How to Master Your Life & Build Daily Happiness with Dr. Michael Gervais

The following podcast is a deer media production. Welcome to RealPod. It's your host Victoria Garrick Brown and this is the podcast where we hold nothing back. Oh, so we're getting deep, huh? I really cried for 12 days straight. Why do I want to be perfect? There's nothing in my life that is perfect. Every week I'll bring you honest, unfiltered and eye-opening conversations to help uncover the real in all of us. I crave the type of content that you're talking about. I actually felt insecure. Oh, my God, am I going to cry? Let me just unload everything. New episodes every Wednesday leave those filters at the door because it's time to get real. Hello, everybody and welcome back to RealPod. I'm so excited about this episode because Dr. Microwavek not only has been on RealPod twice now. So this is his third time, which is a special category of people. We haven't had too many three-peat guests, but he is so brilliant and has so much wisdom to share. I feel like I learned so much every time I get the opportunity to speak with him that I wanted this conversation to be recorded so that you all could gain as much from it as I did truly. This episode inspired me to go pen to paper immediately after the conversation and start to map out exactly what I want my life to look like using so many of the guidelines that Dr. Jvey provides us with this episode. For those of you who are unfamiliar with Dr. Mic, he is a renowned high-performance psychologist. I'm talking the most important athletes, celebrities, high-performers in the world. If they're struggling, you know who they call this guy, Dr. Microwavek. He currently works with the Seattle Seahawks, Fortune 50 CEOs, Olympians, musicians, world record holders, and he helps all of them achieve mastery in their craft. He also has his own podcast called Finding Mastery, which is incredible. You get to hear him talk to some of the other brilliant voices in this world. So if you have not checked out Finding Mastery hosted by Dr. Mic Dr. Jvey, definitely check out his podcast. It's amazing. Today's episode of RealPod, we are going to dive into so much good stuff. Dr. Mic is going to explain why hustle culture is out and that the real key is not to do more, but to be more. What does it mean to be more? He's going to walk us through that step by step. Dr. Mic's also going to share what it means to truly be a master of your own life and how to be at home with yourself. We're going to discuss fundamental commitments, so what it means to commit to something so that you can live an intentional life on a path towards greater alignment in every area, and at the very end, Dr. Jvey is going to share what he believes the one skill is to achieve greater happiness every single day. And his answer definitely surprised me. It was not gratitude and it was not meditation, so stay tuned for that. It's coming at the end. I hope you love this episode just as much as I did. Without further ado, please help me welcome back for the third time, the amazing Dr. Mic Jvey. Dr. Mike Jvey, your third time. Welcome back to real five. It is always fun to be with you. So thank you again. I'm so happy to have you. I have just been dying to have a conversation with someone who's just like 30x smarter than me. Why is intellectual like I'm thrilled to have you here. High standards are ready. So I'll just kick this off by asking, you know, you've coached so many elite performers in sports, business, and beyond. What do you think people misunderstand the most about high performance? I think if we asked most humans, what do you want in life, and most people would describe something akin to what the good life would be. Most of us want the same things, right? We want a sense of meaning and purpose, and we want some fulfillment, we want to laugh a lot, we want to be connected. We want to do hard things and know that we've accomplished and left something better. That's really common. But it's not common when we talk about what is high performance. First performance is means doing something, and then high performance means doing it kind of exceptionally well. Not to be confused with peak performance. Peak performance is doing one thing exceptionally well, and then kind of you're on the, you're towards the downside, right, the peak meaning of mountain, if you think about the visual. But we're more interested in sustaining high performance and doing something extraordinarily well for a long period of time, and I'm more interested in mastery than high performance at this point. So if you think about a stack, mastery at the top, high performance just below it, performance just below that, and then below performance is like struggling. So choking under pressure, that type of stuff, and we've all had those low performance experiences. And I think that we've all had high performance experience, even if it's just one or two moments. The sustaining of it is super interesting, but just above that, just in this kind of aspirational space, how do you master life? How do you become a master of self? And so high performance tends to talk about mastery of craft, or just being really good at something. Master of craft is just a little bit of a different contour, but in that mastery strata, I'm far more interested in mastery of self. And so yes, I get to spend time with people that are world class at what they do. And I'll add one more dimension to it, is that there's a language of high performance. So there's a language of mastery, and you know the language when you're around people, like you can tune to it. And so if I just say that statement, there's a language to master your high performance. Do you think you know the language? Do you definitely know the language? Are you wondering what I mean by it? And that's for you. Well, what comes to mind is, can mastery become a slippery slope to perfectionism? Oh, that's cool. Do you feel like you know the language of mastery, or the language of high performance? I would say no, however, I did compete on a high performing team, so I know the culture and the environment and the routine of high performance and mastery, getting to watch especially someone like San Bricio, who is the national player of the year, and was my teammate. I got to watch her work ethic, but no, I don't think I feel clarity on it because of the dangers of it, as well, in terms of perfectionism. That'll be fun to go to, like that's why you brought a perfectionism. Yeah. So when I watch from a distance, and as I've gotten to know you, like you're living a high performance life, I know you're curious about what I have to think about it, but unless you've got like a second self, that you have hidden from me and hidden from your community. I say, you're on it. You know the language. Like you want to be better. Is that right? Yeah. And I'm mentally committed to get better. Yes. I like that you pause because that's the big one. So there's a handful of, call it, I don't know, characteristics of high performers. They know how to use their mind to be in the present moment more often. High performance happens in the present moment. So the amount of time you're in the present moment has a direct relationship to the amount of time you can be in high performance or be a high performer. So if your mind is constantly ping ponging all over the shop and let's call it 50, 50, 50, 50% of your time you're worrying about the future or think about the past or whatever. And then the other 50% of the time you have the ability to be in the present moment. Okay. So now of all the available moments of time you have, you've just kind of shrunk them down to 50% gives you a chance to be a high performer. That's, that's not very good. We need to do better at that. So, but you bring up something really important, which is you're not sure because the fundamental commitment, if I could express anything about what a half percenters or the 10 percenters at the kind of the edge of the curve of performance to, they make a fundamental commitment in their life to be their very best. And that is an all in, all consuming, all taxing, sometimes, sometimes unhealthy, but it doesn't have to be commitment to be your very best. These sometimes I'm referring to as the perfectionist and maybe the other kind of compromises that come with it. So I'm glad that you brought up perfectionism. Do you think, and this is like my dream, because I've got a thousand questions in my brain right now. I'm so excited with where to go. First thought is, do you think a everyday person can make a fundamental like commitment to mastery without the traditional goal of a super bowl ring or taking my company public or, you know, you obviously work with people that I just kind of mentioned, that caliber of people. So what about the everyday average show, average shame? Well, I think we first need to think about the human population for just a minute. Go back to like a bell curve relationship, okay? So the mean 50 percent mark, right, below the mean and above the mean, okay? So 84 percent of people are kind of really close to the mean. The majority of people are relatively average. And then what we're talking about is folks that are in that relatively average experience in whatever function of life we're talking about. I think what you're asking are those folks, can they make a commitment to move up closer to their potential rather than leaving potential on the table? course, of course. This is available for everybody. This doesn't mean that you need to be, what is LeBron James, 6'8" and 265 pounds and jumps 41 inches. And like, it doesn't mean you need those things. Now, if you want to be exceptional basketball player, it does help to have physical capability, so probably both as well. But what does mastery of life mean? It means that you're able to kind of be unbothered. You're able to eloquently be in the present moment. You're able to bring yourself forward. You're able to contribute to something that matters to you. Yeah, that's completely available. But that requires training the mind. And does that look different for every single individual person? It will rest on the most meaningful values to that person. And so, short answer, yes. But for the most part, true masters of self, they end up having the same language, meaning they're thinking about similar things, whether if somebody's a musician or an athlete, they end up talking about some of the same things. Which is like, how do you unlock a little bit more? How do you be more connected to your honest capabilities? How do you really quiet your mind when you're in a stressful environment? They end up talking about the same things. So it is totally available to everybody. And I wish that in our education system, we talked more about how to train the mind so that you can have a chance of living what I would consider a great life. - This episode is brought to you by Premiere Protein and I love Premiere Protein so much. I feel like I don't go a day anymore without having a protein drink because it is just so hard to ensure that we're getting enough protein and the amount that we need every single day. And sometimes I'm super busy. I just can't think about that in every single meal. And I don't like to hyperfixate on it, right? So that's why Premiere Protein is the solution. It's easy and delicious and a protein-packed way to power your day. There's so many incredible flavors. 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That's P-R-E-M-I-E-R protein premierprotein.com or at Amazon, Walmart or any other major retailers. And keep your eyes out for the cafe latte flavor. That is my favorite. This episode of RealPod is brought to you by Quince. I love Quince so much. I have Kashmir sweaters from Quince. I have my clogged shoes from Quince. I have sunglasses. I just got a gorgeous leather belt. Quince just makes high quality wardrobe staples using premium fabrics, like 100% European linen, 100% silk, and organic cotton poplin. And everything feels so luxurious. And Quince works directly with safe ethical factories and cuts out the middle man. So that's why their prices are so amazing because we're not paying for a brand markup or a fancy retail store. We're just paying for quality clothing. And it's not just me. I mean, Quince clothing is consistently rated 4.5 to 5 stars by thousands of customers. So these are real people wearing these pieces every day and actually loving them. And the Quince cotton Kashmir sweater has seriously become one of my go-to's. It's light enough for layering, but still feels lux. I love bringing a Kashmir sweater with me. I just feel like it elevates every outfit. And right now, you can go to quince.com/realpod for free shipping and 365 day returns. That's a full year to wear it and love it and you will. But if you don't, you'll get a free return. So now available in Canada as well. Don't keep settling for clothes that don't last. Go to quince.com/realpod. That's Q-U-I-N-C-E. com/realpod for free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com/realpod. Quince.com/realpod. Realpod is brought to you by BetterHelp. And look, I love therapy. I talk about it almost every episode. So to my guests, it's truly been life-changing for me. And we're in the month of March. And March includes International Women's Day. It's a moment to celebrate a woman's strength and progress while also recognizing how much they carry every day. Between caring for others and managing unseen responsibilities, their emotional well-being can be easily overlooked. I know I've been there before and many women in my life feel the same. We want to remind women how much they matter and that therapy offers a space for them to take care of themselves in the way that they deserve. BetterHelp therapists work according to a strict code of conduct and are fully licensed in the US so you are getting top-tier care. And BetterHelp does the initial matching work for you so you can focus on your therapy work. Just answer a short questionnaire to help identify your needs and preferences and then using their over 12 years of experience and industry-leading match fulfillment rate, they typically get a rate the first time. There's over 30,000 therapists. And BetterHelp is the world's largest online therapy platform having served over 6 million people globally. And it works with an average rating of 4.9 out of 5 stars for a live session. BetterHelp truly makes it so easy. When I first logged on to my very first BetterHelp appointment, I just opened up my computer, took it from my bed. I mean, imagine that you're getting the help you need from the comfort of your own home. Your emotional well-being matters, sign support, and feel lighter in therapy. Sign up and get 10% off at betterhelp.com/realpod. That's BetterHelp, better-h-e-l-p.com/realpod. Let's talk about that training the mind because I think it's getting harder and harder to focus on one thing. It's getting harder and harder to be present in a moment without the ping of your text messages or the forgot to send that email or did that go through. So how can we work on some of those mindset skills in a world that feels like it's constantly pulling us in 10 directions at one time? Well, you remember when you went and you were playing? That there was an environment that was purposely cultivated for you to get better. Coaches would say, right, this is what we're going to go do today with thoughtful. And it was very concrete about what you were going to work on to get better at. And they would minimize distractions during that to our period. Same thing in life is if focus is an important capability then we need to figure it out. Like focusing is a trainable skill. It is a trainable mental skill and it's hard. It's really hard. But this is why meditation, I think, one of the reasons meditation has had such a significant moment over the last 10 years is because it is the practice of refocusing back to the present moment without needing any task, without needing a flute in your hand, without needing a ball in your hands. Like, you don't need to be skilled at anything other than recognizing that your mind is wander to something else other than your inhale or your exhale. And then refocusing it back to the inhale of the exhale. So if you want to be better at focus, there are thousands of ways to do it. Meditation would be a great way to do it. It's hard because it's boring or brain-like stimulation. And it's also the boring aspect of it, what it ends up doing over time, is it helps you become more aware of what's happening. So it's not just a refocusing practice, it's also helping build awareness. - I feel like I need to create more opportunity in my own life to have silence and stillness to practice that because like you said, it's boring. It's uncomfortable. The mind wants stimulation for all of us. It's for all of us it is. I was kind of hoping 2026 would be my year to be meditating in the morning. We haven't done it yet. - Do you have people that are supporting you to do it or holding you accountable? Like as Max fundamentally committed with you? - No, and I'd love to blame that on everything. Everything I don't do right in my life is because my husband won't do it with me at the same time. - Yeah, I mean, it does make it so much easier. The reason I ask is because if you've got people that will hold you accountable, like going to a fitness coach or going to a piano coach or whatever, like if you've got an appointment that you set and there's some accountability to it, it helps. And if you're meeting people to do it, it helps. This is one way you can do it first is like, have you honestly made a fundamental commitment? I'm not sure you have. But have you and Max like had the real conversation like, "Hey, let's really do this." Give that a go for a little bit and hold each other accountable. Maybe bring two, three, four other people kind of into the accountability mix. It doesn't mean you're meditating with them, but you're on a text thread. You're holding each other accountable and when it gets this and loser gets that, like put something on the line, have some fun with it as well. So those are just kind of good behavioral kind of habit forming things that you can do. Accountability is one of them, but doing it with other people and also picking the time and scheduling it. So if you put it in the morning or you put it midday, whatever it is, and put it in your calendar, you know if you don't have it in your calendar. - Yeah. - It likely doesn't get done. - I like that idea. Maybe starting the group chat, I'm gonna have to do that. So all my friends, get ready. I'm curious, what is your definition of a success? life beyond achievement? For me, excellence is the ability to be at home with yourself wherever you are. So excellence therein means that you got to really know yourself and done some self-discovery work so that you can understand what good looks like for you, you know? And then the second is have all of the requisite psychological skills to navigate a moment so that you can be at home with yourself. That takes time. That's not easy to do. And so when I think about, you know, a great life, I think about it simply and like how many moments am I able to be completely at home with myself? And I like doing things that are challenging and difficult so I've got to be even better at being at home with myself. So I'm more interested in the being attribute than the doing. So that idea that I need to do more, to be more. I think that that's a broken model. I think we're fatigued by it. And world class performers and athletes and thinkers and doers are flipping that model right now. Undercurrent is that no, I need to be more and let the doing flow from there. I need to be more creative, more present, more connected. I need to be more honest with what I'm doing in my life and let the doing flow from that point. And when you get that orientation, right? I think that doing becomes quite eloquent. It's not corrupted or rotted. But what is rotten is that I need to do more extraordinary things to be extraordinary. It's totally backwards. And I you, we have swallowed that pill, you know, long ago. I love that so much. I feel like I needed to hear that. I burnt out pretty badly at the end of the year. I just felt so exhausted, emotionally depleted, like mentally drained just from work. And it, it's like when you said this doing more versus being more, I almost had this vision of myself, like, like hands are moving and like things are happening. But like the actual person is like feeling soulless versus having this like bright light that's radiating. And then like you said, inspires the action. And it is not what society praises. Right? If I said, if someone said, what are your goals for the first quarter of the year? And I said, just to be more. I'd be a wonder. Like, yeah, okay, okay, weirdo. So in high performing sport, you know this, you, you must get results. You know, if I help a team right now, I'm fortunate to be at the Seattle Seahawks. Oh, yes, that's so exciting. Yeah. So this will come out after the fact, but setting you get you, Joe. Thank you. If I don't have the team win, get the outcomes, then the owner still flies back on their private jet. And I'm, you know, kicked off into the dinghy in the middle of the ocean, rowing myself. Like, so outcomes are required. However, they are out of our control. So when you think about putting yourself in the most powerful position of leverage, you want to put yourself in a position where you are fully responsible for maximizing the things that are 100% under control. And that phrase, you know, control, control, let go of the rest. It just falls a little short to what I'm actually speaking to, which is fundamentally commit to mastering the things that are 100% under control. And when you do that, and you point that energy towards something like a podcast or volleyball or friendship or being a great spouse or a business operator, and you're pointing it towards a craft, you've got something. Everybody has a craft, right? Parenting is a radical, difficult craft, being a business operator, whatever that thing is. Like, that's not an easy thing to do in modern society. So being more to do more, putting the, and then putting yourself into that leverage, highly, powerfully leverage position where you are able to have an outsize impact because you're working on mastering the things that are 100% under control. I think you got something. Okay. I want to now get granular about how we can all be more present. I think I'm in this unique place right now where I want to do less. I feel like I was pointed towards too many things that it was actually impossible to be getting like my best energy to each. So, oh, you're now talking the language of mastery, by the way, right? That's that's part of the language of mastery is to do one or two or maybe three things extraordinarily well, highly tasteful, very artistic. There's a purity to that approach rather than seven things really well, like to do two or three things exceptionally well. So I just wanted to tune that for you. You're actually talking more mastery than high performance in that respect. You know, it's so interesting about that is I have so much of that conditioned judgment about the churn and burn society kind of hamster wheel mentality that like I judge the shit out of myself when I want to do less. Yeah, I think your reference point if you're not careful, Victoria, will be others. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I know it. I see it in you. I know it because I lived it. I grew up super anxious. And I didn't even understand what was happening or why. My hand would shake when I brushed my teeth in the morning. I didn't understand it, but it was because I was racing. I was unsure if I was okay. That's why my definition of excellence is like, can I be at home with myself? Wherever I am. So if you're not careful, standards that other set, which is like this mystical, they becomes nearly unattainable because you're not built that way. You're not situated that way. You're not in that part of the world. You're not in that friend group. Whatever the conditions are, they're not yours. But you're missing what is yours. How about that? Like just start with that idea. Totally. To your point, when you said the the threat to mine is like probably the opinions of others, the thoughts of others, the disappointing of others, definitely. And I think I'm going to continue to slowly expose myself to that. And possibly the judgment. Wait, I think like totally make this decision right now. It's going to go through my filter first. I am going to be the tuning fork for how to live a life that's worth living. And there are great thinkers that have done this. I mean, Buddha did it, Jesus did it, Confucius did it, Laozu did it. There's great thinkers that give you some guideposts on how to live a good life. And they're all tuned to taking care of other people. So I'm not saying move to a narcissistic selfish kind of me, me, I'm not saying that at all. But what you're describing is a little bit more akin to codependency. Like my happiness depends on your happiness is really what codependency is. I do think, yeah, my mom for sure, she knows this. But like my mom's happiness is reliant on our kids happiness. So then the flip side of that is as happy and great as I can be, is as happy and great as I can make my mom feel. Yeah, that's codependency. Real bodice brought to you by elements. And you know how much Max and I are obsessed with elements actually just the other day. He was like, do we have element on us? Because I usually have an element pack on me somewhere, whether it's in my car, in my purse, or the hundreds that we have in our pantry. We love all the flavors. They're so good. 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It's so convenient to have peloton in your home. I feel like it's what got so many people through 2020. And they have so many amazing, inspiring, motivating instructors. I love all the peloton instructors. So you'll find one that works well for your vibe. And peloton IQ provides real-time strength coaching. So peloton IQ has features like goal setting. So you're always making new progress. And the new movement tracking camera even allows peloton IQ to count your reps and correct your form in real-time. That is like amazing. The last thing I want to do is count my reps. I'm like, one, two, three, where was I? So the fact that Peloton IQ does it for you is just Let yourself run, lift, scope, push, and go, explore the new peloton cross-training tread plus at one peloton.com, that's one peloton.com. That's a helpful revelation, though. I've never thought about the codependent relationship because I do feel like my mom and I are pretty independent as well, but if I look back on subconscious messaging, right, you just want to make your parents happy. And you know, it takes all forms. And everyone, I mean, that's the thing is we all have something that we need to learn about our family relationships, our close friendships, and I feel like I had such a perfect privilege childhood as well. You might not have big T as you like to say, right? But you might have little T, little trauma or things you're dealing with, but we all have something that we're needing to unlearn. But if I bring this back to the exercise of being more, what would you say are some of those things? And we could use me as an example if you want. Yeah, well, let's just go being present is one for sure. I think that that's a high calling for folks. So how do we practice or train being more present? Meditation is one of them. It's great. And the science is pretty crisp. I mean, if you wanted to start at eight minutes a day, would be considered a minimum threshold for some of the results that we see that are pretty profound. And I think you can do eight minutes. What else in addition to that? More connected. So being more connected. One to yourself. And then in second order, be more connected to other people. It doesn't mean that you're solving things for them, but you are connected. You understand them. That's a really nice one. And then I think a third one is being more honest with myself. And so when you work from a place of honesty, I think everything gets really easy. So the most high performing environments that I've been able to work with are the most honest. The ones with the most consequence are the most honest. Oh, can you give an example of that? That's so interesting to me. Yeah. Like, let's go back to Red Bull Stratos, where Felix Baumgartner, who has recently passed away, but he was the pilot, the athlete for Red Bull Stratos. And the vision, the mission, he had this idea. I want to break the speed of sound without a capsule and no one's ever done it before. Well, so the engineers got together and they said, well, you'll have to go like to the edge of the atmosphere. You have to go where there's very little gravity and go as high as we possibly can. We think it's somewhere around 130,000 feet. You're in the blackness kind of of the sky. And if you could jump from that height and you're going to travel the speed of sound, we're not sure if your arms and legs would rip off, but we think that you would travel the speed of sound. I mean, that's only one of five very dangerous conditions that he was having a face. And so in that environment, I remember they were building the capsule. So these are the brightest minds in aerospace. We're building this capsule to take him up with this huge balloon, to take him up to 130,000 feet. And it was a custom built. No one's ever built anything like this before. And a bolt rattled loose in some of the testing. He was not eloquent. He was not kind. He was pissed because his life is on the line. So there's no sugar coating. It'd be nice if he was angry and kind, but it wasn't his style of it. He was pissed and he held everybody to test because if that bolt rattles loose at 90,000 feet, we got real problems and his life is on the line. So dammit, you better be on your A game. Like, I don't care what you think you're doing right. This is not right. And so he would, there's an exacting standard that must be honest for people to survive in those environments. And so the most consequential environments often are the most honest as well. Another example is like he, the reason I was brought into the project is because he needed to be in the space suit, which was like a NASA based, you know, astronaut space suit for five and a half hours. And he was developing claustrophobia within like three minutes. And so he just couldn't do it. So you needed to be honest. And in front of these other very, learned, hardened, crusty, you know, old, guard tough-minded people, he needed to bring forward that he was scared. Now, that's a very difficult thing to do in an alpha competitive environment. Male or female, this happening on men on the team. And that level of honesty and vulnerability is required. How do you even help someone overcome claustrophobia? Well, from good science, you can extinguish just about any fear. And extinguishing of fears fundamentally different than managing fear. So with good psychological science, you can fundamentally extinguish fear. So we walk through that protocol, which is, you know, facing your dragon. It's, this is a tough thing to do. But the protocol is called systematic desensitization. All of flooding is, it's been renamed. And so you would walk people through the most dangerous parts of the environment in their mind first. And they have to master each step or each kind of level of intensity. And then you do it in real life. And you, you don't earn the right to go from low stress and environment. I'll explain that in a minute, all the way to high stress, until you master each step. So the lowest in imagination first, right? So we write down from one to a hundred all of the things that are scary. And so the first thing for him was, oh, when I'm pulling off the highway to go to the training facility, I feel like my heart starts to kick up a beat. So he's just pulling off and he's got another five miles to drive. So in imagination, first, we master pulling off the highway and him being totally calm. And then fast forward, like level, let's call it 75 or something where he's got the suit on and he's about to put the gloves on and the helmet on. And that's where he starts to really kind of feel anxious and agitated as body is kicked on as heart rate is up, his sweating, you know, even though he's just standing still in his mind starts racing. Okay, if we're at that point, now we have to master that experience in his mind first, using all the psychological skills of self-talk and being calm, and then you earn the right, once you master that, and his heart rate is calm in that environment in his mind, then you earn the right to go to helmet latched. And then you earn the right once you master that, you see where I'm going. So it's a tough protocol because you're facing each fear repeatedly until you master it. Wow. You do it in your imagination first and then in real life. And then that was successful, that project, right? Yeah, you know what's fun about that. I'm going to send you the documentary. It was on, it was a 30 for 30, it was ESP. Oh, awesome. And there's a clip in there where the oldest and crustiest and the hardest that are leader. He looked at me at one point on the documentary and he says, Mike, if he dies, it's on your hands. My son and I watched it, you know, and he's like, God, did they just, what, why did you do this? I was like, son, he had a vision. I believed that he was fundamentally committed toward it. He said he wanted to do all the work. I watched him do all the psychological work to extinguish the fear. Like, that's good science at work. And he's an adult, you know, and of course, I lost sleepless you know nights, but something coming through and just this whole conversation that I haven't given as much attention or value to is commitment in general, right? It seems like this natural thing that will come with what you love or you think, oh, one of the biggest things I've committed to is my marriage, right? But then after that, I don't sit down and like make a commitment to my podcast or to this thing. So I'm curious because I've now feel inspired to get really intentional about what I'm committed to and what is a huge priority for me. That said, we all could think we know something and then be three months in and realize, maybe that wasn't the thing for us, but then now would make me think, I'm going back on my commitment. So how can we make commitments should the priorities of our life and then are we allowed to pivot if we discover that it's not working? That's a good question. I mean, of course, the answer is yes, right? Like, you get to design the life that you want to live unless you're a determinist that you believe that we don't have free will. That's a different conversation. Like, you can change anything you want. But then how do we really make a fundamental commitment if part of our mind is like, oh, but we can change this next week? Because I think that that's how it works. And so there's a difference between making a commitment and saying, yeah, but I can change whenever it gets hard or I can change when I see something that's more interesting. A fundamental commitment is to really see this thing to the edge where now you've got some information that it's too big, it's too hard. You don't love it anymore. You don't see the compelling future is no longer compelling to you. So think about that for just a moment. When you close your eyes, it's only 3% of the population can't do what I'm going to suggest. But if you are one of the three, I think you'll feel seen here. But when you close your eyes, can you Victoria see a apple? You can see a fruit. Yeah, you could see a screwdriver. Yeah, okay, good. So not everybody can see an image in their mind. About 3% of the population cannot. For the 97% of the population, that's a skill that athletes, we talk about all the time. You probably used it, mental imagery, visualization, yeah. So seeing them, most beautiful movie in your mind is a mental skill. Okay. I can talk about why that is so powerful later. But when you think about a compelling future and you close your eyes and you imagine a future that you say, that's what I want. That's what I want to work towards. And then you're like, oh, it's clear to me. Oh, well, then am I going to make a fundamental commitment to make that happen? Yeah. Now you start lining up some arrows. Now you've got like real wood behind the arrow, if you will. So that, that to me, is part of the broth of living a good life, a compelling future that you are going to work towards making a fundamental commitment toward it, knowing your first principles, you know, sounds kind of academic. But what are the values that you're going to use as bumpers along the way? Knowing those, because now you've got some decision rights to make. If I get up and I leave, you know, $10 on the seat, or you can be like, Oh, that's good for me. $10, you know, or you can say, you might get a lot of $10. You would probably knowing you would probably say, you left $10. That's not for everybody. They will maybe rationalize something else. So values, compelling future, and a fundamental commitment. Now you got to go build the skills to make that vision real. I love that. Paul, this stuff takes takes us really looking at ourselves in the mirror. A lot of people don't want to do it. I think it's pretty uncomfortable. I just want to finish by asking you some quick questions about just daily routines. So remember, the very first episode you did on this podcast back in 2020, you talked about, I think it was your four step routine in the morning. And the one that stuck with me to this day is when you wake up in the morning, taking a big deep breath and just saying, I'm okay right now. Oh, cool. I don't know if you still do that. Yeah. It's a daily practice for me. I just love that. It's just so innocent and sweet. It's like, you just wake up. You take a deep breath. You look around and think, I'm okay right now. You know, I don't have hopefully, if you're listening to this, you don't have a perceived threat around you and you're just in your bed and everything's okay. And that can really just set the nervous system up for the rest of the day. So I'm curious, what's your updated morning routine? Same four steps. It's something that I do. I want to say every day, give myself a few days I missed throughout the years, but I'll send it to you and I'll send it to your community. We've got an audio file that will send you so you can learn it. It's called the morning mindset routine. And there's four steps. First is a breath. You're in control of setting the tone for your day, right? Just by starting your first moment that you wake up is taking a long exhale because a long exhale over the 300,000 years we've had our brains is paired with safety. I'm good right now. And I'm in control. I'm sick. Before you reach for your phone and your emails or your whatever accounts tune into to yourself first. So one deep breath, the second mechanism is one thought of gratitude. Now this is not like check the box gratitude list. It doesn't really work. Can work, but it's not what I'm suggesting. I'm saying just take a beat and be fully connected to what you're grateful for and let it kind of run over you. Let it fill you in a way. Like I'm grateful for my eyes or I'm grateful for my wife and her health. It's not check, check, check, check. It's just let it one. Just fully be part of you. So one breath, one gratitude, one intention. So that's number three and one intention is really just using your imagination to see yourself being great in some aspect of today. Feel imagery for the daily folks. And then the fourth is take your sheets off, swing yourself to the side of the bed and just take a moment to be where you are. Now if you have two feet great, stand on your feet and just be where your feet are. It's an ancient saying. So just take a moment to be fully present. And at first that feels kind of awkward. Like what am I doing? But then over time you're like, ah, we like relish this moment to be fully present right now. And then so that's four simple little steps to wake up very specific particular brain circuitry. I think to give yourself a great chance. I love that. And then lastly, what do you think is the most underrated skill for success and happiness in daily life? The kind of ultimate attainment of being unbothered. And that doesn't mean that you don't care. It just means you're very clear about what's in your control and what's not. And the things that are not in your control to be unbothered by them. And so how do you develop the ability to be unbothered? Is I think a cool thing to entertain? Yes. Meditation for being more connected with awareness and being able to be in the present moment more often, being able to understand how your thoughts and emotions and feelings work together. Check, check, check, all through meditation. Being psychologically agile, think about these three just for a quick narrative. Resilience, flexibility and agility. So resilience is when something's coming at you and it hits your shoulder and it knocks you back four steps. You put your foot back in the ground. You're like, ah, I'm going back forward. And you're tough enough and savvy enough to keep marching forward. But you've been pushed back three four steps. That's good. There's some toughness in that flexibility is that you side step and you're out of the way. You don't get hit by that thing. That's cool. I'm way more interested in agility. It brushes my shoulder and I know what the compelling future is. I know what the vision is. I know what my North Star is. So I brushed on my shoulder and I can pivot and stay lined up moving toward. There's a pirouette that I'm able to do. That's what psychological or emotional agility is. And so people that are psychologically emotional agile, they know how to become and they know how to be confident. They know what the North Star is and they're working that calm, confident state to constantly stay true to the North Star. Those are my people. Like, I love that. Like, what do you mean? You've got knockback five steps. We don't have time for that. We're trying to do something here. Be more aware. See what's coming. I just got in a head on car crash. This was like four weeks ago. And I was doing 50. He was doing 70. His phone was more interesting to him. He swerved over two lanes head on right behind LX Airport. Both cars totaled pretty heavy experience. The speed of it, the whole thing. I got out and I was like, Oh, okay, I wasn't sure if my legs were going to fold underneath of me because the impact was so great. I said, Oh, I'm walking. Okay, good. And the next day I was really grateful for my psychological fitness because I was able to understand that was not in my control. My control is how I respond to this thing. Okay, good. I'm a little elevated activated. I got to breathe, bring it down. Okay, look, I'm safe right now. It's good. So I'm not kind of walking in a trauma state. I was so grateful for all the work that I put into that. So that's agile more than it is resilient, more than it is tough. And so I'm into that. I love that unbothered, not riding the wave and not. Well, we talk about, I talked about this on a recent episode too, but holding the wheel of life lightly and loosely and not gripping up or something. Yeah. We're not talking wanderlust like, ah, whatever. There's a time and place for anger. But if you're stuck in it and you can't get yourself through it, then it's kind of running the show, not you. There's a reason that anger is part of our process, but it's way overused. That's for sure. Well, thank you so much. This was amazing. I'm excited to make my list of what I'm going to fundamentally commit to create my meditation group chat for my eight minutes a day minimum and focus on being less co-dependent. So let's go to kind of in more what that would do that. Fun bothered. Yeah. There we go. There we go. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. Thank you so much for listening to this episode of RealPod. If this hit home or helped you in some way, send it to a friend, a teammate, Rumi, share the love, share the realness, new episodes of RealPod come out every single Wednesday. So make sure you are subscribed to this podcast so you never miss an episode to leave a rating or review of the show. Head to iTunes and let me know what you think. I love hearing from you. Not to mention you can stay connected with RealPod throughout the week, seeing behind the scenes info and sneak previews of upcoming guests by following the @RealPod account on Instagram. All information about today's show and guests will be linked in the description of this episode. Thanks again for listening. I love you guys so so much. Let's go dominate the day and as always, keep it real. Please note that this episode may contain paid endorsements and advertisements for products and services. Individuals on the show may have a direct or indirect financial interest in products or services referred to in this episode.