The Optimism We All Need Right Now with Simon Sinek

This episode of The Oprah Podcast is presented by our partner, Geico. I'm so excited to welcome to the T-House, Mr. Optimism himself, Simon Sinek. So you have truly changed the culture because we're now all familiar with the phrase of, "What is your why? What is the key to finding your why? This is how I help people find their why. I look at the past and I find the times where for whatever reason they were in flow. Yeah, they loved what they were doing no matter how hard it was and we can actually define. We can see that pattern and that that is the why. I'm just feeling like I'm stuck in a cage and I have the key. What should my guiding question or my guiding light be? So I think task number one is not you're asking yourself the wrong question which is not what should I be doing next but who do I want to be doing the thing next with? That's so key. I saw your light bulb moment right there. I saw your big aha. Hi everybody and a warm welcome. I'm really happy to be with you here on The Oprah Podcast. We know that there is a lot a lot of anxiety going on with so many people and what some say is an existential angst around jobs and around careers these days. Maybe you or your loved one has a feeling of disruption and unease when you think about it is true. We spend most of our adult lives and waking hours at work and for some even a few more hours a day just getting to and from their jobs and so on this episode of The Podcast we're asking this question how can you feel more energized more engaged how can you feel more optimistic about work and so I'm so excited to welcome to the T house Mr. Optimism himself Simon Sinek Simon Sinek's landmark New York Times bestseller start with why transformed how leaders entrepreneurs and employees think inspiring so many people to shift their focus from what they do to why they do it Simon brought this revolutionary concept to life with his Ted Talk which went viral and now ranks as the 4th most watch Ted Talk of all time with more than 90 million views why how what this little idea explains why some organizations and some leaders are able to inspire where others aren't self-described as an unshakable optimist Simon has continued to inspire people throughout the world with his organization the Optimism Company his podcast a bit of optimism and his most recent New York Times bestsellers leaders eat last and the infinite game it's hard to believe this is the first time we're sitting down because time yeah how did that happen I mean I blame you but no it's it's wonderful to be here and it is surprising because you and I have a very similar worldview yes very similar which is we believe in the goodness of people and we believe in sort of striving towards that it is so it it's nice to finally be here yes and you've written so many books your first book start with the why sold over 3 million copies your Ted Talk how great leaders inspire action is one of the most popular of all time but you know what is so it's so fascinating to me about because this book was at least now 15 years old 16 years old coming on yeah 16 17 years old and the Golden Circle yeah that you introduced uh in start with the why applies now as it applied 16 years ago as it will apply 16 years ago now can you explain the golden circle for for the 10 people who haven't heard it very simply every single one of us knows what we do it's the jobs we have it's the things we do right I'm a doctor I'm a consultant I'm a barista like this is what I do yeah some people know how they do it these are the things that we think make us stand out or make us better than somebody else who does also does what we do but very very few people can clearly articulate why they do what they do that deep-seated purpose cause or belief and what I discovered is that the best leaders everybody from Martin Luther King to Steve Jobs every single one of them thinks acts and communicates the exact same way and it's the complete opposite to most other people and every single one of them starts with why so if you say what do you do they don't say oh I'm a speaker I'm an author I am a talk show host they say I wake up every single morning to inspire people to do the things that inspire them for me the fun is finding all the ways in which I can do that and that's how you get to what you do yes it it's interesting because Jim Collins just recently wrote a book and he says that people like that were encoded with that that they were that there was an encoding for them to do that that that's not something just as you say you don't require it out here you had it in here to begin with I think so I agree and I would add onto it which is it's not that some people are encoded like that all of us are encoded like that the question is are we working in environments and do we have a support structure that encourages it and support us to live by that code and very often we are seduced by money or fame or to be an influencer we are pressured to be responsible become an accountant because that way you can provide for yourself even though you have no desire to be an accountant etc so we given to peer pressure we given to societal pressure we given to family pressures and so whether we're following the code is is the big question so and so you have truly changed the culture you've changed how the culture speaks about itself because we're now all familiar with the phrase of what is your why what do you think it is about your message that has resonated so first of all were you surprised I was surprised at the speed and the scale that it took off but I wasn't surprised that it resonated with people because it was it's a deeply human message and it was not something that I put together for any commercial or academic reason it was put together for me it was the solution that I found when I lost my passion for my own work and it was only meant to help me yeah and it did and I shared it with my friends and it helped my friends find renewed passion there for their friend yeah yeah that's how it started that's how it started I was giving which is the most organic yeah I was giving talks in my friends living rooms to their friends and helping people find their why for a hundred bucks on the side that's so to tell us where you were before you discovered it for yourself what was actually going on with you I was living in New York City living the entrepreneurial dream I'd started a small business at a little marketing consultancy and I knew the statistics that the vast majority well into the 90th percentile of new businesses fail in the first three years and so if you're sort of like that kind of stress and that kind of competition you know entrepreneurship is a is a is a crazy fun game yeah and we survived like we survived three years in business and my fourth year in business was dark to say the least because I survived I now was a member of the small group of organizations that had beaten the three-year statistic but I was a victim of my own success because I didn't know how to build the structure for a company it was all my personality and force of personality and as things started to go well I didn't know what to do and it sort of came crashing down on me to go on it's not literally but like the pressure was overwhelming and I went into what can only be described as depression and being happy go lucky and living what superficially looks like a good life I was very afraid or embarrassed to tell people that I was struggling and so I kept it to myself you were struggling how you didn't want to I don't want to go to work anymore wow I didn't want to wake up and go to work and I was very very embarrassed because superficially things were good and so I sounded whiny you know so if you've ever been in a dark place if you keep it to yourself it gets worse that's right and that's exactly what happened and it wasn't until a very dear friend of mine came to me and said something's something's wrong and that that was the that was the gate that opened up okay so what did uncertainty teach you about yourself so the single greatest lesson I learned in that whole experience was that I don't have to know everything and I don't have to pretend that I do and and to ask for help and to say to people I don't know what's happening and I don't need to find certainty I just need to feel not alone as I go through the journey that was that was the greatest gift yeah and I've discovered that too that many times knowing what you don't want to do is just equally as important as knowing what you do want to do yeah and that's how you get closer to certainty so you we're speaking earlier about the fact that you and I it's a surprise that we haven't really connected over the years because we share the same worldview I remember when I found my why on the Oprah Winfrey show it was around 1989 I didn't call it the why I called it intention so I'm wondering if the why and the intention are the same I mean depending on how you define them probably yes you know the way I define why is it's this deep-seated purpose cause or belief reason why you're doing it's the reason behind the reason it's the reason behind the reason it's the thing that inspires it's not a goal yeah it's not it's not some thing you're tried to obtain it's not based on the job you do right but it's the thing that inspires you to get out of bed in the morning and if that thing is there no matter how hard the work is it feels worth it yeah and that that's so in in the way you're defining intention the way I define the why they sound so for me the intention became in 89 up until then I was just doing a show and I was happy to have the job and I was excited about though I was still excited about the work but something shifted for me, and I just wanted to use the show and not be used by the show. I wanted to use the show as a force for good. And so in that intention, I told the producers, "Do not even bring me ideas unless I'm aligned with whatever your intention is so that we all sync up." And so, regardless of what the subject is, we're all really saying the same thing, that we're using this story or this person's life or whatever is happening in this experience as a force for good. How do you define the intention? How do you define the why outside of the show? Because the show is one of the things that you do, one of the things that you did to bring your cause to life. This podcast is one of the things that you do to bring your cause to life. How would you define the intention? What's the string that connects absolutely everything? Being a light in the world. Yeah. Wherever you go, you're bringing a light in the world. And that's a why. Yeah. You're bringing enlightenment in the world. You're bringing light to the person who's you're picking up your laundry from today, being being a light in the world, and helping people to see themselves differently, absolutely in the best light. And this is one of the reasons you have passion and love for what you do, which is it has purpose. And as you said, when you put that filter up and say, "Make sure that everything we do," and sometimes we'll get it wrong. Sometimes you get wrong. Make sure that as many times as possible with intention that we pass through this filter, that it does this, it brings light. And the thing that I love, and this is what a good why is, people forget that a why is actually an act of service. It's something we give to the world. It's not something we take. Absolutely. And the fact that you say to bring light in the world, you know, it's not just you. You are one of the things that brings light to this world, but your work will inspire others to bring light to this world. Absolutely. Your work will inspire others to bring light to this world. And they in turn will bring light to other people. It's magic. I like it. It is magic. And I like the fact that you use the term thread. What is the thread that connects everything? Because I think that is true for most people. There is a thread that connects the dots of their lives that they were to look back at that thread. You would see that your life has, oh, you've already defined some sense of purpose for yourself. This is how I find, this is how I help people find their why, which is I look at the past. It's not some, it's not a vision board. We do cutting up magazines. That's not what it is. I look at the past and I look through their personal lives and their professional lives. And I find the times where for whatever reason they were inflow where things just naturally were incredible. They loved what they were doing no matter how hard it was. Even it wasn't a commercial success. And I find that when you look at all of the things when they just naturally go well, there's a pattern that emerges and we can actually define. We can see that pattern and that is the why. And our why is fully formed by the time we're sort of in our mid to late teens. I would agree with that. We are who we are, we're products of our upbringing. And absolutely. And now the rest of your life is an opportunity to make decisions to be in sync with that way. Yeah. And if I think about that, so if you think about that for yourself, how is that why formed for you by your teens and what was it? So when I was younger, I said I was happy go lucky. That's what I would say when I was trying to explain myself to people. Now I know I have better words for it, something more actionable. My why is to inspire people to do the things that inspire them. So together each of us can change our world for the better. And I guess, you know, I look at my childhood, I lived all over the world as a kid growing up. Very loving parents, very loving family, very close with my sister. And there was this, there was a constant encouragement to follow our passions and do what we enjoyed and show we had the pressures to do well in school. But my parents like sort of would encourage us to do the things that we liked. And so I think there was just this natural support. Those of you who watch the Oprah podcast or listen to us, you know, every story we share, every guest we welcome is chosen with purpose. And when people share their stories, we're reminded that we're not alone in this journey called life. As the official insurance partner of the podcast, the folks at Dicco understand that the way we move through life and who we move through it with matters. And I know that life starts to move even faster as a new school year begins. All teams get underway. The calendar fills up whether you're waiting in the school pickup line, loading up the car for a weekend getaway, taking a quiet drive home after a hard day or cheering on your son or daughter from the sidelines. These moments remind us the road is not always a straight line. Dicco is there with insurance design to help keep you covered along the way because life happens. And with the right support, we all just keep driving forward. And that, dear listener, is everything. You do these multiple seminars and speak around the world just as I do. And you always, I know come across so many people who are like, I don't know what my purpose is. I don't know how do I find my purpose. And you know, some people may know their why, but still actually fail to act on it. Where does the breakdown occur? I found over the years the people who struggle the most as their careers progress are the ones who chase money and fame. So, and I remember, I have this. Now everybody's chasing money. I know this one, I'm thinking of one case in particular. This guy called me for help. He was in a bad, he was in a bad place and he needed, he needed some help and so I offered to help. And I went through his life and how did you choose this job and how did you choose this job and why did you choose that job. And in every single case, he just took whoever would pay him the most money. Wow. Not whether I'd enjoy it, not whether I, it leverages my strengths. Will they pay me the most money? And it worked fine for a while. He was making good money. He could rationalize. Yeah. The pain and discomfort, you know, that's so interesting. But at some point, it caps out. At some point, it's going to cap out. It always caps out. It always caps out. Tell us why it always caps out. Because there's no purpose. That's not a purpose. That's money and fame are a result. And they should be the unintended byproduct. And if they are the reason, there's a point at which you're not popular. You're just a product on a shelf. Yeah. There's a point at which someone else, somebody else's product is better than yours or they're, they're, their thing. And I just, I sort of, I was at a, I was at a concert once. And before the concert started, this young woman was standing in the stairs and somebody was taking pictures of her and she was sort of posing and somebody next to me sort of nudged me and she goes, she's a famous influencer. And I responded, you mean she's a freelance employee of an algorithm. And that's the problem, which is when you're, when you're seeking that, you, you have a boss. The boss is an algorithm. You work for the algorithm. And if the algorithm says that you must produce constantly all day, if you were to make money, then you don't get vacations. You don't get holidays because you have to produce produce, because the minute you stop producing, the algorithm chooses somebody else. I just read a statistic that said between the, young people between the age of 16 to 38, 86% of people want to now be influences. That's where we are. Whatever that means. Whatever that means. I mean, like by modern standards, you and I are considered influencers. I mean, whatever that means. I think that fame has become not the result of something. Fame has become the thing unto itself. Yeah, I know. I realized that it shifted when I went back to my school in South Africa several years ago. And it used to be when I first opened that school, everybody wanted to be a doctor. They wanted to be a teacher. They want to be. And now all the girls are like, can you tell us how to be influencers? I don't even know. No, I don't know how to do that. It kind of makes sense, right? Because people emulate the things they see in the media. Yes. And so, if their doctor shows and hospital shows, people want to be doctors. When you were on TV and the Oprah Winfrey show was around, people wanted to be a force for good. People wanted to be a light because that was the thing they saw on TV. That was so iconic. And now it's so diffuse. And there's not a thing that stands out. But the things that we see show up in the feeds all the time because the algorithm feeds it to us. That's the thing we emulate and that's the thing we want. Whether it's healthy or not, it makes sense. Yeah, but we do have such aligned world views. Because I remember when I first became syndicated in 1986, long time ago, y'all, I got a letter from a woman who said, watching you be yourself every day makes me want to be more of myself. And I thought, well, you know what, I think that's what I've been doing since I was a kid speaking in the church, being an inspiration to other people, letting them see what's possible for themselves through what was possible for myself. But isn't that just, I mean, I want that on my tombstone, if I was going to have a tombstone. Watching you be yourself made me want to be more of myself. I mean, I think that's what it means to accept the responsibility when you recognize that you're in the public eye, when you have a bully pulpit. Yeah. You know, it is unacceptable for anybody who finds themselves famous whether they're athletes or musicians or whoever they are to say, well, kids shouldn't follow my example. It's like, with you, I mean, you don't get that choice. You don't get that choice. Okay. So you call yourself an unshakable optimist. Indeed. You are. Indeed. In your podcast, it's called a bit of optimism. Indeed. And you even name your business the optimism company. It's a little obsessive. Okay. So we are in need of some optimism. What is the dream? - Driving forced behind yours. - So I think people confuse optimism and positivity. Positivity is very often blind. Everything's good, everything's good. And I see it in leaders all the time, they try, they think that if they just tell everybody everything's fine, then it'll be fine. - Right. - Not true. Optimism is realistic, optimism can be dark, it can be in dark times, it can struggle, but optimism is the undying belief that the future is bright. So I can say, look, very different between just being positive, very different. I can say I'm having a hard time. I can say I'm living an uncertainty right now. I can say I'm off my game. I can say I'm struggling. I can say that I'm going through, like I've gotten a lot of things wrong lately and I need a lot of help. And I know that if I'm surrounded by people who love me and I'm willing to help others as well, and we do this again, things will be fine. - Yeah. - The optimism is the light at the end of the tunnel. It's not the tunnel itself. - Ah. Okay, so you say we're in the middle of a great rebalancing. - Yes. - Yeah, it can explain what that means. - So I think we're, yeah, I think this is a great rebalancing. It's a massive social market correction. You know, when the stock market is unbalanced, when there's a bubble, it will correct with a stock market crash. There's a rebalancing. Well, this is happening at a social level. And if you look back at like the 70s and 80s, we started to see robots sort of show up in factories. And the, and the blue color world said, hey, what about our jobs? And the white color world said, it's the future baby, like progress stops for no one. Re-skill. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - And then we over, we over sort of indexed on the value of knowledge work. And the reason was because we paid knowledge workers and insane amount of money. And so clearly they must be quote unquote more important. And we sort of looked down at blue color work. Well, now the rebalancing is happening. As AI shows up, it's affecting knowledge work. Your plumber doesn't care about AI. The carpenter doesn't care about AI. Your mechanic doesn't care about AI. Skill blue color labor does not care about AI. It's the engineers and the white color work and the finance people who are like, but AI's gonna take my jobs. And my cynical answer is like, it's the future baby, progress stops for no one. Re-skill, and it's a rebalancing. And I think we can see it. The reason we see a rise of populism both in this country and in the world. And I don't care if your politics are on the right or the left side of the aisle. We're seeing this rise of populism. We're seeing the rise of sort of your average working American saying, hold on, the system wasn't built for me and I'll have none of it now. - And young people are redefining what work looks like. - Yeah. - How so? - I'm loving it too. So let's just take a step back and look at the world that they grew up in, right? Because a lot of people complain that young people are not loyal, that they're entitled. All of these are the words that they use. Well, let's look at the world they grew up in. They grew up in a world in which things like mass layoffs were normal. Their parents or at least their friends' parents were laid off through no fault of their own because some company missed its financial projections. They're profitable, just not as profitable as they promised. And so somebody lost their job, not a meritocracy, right? And so they've seen a world that the company offers no loyalty to the employee. So their attitude is, well, I should I offer loyalty back, which is the correct logic. They're playing by the rules that the company's set. So what comes across as entitlement is like, when you and I were younger, we would have to work hard, go the extra mile, then we would go to our boss and say, look what I did. Can I please have a raise? Young people now are like, pay me more. You'll see what I can do. And their attitude is, well, I don't know if I'm gonna have a job at the end of the year, so better cash in now, because otherwise I may not get it later, which, again, is the right logic for the world we live in. And so one of the things that we're starting to see now from young people-- The idea of pay me more and see what I can do. Yeah, but that's normal. It's so far into-- It's far into my generation. Far into me too, but it makes sense. Get based on the world that they've grown up in. OK. And so what we're starting to see now, is something kind of magical, which as young people are redefining what a job looks like. Where they're working for themselves, they're doing something they want to do. Maybe it's be a coach, or maybe it's be a tour guide, or maybe it's be a comedian, or a chef, or whatever it is. But they're not building businesses. They're not the traditional entrepreneur where they imagine having employees or massive scale. They're just doing the thing that they love that provides an income, and they're hustlers. And it's sort of like born out of the gig economy, but they're defining what the gigs are, as opposed to just sort of taking a new bird job, for example. And they're choosing something they want to do, and they're making their eating together a living. And some of them are doing quite well. Again, it's not an entrepreneurial aspiration, like we understand it. They're not looking to quote unquote, "build businesses," but they are working for themselves, and they're just avoiding and sort of like thumbing their nose at traditional jobs. Working for themselves, Simon, and also saying, I don't want to work like you all did. I don't want to-- I'm not giving everything that I have. But do you believe in work-life balance? I hear a lot of my young girls talking about work-life balance. I think-- yes, of course, I believe in work-life balance. I mean, whether it's buzzwords, it can really-- Well, I think we've misunderstood work-life balance means. First of all, no amount of yoga is going to fix your work-life balance, right? And taking your computer on vacation and emailing-- as the kids are having breakfast, that's not work-life balance either. That's commuting from a beach, right? That's telecommuting from a beach. Work-life balance is time to reset, of course, vacations matter, proper vacations, like disconnect for one week, leave me alone. I've got to recharge the batteries, and nothing's going to collapse while I'm gone. But also doing things that we love. I'm fond of saying that working hard for something we don't believe in is called stress. Working hard for something we love is called passion. And it goes to-- you worked extremely hard. You were telling us-- But it doesn't even feel like working. It feels worth it. You can still burn out. You can still be exhausted. But for some reason, the effort feels worth it. And I think that when you have passion for something-- and I don't believe passion is an input. Passion is an output. Find something that inspires you, that brings the light you want to give to the world. It somehow is a mechanism to help bring that to light. And passion is the thing that emerges. Yeah. And remote work is different for introverts than extroverts. That's what you've said before. Yeah, I think when-- Yeah, it's playing the difference. So when we went into lockdown, if you can remember, all the extroverts went, oh, no. This is horrible. And all the introverts went, oh, this is fantastic. Yes, yeah. And I think this is kind of the future of work, which is the office environment tends to favor the extrovert. And I don't think that the correct balance is to pick one or the other. I think the correct balance is actually a bit of both. That the introverts have to suck it up every now and then to come work with the extroverts. And the extroverts have to suck it up now and then and let the introverts go do their thing. And it's about service, right? It's about helping each other work to our greatest strengths. But I think, again, one of the happy side effects of us getting comfortable Zoom calls and remote work is that it allows for balance. Certain industries, obviously, you have to come to work. You can't-- creativity and innovation don't work remotely. It's hard to have a brainstorming session over a Zoom. It doesn't really work very well, because you can't have that interruption in that rough and tumble. But for those people who like to separate themselves, you can also go to an office and close the door. Well, our listeners heard that Simon was going to be here. And so we have some questions for you. I think many of you listening and watching can learn from Sarah's from New York. Sarah, you're joining us now? Hi. Hi. Hi, hi, hi. What's your story? What do you want to share with us today? What's happening? Yes. So I am a single mom of two. And I find myself in a nine to five job. This is all I've known. It's all my mother has known. She's Gen X. And like you said, growing up, I watched her give her entire life to a company. And they laid her off like that. And she was devastated. And as a kid, I was like, I'm not going to do that. And yet, here I am. And when I'm not happy at my nine to five, I go and look for another nine to five, knowing that that's not what I want to do. And I have dreams of starting my own business. And I want to start a play cafe in my hometown that is a place for parents and kids to connect and get off the screens and use their creativity and all the things that I encourage my own children to do and the gap I see in my community. But there's a lot of, you know, doubters and noise in my life, you know, where my mom's generation is. But there's no benefits in, you know, your own business. So my question for you is, how do I kind of block out the noise and the doubters and go after that vision? So she's touching on a myth. It is a myth now. It didn't used to be, it used to be that if you had a job, especially for like a public company or site, something like that, that job was safe, right? Versus entrepreneurship, which is, which is, which is, which is considered risky, which is considered risky. And the irony is, as she pointed out, her mom got laid off, right? And so these jobs are not, you can come to work one day and just be laid off through no fault of your own, where if you work for yourself and you're going to got a business, Yondo. months in advance. And so let's dispense with the myth that a job is safer than entrepreneurship. Now, entrepreneurship is the single hardest thing you can do. When you work for a company, your highs are not that high and your lows are not that low. When you take the entrepreneurial lead, your highs are insanely high and your lows are insanely low. And so you have to be solving a problem for yourself or for others. The best businesses, somebody is trying to solve a problem for themselves or others. They have a solution that they think works because that's what drives the passion. They're not pursuing money, they're not pursuing fame, they're pursuing the desire to give this solution that they want for some problem that they found in the world to others as well. It sounds like she has that. And one of the most important things is don't do it alone because entrepreneurship is very lonely, right? And so you don't have to have a business partner, but you have to have somebody who says you got this, right? Now, here's the great news, right, which is you can find another job. And so there's something kind of magical about, if it's bothering you, if you're lying awake and not going, I really want to do this, I really want to do this. And the only thing that's holding you back is your own fear and the pressure from the world, then I say do it on the side, right? You don't have to like quit your job and then go try this. You can start on the weekends. You can start in a place where you don't have to pay rent, you don't have to lock yourself into a lease. You can borrow a space, you can start in a church rec center or something. Be quote unquote entrepreneurial about it. If you've got no funding, go do some more where it's cheap, find some clients, pay, let it pay for itself. Start small, do it on the side, do it on weekends, and at some point, you'll get to the point where you're going to have to choose one or the other because you won't be able to do both because you don't have the time and that's when you get to take the full unleab. But if you're curious, go try it on the side. Okay. Yeah. I say do it. I think it's a great idea. I say do it too. I thought what you said earlier too about the way we think about jobs having been safe, that's just an outdated thinking, outdated thinking, outdated thinking, and all the people they're telling you that are probably Gen X generation or older because that's the way we were ready. It used to be safe. And that was the security. That was the security. It was true. But you have a steady income and you have two little kids. And so let that be your funding. Let that pay your bills and then just, and no illusion, you're going to be working hard, but start small and start on the side. Got it. Got it? I think it's wonderful. Thank you Sarah. Best of luck to you. Now Sarah just touched on something that I think is so interesting. We actually did a whole podcast about this is how Gen X view work differently than Gen Z. And you have a unique take on why Gen Z and Millennials struggle in the workplace in Vice-Sorcer. Yeah. I mean, again, I think that, remember, they're getting advice from people who grew up in a world where work was different. Yeah. And the securities were different and the safety was different and the deal, you know, there was a time. So I'll go speak to an audience and I'll talk about the Gold Watch. And you know what I'm talking about. Yeah. And I, there's an entire, I ask. I plan to get it. Gen Z doesn't even know what you're talking about. No idea what I'm talking about. Anybody who's born, who's Gen Z or even some Millennials, when I talk about the Gold Watch, they literally have no idea what I'm talking about. The Gold Watch meant that you devoted your career to a company 20, 30, 40 years and at the end of your career, they gave you a Gold Watch to say thank you for your service. But this was a time where we gave our blood, sweat and tears to the company and the company look after us. Those times are gone. You know, Jack Welch and his peers in the 1980s, there was no such thing as mass layoffs to balance the books in the United States prior to the mid 1980s. It didn't exist. It did not exist. It did not exist. It was the existential reasons only. Wow. Okay. And so it was this new form of short-termism, capitalism that took hold in the 80s and 90s and is now so normal we don't even know that it was different. But that is not the capitalism that made America great. That is a relatively new experience. Maybe you're feeling it too with so many ways to reach each other. It can be easy to mistake being reachable for being truly connected. What I've learned that what many people are longing for is just to be heard, truly heard, by another person. That's what we're trying to do here on the Open Podcast. I see you contemplating and I can see that you're seeing yourself a different way after he said that. Making space for real connection because every time we stop and actually listen to each other, something shifts, something opens. AT&T believes that too. The right connection at the right moment between the right people can change the course of a day, a relationship, and even a whole life. So the next time you reach for your phone to call someone you love, know that AT&T is with you, keeping that connection strong because AT&T is there when the connection matters. And connecting changes everything. Laura joins us now from New York City. Laura? Hi. What's going on? Hi. First of all, thank you all so much for having me. So I am 49 years old. I have had a long career in different parts of the performing arts. I was a classical singer, did some work in academia and traveled the world when I was younger and really thought that was my purpose, was singing and making beautiful music and experiencing everything that the world could give. And then I transitioned into education, which I find to be one of the most rewarding jobs and most important things that we can do is be with young people and mentor them. And it's rewarding in a lot of ways. But I'm feeling stuck because in a little sad because the passion that was once music and singing for me is just not really, I've done it. And that part of my life feels like a little bit over. And so I'm teaching students, which is really motivating as well. But I'm thinking like what's for me? And I just recently, like I said, turned 49 and I'm looking ahead next year to my 50th birthday and I'm thinking about all of my friends that, yeah, thank you that I want to be able to like take on a trip and like pay for everything. And I'm like, well, I don't have the kind of salary to be able to do a lot of the things that I really want to do for the people that I love and with the people that I love. And that is very real to me now as I'm looking forward to this next chapter. And I have all this energy and agency to really create things and have this beautiful, meaningful chapter and I'm just feeling like I'm stuck in a cage and I have the key. But my question is like, for Simon, what should my guiding question or my guide light be? What should I wake up with in the morning and ask myself? And then also, what could be in next step? Yeah. Yeah. So I weirdly see this a lot in the arts, right? Yeah. I'm sure your story is somewhat similar to this, you know, you're a little kid growing up wherever you grow up and you dream of being on Broadway, you dream of being a singer and you dream, and it's a very fixed goal, you know, limpians are like this, you know? And you spend your whole life taking singing classes and dancing classes and acting classes to achieve the goal and some make it. But you spend your whole life achieving, you know, working to achieve this goal and then you make it and then what? And I see it a lot in the arts, you know, the ones who make it, the ones who get to Broadway you know, they're actually complete, they're so passionate until they make it. And then they're sort of don't, what, do you do another show? You know? So let me ask you a question. You're identity to me. Yeah, you're identity. So I get this. And it's just to take comfort in the fact that you're not alone in this feeling. Let me ask you a question. What is something you did in your career? It doesn't matter if it's commercially successful or not, that you absolutely loved being a part of. Something specific that you did that you loved being a part of, that if everything you did was like this one thing, you'd be the happiest person alive. Okay, I think I would have to say, say, recording. Recording one specifically. Recording album. Oh my gosh, that's okay. I want to know one. I want to know a specific thing that if you just did this one thing. Hunchback of Notre-Dame, the 15 new cast recording and being in the room with Alan Makin and Stephen Schwartz and all these incredible artists. And I was in the ensemble, so just the magic of that. And I remember waking up the next day feeling like I was just hungover like, why can I do something like this every day? So you've done, you've been in ensembles before, you've done recordings before, you've been in the room with other amazing people before. What specifically was it about this recording that stood out from all the others? It felt like the story was so amazing to be a part of this specific story was so important about an outcast and lifting this up and lifting someone who didn't have a chance and I think it was that. And then also just the sheer beauty of the center. around me. And there was no politics. There was no, you know, in New York, you show up for a gig sometimes and, you know, there's like a vibe. And the vibe was just so good. Everyone was on the same page and everyone was so excited. And last question, which is, tell me as an early specific happy childhood memory, something that, you know, not like we went to my grandparents every weekend, something that one specific that we can relive with you. Oh, my goodness. I had a lot. Very lucky. I would say going on summer vacations that we had one week in the summer where my dad, we would all go, we'd pound the car and we'd go to Florida. And that was our vacation time altogether, just the five of us, no one else. And that was a really wonderful. I can work with that a little bit. So what we have here is is the connection between those two memories. There is something to be said for being in a room with like-minded people all going in the same direction, right? That's what that recording had in common. That's what these vacations have in common. And so immediately, what I'm getting the sense when you're trying to say, what should I do next? You're saying, what's the next stage in my career? And so you're trying to say, how do I act alone to find something to do next? Where you are your happiest when you are in the car with people heading on the same direction? Where you're in the room recording, heading in the same direction, right? So I think task number one is, you're asking yourself the wrong question, which is not what should I be doing next, but who do I want to be doing the thing next with? Go find a team, go find a group, go find a cause, go find something that you believe in, go find a story that resonates with you, but find a group of people and join that ensemble, join that group, and take those risks. If you do it yourself, you're just based on what I'm hearing, you're working to your weaknesses, because you really love being in the car in the room, part of the ensemble, part of the story, part of the group, the vibe. So continue on this journey of exploration of what next, but make sure you do with others who are on the same journey. That's so key. I saw your big off. It's not what what next, but who are you doing it with? Find other performers. Find other performers on your same group and start a little group of four, five or six of you, and I guarantee you the four, five or six of you will figure it out. I guarantee it. Thank you, Laura. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. Thanks. You know, Laura's like so many other people. I thought what you said about searching for the dream and giving everything to the dream, who are still searching for that dream. Do you think most people find their dream job? Is that a realistic hope? And once they find it, what does that mean? I think that, you know, this is sort of like where my work and your work sometimes get misinterpreted. Yeah. And you know, our guidance counselors don't help, you know? Yeah. Like what do you want to do with the rest of your life? Yes, yes, yes. And it's, it's, you know, and like my work, people say, people have said to me very cynically, oh, well, you talk about Apple in your book, you know? It's, but I work in manufacturing. So it's, it's, we're confusing the glamour of the product with the people that we're doing it with. And it's, it's about being like as human beings, we have the desperate need, the deep-seated need, to feel like we belong to something bigger than ourselves, to be contributors to something bigger. And that's more about culture. That's more, so I mean, one of my favorite leaders, a gentleman by the name of Bob Chapman, who ran a manufacturing company in the Midwest, called Barry Waymiller. I mean, it's, it's blue collar manufacturing work. And yet when you visit their factories, you see people who wake up every day with this amazing sense of purpose because they recognize that their job is not just to make machines. Their job is to serve the person to the left and serve the person to the right. And they feel each other. They are to support each other. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And they come to work in service of each other. The product is, is irrelevant. And this is, and this is why it's so important to surround ourselves with the right people. And it's also why I say, and you say, in your own way, and I say in my own way, that you don't concern yourself with success. You shift the paradigm of whatever it is you're doing to how do I use this in service to something that's bigger than myself, that's greater than myself. And everything else changes with that. Look, and people are cynical. When you and I sit in front of microphones, and I only pull pits and, you know, you know, it looks like, well, of course, there's fame and there's money. Yeah. And they'd be like, well, you can afford, you can afford to, and what they, what they fail to recognize is, if you go back, and I'm just guessing, because I don't know, so I, but if you go back to both of our stories, yeah, I was turning down work when I could not afford to turn down work, because it was the wrong person who didn't believe in what I was trying to do in the world. And, and, and, and it, and it was hard. And, and so I've been turning down the wrong people to work with since before I could afford to. And, and the, and what people are seeing is the unintended byproduct of, of doing something that I believed in. Yeah. Yeah. It didn't suddenly align with your purpose. It didn't happen. Yeah. When the success came. Yeah. The success came because it happened because because you asked the why first. I know that. I know that. And that the same thing is true for me is that in the show took off when I shifted it to how do we use this not just as a force for good, but how do we use it in service to the viewer and not just by having viewers watch. And I think the, the great, I think the thing that you and I have to do. Yeah. Is, is not simply talk about the things we got right. Yeah. Is it talking about the things that we got wrong? Yeah. All the things that were wrong. And the stakes and the heartache and the, and the stress and the pain and the people who, who pushed us aside. And I think to talk about where we struggled. Yeah. Has actually greater value. Yeah. Because by always talking about what we got right, what we got right. Somebody who's struggling it makes it feel like everything's out of reach. I know when you were talking about going into your boss and asking for a raise, I remember going into my boss and asking for a raise and my boss saying to me, because I was working with Richard Scheer, who was my, was my partner on, on this talk show. And Richard was making 50,000. And I was making 22. And we were doing the same job. And I went into the boss. And I said, I, I think I should be paid the same thing as Richard. And he says, why? And I said, well, because we're doing the same job. And he said, well, Richard has children. Do you have children? Richard has a home. Do you have a home? Richard has insurance payments. Do you have a payment? And I said, no, sir. And he said, okay, then, I was 22 or 23 years old. I had a job for a company. But I did decide I'm not going to stay here. Of course. Okay. I'm not going to stay here. I had a boss literally. She used to, she used to like to have career conversations with us. And I kid you this actually happened. And so one of my career conversations, this is a word for word, which she said to me. She said, you have no talent. And I said, none. And she said, none. I said, I can write pretty well. She goes, not for business, you can't. And I thought it was so hilarious. Because it's so ridiculous. Like everybody has some talent, right? Like even like a tiny little bit. So she didn't make you feel bad. It didn't make me feel bad because it was such a ridiculous, if she said you don't have much talent, that would have hurt. That would have sent me spiraling into a deep depression. Right? But she said you have no talent. I mean, like, how can you take something like that seriously? You said, I know I have some. I got something. I'm like empirically you're wrong. Okay. Marsha's in Denver. Hi, Marsha. I hear after 40 years of working, you've decided to retire and it's terrifying. And it keeps you up at night. Right? Yeah. Thank you, Oprah. Thank you, Simon, for letting me join this conversation. Yeah, I'm ready for the gold watch. The problem is I cannot figure out how to get to a Y that I have to completely divine for myself in this new experience. You know, I've had the thread when we were talking about that back on my career and my thread has been always, there's been a community of people that, you know, like that Laura has and Laura is looking for. And I think about that. I'm like pushing myself into a place now with retirement where I'll have maybe blocks of time where I do go to the gym or I play majong or something, but there's big blocks of time where no longer am I part of a community? And first, so my two questions for both of you would be one, how important is it that I make a community my Y? Because it seems more like an endpoint than a, that seems more what than a Y and to help me sort all this out to get to what do I need to do to find the Y to move me into this next phase of my life? So I, uh, community is probably a, it's probably in the house stage, which is how do you go about bringing your Y to life? Community is, is one of the essential components, but there's a fun little thing that you can do that will get you in the ballpark of your Y. It's called the friends test, right? Find a friend you love and who loves you. Like if, if a friend who, if they called you at three o'clock in the morning, you'd absolutely take the call or if you called them at three in the morning, you know they'd be there for you, right? Do not do this with family. Do not do this with, uh, with a spouse. It just doesn't, those relationships are too close. Do it with a best friend, right? And ask them this question, why are we friends? And they're going to look at you like you have seven heads, right? Because it's an emotional question and it's very hard for human beings to put emotions into words. It's the wrong part of the brain. So they're going to look at you like you're crazy and then you immediately changed the question. You actually abandon the question why. And you say, "Come on, what specifically is it about me that I know you would be there for me no matter what?" And they'll hem and they'll ha, and they'll try to describe you, you're loyal, I trust you, you've always been there for me, and you play devil's advocate. Great, great. You have that with lots of friends. What specifically is it about me that I am so confident that I know you'd be there for me no matter what? And again, they're going to go through a few rounds of this, do not help them, do not let anybody else help them, let them go through the stress and the strain, and eventually they will give up trying to describe you, and they will start describing themselves. And this is what my friends said to me, they said, eventually when they gave up, they said, "Simon, I don't know. All I know is that I can just sit in the room with you. I don't even have to talk to you and I feel inspired." And I got goosebumps. In fact, I'm getting them right now, because what your friends will articulate to you is the value you have in their lives. It's the space you fill that no one else can fill, and that's your why. It's that act of service. It's the thing you give to the world. And if you do this and you will have an emotional response when they say it, you will get goosebumps, you will swell up with, you will well up with tears, you will have an emotional response which is proof that they're tapping into your why. And if you do this exercise with a few friends, they will say similar if not the exact same thing, because that's the value you have in the world. Go do the friends test, and that will help you get to the core of who you are in the value you give to the world. And then the fun thing is now in retirement, what are all the new ways that I can bring this to life that I didn't have the opportunity or the time before? Great. I can't wait to go torture my friends and family. Yeah. And you know, so many people, and I think you mentioned this on the phone to the producers, that so many people who are going through what you're going through, particularly having identified with a job for so many years, once you are leaving that job, lose that identity and don't know who you are anymore. It's very, very common. This is one of the reasons to articulate your why, because it allows you to define your personality and your person in terms other than your job, right? When I blur books, it always says, Simon Sinek, "Optimist and author." Because I never want to be defined by the work that I do or that I have done. I want to be defined by who I am. Until the day I die, I'm an optimist. I may not write more books. I may not give more talk, so I don't want to define myself by work. My work is my output. And so if I stop writing, I don't care. If I stop speaking whatever, you know, but I will never stop being an optimist. I love that. I just think that's great. Maybe it's that I want to be a connector or that I want to, I think about when you talk about being a force for good over, I think about maybe just being a little kinder, right? Maybe that's all I get out of the next 30 years, I think that would be cool. Yeah. I look forward to hearing how you torture your friends. Yeah. We can all be a little kinder. Thank you so much, Marsha. Okay, so we've been through so many crises lately, pandemics and economic downturns. And what distinguishes do you think a leader who navigates crises well? It's that infinite mindset. Too many leaders are focused on the quarterly results, the annual results, and that's pretty much it. It's short-termism. Yeah. And the great leaders have a very, very long-term view of things. Their goal is not to quote unquote be number one or be the best, because that doesn't exist. There's no such thing as winning in business, you know, it doesn't exist. Like when when Circuit City went bankrupt, Best Buy didn't win anything, right? The goal is to stay in the game as long as possible. That's what the infinite game is all about. And so when we have crises, they understand even if it's difficult and even if it adds stress to the system, it's it's it's a moment in time. It's kind of like getting the flu. It's not the end. It's just a period. It sucks and I have to cancel a vacation, but but I'll get through this. Well, I think that applies to people who are leading corporations and people who are also just leading themselves. 100% 100% 100%, which is and again, I will say this over and over again. And this has been my own journey, right? Which is I'm writing a book about friendship right now. I'm obsessed with friendship right now. And people look at me and I've written sort of these philosophy books, cleverly disguised as business books. Yes. And you know, I've been writing about work, work, work. Why would I write about friendship now? It doesn't, you know, Simon, that doesn't seem to make sense. It makes perfect sense because all of my work, what I've learned, is that starting with why is something we give to the world, it's something we give to other people. We just talked about it, right? Leaders eat last is about how to create circles of safety and psychological safeties for other people to thrive and be at their natural best. The infinite game is how to have this long term perspective that we can only get through difficulty and uncertainty if we are together. And so it makes perfect sense to write about the mechanics of friendship, how to actually be a friend which so few of us are actually very good at because it's relationships, it's relationships, we're social animals. Yeah. We cannot survive or thrive alone. It just doesn't exist. Right. And to understand how a friendship works and how to resolve conflict and have difficult conversations and how to nurture friendship and grow a friendship and how to repair a friendship, these skills are all transferable to absolutely every aspect of our life. Being a good leader doesn't make you a better friend. Being a good spouse doesn't make you a better friend. But being a good friend makes you a better spouse and it makes you a better leader. Wow. Incredible. So would you give the same advice to everyone watching and listening us right now that you just gave to Marsha to do the friend test? It's tons of fun. It's tons of fun. But would you do that if people who are listening to us right now and are like okay this is really inspired me but I still don't know what my why is. Yeah. So you cannot do it for yourself because we're not objective about ourselves. Right. And so as much as I even I asked somebody that helped me with mine. Yeah. Right. Because you need somebody to be able to look at those patterns objectively. We can't see them. It's the farest for the trees. Right. And so I've made it my goal to offer as many resources as possible to people and they can choose the one they like. I wrote a book called Find Your Why. If you want to do the workbook, you wrote a book. I'll start with the why. Like we I've done you know we have an app called leaderful and in there there's ways to help find your why. You can do the friend's test which is free. Yeah. You know we're certifying coaches now. We have a why school. We're certifying coaches. If you want to hire a coach to help you find your why. The point is find the thing that works for you and my goal is to make as many of those things available. So start with the friend's test. It'll get you in the ballpark. It'll get you language that's actionable. And however you want to do it, you should absolutely do it. And my rule is you have to want to. That's really important. So I tell my friends. My friends know what I do. And I say to them, I will help you find your why. The answer will always be yes, but you have to ask me. I will never push it on you and I will never tell you. And if I see my friend struggling and I know it's going to work, I know it's going to fix everything. I'll never force it on somebody. They have to be ready. And they have to come to me and say, can you help me find my why? And the answer is always going to be yes. So if you think you're ready, choose the thing that you think works best for you. Dip your toe in with a friend's test if you like. And but you have you have to want it. I'm curious to your thoughts on this because you're so well known for helping millions of people find their why. What is the why behind a well-lived life? It's it's service. A true purpose, true purpose is the opportunity to serve those who serve others. There was a guy named Matthew O'Reilly and he was an EMT. It's a five minute TED Talk. You can find out on YouTube. And basically what happens is he showed up to a scene of a car accident or by a motorcycle accident. And he could tell from this person's injuries that they weren't going to make it. They were conscious but they weren't going to make it. And people look at these EMTs and they say, am I going to make it? Am I going to die? And for some reason we believe that by lying to them, it makes it better. You're going to be okay. We gotcha. Don't worry. We're going to take care of you. And it's a lie. They know that these people aren't going to survive. And so he showed up to a motorcycle accident and he doesn't know why he did this. But for some reason he told the truth. The person said, am I going to die? He goes, yes, you're not going to make it. And this calm came over them over the person. Over the person. They asked three questions. They said, I hope my family loved me. And they wanted to make sure that they they they were good to others. It's incredible. It's called am I dying? Am I dying? Yeah. Matthew or Riley, thank you. And they just wanted to know that their life mattered to others. They asked the EMTs that you asked them. It's not that they asked. It's that they should like, I hope I lived the life that mattered to others. Yeah. And so the more he did this, the more he discovered that those same three themes were the exact same person, the exact same themes that showed up for every person who was dying. Yeah. Which means it's deep-seated in us. It's deep-seated in us that we want to matter to our friends. We want to matter to our family. And we want to matter to the people in the world. Yeah. And so if that's the question you're going to be asking when you come face to face with new immortality, why not live that life now? This is the thing that I found that the isn't that the thing that everybody everybody else is looking for, that's what I learned. That was the one thing that came out of 25 years of experience of every single show is that everybody wanted to be heard, seen, and to know that they matter. It's service, I'll tell you a quick funny story where I learned this. I have a friend who was struggling. I mean like everything wasn't working. Her marriage was collapsing, her career wasn't going well, her kids were driving her nuts. I mean, she just, she was making a hard go of it. And we've been friends forever and she says to me, can you help me? I said, why don't we get together every Wednesday, and I'll coach you. And so every Wednesday, for 90 minutes, we got together. She told me it was going on in her life. I gave her some friendly advice. She felt amazing. She went away, lasted about, the halo lasted about two days, and then went back into malaise. Repeat, Wednesday, amazing, two days malaise. And this went on for months. This was just the pattern, rinse and repeat. And so I realized this is not working. And so the funny thing is I went back to my own work, and I looked at alcoholics anonymous, right? The 12-step program. We know most of us know the first step in New York. A problem, yeah. But it's the 12th step. It's the 12th step, which is to help another alcoholic, service. And to help somebody who's struggling with the thing that you're struggling with. So I said to my friend, I said, look, we get together every week. I have an idea, why don't we split the time? Why don't we do 45 minutes where you can coach me? Because I need help, too. And it was genuine. It was like, I want to talk to somebody who I trust. And then we'll help each other. She goes great. So we got together the next Wednesday, and we started with me, and it lasted the whole 90 minutes. And then the next week, we started with me, and it lasted the whole 90 minutes. And the next week, we started with me, and we had lasted the whole 90 minutes. And in about three weeks, everything in her life was thriving. And I never gave her a single word of advice. It's when she had the opportunity to coach me. She sold all of her own problems. And what I have learned is that if you're looking for love, go help somebody else who's looking for love. If you're struggling to find joy in your career, go help somebody else who's looking to find joy in their career. If you're looking, whatever you're struggling with, if you can find a friend and somebody you care about, and you can help them overcome the struggle that they're struggling with the same thing, you will find very quickly that you will overcome those challenges yourself. The greatest opportunities to serve those, who serve others, and serve those we love. That is, that to me, is the ultimate purpose of life. That was the ultimate purpose of this podcast. Thank you so much, Simon Teneck. Oprah, what a joy. Just thank you for being here in the T House. His books start with the why, find your why, the infinite game. What is the one you're working on now? It's, I don't know, I have a title for it yet, but it's all about friendship. How to be a friend? How to be a film? All of it, that's not available yet, but all the other books are available everywhere books are so. And thank you to Sarah and thank you to Laura at Marsha for zooming in. We wish you luck on your next pass. Thank you for watching. See you next time. Go well, everybody. And thank you to our friends at Geico for presenting today's episode. Our listeners tell us that the podcast is resonating with you and is serving as a bright spot in your day. That means a lot to me. So here's the thing. I would really appreciate it if you like and subscribe to the Oprah podcast on YouTube or wherever you podcast. It's just a quick tap of the subscribe button. And that way you won't miss an episode in your queue. You don't have to pay anything. I know subscribe usually means you're paying something, but this time it means you just are notified when there's something new. There are many more to come that we're excited about. So thank you for watching and listening. [BLANK_AUDIO]