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Powerful Habits to Ease Anxiety and Boost Productivity with Mel Robbins

Hey buddy, what's up? It's Chase Welcome to another episode of the Chase Jarvis live show here on Creativelive. This is the show where I sit down with amazing humans, I unpack their brain with the goal of helping you live your dreams and career hobby and life. My guest today on the show is the one and only inimitable mel Robbins. Mel is one of the leading voices in personal development and transformation. She's an international bestseller. She's got four number one audible book of the year. She has just come out with the most recent book called the High five habit, which is a mechanism for transforming your life instant new york times bestseller. Her groundbreaking work on behavior change has been translated into 36 languages. She has done an incredible course on Creativelive that has and 55,000 students in it called How to break the habit of self doubt and build real confidence. This episode is incredible. One of my favorites of the past two years, a couple of things that we cover a ...

a morning routine that moves you out of anxiety and into a mode where you can be your most creative, productive and authentic self a mantra that is backed by science to get you out of that duress moment and into a calm neuro regulated state. Uh a set of philosophies and practices for loving yourself, not in this sort of spa day or day drinking day drinking sort of way, but the true way of connecting with who you are at your core and I think something important, a prescription for helping others in your life do the same and to do so in a constructive and positive framework, so incredible episode, I'm gonna get out of the way and let you enjoy yours truly in conversation with the one and only mel Robbins enjoy the show. Mhm. Mhm. Okay. Yeah, it brings me great pleasure to welcome mel Robbins of the show. Mel Welcome back, I love the Welcome back. It is the best and I cannot believe that it's been almost four years uh since we've seen each other. Um So thank you for welcoming me back, I'm very happy to do it and um I will take the role for a moment here of aspiring fan um having watched what you've done over the past four years from you, the class that you made four years ago in Creative Live, which is still hasn't just looked at, it has 100 and 55, students in it called How to break the habit of self doubt and build real confidence with mel Robbins. Um you've had to, you know, massive success, successful books, new york times bestseller most recently with the high five habit. Before that, the five second rule, which I used to get out of bed this morning, not lying honest and uh so we got a lot of ground to cover, but before we do all that, like what's the, you know, here we are, we are hopefully emerging from the pandemic where the people that pay attention to me in my show, but more importantly, you and all of your incredible activities, from speaking to building courses to having a daytime television show, um what is the word on the street? What are you hearing from the people who are in your community? And um is it time for us to be hopeful to be doubtful? Should we be scared? Should we be energized? What's the word on the street in the mel Robbins community? Well, um, I'm going to answer this two ways. I personally believe that people are feeling more beaten down, more discouraged and I think more distracted and uncertain than they're letting on. And the reason why is human beings are not designed to sustain this level of intense stress and uncertainty. And so regardless of what's going on in terms of your mindset, which I'll talk about in a minute in terms of why I think this is actually a really great time to be full of hope and optimism and energy and innovation, incredible moment for creativity. I want to talk about the reality of where you're at and and that is that we're not designed to live this sustained level of uncertainty. Your nervous system is completely fried and that if you don't listen intently to the things that we will talk about in terms of how you can settle your nervous system and get yourself back into a state of feeling like you're in control, you're comfortable in your body, you're not living on edge and full of anxiety every day as the default state, you're not going to be able to reach what I want you to reach, which is intense optimism, intense creativity. This is the moment in my opinion to be moving. This is the moment to be excited and energized when everybody around you goes into survival mode. This is when you need creativity more than ever. And it's also moments of extraordinary growth and innovation and you know, you got a chance to pull way ahead of where you've been and what other people are doing because so many people are stuck in survival mode right now. So I answered it in two very contradictory ways, which is based on your body state, you're probably more stuck and frazzled than you realize, which is why you find it hard to focus right now, but based on where we're at, I think this is an incredible moment of opportunity. Alright, we're gonna peel this onion and we're gonna peel into house, Okay, we're going to peel this onion in two different ways and the first the left half is this idea that our neurology is fried. My wife kate is a meditation of mindfulness teacher, she works on awareness and she has helped me understand my own neurological journey and hers, which is very different, but they both have at different times in our lives, bend completely ground to pieces and if you look at that as history of what was possible or tolerable and now over the last two years as you outline throw in a pandemic, throw on the pandemic has catastrophic economic challenges for largely small businesses creators and entrepreneurs. Which is the audience of the show and most of the people you talk about when I think about the history of what we went through, what we're going through now and the fact that where I am with the resources versus so many out there in the world it's of course everyone is freaked out and fried and burnt out and struggling to talk about it. We don't have the words, the vocabulary, the kurds the vulnerability. If in fact as you say this is peak of this ship sandwich that we've been eating. What's the path out. So the path out. Um this is gonna sound like crazy simplistic but um One of the things that I learned in researching the book the high five habit which was freaking news to me chase. But once you have somebody unpack it you're like oh shit well that makes a lot of sense. Um It is research from a woman who was at U. C. L. A. For a long time. One of the leading neuroscientists in the world she studies the brain and what it takes for the brain to learn to change to create. And one of the things that she discovered is the connection between your nervous system and your brain's ability to function as it's designed and to just really dumb it down mostly for myself. Um this is how I've boiled down what she talks about. So your nervous system trumps your brain and when you are in a state of stress or anxiety or uncertainty and your nervous system gets locked into a fight or flight response, which is what everybody is in. There's no way. I mean your wife may not be there because she is a expert meditation. She's a practitioner so she has daily practices that helped her flip off. What's called the sympathetic nervous system which is your fight or flight anxiety on edge. Oh fuck. How am I paying the bills? What's happening in politics? Gas prices are now crazy. When are we getting off zoom? Are the kids going back to school? Do I have to wear a mask? Do I need a booster? Like all of that ship that you're processing that makes your nervous system fire up like alarm, alarm, alarm, that's your sympathetic nervous system. If you don't switch that sucker off and flip on the other nervous system, you got two nervous systems sympathetic parasympathetic, parasympathetic is your resting nervous system. It's your grounded calm. It's the nervous system that's in play when you're in flow, being creative, it's what it feels like when you're grounded in your body and your okay and you feel okay. And so what I learned from dr Judith Willis is that when you're sympathetic, fight or flight nervous system is running the show your brain doesn't work properly because the alarm system takes over. And I can explain this using a very simple example if all of a sudden the alarms went off in the studio that you're in and you smelled smoke, would you be able to solve a math problem? No, no, I'm out, I'm out. Well that's basically what it's been like for the last two years, the fire alarms are going off and your body, your nose smells smoke and so your nervous system flips on an alarm. The reason why it's so hard to focus. The reason why you're exhausted by one o'clock in the afternoon. The reason why you feel like you're one more thing away from checking yourself in and needing help is because your nervous system is just fried and it's impacting your ability to think clearly. And so there's a simple trick that you can use and I know you've talked about the vagus nerve a lot on your show. Um it's a really important thing to understand. It's a treasure inside your body. The vagus nerve is a nerve that runs all the way from, you know, your seat through every major organ, your vocal cords all the way up to the top of your head and the vagus nerve is the on off switch between your, oh ship nervous system and your, I got this nervous system. And so a simple thing that you can do and I want everybody to do this at the beginning of their day. And the reason why I want you to do it at the beginning of your day is because I guarantee you particularly because you're in business for yourself, you're waking up on edge, your cortisol levels, the stress hormone are the highest first thing in the morning. And so when you wake up and you're already on edge, feeling like, oh my God, how am I going to get through the day? How am I going to pay my bills? You're rattled, You're thinking you're worried, your cortisol levels are high. That means your oh ship nervous system, your alarm system is already ringing. So we got to flip the switch and turn off the alarm before you start your day so that your brain can focus and work for you. So the way you're going to do this, I call this high fiving your heart, we're going to press in the center of your body and that's going to kind of right by your heart. It's going to press on your vagus nerve. That's where the on off switches. And I'm going to teach you to manually flip the switch and to turn off the alarm system and to turn on the calm, grounded creative nervous system. That's going to help you get back into a state of flow and help you be more strategic because right now is the most extraordinary moment in time for you as a business owner I believe and for a creator. So as you're pressing right here, you're just going to take a deep breath, go ahead and now I want you to say these three sentences. I'm okay, I'm okay, I'm safe. I'm safe. I am loved, I am loved. That's it. And most mornings I need to do it about 23 times. I'm serious. I know, but I just I love that about you though, like, like 23 times. Like no, like, well you, you know when it's when you can stop because you actually have a sensation of the rattle settling and you come back into your body. And I didn't realize until I learned how to turn off the alarm and turn on that cool rested state that my default for as long as I can remember. Chase has been alarm mode that I have been running so fast mostly away from things that I did not comprehend just how dis regulated my nervous system was. And you know, I think it's really challenging for creatives like you and me and everybody listening. And even if you're a small business owner and you don't consider yourself a creative and an artist your business is your art. And as a small business owner, you're creating something I didn't like slowing down is terrifying when you're creative because there can be this manic, stressed out energy, that's part of the creative process. And so it was very foreign to me during the pandemic. To not be able to run somewhere. I mean, I literally could not go to get a cup of coffee or go to catch a flight or run to target to run an errand, which I didn't realize was how I was kind of managing all of this dis regulated kind of survival mode energy. But learning how to stand in that frenzy, put my hands on my heart and bring myself back into my body so that I could leverage the intense and incredible power of my brain and be strategic instead of reactive and be confident instead of like chaotic, it's been life changing. And so I believe that, look, while putting your hands on your heart, take away your problems. No, it won't change the circumstances you're dealing with. But what it does is it changes you from the inside out and changes your ability to be calm and to be confident and to be clear minded and intentional about how you face those things and that changes everything. Everything because ship happens ship is going to happen, and it's not that we aim to prevent things from happening, but we take control of our response to those things, right? Whether this is stoicism or neurology or psychology, all of those things aligned to say that how we respond is the measure of greatness, right? That is how we become our best self for santa. I mean I give you an example chase. So we just, we've been wrapping up kind of like this big like book tour to the extent you can do one in these times and I went over to London and we had an incredible tour over in London and I took my daughter with me and it was time to come home and the regulations for getting any kind of international travel At least right now at the time that we are filming this are mind blowingly complicated and they're changing in real time and some involve printouts and others involved apps. And so I found myself at 4: AM at the airport two days ago with my daughter and we didn't have the right paperwork and as soon as we learned, we don't have the right paperwork. As soon as you start to entertain, I'm not getting out of this country as soon as you learn that oh my God, am I gonna have to quarantine here for 14 days then? Can I get back in the country like, and that whole thing happens When you allow the stress of your life or the stress of a moment or the uncertainty of something or the fear that you feel to all of a sudden surge through your body, you will not be able to solve the problems you're facing and so literally at 4:30 AM at Heathrow, I got my hands on my heart as I'm huffing and puffing because I I didn't download the app and I can't get back home and I don't want to stay here for another 14 days and my daughter started, I'm okay, I'm safe. I'm left. I'm okay, I'm safe. I'm like, my dad was like, what are you doing? I'm like, I'm okay, I'm safe, I'm okay. And I bring myself back into my body and then I start saying what if it all works out, what if everything is okay? What if I figure this out and I use the tools to come back into the moment chase so that I can focus on what I need to do. And I'm telling you if you're a small business owner and you are rattled and you are living with sustained stress, It's hand to hand combat with yourself in order to fight against the way that your body, your nervous system, your emotions can hijack you and you can get control and the more you use the tools that we're going to talk about, the faster and better you become at it. I think that, you know, there's a first of all, thank you for sharing that personal anecdote there, but it's also like we can relate everyone who's listening can relate, right? And this system was designed to be very effective at protecting us from saber toothed tigers, right? It helped us grow and evolve and the difference between running from a saber toothed tiger 10,000 years ago and trying to find out how to catch a flight when you're running a business, you're, my daughter has to get back to school. You know, the list of things that are going wrong in that moment is that we used to have to run from a sabertooth tiger once in a while and that the part and parcel of an unintentional modern life is that if you do not control your nervous system's response to all these stimulus, you are going to be perpetually living in that state which is a state that we were not designed to live in. So this is my debt of gratitude, my saying you know you you prefaced all this with this is going to be mind blowingly simple but so is equals M. C. Squared, right? It's the most simple things that can describe. Very complex can be the solution to very complex problems. That's what I found so beautiful in the high-5 habits. So congrats for harnessing and obviously that's one of the reasons it was an instant new york times bestseller. But let's unpack it. Another layer. We talked about an onion and you've got science that backs you up. This is not a mantra. You were clear that mantra is without some science you were skeptical of but help me understand how you arrived here And maybe five habit. Yeah what what what made you go looking okay, so, so I didn't even go looking, so, because, because look, you know, the last time that we were, that we were together, I had just self published the five second rule, the creative labs blowing up, blowing up the way that that was blowing up in the best way, but but but the first course I had ever done was with you guys and that was four years ago and like most creatives, I then hit this incredible block and I couldn't think of an idea and I didn't know what to write and everything that I thought of just seems stupid or paled in comparison or just didn't feel right and believe me, I tried, I, you know, tried to write a book about, you know, the life is like a road trip that was stupid. Then I, you know, tried to write a book about five decisions that was like a kitchen soup book, that one was dumb. You know, I tried to write a book about something else, it was like so pathetic, like that one ended up in the garbage can. So the whole time I'm like, oh, I'm a one hit wonder, oh, I got lucky, oh, there's never gonna be another idea. I was so filled with writer's block and shitty ideas that I got fired by my publisher that I ended up going with because I was a year late on delivering an idea and so that's a fun moment as a creative when your publisher says under the contract, we have the right to cancel this and you're like, yep, you do. And by the way, can we have the advance back money I've already spent because you know, we don't have any confidence in you. And so that's where I was as the pandemic hit Four years of shitty ideas and nothing and about pieces of paper that hit the circular file under my desk and publisher that fired me. And then the pandemic hits, I need to give money back that I've already spent my talk show, which was a dream job gets canceled with five minutes notice, which because they find covid 19 at the Cbs broadcast center. And so I then lose my dream job. And um you know, the life turns upside down for all of us And with that as the backdrop, it was April of 2020 and at this moment I'm basically have not changed out of my pajamas in three weeks and we're eating breakfast for dinner and I'm sleeping on the couch next to the dog where I've been drinking bloody marys since about 10 o'clock in the morning. I'm like functioning really well at this point and I uh wake up one morning and I feel the weight of the world on my shoulders and you don't even need a pandemic or to get fired from your job or to be struggling financially to understand what that feels like. Everybody feels that at some point like that you just can't face the demands of your life and business. That you would just kill to have somebody else take all this responsibility off your plate. You just need a break from your life. And that's what I felt like. And I was standing in my bathroom and I was brushing my teeth and it was in that moment that I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror and my first thought was not, God, I feel so bad for you. It was oh, you look like hell. And that was this moment where this the beatdown starts and this is the thing that I want to blow wide open because it wasn't until I had this epiphany This morning in April of 2020 that every one of us has this dirty little thing that's hidden inside your morning routine and I believe that it is the source of almost all the problems you face. And the thing that's hidden in your morning routine is a habit of rejecting yourself and it's really subtle. But then when you see it, you're like, oh my God, not only is this habit there in the morning and it's how I start my morning, but then I carry it through my whole day. And so as you stand in front of the mirror Every morning in the bathroom, I've been researching this for a year, we've had 100 and I think 42,000 people go through a five day challenge online from 91 countries in a matter of 33 days. I've done the research. Every single human being on the hand on the planet does one of two things when they look in the mirror in the morning. Either they can't look at themselves in the mirror jace because they are disgusted or disappointed by where they are in life. Not looking at yourself in the mirror. Has a habit of rejecting yourself by the way, or you look in the mirror and you focus on what you don't like and what you need to fix. That's a habit of rejecting yourself. And so that morning brushing my teeth is part of my morning routine. And there I go, I start looking in the mirror and I start focusing on other things that need to be fixed. You look like hell, look at the dark circles under your eyes, a saggy neck when boobs hanging lower. Then my mind's like not thinking about all the things that I need to do that I'm positive about, but like why did you get up so late? You got eight minutes to get to the zoom calling. You didn't text chase back and boom, the beatdown starts like boom boom boom, like the sledgehammer. And I don't know what, what came over me. This is literally a story. Just like the 5 2nd rule. I wish it would have been as easy to say, oh I need to write another book, I need a five in the title, let's call it the high five habit. Let's figure out what I like. Like that would have been amazing. That's not my creative process. My creative process is mel Robbins needs to dig a hole or fall into one and then she needs to realize nobody's coming to save her ass. So she's got to build a ladder and so here I am in a whole, emotionally feeling the weight of the world on my shoulders. I'm beating myself up and as cheesy as it sounds that morning standing there in my underwear, I just instinctively high fived the woman I saw in the mirror because she looked like she needed it. And as my hand hit the mirror, I laughed, I laughed because it's so cheesy and corny. I'm like, oh my God. And then here's the thing though, I immediately felt something shift inside. Hmm I immediately felt the energy change. I went from this woe is me beat down, you're a loser, You're fucked today. Kind of energy to not even thinking words, but feeling an energy that I would describe, that's sort of like, oh come on, it's not that bad. You got a roof over your head, like sort of like that tough parent kind of thing and I left the bathroom, that's what happened. That was day one. So I'm not at the point where I'm like, okay, I got a book here, you know, that's not what happened, but the second morning is when the profound nature of this started to unfold, so I wake up and like you, I still use the five second rule because I hate getting out of bed, It was so cold, it was so cold in my bedroom this morning and left the window open, it got into 30° and I'm like, I could snooze forever, correct, correct, I can relate to that. And so um I get up 54321, I start walking to the bathroom and I realized chase that I'm feeling something I've never felt in my adult life and it's this, I'm not even in the bathroom yet and I'm already having this sort of realization, you know when you're about to meet somebody that you really just like for a cup of coffee and you're about to walk into, you know, like a cafe or something, what is it that you feel in your body when you're about to see someone you like, I had some fluttering, it's a like some energy and there's a little uh hiccup or giddy up in your step. There's um yeah, all these, I don't know, a little zing of emotion and joy. Yeah, exactly. I realized that I was feeling that about seeing myself now, I had never felt that before, I'd certainly felt excited about seeing an outfit or haircut, but the human being mel Robbins excited to see her what, and as I rounded the corner, kind of the profound nature of this started to hit me and as I walked into the bathroom and I kind of step in and the woman in the mirror steps in with me, I have the second realization holy sh it, There are two people in this bathroom, There was something about the high five the morning before that broke this seal and made me realize that that's not my reflection, that that's a person who needs me, she is trying so hard, she is doing the best she can, she feels so beaten down, she's tired of the negativity, she's tired of you picking her apart and she needs you to be more supportive and I kind of stood there for a minute because I had never had this sort of experience with myself, it's like almost like a moment of objectivity with yourself and you know, if you allow yourself to look past the body and the face, you will see your soul, your spirit, your humanity, it's an entirely different way to relate to yourself and you know, I just kind of stood there for a minute and I thought to myself, what does she need from me today, and as I thought about it and the answer kind of that second morning was like could you have a little fucking fun, like this has been like just jesus, you know, it's kind of like that sort of thing, You know, I kind of laugh again and so I raised my hand and I go to high five and that was sort of what sealed the deal for me. And so I added it into my morning routine after I brush my teeth, I just take a minute I look in the mirror, I don't even say anything and I go to high five myself and I started to notice every single morning I did it, I felt better every single morning I did it, I felt a little bit more optimistic every single morning I did it, I felt more energized and it was about a month of doing it that I posted a photo of my story, doesn't even say try this, this is what I'm doing. It literally is just me high fiving myself in the mirror and that was all it took within an hour, more than 100 people around the world had posted photos of themselves doing it, some with their kids, all different ages, professions backgrounds and that's when it hit me, maybe I'm not the only one who needs a little encouragement right now, Maybe this high five ain't so cheesy after all. And so I took on a year long research project which involved not only reaching out to all these people around the world and kind of doing that sort of real person type of research, but also talking to some of the leading experts in neuroscience and habits and the research is freaking jaw dropping. So just shorthand very quickly, you know, I'm on a mission to get everybody on the planet to start their day by high fiving the human being they see in the mirror. And the reason why I want people to do this is because the science is just absolutely a game changer and um there's a couple of reasons why this is so important, particularly for those of us that are in business for ourselves, Those of us that are putting creative ideas out there. Number one. Um when you go to high five the mirror, your brain recognizes what a high five is and this is where all the power of this habit comes from, you're not actually having to learn anything new. The coolest part about this habit is all the programming, The neuro association of a high five is already in your brain and your nervous system. And so we are just going to a mall of that positive energizing celebratory programming back at you instead of at everybody else. And we're just tapping into something that's already in there and giving you the benefit of it and you don't have to do anything other than raise your hand and high five the person. So when you go to raise your hand, the act of raising your hand, you can stand there in your underwear and think Chase has lost his damn mind and mel Robbins is now out of her mind to this is the dumbest thing I cannot like. You can literally think all that. But the second you go to raise your hand as you get closer to the mirror, all the criticism goes silent because the hand gestures a trigger that causes your brain to grab the programming associated with a high five that's in your brain. So when you high five, somebody chase, what's the what's the high-5 communicate to somebody? It's affection, connection, recognition, acknowledgement. Mhm. I believe in you. I see you celebrate you. If you do do it with a teammate who just screwed up. It's like shake it off, keep going. It's all those things. It's only ever been those things you've never high fived somebody and thought I hate you, You suck. I hope you lose. You know you've never done it, done it. It's why it's neurologically impossible to criticize yourself as you're high fiving yourself because your brain isn't wired to do it. And so go ahead. You can see that you know keep going. You're on a roll. Just so as you go to high five yourself and the critics silences all that programming. I believe in you. I see you, I celebrate you keep going, marries with your reflection as you get close to the mirror, Your brain gives you a drip of dopamine. That's why everybody laughs. That's also why people will cry when they do it. It's why your mood boosts a little bit. It's why you feel a little bit more intentional once you finish it, the other thing that happens is your nervous system. You know, we've talked about the parasympathetic and the sympathetic nervous system, the kind of fight or flight, the kind of more energized grounded nervous system in the parasympathetic, well your nervous system is wired for celebration instinctively. You know when you cross the finish line, everybody raises her hands when your favorite team scores, everybody raises their hands when you shout surprise at a birthday party, everyone raises their hands when you wave hello, you raise your hands when you hug somebody, you raise your hands When you high five yourself, you raise your hand. So in the act itself it flips on the celebratory energy in your nervous system. And this is just the beginning of what starts to happen. There's all this research that uh that you know, scientists have done, we just packed the book with all of these studies about motivation, inspiration winning and a high five is unbelievably well documented as the most motivating source. Even more so than any kind of verbal encouragement than you can give because a high five makes you feel like you're in partnership that you're gotten, that you're recognized that you're celebrated. That's the most powerful force in the world and what I'm here to tell you. And this is what I have discovered now that I've been starting my day, every morning, I get the gunk out of my mouth so I don't spread bad breath everywhere. Then I get the gunk out of my mind, body and spirit so that literally you can clear generational ship out of your body by high fiving yourself in the mirror because what's happening is you are validating yourself, you are accepting yourself, you are encouraging yourself with that simple gesture and what I've found, there's three major insights that I've gotten chased from doing this one is that I like so many business owners and so many creatives. I had married achievement was self worth, as long as I'm creating something, as long as I'm achieving something than I deserve praise or I am worthy or I'm validated, which puts you on a path of always chasing things and always feeling like it's never enough because your self worth and your love ability is located outside of you when you start your day every day by validating exactly where you are. I didn't go to the gym yesterday, still high fiving myself, didn't get through my to do list. Still high fiving myself, you're demonstrating that you're worthy as you are and that changes everything. The other thing that profoundly changed for me is, you know, if you're insecure you doubt yourself or you struggle with people pleasing or an imposter syndrome and I think most creatives, we do, what's incredible is that when you add this habit and your brain watches you celebrating and supporting yourself every day, you learn to like yourself and when you like yourself, something amazing happens, you'll stop worrying so much about what other people think because so much of your validation seeking comes from the fact that every morning in the mirror you reject yourself. So of course you're going outside to try to build yourself back up if you can start your day by showing that you like yourself and accept yourself. Yeah. If other people don't like you, it stings but it won't change the fact that you like yourself. And the third thing that I learned and I think this is the most profound one is you know when I first started doing this chase Um my husband Chris We've been married for 25 years. I said to him, I said because you know, one of the things that that has has been happening in my life, you know, since I last saw you is that my husband has come to terms with the fact that he's been struggling with depression for a long time and you know, I said to him at one point as I've been high fiving myself, you know, I turned to him, he's at the sink next to me and I'm like, you know, I really think this high five thing it could help you. I really, you know, I think I think it'd be really good for you and and depression and he looks at me, he's like I am not that that is the stupidest thing I've ever I am not doing your high five thing that's fine for you. And I'm like look, if you don't want to do it for yourself that's fine. But would you do it for me? I mean I'm like excited about this thing, I'm about to start reading like could you just do it for me? So I bully them into it right, just five fucking days, just do it for me, see if it makes a difference. So after he had high fived himself five days in a row. You know, I talked to him about it and what he shared is profound and I think it's incredibly relatable when I said to him, I want you to start high fiving yourself. The reason why chris thought it was stupid is because ever since that restaurant business failed And he got out of it in 2014 For the past seven years when he looks in the mirror, he sees a man who failed, He sees a person that's not been a good father or a good husband because he has not been able to provide financially for them. He has judged himself, he has hated himself and the fact that I don't see that doesn't make a dent in what he sees. You know, I've been standing next to this man at the sink next room for seven years. I had no idea how dark his mind had become. And he said to me, I thought that high fiving myself is stupid Because don't you Joe. Always High five a winner. And if I think I'm a loser and a failure, why on earth What I ever high five myself And based on our research, that's most people's experience that as you stand in the bathroom, you see what you're disappointed in. You see the regrets and you withhold the very thing that you need which is support and acceptance and compassion. And so the high five in the mirror every morning isn't yeah, I'm winning at life. It doesn't that's not what it is. I see you, I know that this is hard and I still love you and you deserve to be happy and keep going. That's what it becomes. It becomes a gateway to healing to forgiveness to all the things that we need. So incredibly profound. And as I mentioned earlier, my E. Equals M. C. Squared comment. That's part of what I found so beautiful about the book, your research and of course, you know, you layer in these personal, very personal and vulnerable relatable experiences and it's real, it's really the science is clear and, you know, most people you mentioned earlier this external this desire for external validation that culturally from our parents, our teachers, our coaches, all of the people are career counselors. You know that is a uh for I was going to say it better or worse, but for worse, that is a culturally largely culturally ingrained um part of our culture and yet the science is clear if you wait for external validation in order to have a good attitude, you're going to constantly be chasing this external validation versus having a good attitude that can create the feelings that you seek this connection. And most importantly as you mentioned the connection, respect, love and connection with yourself. Yeah. Damn. Thank you again for this. You know uncovering you know the the ah somehow some of the most simple things in life can be the most profound. So you walked us through the experience how you got to that place where you needed that from yourself. You shared this experience with your husband and I think we've convinced the people who are watching, listening to try it. You said five days yep. What's the minimum viable dose? What do you think? Is it five days? I think the I mean I personally think everyone should do it for the rest of their lives every morning because I want you to break the habit of self rejection and replace it with a habit of self acceptance and self compassion and self respect and self validation. And what I love about it is again it takes you know a couple of seconds and I love that it's a physical action because your brain is always watching and you know we talked yeah, your wiring and the other piece that I love about this is that um you know, these concepts of self worth and self validation and self acceptance and self kindness and self respect, they're kind of these big topics and we all know that that's what we need to be doing, but we don't know how and so what I love about this is it's a demonstration of those things and your brain is watching, so as you're rewiring your brain starting to go, oh wait a minute, I'm a person that respects myself, oh wait a minute, I'm a person that accepts myself, oh wait a minute. And it has this incredible ricochet effect because it sticks with you again because of the neuro association that's already there. Um so, you know, I think it's a minimum of five days and the reason why I say five days is because um if you grew up in a culture where nobody high fived you, the neuro association is still there because you've seen it in sport online, you've seen viral videos of people doing it online, and so you still have the positive association, but the main reason why I want you to do it for five days is because for the majority of people, they resist it immediately because of the amount of judgment about your past and about where you are, and so it's going to take a couple of days of doing it and be like, I don't feel anything. So then doing it again and being like, sh it okay, you know, that's weird, and so just give it five lousy days and you will literally have the most profound breakthrough, both positive and negative, negative being, I can't believe how shitty I've been to myself for so long, and I just have been like, I have been withholding a fucking high five, like, that's how bad I've been to the profound breakthrough of truly feeling chase that you're coming home to yourself because you were not wired, hating yourself, life taught you how to do that. You came into this world loving the sight of yourself, cheering for yourself, celebrating yourself. And so it's actually bringing you back to your true nature, which there's something like that's the part that in my participation in a lot of your work online and your books is that these are so foundational, the concept of, you know, finding gratitude that you have a body and that body can carry you around in the world, and this recognition is so fundamental that we have forgotten to how to manage it, and it is even worse and almost borderline toxic visualization or manifestation or uh description of what this is, it equals a spa day, like loving yourself self care is like, I'm going to the spa. So if you don't go to the spa, you can't afford to go to the spot or I don't know anyone who goes to the spot every day. It's, it's, it's almost impossible. It like creates this and actually a gap between your ability to touch this judgment free zone of yourself. This more importantly, judgment free and actual acceptance of yourself versus the dynamic that you've set set up here so well, you know, I can give you another example that's really relatable. Um, because I, you know, you talked about judgment free zone, I think we just live in the judgment default judgment zone as a default and here's a really quick example like, and this is so stupid and this happened this morning, I was talking to my mom, I'm close with my parents, I grew up in michigan, my husband and I for a couple of decades have lived outside of boston massachusetts. I hate that I live away from my parents but I'm not moving back home to a tiny town of people in Western michigan. I don't want to live there, but I hate that I don't live near my parents by the way, my parents aren't moving near me either. So we're kind of in this standoff. So my mom was talking and you know you and I are talking around the time of the holidays and she mentioned the fact that my brother and his wife who I love are driving down to florida to be with my parents for thanksgiving week and I felt this like in my heart and not guilt, but just like I wish I we were all going and we're not, we're going to be up here in boston or kids are flying home from college, they want to see their friends, this is the period of life that we're in. But I was like and then I immediately, and then I went down the road of, oh my God, but they're getting old, how many more thanksgivings do you have with them? And I start to beat down and I paused and I said to myself, why are you doing that to yourself? You have a beautiful relationship with your parents, you have a beautiful life, You just had a beautiful conversation with your mom, you are so used to beating yourself up and finding the negative that you tilt there when you're not paying attention, that's how fast it can happen. And so I caught it and I flipped my attitude which is like giving yourself a mental high five, you know when in sport, if you see somebody going down and you high five them, you bring their attitude back up. We so focus. And this is the other thing that I've noticed that in business, I would literally focus on the one thing that wasn't working instead of the 100 things that were going right. And so this is a daily practice of catching where you're drifting to and pulling yourself into a lane of kindness and into a lane of celebration, which profoundly changes your experience of life itself. So many people that I know there's a we're biologically wired for a negativity bias, right? That's part of a survival mechanism that we, you know, I talked about this as the brain rather than your brain because it's an organ. Its job is to keep you alive, not happy. And turns out we've done a pretty good job with that whole alive thing because people are living to be 80 something years old. There's 7.5 billion people on the planet and what we ought to be doing is learning how to manage the thing between our ears and the thing between our ribs and this is probably the most practical, simple and approachable vector for that. That um I've, I've experienced so again, I don't want to blow smoke, but I think it's fascinating. Um and you know, as you put together this self gratitude appreciation and recognition with your earlier work around getting your ass into gear whether you like it or not, um how to manage this thing between our ears. It seems like that's a um it's become your, your occupation and your focus and you're good at it. And so it makes me want to ask you, first of all, we should pause and celebrate you thank you for that. Those two pieces of work game changing. And I want to ask you a question since you are you've demonstrated that you have a mastery over managing the brain and the heart. Most people who, when I ask if money could be no object, If you could do whatever activity you want and have the life of your dreams, what would that activity be? What would you do for your time? How would you spend your time on this planet? I am continually shocked that most people are unable to immediately answer that question. There is a long, somewhat frightened expression. A long time of period, period of time goes by and then they look at me and they say, huh, haven't really thought of that or yeah, I couldn't be possible. Or this is just some sort of a fictional activity that Sure, I'll try and humor you chase. But my question for you then is if I have, I believe that most people do not know what of all of the things that they could be doing in this one precious world with their life. They don't know what to do. Clearly you have through by hook or by crook, by a mistake. By you know, you've you've chronicled the different careers that you've had. And in this show alone, you've been incredibly vulnerable, talked about how you're struggling to follow your own damn advice and yet you've managed to achieve greatness. You've managed to navigate. What I think is the most difficult question is how can I, you know, live the life of my dreams. You just talked about a moment ago, having a beautiful life, having a great relationship with your parents now. Most people struggle with this. How have you nailed it? What advice would you give? Because most people who are listening right now, if I could snap my fingers and give them any life, they wouldn't know what life to choose for themselves. Mhm. You have incredible, incredibly this, what would you say? Thank you, thank you. Um so what I would say is I uh for the majority of my life felt the exact same way, either because I didn't believe it was possible or I just was so in survival mode and out of touch with myself that I I had no capacity to answer that question authentically because I was not actually in relationship with myself, I was just surviving life and to be able to answer that question authentically, you do need to be connected to yourself and know yourself and that's harder than you realize. Um before I kind of give you the answer, I think I do have to share one thing which is I think one of the reasons why I have stumbled into these tools is because for way too long, I was really fucked up. Um I lived for way too long in a dis regulated, anxious, self loathing state. I was really miserable for way too long and you know, on the outside people that knew me would say I was really positive and really competitive and really confident and the truth is inside because I was so on edge and so full of anxiety and so insecure and also dealing with untreated childhood trauma. I didn't know any of the things that I know now that once I started healing and once I cracked this shell and a little light got in and I got a taste of what it felt like to feel grounded in your body and not on edge to feel comfortable in your own skin, to feel ok with exactly the person I am and exactly the person that I'm not. Once I got a taste of what it felt like to be connected to myself and to feel present, I am so aware when I'm not in that state. And so these simple tools that I've created, whether it's the five second rule or now the high five habit or high fiving your heart or mindset tricks, like simply saying what if it all works out when I start worrying or any of the little tools do it. Anyway, that flipped me from a on edge, stressed out a fox state into, okay, I can face this or a negative anxiety ridden self loathing, why don't I live near my parents shipped, I should wait, they're gonna die and then I'm gonna regret flip it like I literally spent too many decades hating myself being disassociated, dis regulated anxiety ridden questioning that I don't want to waste any more of my life feeling that way. And so I think that you know part of my genius if you will of coming up with these simple things that encapsulate decades of research that help people take control and transform things through physical action or through mindset changes. They come to me because of how miserable it's been to be in this body and in this mind and it is like hand to hand combat with myself. And so I also want people to know that even though I have these tools, I still get hit with stuff that sends me back into stress mode or sends my mind into like a dark mode and that's normal, it's okay. But there are simple things you can do to flip the switch and take control again. So that's number one, the second thing is that um it's related and that is that for me discovering what's meant for you next is an energy thing. And so I just pay attention to what I'm drawn towards. The things that are meant for you have an energetic match for you. And the things that aren't meant for you have an energetic like rejection. And the way that I read things is that if the energy around something, whether it's a person or it is an opportunity or it is anything in businesses expansive might be scary, might be intense, but if it's expansive, it feels like there's growth there, I lean towards it if the energy around something feels very depleting or shrinking or constrictive, I step away from it. And so I have for the last decade I have leaned toward things that feel like growth. I have said no to things that start to make me feel constricted. And um the other thing that has helped me a lot, so that helps you make decisions to about whether or not I'm going to take funding or whether or not I'm going to like right, now for example, I'm I'm my biggest goal for the year 2022 is to launch a podcast of my own and my Mhm. The thing I'm making a decision around right now is do I just do it all on my own? And do I hold the whole thing and do I bring the advertising in house and just do whatever the funk I want or do I partner with somebody but still own everything. And I don't know the answer yet, but I think it's going to be doing on my own and I can see that there's this history of every time that I have something in business that doesn't work. I knew instinctively that it was a bad idea because it felt like there was a part of me that was going to be constrained or restricted. And so that's an example of how I'm using, this sort of, is it expansive? Is it depleting, is it energizing, is it like that sort of feel to make the decision that's going to be right for me. And then the second thing that has helped me tremendously is to understand the difference between passion and purpose and in my mind, passion is for you, Passion is anything that brings you energy. If you feel stuck in your life before you end that marriage or quit that job, try just bringing some things into your life that make you feel energized, whether that's taking an online class or taking on a new hobby or learning something, because you've probably just stopped growing when I understood that passion and feeling alive and energized is simply about making it a priority to do things that make you feel that way. I brought more passion into my day to day life and work. Whereas purpose is something that you're giving to the world and purpose might not have anything to do with what actually brings you energy. Purpose is the gift that you give to the world and for those of us in business, for ourselves and those of us that are artists, your story and the thing you're creating is your purpose, because it's what you're giving to the world. Mhm This may be perceived as a trick question, I think that was a very helpful answer that was all about how do we do this for ourselves? I think it's the biggest problem to be clear, which is why I started there, But let's do let's do one step removed, which is how can we support others in doing this specifically the and I'm going to place at your feet now is you have some lovely Children and they are growing up and they are becoming their own little humans out in the world doing cool human shit. Are you always supportive of the things that they want to do? How do you do that? And by just to be clear, I'm hoping that this is a model we've just heard for the past hour, how we can take care of ourselves. It also doesn't hurt to be able to be supportive for those that are in our circle whether their spouses, um you know, kids, parents, we talked about that earlier before we started recording, we were sharing swapping parents stories and I'm just curious how has it been to use the lens that you've developed on yourself? How do you direct that to your kids? Um there's a couple of rules that I follow and before I share kind of my rules, I'll just give you the biggest framework I feel like and thankfully chris and I are very aligned on this that our job as parents is to help our kids become themselves and that can be a really challenging thing to do when your kids are nothing like you and so one big rule is you gotta show not tell. And so if you expect your kids to have a certain philosophy about life or to have a certain type of work ethic or to treat other people with kindness or to be kind to themselves? You got to show them what that looks like. You can't just tell them what it looks like. The second thing is that I I think that one of the most important skills that your kids need, that a lot of us don't know how to teach is how to make a decision for themselves. And so many of us as parents, I made some major mistakes when when I was younger and when I was still very dis regulated when your kids are anxious or your kids are struggling. It's just natural to want to swoop in and save them and to make the decision for them and they're going to be times when it's dangerous or destructive or there's a safety issue, you got to make the decision for your kids then. But really what your kids need is they need your help in having a framework for how you make a decision, how you think through consequences, how you think through the way that something may impact a friendship or a relationship or a great at school and it's only through experiencing the consequences of their own bad decisions that your kids learn what they care about. And so I think that one of the tools that we developed over time that's been super helpful is that when our kids come to us with a problem, I always say this sentence and it saved me as a parent. I say, do you want my help or do you just want me to listen? And nine times out of 10 they just want me to listen. And I have also found that I instinctually just want to solve their problems and so asking questions instead of telling them what to do. So what do you think you should do? What do you think would happen if you do that? What are you worried? What happened? And oftentimes my kids will say, well what do you, what do you think I should do? And I'll be like, well first I want to hear what you think you should do and so putting it back on them, put it, make teaching them how to think for themselves. Super super important. You know, I made this mistake with kids with our kids Chase the second that they had any kind of anxiety. I don't want to sleep in my room, I don't want to go to this party because I might throw up. I don't want to go take this test. I don't, I would swoop in and be like, okay, okay, don't worry, you don't have to go, you can do a sleep under not to sleep, you can sleep on the floor in my room. What I've learned from one of the leading experts on childhood anxiety is that when you as a parent rescue your kids from the things they're worried about, you're doing a couple things, number one, you're subconsciously telling them you're right, I don't think you can handle it either. And the second thing that you're doing, because anxiety when it first starts, it's not a disease like depression, it's a freaking coping mechanism for uncertainty. The more you rescue your kids, the more they develop anxiety as a strategy to deal with uncertainty, You make it stronger instead of helping them, you're actually hurting the situation. So as hard as it is to march your kid back up to their bedroom and say, I'm sorry, you're not going to sleep on the floor again tonight. I believe in your ability to stay in your bed and I'm gonna stand out here for 10 minutes and if you get scared, yes, you can come down. But guess what? I'm gonna walk you right back up because you know what, I believe in your ability to face this, you can do this kind of thing, honey. And so again, what do you think you need? What do you feel like it? What do you think you should do? What do you think might help your teaching them the skills they need as an adult? Um, you know, so those are some things that have happened. And, you know, we have we have a couple of kids that are super creative, we have a daughter who's uh at USC in the thornton school of Music in this wildly competitive pop music major program as a singer songwriter. And it was so hard for the first two years to watch her get into this program that was like winning american idol dream come true. You know, working with Graham like this is her dream and to watch her spend the first two years being a college student going two frets and squandering the opportunity. And there was nothing that I could do as a parent to change that. And my biggest fear was, you know, of course something happening to her. But my biggest fear is holy ship. I can see this playing out. She's going to be a 30 year old adult that spends her life regretting the fact that she squandered that opportunity and that makes me want to swoop in and that makes me want to go, are you practicing? And that makes me, did you write any song? And that would backfire. I have got to let her walk her own path. If she ends up being an adult that regrets how she spent her childhood years? Maybe that's the fuel she needed as an artist? But you know, I can ask her and I do. Are you happy with it? How do you think you're doing? What do you think you're struggling with? And that sort of opens up things and you know, I'm happy to report that. I think the pandemic was this incredible gift in her life because Having that program canceled for a year and having it completely taken away was the wake up call that I've been fearing she would get as a year old and now every time I call her, she's in the practice room every time I call it, like she's just and so you've got to trust that they're going to figure it out. You got, you really have to, I think that we just used that through the lens of your kids. But I think that's true as a leader in an organization. I think that's true as a friend, appear as a mentor and a mentee. Like there's a lot of this dynamic that us learning how to help ourselves first and put our own oxygen mask on before helping others is obviously critical. But the ability, if you do make some progress along that personal journey, the ability to be there for one another is super important. I want to say thank you mel. Um congrats on the book in addition to you, What was it? I think you've got four number one bestsellers on audible every time I turn around you got another one of those things. So keep churning out the hits as you may say to your daughter at some point. Um, but this this most recent work, truly profound beautiful in its simplicity and its power. Um it's been great to reconnect after too long. Um it's been fun to follow you on your adventures and social what's if you wanted to steer some, some people towards, some ways to interact with your work out there on the the worldwide universe. Um we were just steer them um outside of the book and the things we've talked about on the show, I just go to social media um uh the other thing that that you could do, you know, that's free, we put out just a tremendous amount of content every single day. That's free. I'm actually in the middle of reading the high five habit for free every day, cover to cover online because I know so many people are hurting and I don't want these tools to only be for people could who can afford a book. Um also we have a free newsletter that is read by almost a million people every other week when I get it out and um there's just a lot that we're putting out there to support you. So if you just sign up for the newsletter at mel Robbins dot com or follow us on social media, you'll have all kinds of support that you need. Awesome congrats again, thank you for being so honest and vulnerable and uh just it's authentic as hell. It's just a treat in this world where everyone is so scheduled and predictable and calculated to have someone like yourself to just take us take us on the ride that we need. Thank you so much for being on the show. Congratulations. And this community will show up for you. So let's go support Mel. Her newsletter is extraordinary. Obviously we've already talked you into buying the book. So that's that's a done deal. But thanks again, Mel. And again, I will also how to break the habit of self doubt and build real confidence. Is Miles Class on Creative Live. 155,221 students. Thank you so much mel signing off until next time. I bid you all out there on the Internet. I bid you all adieu.