Next Level University

3 Questions To Ask To Build More Humility (2033)

• Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros

Share episode

What if being more humble starts with believing in yourself? In this honest and thoughtful episode, Kevin and Alan share three powerful questions you can ask to grow real humility—without falling into self-doubt. They explore the difference between low self-belief and true humility, how challenges shape character, and why balancing confidence with self-awareness matters. Whether you're trying to become a better leader, teammate, or just a better version of yourself, this episode gives you simple tools to think deeper, stay grounded, and keep growing.

Learn more about:
Next Level Group Coaching - https://www.nextleveluniverse.com/group-coaching/
Group 18 - Our first call kicks off on Tuesday, April 15, 2025, at 5 PM EST, and the group runs for three transformative months. Promo Code (30% off): NLULISTENER

_____________________

NLU is not just a podcast; it’s a gateway to a wealth of resources designed to help you achieve your goals and dreams. From our Next Level Dreamliner to our Group Coaching, we offer a variety of tools and communities to support your personal development journey.

For more information, please check out our website at the link below. 👇

Website 💻  http://www.nextleveluniverse.com

_______________________

Any of these communities or resources are FREE to join and consume
Next Level Nation - https://www.facebook.com/groups/459320958216700
Next Level 5 To Thrive (free course) - ​​https://bit.ly/3xffver
Next Level U Book Club - https://bit.ly/3BQBYDr

_______________________

We love connecting with you guys! Reach out on Instagram, Facebook, or via email. We’re here to support you in your personal and professional development journey.

Instagram 📷
Kevin: https://www.instagram.com/neverquitkid/
Alan: https://www.instagram.com/alazaros88/

Facebook ✍
Alan: https://www.facebook.com/alan.lazaros
Kevin: https://www.facebook.com/kevin.palmieri.90/

Email 💬
Kevin@nextleveluniverse.com
Alan@nextleveluniverse.com

LinkedIn ✍
Kevin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevin-palmieri-5b7736160/
Alan: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alanlazarosllc/

_______________________

Show notes:
(3:35) Three questions that build humility
(5:01) Is it humility or low self-belief?
(8:46) Why do hard workouts and suffering build character?
(13:45) The power of knowing what you don’t know
(15:01) Join 10 podcasters growing together. Level up your mindset, habits, and podcast. https://www.nextleveluniverse.com/group-coaching/
(17:22) How humility changes as you grow
(20:14) The truth about setting goals
(23:06) Why humbling moments are good for us
(25:59) Outro

Send a text to Kevin and Alan!

Kevin Palmieri:

There is a great quote about humility by CS Lewis. I believe he wrote Narnia. I've never read the book, I've never seen the movies. I don't want to talk about it. The quote is Humility isn't about thinking less of yourself. It's about thinking of yourself less, and I think it's one of those things where you just have to understand where your overall importance in the grand scheme of things is, and that can be really hard at times especially if you're somebody who has low self-belief.

Alan Lazaros:

I think everyone out there needs to find their people and they're they're absolutely people and they're absolutely not people. And our absolutely people are people with high humility and high work ethic, who have a sincere interest to grow and contribute beyond themselves. Our absolutely not people are people who are entitled, who want huge rewards for minimal effort. Now, one of the most important character traits and I never would have said this in my early 20s or any of that, because I didn't understand the value of it to the extent that I do now humility, an accurate view of one's own importance.

Kevin Palmieri:

Welcome to Next Level University. I'm your host, Kevin Palmieri.

Alan Lazaros:

And I'm your co-host, Alan Lazarus.

Kevin Palmieri:

At NLU, we believe in a heart-driven but no BS approach to holistic self-improvement for dream chasers.

Alan Lazaros:

Our goal with every episode is to help you level up your life, love, health and wealth.

Kevin Palmieri:

We bring you a new episode every single day on topics like confidence, self-belief, self-worth, self-awareness, relationships, boundaries, consistency, habits and defining your own unique version of success.

Alan Lazaros:

Self-improvement in your pocket, every day, from anywhere, completely free.

Kevin Palmieri:

Welcome to Next Level University, next Level Nation today for episode number 2033. Three questions to ask to build more humility, full disclosure. That little cold open you heard took me three times to be able to hammer my part without screwing it up, true or false. You thought I was gonna butcher it at the end of mine. You were close. You were close, I thought you're. You know, occasionally we walk that line where it's like this could go horribly wrong or it could, it could go correctly.

Kevin Palmieri:

I was on a podcast today and we were talking about a great, great podcast. He what are some of the common themes or attributes from people that have been successful that you have coached? Like, what made the biggest difference when you coach someone? And I said humility, by far and above, is the number one thing, a hundred percent. And then we kind of went down that rabbit hole and he said you might not have an answer to this, how do you build humility? And I was like, oh man, also, you sound extremely arrogant when you're talking about how to build humility. I understand it's hard to say like, seriously.

Alan Lazaros:

I think so I feel like what sounds arrogant is totally not on my radar at all. I would say that's accurate yeah, I have no concept whatsoever of what does and doesn't sound arrogant.

Kevin Palmieri:

And again, who knows, maybe it's just me being paranoid, but I essentially was like I don't know that I have it completely figured out. I think you have to do hard things. I think that's super important, but I think at the end of the day, it's just the understanding that you're not that big of a deal all things considered, and not everything and, honestly, most things aren't about you, but we think they're about us because we're seeing things from our perspective. And I gave some other tips and stuff and awareness, I guess.

Kevin Palmieri:

But, when I was thinking about what episode to do today, I thought that we should talk about humility, because I don't know if we've ever really talked about how to actually build it based on our awareness and studies, I guess, and experiences. And I think there's three questions that you can ask yourself that are super powerful. One what am I wrong about? So somebody who is humble wants the actual answer. They don't necessarily just want to be correct, and one of the best questions for that is what am I wrong about? Second one is where do my beliefs come from? So if I have a certain belief about something, it's not very humble of me to assume it is the way if I don't know where that belief came from originally. And then I like this one what can I learn from others? Today? Again, it's very humble to ask people not even ask to absorb lessons from other people.

Kevin Palmieri:

Here is the preface, before we get too deep. There is a fine line between humility and self-deprecation. So if you are somebody who is struggling with self-belief and self-worth, I might ask yourself these questions less than somebody who has high self-belief, because if you feel like you're wrong about everything, I don't know that. The first place I would start is building humility. I would probably start building self-belief. Maybe that's a deeper conversation, but that's my thought.

Alan Lazaros:

Well, early on, when I started coaching people, I would realize we would reverse, engineer the goals and we would get them on track, metrics and habits, and then they would achieve them. And some people would swing the pendulum the other way, who used to be really humble or seem humble from the outside looking in, and then once they achieved things, it would go to their head very quickly and I know you've been guilty of that as well, I certainly have as well but quickly, and I know you've been guilty of that as well. I certainly have as well. But people who I thought were really humble actually just didn't believe in themselves. And then, once they achieve things, sometimes they lose what I thought was humility and when in reality it might have been just self-deprecation or whatever, or just not believing in yourself. So at NLU we have three core values the company core values. I'm on the NLU team dashboard right now and on our mission tab. We have three core values. Number one is growth a deep belief in self-improvement, personal development and being the best version of yourself. Number two is impact a deep belief in helping others reach their potential to achieve their goals and dreams. And number three is humility A deep belief in working hard to earn what you achieve without entitlement. I have been wondering. You don't understand something until you understand the opposite. That's kind of a belief that I have. So what is the opposite of humility? I think it's entitlement. I think the opposite of humility is I deserve by default.

Alan Lazaros:

And I think that there's something I've said in the past called spoiled brat syndrome, and I do believe that in the early days when my stepdad was doing very well economically, we I think that I'll never forget this story we were with some friends and friends of friends, and there's a Three friends of mine that were all part of a friend family. I've said friend 18 times. My mom and stepdad had a couple that they hung out with and that couple had three boys and those boys were like brothers to me at the time. And I'll never forget when we all went to go buy dirt bikes and four wheelers and stuff and I remember sitting there observing them and I had this really visceral moment of wow, they're really fucking spoiled. They were like angry that they couldn't get all of them. They had to like pick only two four wheelers out of the five or whatever. I want that. And I remember thinking, wow, you guys are really fucking spoiled.

Alan Lazaros:

Now again, this is sort of after my stepdad left. He took a lot of the income with him and my life became very different. Very quickly. My mom traded in her BMW for a little Honda Civic. So I went from having a lot to having very little in a very short amount of time, and so I think that created character and humility, and I'm actually grateful for it in hindsight, because when you have everything stripped from you from a young age not only friends and family and extended family, but like money you learn the value of things. Emilia and I were talking last night and we were saying I'm so grateful the furnace went out because it gave us perspective how cold it was when we woke up yesterday. I'm so grateful for heat now because now it's exactly 70 degrees, we have a smart thermostat that I can talk to and just have it be perfect all the time for me. I like suffering because it gives you perspective and I think suffering gives you humility I agree.

Kevin Palmieri:

I agree. I told alan today was the worst workout I've had in years, years because I'm I've crossed the chasm in the diet and it was the worst workout I've had in years, years, because I've crossed a chasm in the diet and it was just my fucking AirPods died. It was terrible. I mean it was just. I told Taryn today. I said I had to use the. Taryn got abducted and if you don't hit a certain amount of reps she doesn't come home. I had to use that more today than in a normal workout and it was just. It was just brutal.

Kevin Palmieri:

But there was a little piece of me. It was like this is good, this is, this is building character, this is now. Again, I'm not saying you have to have that same experience, but I think it's, it's humble to to have a struggle and then say I'm gonna work through this struggle instead of avoiding it. I think that's a very humble. I think that builds humility. But this is the thing. I think it's really hard to talk about humility, because I am in a similar boat where I would know someone who just didn't believe in themselves and it was self-deprecation that they were practicing. It wasn't humility, because I think you have to have a certain level of confidence, to have humility.

Kevin Palmieri:

So I think, confidence has to come first.

Alan Lazaros:

If your self-belief is a 10, this is what I finally figured out. I figured out finally, I think and this is my current awareness I think I figured out why everyone thinks I'm arrogant Not everyone, but why so many people growing up always thought I was arrogant. I had higher self-belief than I did. Humility Makes sense. If I have level 10 self-belief and only level 8 humility, I'm going to come off as level 2 arrogant and I didn't realize that I have to have humility built in the opposite direction of my self-belief, otherwise I won't be centered. We were with someone yesterday, quinton. We talked about him on the last episode. He interviewed you and I. He's very centered, he's very, very high self-belief, but he didn't come off arrogant because because he has built humility in the other direction, because he has built humility in the other direction and he just lived in Japan for a decade and Japan has a very subservient culture, from what I've heard. Again, I don't know, I've not lived there, but I've just Emilia's dad was just there I've been picking the brains of a lot of people. I've always been curious about Japan. To be honest, just that culture is fascinating to me. But at the end of the day, humility is not put yourself down. It's an accurate view of one's own value. No, you're not. You know the best shit since sliced bread, but you're also not nothing. And the other piece of humility too, and this is something that I struggle with constantly.

Alan Lazaros:

I said this to a client not two days ago. I said what you don't know is limitless. What you do know is very limited. And she said well, how do you know so much? And I said just have data points. I said picture, picture a human being. I drew little stick figures. Of course she's shorter than me, so I drew a little stick figure of her. I said picture a cloud above my head with a lot of data points, facts. So gravity is 9.8 meters per second squared. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. Just data, just accurate data, little facts.

Alan Lazaros:

Knowledge I I said deeper understanding is a connections, the connections of that knowledge and the more data points you have that are accurate. 195 countries you know, 40 million people in Canada, 345 in the US, only 27 million in Australia. Different economies the more statistics you have, the more data points you have in the thought bubble have. The more data points you have in the thought bubble and the more data points you have in the thought bubble, the more you can connect the dots. So when I said there's 200 species of dog, I have someone who is a dog and cat expert who has way more data points about dogs and cats than I do, so therefore she has a far deeper understanding. So to one person it's just a dog, to someone else it's a dog who's a Pomeranian Chihuahua, who's 12 pounds, who has an intestinal blockage or whatever, and Tucker is fine, that's. I'm just saying this stuff. So I go to her when we have a problem with our dog because I don't know shit right, or I look it up or whatever.

Alan Lazaros:

That's what knowledge and experience can do, plus reflection, creates wisdom and understanding. Understanding, and that's why I think deeper understanding is the most important thing. But back to humility what you don't know is limitless. I can spend the rest of my life learning and still know nothing compared to what there is to know, and this is what I said to her. I said, however, I've had to realize as I've gotten older, at 36, that the compound effect of my accumulated knowledge and experience and reflection over time, I actually do know a lot compared to other people, and that's been, and that doesn't sound humble, but that is the truth, because over the years I've started to realize like, oh so you like don't really know much, but when in reality it's actually I know a lot apparently, but it's hard for me to think that because when I wake up in the morning I feel like a fucking idiot.

Kevin Palmieri:

No comment, I'm kidding.

Alan Lazaros:

Well, compared to what there is to know I'm not trying to be—that was me being playful, I know Compared to what there is to know, we all know very little. Compared to other people, I do think we know quite a bit, which is just weird for me.

Kevin Palmieri:

Well, I think that's a humble, I don't know.

Alan Lazaros:

Yeah, one of those is I mean, you don't wake up in the morning thinking you know a lot.

Kevin Palmieri:

I'm the man I wake up in the morning.

Alan Lazaros:

No, seriously, though Real talk.

Kevin Palmieri:

Again, no, I do. You and I are on different fronts, because I don't compare to what I don't know, I compare to what I used to know and I much, yeah. Well then, that must be hard to stay humble. No, because I am an idiot.

Alan Lazaros:

Still, I know I'm an idiot but I'm I'm the smartest idiot I've ever been. Okay, nice, I think that's good. That's centered smartest idiot I've ever been. Okay, that's the end of the episode.

Kevin Palmieri:

I I had to build, I had to spend time building self-belief. I think people used. I think people used to think I was super humble. I don't know if I actually was. I just didn't have any self-belief. So, if anything, I think one of the hardest things about humility is oftentimes humility. Whether or not we recognize humility in somebody else is based on our expectation of how they should act, based on what their results are.

Alan Lazaros:

Which is based on your own level of self-belief, which we talked about yesterday.

Kevin Palmieri:

Right, it's like, well, if I was where that person was, I can imagine it would get to my head. It's like, well, it depends on the person. That's a projection. We're projecting our expectations on somebody else. Next Level Nation. We would love to invite you to our 18th round of Next Level Group Coaching. It is the Next Level Podcast Accelerator. If you are a podcaster who wants to level yourself up, level your podcast up and level your business up, this 12-week program is perfect for you.

Alan Lazaros:

So we've done this 18 times. We've iterated and iterated and improved and improved. The first four weeks is level up yourself. The next four weeks is level up your podcast. The last four weeks is level up your business. Build a brand underneath your business. The promo code is NLULISTENER all one word. Put that in at checkout for 30% off. It comes to less than $25 per session for the 12 sessions. Kevin or I will be on every single one of them. We hope to see you there. I have a story you've heard before Kev, where we were at the beach.

Alan Lazaros:

This is the story I was thinking of, for sure it's so powerful because I just didn't get it back then. And now it's so clear and at the time I was pissed about it, to be honest with you, because these two people out. So I was with two friends and we were at the beach living the dream and we ran into someone who was on the Colts in the NFL and he was a bench player, so he wasn't like a world class, you know, within the NFL, but the percentage of people that get to the NFL is 1% of 1%, of 1%, right. So it's a big deal for them and I don't care about football, but they do a lot, my friends. So when my friends met this person, what happened is when we were on the car ride home. I'll never forget it. They're like oh, that guy, he was so humble and I was sitting there going on. What fucking planet was that dingus humble? He was a fucking asshole, if anything. To be completely honest with you. Oh, you guys think that you'd be more cocky if you were in the NFL, if anything. He's actually too cocky to be successful in the NFL, to be completely honest, because he thinks he's the man, but in the NFL he's not for sure.

Alan Lazaros:

And so there's levels. There's just levels. It's easy to be a big fish in a small pond and that's what he was. And I remember thinking I was really really, really smart in math and science and awards and high school straight A's, blah, blah, blah. And then I got to WPI and it was, oh okay, yeah Okay. So everyone who's you know, there's not a person at this school who didn't get a math award, you know. So it's a different game. But again, there's levels, and so the big fish, small pond thing is really dangerous.

Kevin Palmieri:

Well, I think it's again. It's a prescription based on where you are. If you're somebody who struggles with self-belief, you have to look at the wins. Yeah, Look at the wins. If you're somebody who's locked in a fairly, a fairly accurate level of self-belief and you feel good about your self-belief, it's time to look at the losses, because that's how you build humility.

Alan Lazaros:

Well, if the goal is to stay centered, that's exactly what you got to do. Forever, you got to be your own coach. When I get a little cocky in fitness, kev gives me a little check, but if I was struggling, he's going to lift me up. That's what a great mentor does.

Kevin Palmieri:

Well, the problem is we are our mentors. You've mentored me a lot, but I've had more conversations with myself than you. So if, when I leave, none of that sticks, it's really hard to you. Know that's. You're not going to do it alone. Nobody's going to do it alone, but the majority of your time spent is alone. So what you take from other people, you have to find a way to absorb and keep within yourself, because you spend more time with you than anybody else.

Alan Lazaros:

The other thing with this too, and this is what I've come to realize. It comes down to what I talked about yesterday with with Quentin. On that episode we were on the social world versus the real world. Where are you getting your data? Because I'm in, I have a small, so I'm I'm living in the northern part of the town I grew up in, and I think there's a big difference between living in your town, which was totally by accident Emilia and I we bought a condo that's in the northern part of the town, which is a gorgeous spot to live. I'm so freaking grateful. But, like there's a big difference between being a townie and then living in your town.

Alan Lazaros:

And I go to a small gym in a small town, right, and if I'm not careful, it can really get to my head because I'm in the best shape there. But I need to override that and say, alan, compare versus your best, because your best would wipe the fucking walls with you. It's important, but I also have enough self-belief to be able to do that right. So it all depends on you versus you and, unfortunately, if you do compare to the social world, if you're on social media, you're going to compare all the top 1% to you and that can be detrimental. If you're in the real world, you're on social media, you're going to compare all the top one percent to you and that can be detrimental. If you're in the real world, you might think you're the man when you're actually just in a small town, or the one, yeah it's very, yeah, it's very interesting.

Kevin Palmieri:

I didn't realize how much it was connected to self-belief, because I don't really have that moment in the gym like I don't have the like you got to stay humble moment in the gym really almost ever. Why?

Kevin Palmieri:

because your gym has big fish there's definitely some big fish where the freaking bug come from, sir. Sir, we're recording an episode. Please, please, take it on. Thank you, yeah, I this morning. I was definitely. I was definitely in the best shape of anybody in the gym this morning, for sure, but it I'm not where I want to be. I think that's all it is.

Kevin Palmieri:

There's always a measure of where you are versus where you want to be. I'm not where I want to be, so it doesn't matter. But you never will be. Yeah, but I, I will be like if there's a specific goal I want to get to a certain weight, I get there.

Alan Lazaros:

I'm not there okay, but when you get there, you're gonna set a bigger goal yes yeah, yeah, that's the finite game versus the infinite game, and a lot of people can take that too far and say, okay, well, once you get there, you're not going to be satisfied. Well, no, of course not. The goal isn't to hang out, it's a ladder, not a bed, right? So we're trying to climb to the next level, next level, next level.

Kevin Palmieri:

You never actually get yeah to your dream but I will be satisfied for a very short time, until you up the ante well, I think there's a difference between, and again, maybe there isn't. I don't know the definition between satisfaction and content. You'll be satisfied for a minute.

Alan Lazaros:

I think content is like staying there or complacency, I think, is a better word for that.

Kevin Palmieri:

Yeah I'll be super excited, I'll have a big cheat meal and then I'll figure out what the next level is, what the next? Well, I think that's hard.

Alan Lazaros:

The only reason you look the way that you do right now is because you're on the way to something better 100%, but I think next level doesn't always look next level.

Kevin Palmieri:

So, okay, what am I going to do? I doesn't always look next level. So, okay, what am I going to do? I'm going to try to gain muscle again.

Alan Lazaros:

Yeah.

Kevin Palmieri:

So I'm not going to look the way I, so it's not going to really look next level necessarily, of course. Yeah, and I think that's what makes it challenging.

Alan Lazaros:

Yeah, that's the conversation about trade-offs Again. We talked about that yesterday too, but you have to sacrifice the current level that you just got to in order to go to the next level, and it seems like you're going down. Yeah, of course, that's the hardest part about goals, even though you're not, I know this wasn't the point, but I was thinking about this earlier, the moment you set a goal your whole life gets harder.

Alan Lazaros:

Let me explain. The moment you set a goal I was just on a call right before this, with a client and she has some new things in her life happening, shout out to you. If you're listening, you know what I'm talking about. Everything has to change. Now she has a new goal and we went and revamped everything, and it's the moment. This is why goals blow. The moment you set a goal with a future end date, everything you do and don't do has to reorient based on that, and you can't have a high goal without a high standard. So this is the formula Increased self-belief leads to a higher goal. Higher goal leads to a higher standard. Higher standard leads to frustration in the moment.

Alan Lazaros:

Emilia and I, we just shifted from fitness, food and family in the evening to we're doing our workouts in the morning. Today was the first one and we talked about it last night, because we walked last night for our exercise and then worked out first thing in the morning the next day. And I said the first day is going to blow. It's going to be people, tons of people, rush hour traffic. It's going to be a new situation. You and I are going to have to rush to our first session. It's going to be terrible. We have to prepare ourselves for this to be fucking terrible.

Alan Lazaros:

I left the goddamn garage door open because we were just off right. I went to the gym every day. I didn't go to the gym. I exercised every day for three years in the evening. Now, all of a sudden, we're doing the morning every day for three years in the evening. Now, all of a sudden, we're doing the morning. Today has gone off the rails because everything has to pivot. Now that we have a new standard and I do I get why goals are so brutal for people, because the moment you set a new goal, everything in the present moment has to reorient quite a bit.

Kevin Palmieri:

Goals are hard, man. Goals are hard, and if your goal is to be more humble, that's like a whole, that's a whole thing I think if your goal is to be more humble, set a higher goal I would say, unless you don't have super high self-belief, and you're gonna focus on that first exactly, I don't know if you can have humility without self-belief I mean this.

Alan Lazaros:

When someone says, wow, this was really humbling, what are they saying? They're saying, wow, I just got my ass kicked. Based on this goal I was trying to achieve, like the live event, next level, live went awesome, but that was very humbling well, I think it's something that shifts your going to when we get a hop here in a minute.

Kevin Palmieri:

But when tara and I went to Karen and I went to where were we? Colorado? No, colorado. We went to Colorado. There was this road where, if you go off the road, you die.

Alan Lazaros:

Yeah.

Kevin Palmieri:

It was very humbling to be that close to something that could take your life yeah, very humbling. It changed my perspective about the importance of me. That, yeah, I like experiences like that, like big time experiences where it's like, oh okay, that changed the way I look at everything, even though it doesn't matter at all, but it also does matter more than anything. I like stuff like that.

Alan Lazaros:

Yeah, the marathon was super humbling, 100% Right First half marathon, honestly easy. There's a video of me running backwards.

Kevin Palmieri:

We're going to get her on social at some point.

Alan Lazaros:

At some point I wasn't looking great, but half marathon was easier than I thought it would be, so that wasn't humbling the full marathon. Are you fucking kidding me? Oh my God.

Kevin Palmieri:

That was terrible. One built belief and one took it away.

Alan Lazaros:

One almost took it all away. You know what I mean.

Kevin Palmieri:

All right, we get a hop. It was brutal, I know. All right, we get a hop. Next Level Nation group coaching starts April 15th. It is our 18th group, the Next Level Podcast Accelerator 12 calls over the course of three months, a call every week. Alan and I are on, alan or I are on every single one of those calls and it ends up being like 25 bucks a call. I can guarantee you're not going to get any better value on the planet from a perspective of coaching, podcast coaching and business coaching. So link will be in the show notes for that. As always, we love you, we appreciate you, grateful for each and every one of you and NLU. We don't have fans, we have family. We will talk to you all tomorrow. Stay Next Level, humble. Next Level Nation. Thanks for joining us for another episode of Next Level University. We love connecting with the Next.

Alan Lazaros:

Level family. We mean it when we say family. If you ever need anything, please reach out to us directly. Everything you need to get a hold of us is in the show notes.

Kevin Palmieri:

Thank you again and we will talk to you tomorrow.

People on this episode

Head Shot

Alan Lazaros

Host
Head Shot

Kevin Palmieri

Host