You're Not Too Busy for Love... You're Just LYING to Yourself! ft. Nir Eyal

What if you could build an empire AND stay deeply in love? Bestselling author Nir Eyal's been married 25 years and more in love than ever, so we had to know how he did it. In this conversation, Sonya and Agon Love break down the dangerous lie about career vs. love, why your partner isn't your assistant, and the one thing that completely transformed his marriage.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_07 0:00

How do you see love?

SPEAKER_03 0:01

Love is measured by the benefit of the doubt.

SPEAKER_07 0:03

Is there a sweet spot where you can have a fulfilling great career while remaining a very good partner?

SPEAKER_03 0:12

To be a great partner, you have to be a great person. I think that really helps.

SPEAKER_07 0:15

But, but is it that career is a distraction from love? We're almost meant to believe that if you focus on the career, you most likely are not going to be the best partner.

SPEAKER_03 0:28

How much you love somebody or something is measured by how much grace you give them.

SPEAKER_07 0:33

There's such a great danger in breaking the promises that you give to yourself. Most of us lie to ourselves every single day.

SPEAKER_00 0:40

I never saw that.

SPEAKER_03 0:42

That's very interesting. Everything worth having in life is difficult.

SPEAKER_00 0:45

25 years in, you're in love. What are you doing differently, and what can other couples that you've noticed are living life differently do?

SPEAKER_07 0:58

It's a it's a real pleasure and honor to have you. Oh, my pleasure. Thank you. Thank you. I want to start this by asking you something that's been on my mind quite a lot lately. And I think it's on the mind of a lot of people who are focusing on career and find it difficult to navigate between love life and career. It feels like we're almost meant to believe that if you focus on the career, you most likely are not going to be the best partner and vice versa. So I wonder, is it that career is a distraction from love? Or is there a sweet spot where you can have a fulfilling great career while remaining a very good partner?

SPEAKER_03 1:48

Maybe a useful place to start is by defining the word distraction. And so if you look at the origin of the word distraction, the best way to understand what distraction is is to understand what distraction is not. So many people think I don't want to be distracted, I want to be focused. But focus is not the opposite of distraction. The opposite of distraction is traction. When you look at both words together, it's very obvious traction and distraction. Both words come from the same Latin root, trahare, which means to pull, and they both end in the word action. Reminding us that distraction is not something that happens to us, it is an action that we ourselves take. So traction is any action that pulls us towards what we said we were going to do. Distraction is anything that pulls us away from what we said we were going to do, any action that we did not intend to take. Now, why do I say this in the context of relationships? Because it's not that work is a distraction, per se, from a love life, it's that it's only a distraction if it's not what we said we were going to do. So if your priority is, if you what you want in life, if traction for you is spending 80 hours a week at work, that's not a distraction. Because we can have it all. I I truly believe that when you live an indistractable life, you can have it all. You can do it all. You just can't do it all at the same time. I think that's the mistake we make. We try and have it all at once, and that's impossible because we can't be at two places at the same time. I see this with parents who are with their kids, while they're checking their phones because they're trying to be more productive in the office at the same time to get work done. Trevor Burrus, Jr. Habit stocking.

SPEAKER_07 3:27

Habit stacking.

SPEAKER_03 3:28

Everyone's stacking the habits of like how to maximize. Trevor Burrus, Jr. Right. So if you're trying to be at two places at once, that's just you're just trying to defy the laws of physics. You can't do it. And that's the mistake people are making. They're getting distracted constantly because they haven't defined what is traction.

SPEAKER_07 3:44

Trevor Burrus, Jr. So it's about the presence with what is it that's important to you.

SPEAKER_03 3:50

Aaron Ross Powell Yeah. And being explicit about that. Not just, oh, you know, I think having a family is important, I think having a career is important, I think making an impact is important, I think raising kids isn't important. It's much deeper than just saying these things. That if you want to know what someone's values really are, what people really think are their values, not what they say, you never listen to what they say. We say all kinds of stupid stuff. You look at two things. You look at how they spend their money and how they spend their time. Don't listen to what they say. If you really want to know your values, that's where you have to look. And so uh the funny thing is, though, that when it comes to our money, we are so protective of our money. We put our money in banks with safes and it's behind these vaults so that nobody touches our money. We split checks, we click coupons, we're super cheap with our money. But with our time, just give it to whoever, right? Some stupid thing in the news that has nothing to do with me, with a problem 3,000 miles away, sure. Now it's top of mind for me. Uh some silly thing in politics I can't do anything about. Uh some gossip that has nothing to do with me. Yeah, give it time, give it time, give it attention. But that's our much more precious resource because money, you can always make more money. You can always make more money. You can't make more time. I don't care if you're Jeff Bezos or uh Bill Gates or whatever, it doesn't matter how much money you have, you have the same amount of time that we do. We all have 24 hours in a day. So I think we need to be very generous with our money, because we can always make more of it, and be very stingy with our time, because that's a non-renewable resource.

SPEAKER_00 5:26

So you're saying that a couple needs to define their values first. And each individual needs to decide, okay, how much time do I want to spend on my work and how much time do I want to spend with my partner potentially? How does a couple go about, let's just say hypothetically, there's this man and he is in his 30s and he's building a business.

SPEAKER_03 5:51

Is this someone you know personally?

SPEAKER_00 5:52

No, maybe, you know, several.

SPEAKER_03 5:55

I'm in my 30s, I'm not middling.

SPEAKER_00 5:58

Well, you've made it so different. Um, but okay, so let's just say someone's at the start of their career and they they have they're seeing traction, but they also have a partner or they want to get a partner, and they're like, I need to dedicate time to this, but I need to potentially dedicate this much more time to this to get to the goal that I want to get there with my business. So, how does he, together with his partner, let's say there's a partner in this in this situation, decide how much time is the sweet spot for their relationship to flourish as well as the business to thrive.

SPEAKER_03 6:34

So they already have a he already found a partner. Okay. Already found a partner. So um this sounds like we stepped into a time machine to my life a few years ago. Exactly. That's true. So I'll tell you what we did. Okay. So my wife and I have been married for it'll be this year, 25 years. Wow. Yeah. And uh honestly, uh, I've never been more in love. She's never been more beautiful to me. We just got back from a week together in Tokyo where we took like a second honeymoon when when our daughter was in Australia visiting her friends, and we just got quality time together, and it was like honestly magical. Just magical, our our time together. That was not the case when we were 30 years old. Uh our daughter had just been born, and uh we were really struggling because I had this behavioral pattern of uh I was very busy at work. We had a startup and I was super busy. And I would come home and it seemed like my wife was constantly complaining to me. You know, she would say, Nier, don't you see the garbage needs to be taken out and our daughter hasn't been fed, and you know, there's all this stuff to do. Like, well, why aren't you doing that stuff? And I told her the classic man response of Honey, don't get all upset, which by the way, never works. Never say that. You're on to something nearly.

SPEAKER_01 7:53

Now I know why you've been together 25 years, you understand this. I need to learn this.

SPEAKER_03 7:57

I need to learn this. I need to tell telling someone to relax has never made them relax. Okay. So, honey, relax. Don't get so upset. Yeah. If you want me to do it, just tell me. What's the big deal? Just tell me what to do. But what I didn't realize, now I did, you know, after writing in Distractable, I realized that what I was doing is I was asking her to take on yet another job. Now she's my mommy too.

SPEAKER_00 8:23

True. She has to think what you have to do. Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_03 8:25

She's my manager, which is a whole nother job.

unknown 8:28

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 8:29

You get this. And in fact, when I tell the story to, you know, sometimes I'll tell the story to in front of an audience, and I see all the women in the audience like, yep, yep, yep. And the men are like, oh, I don't get it. And if you look at the studies, it's even worse because the studies show that even today, 2025, dual income households, uh, even today, women take on a disproportionate share of household responsibilities, just the way it is. Okay. And so what changed our marriage, what changed our life, is we started doing what's called a schedule sync. And so a schedule sink only can happen. What is a schedule sink? It's what you do when you have individually made a time box calendar. Okay. Now a time box calendar is one of these things that grown-ups need to learn how to do in life. Nobody teaches to you in school. But uh if unless you're retired or a child, this is just essential. Right? It's as essential as making sure you have enough money in your bank account and paying your health insurance and doing stuff that at first is not so much fun to do, but this will change your life. It did change my life. You're doing it now. Oh, I've been doing it for a while. Oh, tell me more.

SPEAKER_00 9:36

I love it. I mean, it's like me putting my to-do list into my calendar.

SPEAKER_03 9:40

Awesome.

SPEAKER_00 9:41

It's super important. But after reading your book, I also realized that it's not enough to just put my to-do list in my calendar about to-do lists, but there are certain things like rest, sleep, nice, the things that I don't really think about, like lunch, that I just don't schedule. And that's so I end up just playing catch up. So it's not just about putting my to-do list in the calendar, but it's also about just putting my like life into the calendar. It's changed my life.

SPEAKER_03 10:06

Okay, so now that you have that, yeah, and you've put in, you've made your calendar based on your values. What you did was you turned your values into time.

SPEAKER_05 10:14

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 10:14

That's how you know what your values really are. Because what most people do is they keep a to-do list and they say, uh, I want to write a novel, I want to start a business, I want to make that presentation, I want to do this and this and that, all these things they want to do. And those are just aspirations. They haven't made the hard decision of prioritizing what happens when, because a to-do list has no constraints. You can just add more and more and more and more and more and more. And there's a lot of reasons why to do lists are one of the worst things you can do for your productivity and your psychological well-being. We can talk about that in a minute. Whereas a time box calendar forces you to make constraints. It forces you to say, if I spend this much time at work, that means I can't go to the gym, that means maybe I have less time with my kids, that means I whatever, whatever it is, it forces you to make constraints. That's part of the design of why a time box calendar works. Now, when two people in a household do this, now they can start making decisions together about their values. And that's game-changing because it's just about setting expectations. What I found with my wife, you know, I for a long time I thought that she was trying to keep me from having a career because she kept complaining that I wasn't spending enough time with her and our daughter. And I realized actually that wasn't what she wanted. When we actually had a conversation about this, you know, I was saying, look, if you want me to have a career, if you want me to support the family, I'm gonna need to spend time outside the house, I need to build my career. And she said, I don't necessarily want more time. What she wanted was clarity about the time we would have. She just wanted predictability. She just wanted to know, are you gonna do what you say you're gonna do? If you say you're gonna be here, you say we're gonna go on a date, I don't want you to tell me at three o'clock that day, oh, I'm having a busy day at the office, I can't come home until later.

SPEAKER_05 11:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 11:53

That sucks. Right? That's when you are letting people down your life. And so now that I'm indistractable, and by the way, I wrote this book not because I knew what I knew how to do this stuff, it's because I needed to learn how to do this stuff. I was the most distractable person you've ever met. So I wrote the book for me to figure it out for myself. So I had that's why I had to start with the you know, the first principles research around what is distraction. That's why I started with that definition. And when I learned that, now I'm the kind of person who meets my obligations. Now, every Sunday, 8 p.m., it's on our schedule, we sit down together, she has her time box calendar, I have my time box calendar, and we can say, okay, on this day, you need to do uh you're gonna take the daughter, our daughter here, and then this day you're gonna do that, and da-da-da. And by the way, this takes us now that we've been doing it for so many years, take us maybe 15 minutes. It's actually a pleasure because now we're on the same page. For the week? Yeah, for the week. We do the entire week. Okay, you here's where you have these obligations, you know. Uh back when we lived in New York, okay, here's uh, you know, the you need the car on this day, that day, whatever, like you know, resources within the household. Obligations essential for parents. Because you know, you as a parent, you start schlepping your kid all over the place, so somebody's gotta do that. Um, and then once we had that schedule sync, everything changed. Everything changed because I knew, okay, here's my responsibilities in my calendar, not just okay, whenever I find time to do it, but actually in my calendar, and here's what she's handling. So she doesn't have to manage me. I don't have to feel like I'm not living up to my obligations. Absolute game changer.

SPEAKER_07 13:22

A lot of what you said is so relatable. I'm sure there has been so many conversations in the household where the husband sits and he's like, you know, I need to provide, and I have all this on my mind. Why are you telling me to spend more time if you want me to be successful? Yeah. This is a very popular conversation, and I love that you're using that as your own personal story. That's beautiful.

SPEAKER_03 13:44

Yeah, by the way, and I saw my parents also struggle. This my father was an entrepreneur, he started a business, and I saw that, I mean, almost ruined their marriage. They almost got a divorce. I remember the shouting still of this exact same issue. And so when I learned this, I didn't I didn't invent it. This is time boxing has been around way before me. Um, when I learned this tactic uh and then came up with this idea of schedule syncing, right? That's where I think was something new. Uh, that I think has changed a lot of people's lives. That uh especially with with people with dual careers, if you don't have those difficult conversations of uh look, I only have so much time in the day, here's how much time I want to devote to my marriage, here's how much time I want to uh being a father, here's how much time I need for the gym, here's much how much time I want to play video games, which is totally fine. I think a lot of people, when they think about distraction, they think, oh, don't do the bad stuff, just do the virtuous stuff. There's no such thing. If you want to go on social media, if you want to watch YouTube videos, if you want to uh whatever it is you want to do. There's nothing wrong necessarily with any of that stuff.

SPEAKER_07 14:45

We we call this uh because we we both used to have a problem with this. We we call this floating. So it there's a very big danger to floating, which is you you don't have a plan and you just take whatever comes your way. So oh, someone wants to meet, or maybe you feel like playing a game right now, and you slowly start realizing that you don't really live your life in your own power, but rather are floating and are on the type of an autopilot.

SPEAKER_03 15:12

Exactly. I I like to say that you can't call something a distraction unless you know what it distracted you from. So if it's not on your calendar, what did you get distracted from?

SPEAKER_07 15:23

Nothing. You plan to get distracted. I have two observations and one follow-up question. One observation is you speaking of time, and it really hit me when I realized it, and I I remember asking my older friend and then even my grandma about it, because I saw a graph that shows how as we age time is not going at the same speed anymore. So we we used it in relation to to career, and it's almost like time is inflating like US dollar. Because the older we get, we actually don't have when we 60 until 80, we don't have 20 years anymore. By the way our brains operate. It goes faster. So so it makes your argument even stronger how time is just such an important element of prioritization in life.

SPEAKER_03 16:21

You're gonna make me start crying here because I'm thinking about my daughter going off to college soon and it's uh it's kill me.

SPEAKER_04 16:27

You're so close though.

SPEAKER_03 16:28

We're super close.

SPEAKER_04 16:29

That's really beautiful.

SPEAKER_03 16:30

It's been amazing. Like, I'm seriously gonna lose it here, but uh yeah, she's she's such a close friend of mine. Um uh we spend so much time together. Tomorrow we have our breakfast, we do Saturday breakfast together. Uh and like to have a teenage daughter who wants to spend time is just amazing.

SPEAKER_00 16:47

Like it speaks to the parenting that you had, though. For sure.

SPEAKER_03 16:50

We got super lucky, and also we like were very intentional about how how we raised her, but um yeah, there's just there's just nothing better. It's the best. Are you guys planning on having kids not to get too personal? But uh you can get as personal as you want.

SPEAKER_00 17:03

I mean, like when we when we hear conversations like like people like like you speak about parenthood, it gives us hope. Yeah, we didn't grow up seeing healthy relationships. My both our fathers were absent. So hearing this is like, yeah, it can be done, especially like you said, when you're conscious about it and you're intentional about it.

SPEAKER_07 17:21

There seems to be a very common factor with homeschooling among parents that we look up to. I see that. Right? Yeah, because you're another homeschooler and that's just always unifies. And what you say about your daughter, isn't it so powerful that you mentioned in the book how uh your daughter asked you a question and you were too distracted to create this core memory. And now you're going on breakfast.

SPEAKER_03 17:48

Yeah, that's uh that was the genesis of the book, was that I really we had this just to fill everyone else in. So we um uh we had some daddy-daughter time planned and we had this book of activities.

SPEAKER_00 17:57

Oh, it was already planned.

SPEAKER_03 17:58

Well, the day was planned.

SPEAKER_00 17:59

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 18:00

Um, but I blew it. And then the way I blew it was that when we were together, we had this activity book of all these things that dads and daughters could do together, you know, do a Sudoku puzzle or uh paper airplane throwing contest. And one of the questions in the book, just to you know uh help us bond, was ask each other what if you could have any superpower, what superpower would you want? And uh I remember the question, but I don't remember what she said because I thought, oh, I just just one second, I have to just do this one thing on my phone. And by the time I looked up, she left the room. She was gone. Because I was sending a message that this was more important than she was. And that was really a wake-up call for me. Because uh, if I couldn't manage my own attention with one of the most important people in the world to me, uh what did that say about my character, about my values? Was I living up to the kind of man I wanted to be and the kind of father I want to be for my daughter? And it wasn't just with her, it would happen when I'd say, Oh, I want to go to the gym, but I wouldn't. I wanted to work on that big project, but I'd procrastinate. And it kept appearing in all different facets of my life that I would say I would do one thing and yet I'd do something else. And so that was the superpower I decided I most wanted.

SPEAKER_00 19:11

You you talk about being that father, right, who was distracted. And I it just comes to mind how many women, I run women's circles, I speak to a lot of women on a regular basis, they tend to have a problem with the way their father showed up or didn't in their lives. And then they go through a journey of healing and then they forgive their dad and they start to see how much their dad actually did for them. And one of the things that comes up is, you know, he made so many sacrifices, he always had to work, and that's why he couldn't be present. And while I love that we're on this, you know, we want to see what our parents did for us as well, what you are showing men is that you can have a life and a business and prioritize your daughter or your child. You also talked about in your book that the reason why we get distracted is because we're avoiding a sudden feeling and an emotion. And so I wonder in this context or just in general, what about these men who are avoiding their homes? I think some men just want to be at work, like in Japan. There is a huge like men just want to work and not come home. You know, it's it's not just Japan, so many places in the world. So what what is that thing that people don't want to come home to?

SPEAKER_03 20:26

Yeah, all right. So let's let's go deep here into human motivation. So not just why do we procrastinate, which I think is a really interesting question. By the way, not a new question. Plato was asking this question, he calls it a crasia 2,500 years ago. So even though we think, oh, it's our cell phones, it's social media that's distracting us, no, people have been distracted for at least 2,500 years before the internet. So it's part of the human condition. So why do we do anything and everything? What is the nature of human motivation? The knee-jerk response, what most people think, if you want to motivate somebody, what do you do? You give them carrots and you threaten the stick, right? Carrots and sticks. That's how motivation works. Completely wrong. That is not how the brain works. The brain runs on one thing and one thing only. To get you to do things, it has to put you in a state of discomfort. So it's not carrot and stick, it's that the carrot is the stick. That wanting, even wanting to feel good, craving, hunger, lusting, all of these things are psychologically uncomfortable. Yeah, like a lack. Yeah, exactly. So the way the brain gets us to do things is by making us feel the discomfort to spur us into action. So if that's the case, if all human behavior is spurred by a desire to escape discomfort, that must therefore mean that time management is pain management, that money management is pain management, that weight management is all pain management. It's all about managing discomfort. So to answer your question, then I put Pause for a minute because it's a big answer. Why don't we do what we say we're going to do? Why do we do anything and everything? It's that everything we do is about the desire to escape discomfort. So when we procrastinate, when we say we're going to do one thing but do another, when we get distracted, it's all about what we call internal triggers. We blame the external triggers. We blame the pings, the dings, the rings, everything outside of us. It's the news, it's my boss, it's my kids, it's blah, blah, blah. That's only, and studies have found this, that's only 10% of our distractions. Only 10% of the reason we get distracted is because of things outside of us. 90% are inside of us. Boredom, loneliness, fatigue, uncertainty, anxiety, that is the source of 90% of our distractions. So when I started to figure out, okay, how do I stop getting distracted? How do I do what I say I'm going to do? How do I get this superpower becoming indistractable? And I read other books on the topic, well, just stop using technology. Thanks, stupid. You know, it was like some, it was usually some tenured professor who could say something like that because they won't get fired from a university. But like real people, we gotta use these technologies or we can't have a job these days, right? You can't just stop. So that wasn't very practical. And it's not useful. Because frankly, if it's not this, it'll be something else, right? If you don't deal with those internal triggers, whether it's too much news, too much booze, too much football, too much Facebook, you're gonna get distracted by something if you don't understand the root cause of what you're trying to escape. So that's step number one. That's why we 90% of the time get distracted. It's because of these internal triggers.

SPEAKER_07 23:37

The the speed of progression of today's world is so fast that it's almost like if you look at 2019 and 2026 almost, we have progressed so fast. And I I guess I want to mention this for people on the other side who could actually honestly benefit the most from this conversation. And these will be the people who are quite on the far end of being demotivated. We like we're motivated and we have the energy to focus to time box and to really follow through with things. And we've learned through our careers and and our work ethic how to get there. But people who really need help to get this done are the people who are on the far end of that. Of demotivated? Of being demotivated and being very easily distracted because you kind of are floating. There's no purpose, maybe it's difficult to find that way of like, oh, I'm gonna check my calendar because they're like five steps away from even caring about what calendar is. So on that note, I want to ask you with you saying how technology, you know, is just 10%, don't you think that in the last few years it progressed to be much more?

SPEAKER_03 24:53

Well, I think the the core reason we get distracted has not changed. I think when people do things against their better interests, Plato's 2500-year-old question, the nature of a crasia, is still exactly the same. It's always a desire to escape discomfort. Because remember, this stuff doesn't live in a vacuum. We say, oh, what about the past five years? What about the past hundred years, 150 years, 200 years? You know what people did before social media? They drank. Have you seen the rate of alcohol consumption in the past? You know how much people used to drink?

SPEAKER_01 25:27

He's Polish, he knows. Okay, you know, you know. I mean, look at the French. It's amazing. I saw this.

SPEAKER_07 25:32

My town is still haven't changed. We're still back in the world.

SPEAKER_01 25:34

Yeah, yeah, yeah. His town is like a capsule.

SPEAKER_03 25:37

I mean, it was insane the amount of people who were just constantly inebriated. Uh, and so this stuff doesn't live in a vacuum. Human beings have constantly be look been looking for psychological escape. Now, the good news is what our grandparents were looking to escape from, Polish, right? The sh awful things that your grandparents had to go through, uh, most likely, the times they had to live through. Uh, I mean, can we even compare? Like their struggles. If you told them, if you told our grandparents that my biggest problem is there's this device, there's this thing in my life that I like to use too much. They would have laughed in our face. Are, but, but are you are you starving? No. Do you have uh syphilis? Do you have uh you know diseases that uh you don't have you have scurvy? What do you have? No, I don't have any of that stuff. We have vaccines, we have vitamins, we have all that stuff. No problem. And what's your problem again? You like to use an entertainment device so that you're not bored too much. That's your problem. It's a pretty high-class problem. It's a good it's a pretty good problem out of all the things. I mean, this is the first compared compared, right? This is the first generation in human history where more people die from diseases of excess, obesity, diabetes, than starvation. That's never happened in 200,000 years of human history. Like we should all be dancing in the streets at how lucky we are. Now, the price of that progress, the price of the fact that we have more calories than we need to feed every man, woman, and child on the face of the earth, the price of the fact that you never have to be bored unless you want to be, the price of this amazing progress that has never happened in 200,000 years of human history, is that we've got to learn some new things. And if you don't learn these new tactics, you will be part of the manipulated masses. Your time and attention will be controlled by other people. If you do learn these tactics, you will be part of this uh Uber elite of people who can use technology in a way that will appear really superhuman. You can you can get in the best shape of your life, you can learn anything you want in an instant, you can have any skill, you can do so much if you know how to harness this technology appropriately. But if you're using it for psychological escape and you don't know how you're being manipulated, you're screwed. I I you you you we have to learn this and we have to teach it to our children.

SPEAKER_07 28:10

On the contrary to that, because I I spent quite a bit of time talking to my grandpa. We funny enough, we would bond over his struggles because my grandpa would always open up about it. And he would he was four years old when the Second World War was happening, so he really has been through all these things. Yes, it is much harder to be back then, but there was not much choice. I feel like if if we're on a subject of distraction, and why am I focused on this so much is because I have been in many rooms with people who define attention. I have been advising behind the algorithms of social media, and I have been behind tens of billions of views on social media when it comes to video content. And there is a very powerful presence of humans plotting to steal your attention. So it is true that you can take your phone and you can find anything, but at the same time, there was a much more simplicity to life when it comes to specifically distractions. I'm not saying that life was in any ways easier, but distractions right now are so they they are so powerful. And the reason why I'm bringing is because if someone is really demotivated and they hear the argument that, you know, people in old times had it so difficult, and we are having phone, it's not a not a as big of a problem, they feel like they are failures. You know, someone watching this who is at a point in life where the their issues are belittle because they're demotivated, they may feel like a failure. So, how would you approach first step of someone who's on a far end of being demotivated and has 10,000 things on his phone or her phone and has all these choices but don't know where to go? How does a person find which direction to go to?

SPEAKER_03 30:28

Yeah. So I think it's important to realize that it's not your fault. It's not your fault. You didn't invent Facebook, you didn't invent TikTok, you didn't invent the iPhone, uh, you didn't invent any of this stuff. It's not your fault. But it is your responsibility. Because who else's responsibility could it be? Are we gonna wait for the government to fix this problem? Are we gonna wait for the tech companies to fix this problem? It's here. It's reality. It's not going away. And in fact, it's only going to become more distracting. You think that the world is distracting now, just wait until this AI revolution really starts going. The world is only going to become a more distracting place. And that's the price of progress. The price of things getting better is that food is more delicious. It's that entertainment is more enticing. That's what a better world means. Things are getting better. I don't romanticize a world with no choice. That sucks. I don't want to go back to a world. The beauty of living in the age where we live today is that if you don't want to make, if you don't want those choices, you don't have to. You can go to a monastery, you can go lock yourself up in a room, you can do whatever you want. But if you don't want that, I don't want to go back to rotary phones and one channel on television run by the government. Yeah. That sucks. Right? Do we understand how good we have it? So I think a bit of historical perspective is really important. Uh Hans Ronsling had a wonderful book called Factfulness. If you haven't read it, I think it's essential reading for everyone on the face of the earth, where he basically showed that people have no clue how good things are today. That even college professors scored worse than random chance. College professors did worse on us on assessing the actual state of the world than if monkeys were answering this survey. Because we have this incredible negativity bias about how bad things are. So to me, having that realization about how great the world is, you don't see that on the media. You don't see that on how the media runs on if it bleeds it leads, on how terrible things are. And I think it's the exact same thing when it comes to tech overuse. When we think about, oh, we use our phones too much, yeah, that's that's uh an unfortunate consequence, but it's a better problem. Remember, technology does not solve problems. Technology does not solve problems. Technology gives us better problems.

unknown 32:47

Right?

SPEAKER_03 32:48

Because as Paul Varillia, the philosopher, said, when you invent the ship, you invent the shipwreck.

unknown 32:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 32:53

So every technology is going to come with goods as well as bads. So what do we do? Do we stop using the technology? Do we stop sailing the ships? No. Right? More ships sail today than ever before. But when was the last time you heard about a shipwreck? Almost never. So the solution is not to stop sailing ships. The solution is not saying, oh, these tech companies, I like to use them a lot. The solution is to make better technology, right? So we do the same thing human beings have always done throughout history with every revolutionary technology. We adopt new norms, new behaviors, right? We make it unacceptable that when we go to lunch together, that we're constantly checking our phones. We we say, oh, I'm indistractable. So if we're gonna have a conversation, let's put our phones away. We adopt new norms and manners, just by the way, like we did with cigarettes in the previous generation. We could talk about that, how we did that. And then we adopt new technology to fix the last generation of technology. So you see, even today, our phones are built with features that help us use them less. Apple screen time, Google well-being. Can you name even one other media company that helps you limit the use of the product? Does the New York Times say, hey, news junkie, can you please get a life? No. Does CNN do that?

SPEAKER_07 34:09

That would hit hard.

SPEAKER_03 34:11

Does the BBC do that? Does uh Fox News does anybody, does any does any product say, hey, does does the baker making croissants in Paris say, eh, you've had too much croissants? Maybe actually they wouldn't. So the the the point here is that I don't think it's up to the product makers within certain limitations. Children, we absolutely need protection for children. Agreed. But I want to live in a society where I can make these choices. And so it's up to me to learn how to use them responsibly.

SPEAKER_00 34:40

Aaron Powell Basically, we look at what we can control. That's right. Even if there might be people who are intentionally trying to hijack our attention. That's true.

SPEAKER_03 34:49

That will always happen. And that's the business model of every media company. Every media company. Look, what are we doing right now? We are monetizing people's eyeballs. So we can destruct them to learn about destruction. It's up to them. If you decided I want to listen to this podcast, I'm gaining value, I'm enjoying it, awesome. If you're doing it because you don't want to go do the laundry or be with your kids or you can't stand your husband or wife, that might be a problem. But who who is whose responsibility is it? Is it the responsibility of the creator or is it the responsibility of the consumer? I think in this case, it's it's the responsibility of the consumer. The good thing is, there's so much we can do about it, right? That that for the vast majority of people, it's not that hard. You read my book. It's not that hard. There's four steps. But what you know what's even easier? I can't do anything about this because the idea of restricting my use sounds really bad. So let's blame the government, let's blame the tech companies. They'll do something for me. If you hold your breath, you're gonna suffocate.

SPEAKER_00 35:43

And the person just real quick completely agree.

SPEAKER_03 35:45

The person who's who's really in a bad situation, super demotivated, the problem was before the technology. Nobody steps on a heroin needle and becomes a heroin addict. My grandma stepped on a heroin needle?

SPEAKER_00 35:58

No.

SPEAKER_03 35:59

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 35:59

But my grandma is an example of because I I I understand both of what you're saying, right? And I see where you're coming from as well. And my grandma comes to mind with your specific conversation. She she doesn't know. She can't read indestructible, she she has no idea about these things, and she can she's I see a lot of old people who are addicted to their phones and and technology. And and she actually would be doing going to the temple more. She had a social. She's starting to isolate, and she's like actually really quite active. So I think rather than going into the conversation of like, oh yes, it sucks what it's done to my grandma, maybe tools about how we can. There are people. There are people that might not be able to time box and put it in their calendar and schedule. So I wonder how do we make the lives of, you know, we have an aging population in some countries. How do we like make the lives of this population equally meaningful, despite the fact that they have less control than you and I do over their time? Because they also matter.

SPEAKER_03 37:04

Yeah, absolutely. I think it's about getting these tactics out there to as many people as possible. So the reason I wrote this book, which you can buy for you know just a few bucks after five years of hard work and research to scale these these insights, is I think I think actually people can do this. I think anybody, it doesn't matter your socioeconomic condition, doesn't matter your age, doesn't matter your geography. Why can't we plan our day? Children plan their days, right? Like anybody can say, it doesn't have to be down to the second, right? But you can say, you know what? Going to the temple is important to me. You know, that this is how a lot of what I learned, and this is a big part of my what's that?

SPEAKER_00 37:41

You need to meet my grandma.

SPEAKER_03 37:43

Why?

SPEAKER_00 37:43

It won't work. It won't just be you know, it's like it's there's a sudden point I think old people reach where they're just like, I know better.

SPEAKER_03 37:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 37:50

I've lived life. And they'll tell me what to do. And I guess that's the consequence. Yeah, that's the consequence.

SPEAKER_03 37:54

So it's just it's uh it's a And frankly, honestly, like to take a step back, this stuff doesn't live in a vacuum. Like, if we didn't have the technologies, if uh uh all the phones disappeared tomorrow, what would people be doing with their time? What have people always been doing with their time? Would we go back to reading Shakespeare and Chaucer? No. We would watch sports, we would gamble, we would gossip, we would waste our time doing all kinds of other things. I mean, I I grew up in Central Florida. Is, you know, what does everybody everybody comes to Florida? Why? To retire and play golf. So you're telling me that uh hitting a ball into a tiny little hole on the other side a hundred yards away or whatever, that's somehow morally better than watching a YouTube video? That's a very funny way of describing a sport.

SPEAKER_00 38:44

I mean, okay, but you mentioned something that I think is is important to come back to at the start, which was okay, once we that father, right, who's escaping something, and just like what you're saying, all these people would have found a distraction nonetheless. How do we deal with that discomfort? Because we're typically going away from something. Right. How do you know what that something is? And how do you actually deal with it at its root so that it's not coming out in places that you don't want it to be?

SPEAKER_03 39:12

Absolutely. So this is the most important first step. So what you need are tools to deal with that discomfort that lead you towards traction rather than trying to constantly escape it with distraction. So there's over a dozen different techniques that I've I've come across over the years that I put in the book. And uh I'll give you a couple just to so something so something everybody can take away. Uh some of my favorites that I use almost every single day. One is the 10-minute rule. And the 10-minute rule says that you can give in to any distraction in 10 minutes. So whether it's checking your phone, whether it's email, whether it's smoking that cigarette, whether it's that chocolate cake, if you're on a diet, whatever the case might be, you can do it. You can do it. You're a grown-up, you can do whatever you want. But you choose to do it in 10 minutes. Now, that's very powerful for a few reasons. The main reason is that pretty much anyone out there can wait 10 minutes for those things.

unknown 40:04

Right?

SPEAKER_03 40:05

And if that's too long, make it five minutes, make it two minutes. What you want to do is to show yourself that, yeah, I waited 10 minutes. So this happens to me, by the way, almost every day when I write. Writing is really hard. I've written three three books now, uh, thousands of articles. It's all I want to do is check the news or stock prices or sports scores or anything but the writing. But when I'm writing, that's what I said I'm gonna do. So when I feel that internal trigger of, oh, I just wanna go check that thing, what do I do? I set a timer for 10 minutes, and now I have a choice to make. I can either get back to the task at hand, get back to the writing, or I can do what's called surfing the urge. Surfing the urge acknowledges that these emotions, that these uncomfortable sensations, they're just like waves. They crest and they subside. But in the moment, that's not how we feel. When we feel bored, I feel like I'm always gonna be bored. When I'm lonely, I feel like I'm always gonna be lonely. When I'm when I'm uh uncertain, I feel like I want to snack or something. Right, I feel like it's always gonna be there, but that's never the case. It's it's just an impulse. In fact, all of this is impulse control. That's all it is. That is the skill, impulse control. And so what you're doing is realizing that these sensations they crest and they subside, and so you have to ride them like a wave, right? Just like a surfer on a wave. So there's many different techniques to surf the urge. Uh one that I use all the time is a personal mantra. Now, you can come up with your own mantra, you can steal mine, I'll share mine with yours. So so when I set the timer for 10 minutes, and now for surfing that urge, I I repeat this. I close my eyes and I say, This is what it feels like to get better. This is what it feels like to get better. And just repeating that to myself, just go, I don't say it out loud, because that would be weird. I just say it to myself for just a few seconds, and it's amazing how just reminding myself that I have a belief that somehow this should be pain-free. That this should be this should be easy. And it's one of the biggest, probably the most common objection to my work is this doesn't sound easy. Right? That we have this uh fetish, this obsession that, well, why is why is it difficult? But everything worth having in life is difficult, right? You want a great marriage? It's difficult. It takes work. You want to get in shape, you want to build muscles, live a long time, get healthy? That's difficult. You want to start a business? You guys tell me easy or difficult? Freaking difficult, right?

SPEAKER_07 42:30

Very hard.

SPEAKER_03 42:31

Very hard. And and run in a while of having a marriage. Yeah. So the problem isn't that it's difficult. Yeah, the problem is that we expect it to not be difficult. So by repeating to myself, this is what it feels like to get better.

SPEAKER_00 42:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 42:46

That's the point. The point is it's supposed to be hard. And so when you when you think about people who are really great at things, they always share this common trait of enjoying the struggle, of learning to find a way to release the belief. And this is what my my third book is all about, Beyond Belief, releasing this belief that things have to be a certain way all the time, that it I have to feel a certain way. So by reminding myself that mantra, I find that I can get back to the task at hand. And by the time the clock is up, the 10 minutes have passed, it's okay. I don't I don't feel that urge anymore, I don't feel that impulse anymore. And what what's magical about this is that the 10-minute rule becomes the 12-minute rule, it becomes the 15-minute rule, it becomes the 20-minute rule. And now I have proven to myself I'm not powerless. I have agency, I have control. Look, I just was able to delay this for as long as I said I would.

SPEAKER_00 43:37

And it actually helps because it built this trust muscle in yourself and you consistently start to gain confidence that you actually can deflect any urge because you keep doing it. That's right.

SPEAKER_07 43:47

It's actually very empowering to be able to say no to yourself. Oh yes, huge. Right? Huge. You spoke about making sure that you do what you say. There's such a great danger in breaking the promises that you give to yourself. So true. They are like parasites. That one decision by one decision, you say you're not gonna eat the ice cream, but you just are today. They don't become easier. Yeah. It only becomes harder with time when you have broken your own promise so many times that now it projects everywhere. It's no longer about you anymore, it's about how you see the world. So true yourself. Yeah. How you see. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 44:34

Isn't it ironic though that um people who would never lie to other people, right? The worst put down I can think of is if someone calls you a liar. That's that's actually terrible. You would never want to be known as that kind of person. You would never want your friends to think you're a liar, and yet most of us lie to ourselves every single day. Right? We literally lie to ourselves every single day. We say we're gonna do one thing, and we totally don't do it.

SPEAKER_00 44:59

You are literally changing my life right now in this moment because integrity is so, so, so important to me. It's like my top value. And I never saw that. That's very interesting because well it hurts, but it's also an I'm gonna eat it.

SPEAKER_07 45:15

We see lie as the we see lie as the external to someone. Now I feel the display. And it also connects so it's such a random, interesting thought because you said you say your mantra inside your mind. We actually had a guest on our podcast, and she's also a writer, and she wrote a book, Say It Out Loud. And she is known for actually saying these things out loud because we as a society we have made it seem that it's weird to say something out loud. If I sing, it's normal, but if you say it's not normal. That's a good point. It's interesting how we think saying something out loud is weird.

SPEAKER_03 45:52

Yeah, right? You know what? Maybe the fact that I say it to even to you guys. Yeah, it also makes it. Yeah, yeah, interesting. I like it.

SPEAKER_00 46:01

You mentioned in your book, oh my god, this was this was a moment where I was like, this is so genius. You talked about putting a hundred dollar bill. Verdict. Putting a hundred dollar bill on your like desk or something. Um, and that was a price packed. Right. Can you tell us more about it? Because like it was just so genius.

SPEAKER_03 46:22

Sure, sure, sure. So um I'll I'll uh back up a second. This is uh step four.

SPEAKER_00 46:29

Okay. Okay, so step three first.

SPEAKER_03 46:31

I well, I I want people to know that these steps have to be in order. So if you listen to what I'm about to tell you and you do this first, it will not work. Okay, so don't do that. Make sure you do the steps in order. So step number one, master internal triggers. That's the most important step. If you don't do that, none of the like nothing I preach, nothing anyone else preaches will work unless you have tools ready to go to deal with those internal triggers.

SPEAKER_00 46:54

Such as the 10-minute rule and everything.

SPEAKER_03 46:55

Yeah, there's a dozen other different things that you need to do to be able to turn those uncomfortable internal triggers into traction rather than distraction. So that's the first most important step. Then we talked about making time for traction, right? Knowing what you're going to do. You can't call something a distraction unless you know what it's distracting you from. Step number three is where we hack back the external triggers. So that is where we start dealing with all the pings, the dings, the rings. That definitely has a place. Step four is the packs, preventing distraction with pacts. You have to do it last. If you don't do the other steps first, it won't work. But if you've done those, this is a great fail-safe. It's the firewall against distraction. Uh now, a pact is a pre-commitment device. It's when we decide in advance uh how to make sure we don't go off track. Okay? So one of those is a price pact. And for me, one of my biggest struggles uh with distraction was that I constantly had this value in my life of that that health is very important. I think a lot of people share that. You know, when you ask them, what's important to you? Oh, health, health. Just you know, that's what you pray for every year. You know, all the time. I just wish I, you know, this is gonna I I want to stay healthy. That's the most important thing. But was I living that value? No. I in fact, I used to be clinically obese, not just fat. I used to be actually clinically obese. Wow. I I've always hated exercise. Can you look at this makeup? I cannot show my own.

SPEAKER_00 48:14

I feel like I need to put the picture up.

SPEAKER_03 48:17

I'll show it to you. Um and so what what changed for me was that when I when I was writing in Distractable, you know, I always struggled with with my weight, I've always struggled with wanting to exercise, but not actually doing it. And after I had done the other three steps, the the pact with myself was called the burn or burn technique. And the burn or burn technique goes like this that uh I have uh in my dresser uh every morning, there's a calendar, it's a paper calendar there. And on that calendar is taped to today's date a crisp, fresh $100 bill. And every day I have a choice to make. I can either burn some calories. So for me, it's every day that I'm at home. If I'm traveling, the rule doesn't happen uh by choice. I decided in advance, so it's okay, it's still traction. But every day that I'm at home, I can either burn some calories, go for a walk, go for a swim, go to the gym, burn, do 20 push-ups, burn some kind of calories that day, or I have to burn the money. So there's a bic lighter right on the on the dresser drawer, right above it, right next to the calendar, there's a bic lighter. I have to set the money on fire. Now, I've never burned the money. Why have I never burned the money? I just do the push-ups. I go on the walk, I go to the gym because my personal integrity is worth more than just doing the work. So just do it. But it's enough of a reminder there to make that pact that there's some kind of financial impact to not doing the behavior. Another example, uh, when I came across this technique back when I was writing Indistractable, was uh, you know, classic writer, I thought I had writer's block, which by the way doesn't exist. It's it's totally a limiting belief. Then I read about this technique about you know the these packs, these price packs, and I went to my friend Mark. We used to co-write together, and I told him, I said, look, if I don't finish my book by this deadline, I think it was January 1st, I told him, if I don't finish the book by January 1st, I'm going to give you $10,000. Right? Do you think I gave him the $10,000? Do you think I finished my book? Of course I did. I'm not gonna give him $10,000. I finished the freaking book. So as he trying to delay you by sending you texts on the 10 to the book. Don't do it, don't do it. We literally shook hands on this and he said, I'm gonna hold you to it. I'm gonna steal that manuscript. You have to finish it. So it's amazing if you think about it. By the way, this is the most effective smoking cessation technique in history. It's more effective. They've done this study where uh it's more effective than nicotine patches, it's more effective than any of the chantics, any of the drugs, any of the techniques that help people quit smoking was much less of a bet. It was a $150 bet. And then they took a urinalysis to make sure that they that people were honest about this. More effective for this super addictive substance, nicotine. Oh my god, it's so hard to stop smoking. Turns out if people made a bet, very, very high quit rate, right? Because they didn't want to have that financial impact. Turns out, however, most effective, hardest to recruit for, really hard to get people to try and do this. You know why? Because people know it's gonna work. Yeah, and the fear of quitting. But how ridiculous is that? Because we would rather pay a personal trainer and lose the thousands of dollars to pay a personal trainer to tell us basically what we know to do in the gym. Right? Do this, do this, eat right. We know what to do, but we'd rather have somebody that we give the money to and it's burned already. Like the money's gone when you pay a personal trainer. Not the personal trainers are bad. I've had personal trainers that are fantastic. But isn't that funny that we would rather pay somebody, lose the money for sure, rather than just doing the behavior ourselves, in which case, you know, taking this kind of bet with a friend, and we get to keep the money.

SPEAKER_00 51:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 51:56

Right?

SPEAKER_00 51:56

It's kind of like you do it for accountability. Yeah. Even with a trainer.

unknown 52:00

Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_07 52:00

I I wonder in in this case. By the way, shout out to our personal trainers. Yeah, I know. Bless them. We we take trainers to check our form. Because we have a bit of injury problems all the time. I'm not dog.

SPEAKER_03 52:15

Yeah, I know I'm not sure. I understand the argument. Yeah, and you can you can substitute this for any kind of accountability person. Dietician or whatever, it can be anything. We pretty much already know what to do, and yet we would rather pay someone else to make sure we do it versus making a bet with somebody, in which case we we actually do the behavior and we get our money back.

SPEAKER_07 52:34

Yeah. So you so you we we were on health. And in this case, I I would want to ask how do you have a conviction towards your traction when things don't work your way? So, to give you an example, we've been staying very strong, but it's frustrating. We have gone through a big change of health in our lives. Like big focus in our lives became health, diet, we have a private chef, we have trainers going to the gym and all these things. And yet we keep on getting sick and get problems with health. And so at the moment, like I don't want to speak for you, but for me, I still have the drive. I still feel like okay, I'm gonna carry on no matter what. And you obviously right now are doing something. I still have the drive. But there is a point in somebody's life when they have been focused and they have been following that no distractions, I'm gonna going there, but the world is not giving back what they expect. In that case, how does the person defer? Am I on the right track, or maybe this is not for me?

SPEAKER_00 53:54

Is there a downside to this um super organized life? Because you've been living it for so many years.

SPEAKER_03 54:01

I don't actually see it as super organized. It's not I don't think it's as rigid.

SPEAKER_00 54:05

Because you also plan your flexibility, right? Because I do that now.

SPEAKER_03 54:09

I think if we zoom out a bit, let's let's go with a 30,000-foot view here. What is this all for? What is all this self-help advice and optimization? What are we talking about here? It's not about accomplishing certain things, it's not about certain bank accounts, it's not about check boxes and awards. Like that it's great, but that's not what it's about. It's at least for me personally, why I do what I do, is that I am trying to build a life that I can look back on without regret, or to minimize regret. There will always be regret, but to minimize regrets. And to do that, I have to be thoughtful about how I spend my time. Uh, that doesn't mean I'm always going to be right, that uh the way I spent my time, maybe I, you know, start a business and then didn't work out, or maybe I do this. But if the point was that I did it with intent, it's what I wanted to do, versus adopting beliefs that somebody else put in my head, or society put in my head, expectations that others want of me. And I've we do this throughout our life, or the fact that we homeschooled my daughter, or that my wife and I are cross religion and ethnicities, and we did all kinds of crazy things. Started three businesses. We've definitely bucked what society tells you you're supposed to do many, many times. I know you guys do the same. So I look at my calendar for the week ahead, every Sunday night, and I say, How would the person I want to become spend their time? How much time would that person spend reading? How much time would that person spend with their daughter? How much time would that person spend with their wife? How much time would they spend writing? How much time would they spend in the gym? How much time would they spend with friends? And there will always be a trade-off. I'm not going to be able to do everything. That's the point of a time box calendar, is because of that constraint, it means if I want to put time into this, I'm going to have to not put time into that. That's how you minimize regret.

SPEAKER_07 55:48

This is a very powerful perspective on your book. For whatever reason, like, because everyone has their own interpretation of the writer's artist's creation. Like I took your book a little more big picture. And so to hear you explain this in the weekly manner, it's it's giving a new perspective that you always have uh authority of. Like you can plan your week, right? And you see what worked out and you review and then you come back to the city.

SPEAKER_00 56:20

And I really like the scientist outlook as well, because it's like to you and to most people, it's like when we look the fact that we're still alive means we can keep experimenting. That's right. And so if we found out that if the hypothesis in your case was when I achieve enough money to retire, I'm gonna be happy, is not true, then you get to create a new hypothesis and cause correct, and that's beautiful.

SPEAKER_03 56:44

That's right. I know. And by the way, you're you're never gonna be satisfied, I don't think.

SPEAKER_00 56:47

Like fully. Really? Aren't you satisfied? You're married and you are happy and you have I think I'm I'm more at peace than I've ever been before.

SPEAKER_03 56:56

I think I want less in a way. Like I don't, I don't, like, it's not that I want less, it's that I want less. Like I don't feel like as lacking.

SPEAKER_00 57:08

Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_03 57:08

I don't feel lacking anymore at all.

SPEAKER_00 57:10

And what's the difference to you between peace and and um satisfaction?

SPEAKER_03 57:14

I I I yeah, I'm not satisfied. I I want to do more. I don't feel like I need to have more. I don't feel like I need to like check out the stuff.

SPEAKER_00 57:20

You want to keep doing like moving the needle, but you don't need to achieve something to feel my e mm, you know, I have a book launch coming up in in about 90 days.

SPEAKER_03 57:30

It's there's a lot to do. There's a lot of stress. In March 2026. Yeah. So there's a lot to do. But uh if I honestly, like when when I started praying recently, we can talk about that as well for part of my new book, uh Beyond Belief. And what I pray for, honestly, is continuation, not acceleration, not a new level is just how do I maintain how do I yeah, how do I keep this path? And I know things will be taken away, my health is eventually going to degrade, like people in my life will die. I know bad things are going to happen. It's to be expected. But I think with this new mindset that I've adopted, uh I I am more at peace than I've ever been. Uh understanding those powers of belief and expectations, not expecting the world to conform to me, that I need to use my beliefs as a lens on the world so that I can get out of it what I'm looking for, which is a state of mind.

SPEAKER_00 58:23

What got you back into into praying?

SPEAKER_03 58:26

Singapore, actually, funny enough. I never was into prayer. Actually, no, that's not true. When I was very young, uh my parents were going through through a very difficult period and they were close to divorce, and I still remember them screaming at each other. Uh my family had moved to America. My parents got scammed out of their life savings because they barely spoke the language, and uh they literally lost almost everything. We had to almost go back. Uh Are you the only child? No, uh youngest of three boys. And uh but my uh my brothers are much older, seven years and ten years older than I was. And I do remember when I was very young, I would I would pray. And then I kind of gave it up because I thought, uh, I don't really believe in the supernatural and who am I talking to? I'm talking to nobody, so what's the point? And then with Beyond Belief, with this next book that I I finished since coming out in March, uh, I started researching how powerful prayer is, even if you don't have faith. And that blew my mind.

SPEAKER_04 59:25

I love that.

SPEAKER_03 59:26

That you don't have to believe in the supernatural for prayer to be incredibly powerful if you do it right. Okay. And so here's what I did. I'm giving you a sneak peek. I'm not supposed to do this because my publisher is not is telling me not to do this until the book comes out. I'll give you a sneak peek. So there's a chapter in the book uh about why prayer works even without faith. And uh I went to here in Singapore, I think it's the only place I could have done it, I went to visit five religious leaders with the same exact question, which was, you know, I read all I had read all about this research, amazing scientific literature about how powerful prayer is, and I wanted those benefits.

SPEAKER_06 1:00:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:06

But as someone who has been secular for so long and I don't have any supernatural faith, can I still pray? And so I went to each one of these. I went to a rabbi, an imam, a swami, a monk, and a priest. Sounds like a joke, right? Yeah, it does actually.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:22

What happens when you put into a sand? Walk into a bar, exactly.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:26

Yeah. And I went to each one of these five religious leaders and I asked them, how do I pray even when I have uncertainties about God? And that's that that's what this chapter is all about. Each one of them telling me, here's what you can learn, here's what you can learn from prayer. And it changed my life because now I pray. So we need to just believe in a lot of stuff. Like when you guys got married, you don't know if it's gonna work out. Yeah, you believe. You want to believe it's gonna work out because that's beneficial for you. It serves you to have that belief. Do you know it's a fact? No, but it serves you. And so we can do that about all kinds of things in our life. We can it turns out that that having the right beliefs help us live longer. It turns out that uh having uh a positive view of aging increases your lifespan more than quitting smoking, more than diet, more than exercise, seven and a half extra years you get if you have a positive view on aging. Thank you.

SPEAKER_07 1:01:25

I always say I live at least until the hundred. So there you go. So that is incredibly important.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:29

Yeah. So so it when it comes to relationships, when it comes to our lifespan, when it comes to pain management, all of these things can be manipulated based on the beliefs we choose for ourselves. That's so that's a sneak peek of that. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:43

It sounds exciting.

SPEAKER_07 1:01:44

Of course, you're working on something that's gonna be incredibly useful. Do the books uh work together?

SPEAKER_03 1:01:51

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:51

Actually, that's that's the third one too, because I know the first one and second one work together.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:55

Yeah. Well, so the the third one is the it is the most different, but I'll tell you the genesis of it. Uh the genesis of it was that uh so I make office hours available, so anybody can call me.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:06

I know, that's so cool. Yeah, like I could come on.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:10

Maybe we could have a conversation sometime. I don't know. So anybody can call if they've read one of my books, they can ask me any question. And so I would get these calls every once in a while that sounded like this. They would call, and by the way, people had to wait sometimes a few months to talk to me because you know the spots flip fill up. And they would say, um, hey, uh Nier, I I read your book. Uh, I really liked it, but it didn't work. Didn't work. Tell me more. You know, it's five years I spent on it. It worked for me, it worked for thousands of people. Tell me what what happened. How did step one go? You know, master internal triggers. Step one, you know what? Uh I didn't do step one. Okay, okay, no problem. I get it. Maybe you skip, skip two. Uh, make time for traction. So how had that go? Make time for traction, you know, turning your values into time, all that stuff, time boxing. How'd that go? Yeah, uh, I read that part too. I read it, I read it. I didn't do that either. And so after a while, you know, I'd hear a few of these calls, not all of them, maybe like one in 20 or so. Yeah, I started thinking, man, like what am I missing here? What's going on? What's wrong with people? Are they stupid? And then I realized, wait a minute, no, I'm stupid. Because I do this all the time. Like I have hundreds of books from authors who telling me to do stuff that I don't do. Or I've hired consultants and coaches and I haven't taken their advice. Like I do this too. And so the genesis of the book was why is it that despite knowing what to do, the behavior, right? Here's what you should do, here's the benefit, here's why you should do it. Why don't we do it? Right? What's missing? And what's missing is the belief. That I call this the motivation triangle. You need behavior. What do I do? The benefit, why should I do it? That's classical economics, right? I pay you a salary to do this behavior, that's it. But there's something missing. Because if it was that easy, we'd all have six packs and be millionaires. We don't do it because either you don't believe in the authority, you don't believe in the person going to give you the benefit, you don't trust your employer, you don't trust the advice, whatever. Or much more common is you have limiting beliefs and you don't trust yourself.

unknown 1:04:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:09

Right? I won't be able to do this. I'm probably gonna fail, it's failed before. I have a hang up, I have trauma, I have this, I have that. That's why I can't. That's the missing link. Was this base of the triangle of how important beliefs are to sustain motivation?

SPEAKER_00 1:04:23

Were you allowed to tell us this already?

SPEAKER_03 1:04:25

No.

SPEAKER_07 1:04:28

I just love how you hacked life.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:30

I know.

SPEAKER_07 1:04:30

Your life is hacked in a way where you just need something and you're gonna write a book about it and learn from it and become better as a human being. Okay, this is what a system for life, right?

SPEAKER_03 1:04:40

Honestly, this is uh this is the master unlock, and you can get paid to do it.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:45

Like, that's amazing.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:48

So the the the sort, but I think I'm very different from most authors. Most authors, like academics or whatever, they know what they want to write about, and then they write about it, right? Like they know the knowledge. I hate that. It's so boring.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:02

I'm looking for the answer.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:03

I get about problems, and uh first thing you know, when I have a problem, I'll talk to my wife, I'll talk to friends, I'll read some books about it. Hopefully, I'll find the answer. That's most of the time. But every once in a while, I have a problem, I can't figure out. And like I've tried everybody's advice, it's not nothing's changing. And so that's when I say, okay, let me start with the, you know, I'm I'm very data-driven. I want to see the studies. I, you know, every all my books have pages, 30 pages of citations to peer-reviewed uh studies. So I want to see the evidence. I start from those first principles. Like we started with what's the definition of distraction? Let's get all let's really understand what we're talking about here. And and then I build up to a better understanding to solve this problem. But I always write about my problems, I got lots of problems, so I'll never run out of books to write.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:41

Yeah, and it helps all of us who have similar problems. So thank you very much. My pleasure. Um, we are desirable, so I would be remiss if I didn't ask you because you have been married for 25 years and you said that you are so in love. And that really touched me at the start. So I I want to know what you're doing. Not Just the time boxing and the schedule syncing, but are there certain values that you and your wife have? Are there certain things that you observe about your relationship that you can see that most relationships don't have? You have been raised by parents that were screaming at each other, and then you've gone on to build a relationship that's really successful. 25 years in, you're in love. What are you doing differently? And what can other couples that you've noticed are living life differently do?

SPEAKER_03 1:06:37

That's a great question. Uh I appreciate that question because that is a question that people who are struggling don't want to ask. And even though I see we see a lot, I mean my wife and I talk about this all the time, where we don't we can see it plain as day in other couples, and we've predicted 100% accuracy when relationships won't work out. Uh so far, we we've our hit rate's pretty good.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:01

Well, and it can be the Gottmans now.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:03

Yeah, no, actually, a lot of it is the Gottman stuff. Like, for example, uh I think is it a Gottman trait about criticizing publicly?

SPEAKER_01 1:07:10

Yes. Oh, at all. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:12

Like, why why do people do that? Like, why would you it I'm not saying don't talk about your problems. Absolutely talk about your problems. One thing I think is very important. My wife and I always had this rule that we only talk about problems when they are so important that this has to be talked about. We don't nitpick. You mean with each other? With each other, right? That if we don't talk about this, this is really going to materially impact our relationship. So a lot of the stuff that I think used to bother me about my wife, if she did this, I I I've it's my problem. It's my perception. It's my belief that when she does that, it's irritating. That's a really good thing. Yeah. Like if it's certainly if it's something that can't be changed, why bring it up? Right. Like so you know, the stuff my parents would criticize, we don't I we that we don't criticize. Um uh that's different than avoidance. Yeah, I think it's raising it to a standard of does this really matter? Like, yeah, is this something that if we don't fix, this will cause a potential divorce someday? Like that's really kind of the standard that we need to talk about this stuff or we are going to drift apart. And we have talked about lots over the year that's been in that category, and we've we've gotten better and better about it. So I think that's that's a big one. But then never criticize in front of other people. I I think that's probably the most common thing I see from other couples that drives us crazy is they'll they'll do it in front of others.

SPEAKER_07 1:08:38

Yeah, it's so I mean it's very you know what surprises me about it is that I don't think people realize that when you talk badly about the person you decided to spend your life with, it speaks badly of you. That's your choice.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:51

If you're in there, they can hear it.

SPEAKER_07 1:08:54

If you think that of them and you choose to stay, then what what's up?

SPEAKER_03 1:08:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:59

I do see it a lot too, actually.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:01

What I love, I saw with you too, is that you've physically touched, you know, you reached over a lot. Yeah, we are touchers. It's it's one you know why you're touchers? Because you don't criticize each other in public either. Because if you're constantly reminding people around why you suck, and uh look, he, you know, isn't it funny how he's this and looking like the stuff that you hear other couples saying all the time, you don't want to touch that person. You don't want to like, you know, you don't want that, it's it's it erects that barrier because it's cold, right?

SPEAKER_07 1:09:26

It's prickly when someone says those things. Where you're like, oh, you suck.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:31

Nitpicking and like yeah, there's this like bickering that happens that I've seen.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:36

I think that's a big I can think a lot more things not to do than things to do. No, it's okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:40

We can reverse engineer it, but I think that's a big one.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:42

I think that's one of the Gottman's like four horsemen of it. Yeah, that's a that's a big one. I'm trying to think what what are what are some of yours?

SPEAKER_00 1:09:48

What are your well we're we're new, you know, we've been together six years.

SPEAKER_07 1:09:53

One lesson that's been massive with this podcast now that we've done so many guests, is that almost every single time we talk to people when it comes to like fixing and working in relationships, they always start from themselves. So like we we we tend to think and believe, okay, you as a couple go to therapy and work on it together. But I think that's like that's if I was writing your book, I would put this as step two. Because step one has to come from like what is it about me that's bringing problems into this relationship? And when two individuals come with that mentality, everything comes so much easier. Because we had a we had a rough start in our relationship. The first two, three years, we even rescheduled our wedding two years, we were ready to get married, and it it really, like in my individual way, I just know my mistake was how I was forming thoughts.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:48

Yeah, it was too much male ego. Yeah. I'll give you okay, I'll give you a few. Wow, you sparked a few things that I'm I'm reflecting now in our relationship. One is I I agree with that. I think um to be a great partner, you have to be a great person. I think that really helps. But but two or one plus one equals more than two. That I think where a good marriage becomes great is where people let themselves change because of their partners. I am a million times better because of Julie. I'm a better person. I've and I and and I I I I wouldn't maybe say this in front of her so loud, but I think she's better too. Like, I'm sure she would agree. Yeah, I would enforce that on her. I'm sure she would agree. But I think I've brought out the the best in her, and she's absolutely, I know for a fact she's brought out the best in me. And I think there's something, I think that to some people sounds weird. Like you can't let people change you. You gotta be you, right? There's no you.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:46

There's no you. There's no you. What is you because you picked everything up from society? That's right.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:51

That's exactly right. And so this is where I think I I can't speak from the woman's side. I can tell you from a man's side. We need to be kept in check. I think a man needs another person, in this case, a woman, right? Very few buddies will really tell you the truth. We need a woman to help us become better. The problem is that for some women will hear that and say, Yeah, he's right. I'm gonna tell my man why he can get better.

SPEAKER_06 1:12:16

No.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:17

That's not the way you do it. The way you make a man better is not to criticize his faults, you praise his val his virtues. True. That's how you make a man better. Absolutely. You say, you know, honey, when when you did that, that was amazing. Yeah, you we we that was, man, that made me just so proud of you. That's how you make a man better. Yeah. It's through that positive reinforcement, not the negative reinforcement. There may negative reinforcement, you know, we want to we want to make a lot of people.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:40

And you want to get defensive or something. Exactly.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:42

Exactly. Not that there isn't a of course, I think there is a place for feedback. For for feedback with that very, very high bar we talked about earlier. Uh, but I think a wonderful spouse is the one who changes behavior and brings out the best in a person by by through praise.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:57

Everything you're saying also is showing me the importance of respect. Like the way you speak to each other, the standard that you've set as a relationship for what matters, what doesn't, that respect needs to happen. And I think it's the lack of respect that allows people to put each other down in public, for example, right? It's it's that peace. And um, I forgot the author, but there's this book called Love and Respect. And it is actually based um on Christian faith, but the the lessons are so applicable to even those of us who are not Christians, and the concept is that men need respect and women need love more. And so for women, we're constantly wanting to give love to our men, thinking they're gonna give us love back. But it's actually men need respect more and that praise more of like what have you you've done something that's so great, and then women need love more and attention more in that sense. So knowing that difference is also nice, but respect is something that I hug. No, that's really good.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:53

I I think there's uh I heard something that uh was was devastating about how uh we know for women on Mother's Day, they get flowers every year. Men never get flowers. Yeah, you know when men get flowers? When they don't dead.

SPEAKER_07 1:14:08

Oh no.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:09

I buy you flowers. But I know, I know. Of course. No, but you're right.

SPEAKER_07 1:14:15

Men don't need praise. Because men shut up. We as men, we're just like, I don't need it. But inside there is a little we we don't need the flowers.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:23

What we need is honey, that was sexy. Or honey, that was awesome. Or wow, I'm so proud of you. Like you did it, that you know, or or man, you you took out the trash, but I didn't know. Amazing, thank you. Like that means so much to me.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:35

Yeah, like that means that's also easy to do, I think.

SPEAKER_07 1:14:38

Which brings this like common knowledge, and everyone knows about it, but we so often forget about it. And even in our relationship, like it really is the small little daily things that make the relationship and not the you know, let me take you out tonight for like let's dress up and have a beautiful night. It's important, but actually, what is really important is how we show up every day. Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:01

I I think another secret to our marriage uh has been walking.

SPEAKER_05 1:15:05

Walking.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:06

Walking. So we schedule. I think this is this is uh huge for us. One is scheduling the time to be together. Whenever we find that we have more fights or we're not, I mean, we today we really rarely, really, rarely fight. Uh we never fight, actually. We sometimes we disagree, but we never ever fight. Uh where we find feel more distant from each other is when we just don't have time together. And so when when I wrote Indistractable and shared this with Julie, ever since we have time on the calendar. And I think that's such a basic thing that most people don't do. They think, well, if we love each other, we'll just find the time.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:41

When uh when you have kids and obligate, you don't you become ships in the night. And that's awful, right? And that's why people have affairs, because they're closer with their co-workers than with their spouse. Because they never spend time together. How do you build a relationship if you don't have that time together? So booking the time in your calendar. So Julie and I have Friday evenings tonight, we're very, very excited. We have our Friday date and we have our Sunday morning walk. Now, why is walking so important? Because women and men, I think, and this is a gross generalization, so I don't want to get in trouble. There are exceptions, there are exceptions. I think when a woman wants to talk, a woman can generally talk to her girlfriends, for example. And you can go out and just look in the world and you'll see this. Girls can get together and have coffee together and sit there for three hours and talk. Sometimes have you ever done that with your guy friends?

SPEAKER_01 1:16:29

We talk about that.

SPEAKER_03 1:16:30

Are you kidding me? That sounds awful.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:33

I know we talk about how different we are.

SPEAKER_00 1:16:35

This sounds terrible. And for us, it's energizing. We leave the conversation more like so energized that we feel ready for the wig.

SPEAKER_03 1:16:45

Like torture to sit there with anybody for hours and just chit-chat. I mean, this was great because it had like a you know, very funny. It's gonna be as a favor for a man.

SPEAKER_07 1:16:54

But like if a friend comes to you and he has like a problem with something and you sit for two hours to change. And it's and it's understood between guys.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:04

It's like either you're busy, you're going into business, you're getting involved. Really big deal. Someone died. How do we bond? We do stuff. Yeah, we do stuff. Activities.

SPEAKER_07 1:17:13

We go to see.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:14

Walking. Walking. So when when you we go on walks, uh I will keep a list of things that that I want to talk about with Julie. Julie will keep a list of things that we need to talk about.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:24

So you give an ongoing list about things in the calendar.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:27

Right. Like it's not big stuff. Sometimes it's big stuff, but most of the time it's like, oh, what about this uh your parents are coming here? What about the phone?

SPEAKER_00 1:17:32

Oh, you all love it.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:33

So we put that in the calendar invite.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:35

Like an agenda for any meeting.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:36

It's not it's not serious. It's just like, hey, here's some things that are on my mind. Maybe we can talk about it. Yeah. And while we're walking, it takes care of her side because she has my undivided attention. I'm not on my phone, I'm not thinking about other stuff. I'm just walking. I do the navigating, so I've got something to do, right? Like I've got a mission that I'm on. It's too funny. I have this golden. I have the same thing. And she doesn't mind it. But but so it gives me a little bit, and and I think there's orders of closeness. Okay, so one order of closeness is when you can do that, like, okay, here's the agenda, honey. We've got these things that we need to cover. Let's let's divide our responsibilities, okay? It's problem solving. Awesome. Walking takes care of that. Then there's the next level. The next level of a relationship is when you can go on a walk, talk about whatever you want to talk about, and you don't have to close any loops. That's just for the joy of being together. That's when you're like, wow, I love being with this person.

SPEAKER_07 1:18:35

When we first started dating, I was so impressed. She would walk five kilometers in heels.

SPEAKER_00 1:18:40

Yeah, I used to wear heels those days, not anymore. Yeah, but not anymore. This is the reason why I still have him back now.

SPEAKER_03 1:18:48

Okay, so maybe get to the that's and we I mean we do we walk for three hours.

SPEAKER_00 1:18:54

Yeah. And it's it's amazing. And so each time it's a new place, sorry, love.

SPEAKER_03 1:18:58

Uh sometimes we'll like so that's all we did in Japan. Like when we were in Tokyo for an entire week. That's what you're navigating walking. Oh yeah, Japan's amazing. We'll be like, oh, we want to go to that temple or that market or that thing, and we know it's gonna take us an hour and a half there, and maybe we'll take an hour and a half route back. Amazing. Uh and you get exercise. Like you're doing so many things at once. It's great.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:15

Would you say you do similar things with your daughter?

SPEAKER_03 1:19:19

With my daughter, we do things. Um it's actually a mix. Like I have with my daughter, uh, we have what we call surf and turf. Because we we picked up surfing here in Singapore. They have this In Singapore.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:32

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 1:19:33

It's uh it's an artificial wave. Okay. Oh, okay. Okay. Oh my gosh, so the ocean. I know, I'm like in Singapore. No, not that kind of so so uh we we do something, we'll go surfing, and we'll have like uh a meal and chit-chat as well. Awesome. Yeah, it's kind of a mix.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:47

Yeah, I see the intentionality that you've put into your relationships, and I really, really value that. Thanks.

SPEAKER_07 1:19:53

I would love to try the weekly planner with for us.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:56

I know, I feel like we we don't sing. We keep the camera.

SPEAKER_07 1:19:59

We don't do we we used to have our uh monthly chats, we would call it, and it it's so funny. We we came up with this at times and our relationship was quite uncomfortable sometimes. And so when we had this like, oh, last Sunday of the month, we have a talk. Both of us already week before we were so heavy. Oh, you know, because like the talk we're gonna talk about. You know, I'm avoidant, she doesn't want to go for this, this, and that. And we dropped it, and I feel like we're at the point in our lives right now when we can so easily have problems.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:36

Yeah, I feel like the more regular, the more often you do it. Like the fact that it was a monthly talk, yeah, it's too long of a bit.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:42

How often do you go for a walk? Once a week, every Friday?

SPEAKER_03 1:20:45

So Friday is our long walk in the evening, and we do a dinner at the end. We'll have like a date, dinner, and then Sunday mornings.

SPEAKER_07 1:20:51

It's beautiful. I love it.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:53

Do it.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:54

At some point, maybe your fourth book's gonna be on relationships. We're thinking about actually making a book about walking.

SPEAKER_05 1:20:59

Yeah, how to walk your final book.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:02

Walking will make all your relationships.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:04

You know why I can't write a book about relationships is because there's instantly if you write a book about something, then everybody's looking for, oh, you know, who's cheating and who's you know like oh tell us about it.

SPEAKER_07 1:21:12

We had we had an episode. Oh yeah, you must be an episode. It was wild, actually. Two weeks ago, we had an episode with with uh Orion Tarabin, his uh he's a psychologist, clinical psychologist, and he he really caters towards male audience with this like economy of how to date. It's it's more like really thinking type of. Because of the sexual marketplace, yeah, how like women with age they lose value, all these things, okay? But in like a very intellectual way, it's not like putting anyone down or anything, but it attracted so many men to to to the because the video did very well. There's so many comments, it's like I'm subscribing to see when they are going for divorce because this is not gonna they like analyzed how she looks at me or not. She doesn't love me there's no way this guy is gonna be heartbroken. It's just so funny how like that's my perspective of the thing. It was funny.

SPEAKER_01 1:22:08

Okay, I see why you don't want to know.

SPEAKER_07 1:22:09

Yeah, yeah. Oh, they have a relationship podcast. Let's see when they divorce.

SPEAKER_03 1:22:16

Well, no, you gotta prove your critics wrong.

SPEAKER_07 1:22:18

Ah, yeah, for sure. That's not a for infinity because you never they can wait for 20 years, even I would love to ask the final question because we just spend so much like meaningful time on a relationship. How do you see love? Like when you interpret what love is, what is it for you?

SPEAKER_03 1:22:38

Love is measured by the benefit of the doubt. That's my personal philosophy. That how much you love somebody or something is measured by how much grace you give them. Uh, think about a newborn child. When my daughter was born, the minute she was born, uh the doctor let me hold her, and I I uh could take her to to get washed, and I I was the the hospital let me wash her beautiful little again, like choke down. Anyway, I love your relationship with your daughter, like I love it so much. It's just the best, it's just the best. But here's this thing that you love so much, and she literally I remember she fit from here to here. Uh you give that thing so much grace, right? This little human being who is pooping and puking and just sucks time and money and energy from you, and you love it so much. Why? Because you give it complete benefit of the doubt. Anything that thing that that little person does that might irritate or offend or uh rub you the wrong way, perfect grace. Right? You you wouldn't expect a baby to do anything but that because you love it so much. What else could it do? And then somehow when we grow up, we don't give people any more grace. We're all just big babies. Right? And yet when people grow up, oh, uh she looked at me funny, or did you hear her tone, or did you see what he did, or somehow no more grace. Because we we we don't love that person anymore. And so love is measured by the benefit of the doubt. When we really love somebody, we always give them the benefit of the doubt that if they said something that might have rubbed us the wrong way, they they probably had some kind of rationale. Maybe we don't like it, it doesn't mean we have to necessarily like it. But we should always give ourselves that that opportunity to change our perspective, which is very human, very natural to say they did it because they wanted to hurt me, right? That's always our knee-jerk reaction. To I wonder what tools they are working with that made them do that. Right? What limitations are they operating under? They're we're all just babies, right? A baby pukes because they can't do anything else. That's the tools they have. If the tummy is uh upset, they throw up all over you. It's terrible.

SPEAKER_00 1:24:56

They cry because they can't speak.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:57

They cry because they can't speak. That's the tools they have.

SPEAKER_03 1:25:00

So when someone says things that hurt you or uh you don't like, that's the tools they have. Not that we need to love everybody, right? Very few people do we need to love in our lives. Uh, but I think that's to me that's the definition of love. Love is measured by the benefit of the doubt.

SPEAKER_00 1:25:16

That's beautiful. And I see how you it comes back to the topic with the standard that you create for conversations and problems, because you give each other so much grace that you don't need to always have a conversation about everything. Yeah. I love it. Amazing. Thank you so much. I feel like I it's interesting because I read your book, both of us did, thinking that we would get like productivity tools out of it, which we did plenty, thank you. But also, I learned so much about relationships from your book. And it's such a wonderful lens with which we can really live our relationships to the fullest. And also at the end of the conversation, I got to, I feel like I got to meet your family through you. Oh, so that was really special for me. You have to meet them in real life, too. I really would love to. I I think that was just so nice. I got to got to feel your family through you. It was really, really nice.

SPEAKER_03 1:26:07

If you like me, wait till you meet Julie and Jasmine. They're really awesome. I can't wait. Thank you so much for the first time. Thank you so much, Snir.

SPEAKER_05 1:26:13

This feels complete.