

  There's a saucer with my spirituality that I can pray for you. I can forgive the perceivingly unforgivable and love the perceivingly unlovable. And then there's a saucer for my finances. And that in every area, because abundance is a three sixty experience. See, wealth is singularly focused. Wealth is about your money and your possessions. That's wealth, okay? But abundance is three sixty. I have a lot of very, very wealthy friends.

• 1:26:56Lewis Howes?

  Who are miserable, unhappy.

• 1:26:57Lisa Nichols?

  Who are not abundant. Who are not abundant. They're wealthy. They're wealthy, they're not abundant. And they understand that. And they come to me and go, Lisa, help me with my relationships with my family or whatever. And so I had to learn something different. Louis, I didn't know what I didn't know. And so that became the moment when I said, what do I need to know to have something different? What do they know that I don't know? And how can I get it? And I became a hunter.

• 1:27:26Lewis Howes?

  So what was the first discovery?

• 1:27:29Lisa Nichols?

  That there's a mindset that comes with abundance, that they think differently. They don't just do something different. There's not a hookup. First of all, what camera do I look into? Is it that one?

• 1:27:37Lewis Howes?

  Anyone, anyone.

• 1:27:38Lisa Nichols?

  There is no such thing as a hookup. I am still waiting on mine. And if you know where it is, my phone number is. So there's no hookup. There's no hookup. Like, it's not true. Like, you got a two hundred and ninety seven. Million chance in one to win the Lotto. Hmm. And within five years, the people win the Lotto are in more debt than they were before they won the Lotto. So that ain't even a hookup, right? Yeah. And so, um, I realized that I needed to change my mindset. I needed to learn something different. And I needed to know it at a cellular level. All that stuff I just told you about, my color, my gender, my, I had to unlearn. People are, we're, we're information junkies. Cause we got all kinds of access to information online. Yeah. And we're learning all this stuff, but we're not implementing anything.

• 1:28:23Lisa Nichols?

  I'm sorry, I might step on a few toes. That's what I do. Mm-hmm. And so I realized that I had to, at a cellular level. First, before I went to get any more information. I had to be willing to divorce and evict some belief systems that I already had. That they had taken me as far as they can take me, and now they're holding me back. Mm-hmm. It's almost like you wear a size eleven, you have eleven foot. And you tried to fit it back in a size seven shoe. You, you passed that a long time ago. And, and that's gonna be a very uncomfortable day. I was in discomfort. I was very uncomfortable with my thinking. And so I, I started diving into books. The first book I dove into was Stephen Covey's. Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.

• 1:29:04Lisa Nichols?

  And it disrupted me. It disrupted everything. I didn't know. It was like, it was like a double door opened up. And then a wall opened up. I'm like, what do they, they know that? Like, why nobody told me that? Like, I felt like I was out of a club. And really, you are. I'm just gonna tell you. Abundant thinkers think a certain way. Hmm. And they don't go around trying to, trying to convert you. Like, people like you and I go, let's open it up to everyone. Yeah. But here's what I, I know about the human spirit. Is that the human spirit has the power of choice. And most people don't wanna choose this kind of thinking, cause it costs you something. Hmm. What's the cost? The cost is, you gotta get up earlier. You get up earlier than the average guy. Your day, what you do in a day is what some people do in a week. Hmm. What you do in the mornings is what some people do in a twelve hour day. You gotta be willing.

• 1:29:47Lisa Nichols?

  What you're willing to do on your book tour, to get on the New York Times? Some people say, I gotta do all that? I wanna do all that? It's a lot of work. Okay, great. Then have your life. Like, you have to, you sign up for your life experience. There's no way. Like, you were, uh, when I realized that I was a culmination of all my decisions.

• 1:30:05Lisa Nichols?

  That's like straight with no chaser. That's like getting it with no cookies and milk. I was a culmination, you're a culmination of all your decisions. And then when you up level your decisions. And that's even harder times when you go, God, why I'm always single? You're a culmination of your decisions. You're a culmination of your actions. Why can't I keep any money? You're a culmination of your decisions, your life. So I wanted to make better decisions. Cause my son being wrapped in a towel. Me having eleven dollars and forty-two cents. Me being overweight. Me, my, my son's father being in prison. I, I couldn't shake it. I was a culmination. My life experience was a culmination of all my decisions. And it was undoubtedly a hot mess. And so I went, well, let me go learn from somebody whose life don't seem like it's a hot mess. And then let me adopt some of their behaviors.

• 1:30:50Lisa Nichols?

  And I began to hunt. I went to conferences. I, and, and scared the bejeebies out of me these conferences. I'd never been to conferences before. I went to entrepreneurial conferences. I was the only, I was one of four women at an eight hundred person conference. And I was the only woman of color. So it was all older white men and me. And I was like, okay, well, they, they're not afraid of money, seems like. They're talking money and business and corporations and ROI's and PPM's and term agreements and no habla español. I don't know what that mean, but I am not leaving until I figure this out. And I went to the same conference. When I say do what other people won't do, so, and you'll have what other people don't have. I went to the same conference, those forty-two times. I told you I was a C student, so I took me a minute to get it.

• 1:31:34Lisa Nichols?

  And I kept getting sponsored back to the, I didn't even have the money to go to the conference. I started volunteering at the conference. I would be on stage teaching because they loved the way I spoke. Then I'd get off and I'd help clean up. Cause I had to pay my dues to be there. I was okay. I ate, ate my slice of humble pie every day. Cause I was bankrupt. See, some people, you haven't pushed non-negotiable yet. You're still optional. I really would love to be successful. I wanna be successful. I wanna be successful. I wanna make money. I wanna make money. I wanna be healthy, but it's not non-negotiable yet. Because the moment the rubber meets the road, you feel a little skin and it gets a little tender and a little blood may show up. And you don't wanna give blood, you don't wanna give sweat, you don't wanna give tears. Let me just tell you, you can't take the elevator to the top. It ain't nothing but stairs.

• 1:32:18Lewis Howes?

  In this section, former Navy SEAL Rich Devini shares how we can train our mind to stay disciplined to achieve our goals instead of trying for a little bit and then becoming lazy and giving up.

• 1:32:32Lewis Howes?

  How do we train ourselves to find motivation and not be lazy? Because I feel like there's a lot of laziness out there. Or there's moments of motivation, but then it falls back into a laziness structured schedule. How do we train our minds and our bodies to be motivated towards a goal and not stay lazy?

• 1:32:54Rich Diviney?

  Yeah, well, at first, it's know thyself, because we're all different. So one of the attributes I talk about in the book is discipline. And what I had to do with discipline was actively separate discipline from self-discipline.

• 1:33:07Lewis Howes?

  What's the difference?

• 1:33:07Rich Diviney?

  Okay, well, the difference is that self-discipline is internally focused. Okay, self-discipline is about managing oneself. And it has very little to do with external requirements, right? So you or I can decide to get in shape, for example, and we can change our diet. We can work out every day. The external environment doesn't have a lot of say in that, you know, in us achieving that accomplishment. So self-discipline is about managing the internal. Discipline, the way I talk about in the book, is about achieving that long-term goal. These are those long-term goals that are going to take a while to achieve. And the external world has a say. So getting that promotion, writing that book, becoming the famous singer, becoming a Navy SEAL, right? The external world has, starting a podcast, right?

• 1:33:51Rich Diviney?

  The external world has a say in whether or not you do that. And the discipline that is required to move through those wiccus takes adaptability. It takes flexibility. It takes the ability to not get seduced by the highs, the successes, and not get crushed by the failures and continue to move towards that goal. And what I found was, because I'm a very un-self-disciplined person. I don't have a lot, right? And so I had to separate this, because I've been able to achieve a lot of goals in my life. I said, what's the difference? Well, the difference is if you are overly... So those with very high self-discipline, sometimes, this is not exclusive, but sometimes have trouble. Achieving long-term goals because the achievement of long-term goals often takes

• 1:34:32Rich Diviney?

  an ability and by necessity to march into the unknown, into uncertainty, which is going to throw you off routine and throw you out of certainty. The self-disciplined person, the very self-disciplined, likes routine, likes certainty, right? That's how, it's structure, I mean, that's what it is. And so, and so, moving towards a goal like that takes oftentimes being able to adapt out of structure, you know, and say, "Well, I can't do that, like, I'm, I'd have to just go in, I have to go in unknowing," right? Now, the best, the most successful people are those who have both self-discipline and discipline, right? In terms of staying motivated for a goal, the way I would do it by knowing myself is I would, I would, understanding I'm not a very self-disciplined person, I would simply try to chunk a goal into smaller pieces, right?

• 1:35:16Rich Diviney?

  So, if I want to, if I want to lose weight, you know, then I can say, "Well, that's why cheat days are actually good for me." Because I can, I can say, "I'm gonna take this piece of it and move." So, I chunk my reward system in a different way, but I think, I think the way, the way one stays motivated towards a goal is highly subjective, but it would, in my, kind of, through my thought process and my experience, involve a, an active, or want to actively map out a reward system that helps someone move through that.

• 1:35:49Lewis Howes?

  Sort of creating a reward system first for the, for the goal in order to help you stay motivated.

• 1:35:55Rich Diviney?

  Depending on, yeah, depending on your, depending on your, how you show up.

• 1:35:58Lewis Howes?

  Not to say, like, "Okay, I'm gonna, my goal is to achieve this thing, it's gonna take me three years to accomplish it."

• 1:36:03Rich Diviney?

  Right.

• 1:36:04Lewis Howes?

  And that's the only reward I'm gonna get in those three years. But how can I reward myself every day for an action I take, every month for a milestone, every year for getting closer? So focusing on the reward system.

• 1:36:16Rich Diviney?

  Yeah, and that, and this is, this is, this is neurobiological, because dopamine, the neurotransmitter, is, you get, you get hits of dopamine when you, as a reward, when you achieve things, you know? There's many ways you get dopamine, but one of the ways is when you achieve things. So if you're able to effectively create a reward system that means something to you, it can't be, it can't be kind of inert, right? So, so if I want to run, if I want to run a marathon. And I haven't, and I can barely run to my mailbox, right? You know, then maybe, you know, buying some running shoes and putting them on one morning is enough of a reward system to get a dopamine hit. As someone who runs, you know, somewhat frequently, and you probably identify with this. Just putting on our shoes one morning is probably not going to give us that dopamine hit. We gotta, we gotta extend that, we gotta extend that task a little bit so that-

• 1:36:59Lewis Howes?

  If you've already accomplished a lot of something, you have to push beyond it a little bit.

• 1:37:03Rich Diviney?

  You have to push beyond it to get that, that reward system. So it becomes subjective.

• 1:37:06Lewis Howes?

  What would you say 20 years as a Navy SEAL at different levels? You were deployed how many different times? Are you allowed to talk about that?

• 1:37:14Rich Diviney?

  Well, you know, I mean, 13 and some change. Yeah, so-

• 1:37:18Lewis Howes?

  Deployments between, what, six months and over a year?

• 1:37:22Rich Diviney?

  Yeah, I never did year-long, but anywhere between, you know, three months to six months usually.

• 1:37:26Lewis Howes?

  This is Iraq and Afghanistan?

• 1:37:29Rich Diviney?

  For the most part, yeah.

• 1:37:29Lewis Howes?

  And other places maybe not allowed to talk about. What would you say of that 20-year experience was the most challenging experience for you? Was it something within a mission? Was it learning how to develop as a leader? Was it having a relationship with your wife during that time? What was the most challenging point for you?

• 1:37:48Rich Diviney?

  Yeah, the most challenging thing ironically wasn't the job. Because you, because we were all so prepared for the job and we were around, we were around just the best people in the world. So, so the trust and the camaraderie was, to this day, you know, I look back on it very fondly, right?

• 1:38:04Lewis Howes?

  So not the day-to-day job, even just like the, the missions you went out on?

• 1:38:09Rich Diviney?

  Yeah, that wasn't, that wasn't challenging. I think, I think if I were to, if I were to say, you know, the first foremost was probably having to leave the family. When you have to say goodbye to your family for a stint, you know, whether it's three months or six months, or some, some folks are deploying for a year, right? That is a rough deal that not many people can, can capture. Not many people with families can capture that. When you have to say goodbye to your kids and your wife for that, you know, okay, well, see you in however. And then, and then to add on to that, understanding their stress, or at least my kids were a little bit smaller, but understanding my wife's stress, knowing that I was going someplace and she, it was dangerous. Yeah, well, luckily with today's technology, contact was-

• 1:38:50Rich Diviney?

  Fairly easy, but we found, again ironically, we found that daily contact was never a good idea. Because what happens is you establish a routine.

• 1:38:59Lewis Howes?

  You get comfortable.

• 1:39:00Rich Diviney?

  You get comfortable. So something happens, I'm working, I'm overseas or something, I have a mission that goes along or whatever, and I don't get to call her that day, well suddenly she's worried. And it also makes time actually seem slower.

• 1:39:12Lewis Howes?

  Interesting.

• 1:39:12Rich Diviney?

  Yeah, so we decided we were only going to talk usually once a week. My son, who had a real trouble, and he was young, I mean, he was born in 05, so he was, by the time he was two, he was having trouble with me deploying. And every time I went, it was rough on him, and we actually, for him, we actually almost had to, well, we literally had to just decide not to, I was not going to talk to him on the phone, it was too hard for him. He had to basically kind of forget me.

• 1:39:39Lewis Howes?

  Oh my gosh, so he had to compartmentalize as a child.

• 1:39:43Rich Diviney?

  Yeah, we had to help him compartmentalize.

• 1:39:45Lewis Howes?

  Survive.

• 1:39:45Rich Diviney?

  Yeah.

• 1:39:46Lewis Howes?

  And not go depressed or be stressed, because that's one of the attributes you talk about is compartmentalization.

• 1:39:51Rich Diviney?

  Yeah.

• 1:39:52Lewis Howes?

  How do you do that if you're an emotional human being that's, you have these deep connections to your family and friends? How do you just detach in a sense?

• 1:40:02Rich Diviney?

  Yeah.

• 1:40:02Lewis Howes?

  And become more machine-like for a period of time? And then allow yourself to feel deeply in other moments?

• 1:40:10Rich Diviney?

  Well, it never goes away, and I think the attributes, the way I talk about compartmentalization and the attribute is more, is more kind of surrounded by the way our brain functions and processes information versus I'm going to block something out so I don't have to think about it. However, I think most team guys, SEALs, Spec Ops guys, have a very high ability to compartmentalize away from things, you know, block out things that are painful. I know that about me, and I know that about my buddies. Because you have to, because war sucks, you know, and at the end of the day, the mission has to be accomplished, you know, so if something gnarly happens on a mission, you can't sit there, these movies that show.

• 1:40:54Rich Diviney?

  These extended scenes of people mourning when their buddy goes down or whatever. Like, oh my god.

• 1:40:59Lewis Howes?

  You don't have that.

• 1:41:00Rich Diviney?

  No, you don't have that time. You have to win the gunfight, right? Because if you don't, then all of you won't make it home, right? So you have to. And I think the training allows you to do that. The training is so intense and so effective that it requires you to compartmentalize. Training teaches you to compartmentalize. You become very, very good at it. Now, that can be a detriment in a relationship. So I think those of us who were able to recognize that, actively try not to do that with our families. And so it becomes much more of a precision tool versus a frenetic thing that just happens without us having control over it.

• 1:41:40Lewis Howes?

  What was the moment that was the scariest for you? When you were deployed? Where you thought like, I may not make it? Or our team may not make it? Or this is a really bad... I guess you're training for bad situations all the time? But was there ever a moment where you were like, I don't know if we're gonna get out of this?

• 1:42:00Rich Diviney?

  No, I was fortunate not to have that moment. I say that with immense gratitude because I know there's a lot of friends of mine who didn't have that, can't say that. They had those moments where they said that. But no, I was fortunate enough to be always in a position, and my team was always in a position, that we had prepared, planned, and executed in a way that was highly effective so that when things went wrong, because things always go sideways, we had complete, or near-complete control, or we understood the pathways we needed to go throughout it. But I say that also, this comes back to compartmentalization. One of the things that you have to be able to do when shit goes sideways

• 1:42:42Rich Diviney?

  is to not focus on that thought you just brought up, right? The focus is not, oh my god, I don't think I'm gonna get out of this. Focus is, how do I get out of this? So the mental agility attributes, which are situation awareness, compartmentalization, task switching, and then learnability, right? So that's how information's coming in, how we're processing it and prioritizing, how we're switching between the necessary tasks, and then how we're learning from our decisions, right? So I talk about the parachute malfunction in the context of that. But ultimately, to even be able to do that in the first place, it requires a four-brain dominance in the sense that you're not letting your autonomic system take over into a fight-flight response, and you're able to think through...

• 1:43:23Rich Diviney?

  Stress, challenge, and uncertainty in the sense of say, okay, what can I control right now? And this is where trust in your teammates comes in, because now I have a team. I mean, I can say this with great pride and gratitude, that I can remember literally walking in areas, you know, when we were overseas and thinking, man, this is a bad area.

• 1:43:45Lewis Howes?

  Sketchy.

• 1:43:46Rich Diviney?

  This is sketchy, and having complete and utter faith, right? Because I was around, because I was with my teammates, right? I was around people who just, I trusted. I knew that if something went wrong, we'd be able to handle it, you know? And so I think that's a necessity when you do this type of stuff.

• 1:44:01Lewis Howes?

  When you're going out on a mission, what's the process like of preparing for that mission? Are you planning more for all the things that could go wrong and how to get out of that situation? Or is it planning for, here's exactly how we would like it to go right?

• 1:44:15Rich Diviney?

  Yeah.

• 1:44:16Lewis Howes?

  But let's also have an exit plan or a plan for when things go wrong? What do you?

• 1:44:22Rich Diviney?

  It's the latter. You plan the mission as you'd like it to go, and then you, inside of that planning, you put together, you build contingencies within each factor.

• 1:44:33Lewis Howes?

  So when this doesn't go as planned?

• 1:44:34Rich Diviney?

  Right.

• 1:44:35Lewis Howes?

  What are the three ways to get out?

• 1:44:36Rich Diviney?

  Yeah, so you know, just like, I mean, just like any athlete would understand. So a quarterback coming out of a snap would say, well, I have two or three or four plays I can fall back on, depending on how this line shapes up, right? You have the same thing, you know? This is where experience matters. You do it over and over again. It's okay, well, during, as we're coming in on insertion, you know, there's a few things that could go wrong. So if this, then that, if this, then that. And you kind of do that throughout a phase, throughout the phase planning. But then there's what we call the 80/20 rule, and that is, you get to 80% of certainty, and then you recognize that 20% is just out of your control. And that's where confidence comes. You say, hey, if something happens outside that 20%, we will figure it out.

• 1:45:19Lewis Howes?

  Figure it out.

• 1:45:20Rich Diviney?

  Because we're not going to figure out everything, and it's, you know, Murphy's Law will dictate that something happens that we haven't thought of. So you prepare yourself to deal with uncertainty.

• 1:45:29Lewis Howes?

  How do you train your mind to deal with chaos in the moment, so that you don't freak out and freeze up, but you actually? Turn on a level of focus and attention towards achieving that goal.

• 1:45:42Rich Diviney?

  Yeah, so I think we're predisposed, each one of us, to what I've called, Huberman and I both have called this, is the autonomic set point. You know, at what point do we start flipping into an autonomic response, into fight-flight, where our system starts, you know, taking over and our forebrain starts coming offline? If you and I use boiling point as the average, most of us might be average. There are those who start really freaking out at like 190, you know, so 212 is the average. At 190 degrees, they're starting to freak out.

• 1:46:17Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 1:46:17Rich Diviney?

  There are people who it takes till like 230.

• 1:46:19Lewis Howes?

  To boil.

• 1:46:20Rich Diviney?

  To boil, right? I think that the guys who make it through that training are predisposed to have a higher set point, first of all. In other words, we tend to, when bad things start to happen, we tend to slow down and start thinking through it versus get all hyped up. It's funny, you know, I live in a neighborhood and in my neighborhood, there's four other Navy SEALs in the neighborhood. There's, you know, one across the street, one down the road.

• 1:46:44Lewis Howes?

  Must be nice.

• 1:46:45Rich Diviney?

  Well, it is nice, you know, A, because they're great dudes and it's great, they're great neighbors, but I remember my wife once saying, and she said, hey, I'm so glad these guys are here in the neighborhood. I was like, why? She said, because if something went wrong, I know I could go to them and they'd act like you act. And I said, well, tell me. I said, because if something happens, they would immediately calm down and they'd start working the problem, right? And so I think there's, I think we show up predisposed. Training to it is difficult, you know, and I think, so Huberman and I are actually working on some stuff to help train, have to help teach people to do that, but it comes down to understanding your own neurology and it comes down to understanding that, you know, here's how you have to think through situations under stress and then it's going to be about putting yourself into deliberate stress to practice that.

• 1:47:30Rich Diviney?

  You can't practice this type of thinking if you're not in stress.

• 1:47:33Lewis Howes?

  You need to put yourself in that.

• 1:47:34Rich Diviney?

  You need to put yourself in that.

• 1:47:35Lewis Howes?

  What are some things civilians could do to practice stressful moments on a daily basis where it doesn't hurt them, but it's actually preparing them? I talk about every day, I think you should be experiencing some type of pain, something that's uncomfortable.

• 1:47:48Rich Diviney?

  Right.

• 1:47:48Lewis Howes?

  Seeking discomfort.

• 1:47:49Rich Diviney?

  Yes.

• 1:47:50Lewis Howes?

  Whether it be through a 10-minute workout, whether it be through a longer run, it doesn't matter what it is, an uncomfortable conversation. We should be doing this every day in a structured environment.

• 1:48:00Rich Diviney?

  Yeah.

• 1:48:01Lewis Howes?

  That allows us to grow.

• 1:48:02Rich Diviney?

  Yes.

• 1:48:03Lewis Howes?

  What do you think are some ways we could do this that's not putting us in harm's way or physically hurting ourselves?

• 1:48:07Rich Diviney?

  I can't answer that because it's so subjective. I can give some ideas and you just gave some. I mean, some people are very social people. So, starting a conversation with a stranger is a piece of cake, right? For me, that would be hard, right? Starting a conversation with a stranger would be hard. So, that might be something I do. Giving a presentation, public speaking for people is tough. So, volunteering to give that presentation is a great way for a lot of people because, you know, that makes them anxious, you know? So, working out for some is like, for some people, they've developed a system where that pain point of working out is something they highly enjoy, right? So, they're not practicing it. So, someone should look at their own makeup and ask themselves what fright, well, in

• 1:48:52Rich Diviney?

  fear, again, it doesn't have to go all the way to fear. Fear is interesting because it's actually a combination of two things. It's a combination of uncertainty and anxiety. You can have each one of those and not have fear, right? So, if you are anxious but not uncertain, that would be, I have to give this presentation on Monday, I hope it's going, I'm nervous about it, right? That's, you know, but there's nothing uncertain about it. It's Monday, it's at 2 o'clock, I know what I'm going to do, I'm just, I'm nervous about it, okay? Uncertainty without anxiety, well, that's every kid on Christmas Eve, okay? I mean, so, but it's when you combine the two that you start to generate fear. Well, the idea is if you have fear, if you have uncertainty plus anxiety and it starts to manifest into fear, the key is to understanding which of those two factors can you buy down, okay?

• 1:49:35Lewis Howes?

  Buy down?

• 1:49:36Rich Diviney?

  Buy down, which means decrease. Anxiety can be decreased internally, it's an internal response, right? So, things like, some of the tools Huberman talks about, visual tools, breathing tools. You can begin to, you can begin to shift your physiology out of your sympathetic into your parasympathetic, come off of the autonomic response system, right? So, that's, so that's how you could start, you know, kind of buying down anxiety. Uncertainty is largely external, okay? That means something around you, outside of you, you don't understand, there's unknown. The way, the best way to do that and the way we do it in the, in Spec Ops is we control what we can control. So, some people have referred to it kind of, control your three-foot world, right? But it doesn't have to extend, it's not a, it's not a three-foot thing. It's what in this moment can I control? And then take control of that, right?

• 1:50:21Rich Diviney?

  Because then you are grabbing onto certainty. You're taking what is uncertain, you're grabbing onto something certain. As soon as you've controlled that, as soon as you've moved through that, then you have to make another decision. What's the next thing? This is basically kind of stepping through, right? Stepping through this challenge, right? So you can start to practice coming off of fear or moving through fear by kind of understanding both of those pieces.

• 1:50:44Lewis Howes?

  What do you think is the greatest lesson you learned throughout the 20 years for yourself? That has helped you, not only during that, but also after being with the SEALs?

• 1:50:55Rich Diviney?

  I think it's not fearing the unknown. It's the idea that I, you know, when you go through something like that, you understand that, hey, I could pretty much do whatever I'd like to do. And I know that even though I don't know how I'm gonna do it, I know I can figure it out. If there's enough interest, if there's enough passion, right? You know, I'm not gonna, I'm not interested in becoming a pro football player, you know?

• 1:51:17Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 1:51:17Rich Diviney?

  So that's, you know, that's off my list, right? But I was interested in writing a book, and that was a whole new process for me, you know? When I started, when I left the Navy, I started public speaking. I did not like public speaking at all, right? I did not like it. But I knew it was an edge that I wanted to conquer, you know? And say, okay, well, let me work through the things to conquer this edge. Kind of like your philosophy. I think it's a really, it's not only a deep one, but it's profound. Because if we are consistently moving, deciding what our edges are, moving towards our edge, and then getting there, then we are growing. You know, because guess what we're doing at that point? We're looking for the next edge, you know? And that's the growth process, is continuing to move to our edges and then finding the next edge.

• 1:51:56Lewis Howes?

  I mean, you say you don't like public speaking, but don't you have to speak to your teams and guys?

• 1:52:01Rich Diviney?

  Yeah, but that's not public. That's like, you know, that's the guys. So it's not the same. It's different, yeah. It's different, there's a lot more, you know? When you're, you know, and when you're in the military, there's no expectation of...

• 1:52:14Rich Diviney?

  Of, you know, kind of great articulation, or humor, or, you know.

• 1:52:19Lewis Howes?

  Just what's effective.

• 1:52:20Rich Diviney?

  Yeah, it's just like, hey, here's the word.

• 1:52:24Rich Diviney?

  And that's what's appreciated, too. There's no one wants you to sit there and pontificate. It's like, hey, guys, this is what's going on. So there's a directness that's appreciated and required, you know, so, but that's not public.

• 1:52:35Lewis Howes?

  What do you think was the hardest lesson you had to learn through your 20 years? Something that you were struggling with, or challenged with, or you kept repeating until you finally learned the lesson?

• 1:52:45Rich Diviney?

  Yeah, I think the hardest lessons, the hardest lesson, maybe not one, the hardest lessons were just around leadership. What it takes, what leadership take, what it takes to be a leader. Because, again, being a leader and being in charge are often conflated. They're not the same thing, okay?

• 1:52:59Lewis Howes?

  What's the difference?

• 1:53:00Rich Diviney?

  Well, anybody could be in charge. As an officer, you know, in the military, I was pretty much in charge of something all the time. It didn't make me a leader. You don't get to call yourself a leader. It's like calling yourself funny, or calling yourself handsome, okay? Someone else makes that decision. You can't designate yourself that way. Someone else decides whether or not you are a leader, okay? And that's done through the way you behave in that position. So if you're in charge and you're behaving in a way that causes someone to make a decision, okay, this is the person I would lead. I mean, if we think about the leaders in our lives, the people who we consider leaders in our lives, it's not because they were just in charge of us. In fact, we could probably think of people who we would follow into hell and back, and they have no place in the hierarchy of our lives, right?

• 1:53:44Rich Diviney?

  They're just someone who just, they behave that way, in a way that's made us kind of endeared to them. So the attributes I talk about in the book, in terms of leadership attributes, are all attributes that actually cause behaviors that typically cause people to look at others as leaders.

• 1:54:02Lewis Howes?

  What are the behaviors that most human beings admire the most? That we want to follow that person, or be inspired to be led by something that they're sharing, or involved in, a community, a movement, whatever it may be? What are the three or four main behaviors? That they have and we should be developing if we want to be better leaders.

• 1:54:21Rich Diviney?

  Yeah, well, I talk about five in the book, Into the Advers, the first is empathy. Okay, and again, I would say this, there's not an exclusivity in terms of what someone will decide. Because there are people who will look at-

• 1:54:31Lewis Howes?

  Subjective, right?

• 1:54:32Rich Diviney?

  It's a subjective thing, you know, again, it's someone's choice as to whether or not they think. So empathy is one. Selflessness is another, and this is not just, you know, so let's just back up here. Empathy, not just, I know how you feel, I feel how you feel, right? I can, I can put myself into your shoes. And, and I, and that reflects in the way I communicate with you and I care about, it shows that you care about another human being.

• 1:54:54Lewis Howes?

  What is the best way to, to show that? I mean, give me an example, as opposed to saying, I know how you feel. How do you-

• 1:55:01Rich Diviney?

  Feel-

• 1:55:02Lewis Howes?

  Empathize showing you feel how they feel?

• 1:55:05Rich Diviney?

  Well, first, deep listening. And so, so, so we all, so listening to another person, but, but true, like, deep, full-on, like, listening, like, I am hanging on every word, listening. Often times, we listen to people and we're two things, one of two things is happening. Either, we're thinking about what we're going to say next, right? Or, we're thinking about how what that person is saying relates to our lives. And it's not from a malicious standpoint, it's really because we're trying to relate. So we're trying to say, okay, you're, you're talking about football, I'm thinking, okay, wait a second, you know, did I play, I played football in eighth grade, maybe I could talk about that-

• 1:55:35Lewis Howes?

  We relate, yeah.

• 1:55:36Rich Diviney?

  But what I'm doing is I'm not listening to you anymore. You know, I'm making what you're saying about me, you know, so, so what's, what deep empathetic listening is, I'm, I've, I have like a whiteboard in my mind, okay? And as I'm listening to you speak, if something pops onto the whiteboard, I erase it. And I move on, I just keep on listening, you know, that is, if you do, if you, if you empathetically listen, like, look into someone's eyes, attentive behavior, facing each other, you are going, they are going to feel cared for, because you're exchanging, now there's an exchange going on. There's serotonin being released, there's, there's oxytocin being exchanged, or at least released. And all these, kind of these bonding chemicals.

• 1:56:12Lewis Howes?

  I hope you enjoyed this, my friend. Thank you so much for listening. This is all about how to upgrade your mindset to really start living a better life and improving the quality of your life. And if you did enjoy it, make sure to click the subscribe button over on Apple Podcasts or Spotify and leave us a review over there if you haven't left us one yet. We'd love to hear your thoughts and your biggest takeaway from this specific episode. And make sure to share this with a friend. You can copy and paste the link wherever you're listening to this, or you can use lewishouse.com/1131. That'll have all the show notes and links to the previous episodes as well from our guests and today's episode back on the show notes link. You can share this with friends, post on the social media. Make sure to tag me at Lewis Howes as well over on Instagram. And if you've yet to subscribe yet over on YouTube, we've got over a million and a

• 1:56:54Lewis Howes?

  half subscribers and it is growing like crazy with the content we are putting out over on video as well. So make sure to subscribe to us on all social media channels, especially on YouTube as it is growing like crazy over there. And I will leave you with a quote from C.S. Lewis, who said, "You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream." No, you are not, my friend, because age is just a mindset. I don't care how old you are, how young you are. It is just a mindset and you can make a decision in this moment and in any moment to start changing the direction of your life towards a new goal or new dream or a previous one that you've had buried inside you for a long time. It can always come out. You can start taking action steps toward those goals and dreams. I'm so grateful for you. I love you very much.

• 1:57:37Lewis Howes?

  And if no one's told you lately, I want to remind you that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And you know what time it is. It's time to go out there and do something great.