THE SHIFT, FROM AMBITION TO MEANING (WAYNE DYER) CUT VERSION

Dr. Dyer, interview one. Okay, Wayne, you came up here to write your latest book. Can you tell us a little bit about what you came up to write about? Yeah, I'd be happy to. One of the things that has intrigued me over the years is so many people coming up when I talk about purpose and finding meaning in their life, is, uh, what is my purpose? How do I find it? It always seems to be eluding me. I can't seem to get there. I've always felt that the real purpose of life is just to be happy, to enjoy your life, to get to a place where you're not always trying to get someplace else. So many people spend their lives striving, trying to be someplace that they're not. They never get to arrive. One of the ways to understand about how to find your purpose in your life is to return to nature, to find your own nature. I wrote a book a few years back called Change Your Thoughts, Change Your Life, which was based upon the ancient teachings of Lao Tzu in a book called The Tao Te Ching. Lao Tzu reminds us that all being originates in non-being. Jesus put it this way in the New Testament. It's the spirit that gives life, that you didn't really come from your parents. You're, you really, all of us came from this place called spirit. When you showed up here in this world, you showed up here from a tiny little drop of human protoplasm, a speck, if you will, and everything that was in that little speck that became you. Everything that you needed was in that tiny little speck. One of the most important metaphors that I ever used is that the first nine months of your life, from the moment of your conception until the moment of your birth, everything was being handled for you. There was nothing for you to do. You don't get consumed with the color your eyes are going to be or what your body is going to look like. It's all taken care of for you. You just surrender. I call it a future pull. And it's pulling. It's pulling you in the direction of whatever it is that you were supposed to be. And to me, it's not too great a stretch to say if everything you needed for the physical journey was already handled in there, then why not everything for the rest of the journey as well? All of your purpose, it's in there. All of what you, your personality, it's in there. Everything that you were to be, not just the physical you, but everything, if you just let go and allow. And so we're born. And we look at this beautiful little creature. As parents, I have eight children. I've seen it happen many times. And you look at this beautiful little child and you look at it and you say, Great work, God. Great work. Couldn't be any better. We'll take over from here. And then we're surrounded by all these people and our family, our culture, wherever we go. And we begin to be told that we can't really trust in who we are. We have to trust in something outside of ourselves. So we're on a journey towards ambition. Once you begin to say we'll take over from here, you introduce something, you just take this perfection and you just edge out the creator. You edge God out. E-G-O. Ego. This ego is the part of us that starts to tell us who you are is not this perfect divine creation, this piece of God that you came from. It doesn't say that. It says who you are is what you have. It begins with things like our toys, and then our bank accounts, and then the possessions that we have. Before you know it, we begin to identify ourselves on the basis of our possessions. We begin to take on a set of beliefs about the more that I have, the more valuable I am as a person. And so we spend our lives taking these young children and immersing them in a culture that emphasizes more. It becomes almost a mantra of the ego. You have to have more. And the more you have, the more you are aware of how much other people are trying to take it away from you. The more you get consumed with how do I protect it and how do I make more of what I have. The dilemma here is that if you are what you have and things go away, then who you are also goes away in the process. The second aspect of the ego is this idea that I am not only what I have, but I am what I do as well. Are you going to get that? No, no, please, go ahead. Oh, it's all right. Well, we're stopped here. Do you want anything, Dr. Dyer? You want water or anything? No, no, I'm fine. Mr. Rowland, guys, we're cutting. What? Keep rolling, keep rolling. Please. So the second component of this ego is the idea that not only is who I am what I have, but it's what I do. And what I do becomes this thing called achievement. And in this whole world of believing that I am what I do, we become consumed with this whole idea of my success, my value, my worth as a human being is based upon how much I accomplish. So I have to make more money, I have to get a promotion, I have to compete with everybody else who's trying to get what I have. We are taught this over and over and over again. All of our young people are taught this when they go out into athletics. The most important thing you can do is be number one. And you see, we're number one. We're better than everybody else. And we constantly find ourselves in this competitive notion again of believing that our world is one in which we have to compete. That's what the ego says. Now, the third aspect of this is the idea that I am what other people think of me. That is, I am my reputation. Particularly, this is relevant for young people who are taught that you have to dress the way other people think. And if other people don't like you, then there's something wrong with you. If you're consumed with that, then you're going to be something different every time you turn around. Now, this is particularly relevant with women, especially in relationship to the family. Women are often taught in our culture and our society that the only way that you can fulfill yourself is by how you relate to your family, to yourself as a daughter, to yourself as a mother, to yourself as a grandmother. And while these are very important and creative aspects of every woman's life, if that's the choice that they make, it's not necessarily the only thing. And many women feel that deep within them that they have a calling to accomplish something great, to make a contribution. And oftentimes we'll put it aside. So what I encourage women to think is don't ignore that calling inside of you. Don't ignore the part of you that says you came here to create something powerful, and you have just as much of an influence in doing that, just as much of a right to do that as anyone else does. Look, I don't need to be having this conversation right now. I don't have time for this. I can't deal with this right now. We move into then the later parts of the ego, which talks about something called separation. And the ego has a very strong belief system that who I am is separate from everybody else. And then another component of the ego teaches us that I'm also separate from everything that's missing in my life, from all the things that I'd like to have. And then finally, the ego teaches us the most egregious error of all. It teaches us that we are separate from God. And one of the simple constructs that you learn in the afternoon of your life when you shift into the meaning phase of your life is to realize that you came from a source. We can call it God. We can call it Tao. It doesn't matter what we call it. And that this source is everywhere. There's no place that it is not. It must be because it creates everything. Everything comes from this source. Then it must be in me if there's no place that it's not. It must be in me. And if it must be in me, it must also be in whatever it is that I feel to be missing from my life. If you know that, then in some way, everything that's missing from your life that you would like to have, you're already connected to it in spirit. And all you have to do is figure out a way to align yourself with that and have a knowing that you're already connected to it. You just have to bring it on its way. That's intense. What, was that out loud? Yeah, you just said that out loud. Sorry. That's okay. It is intense. There's no question about it. Please continue. I was saying that as we move into the afternoon of our life, we take the same ego constructs that we learned in the morning of our life, which is all about competition, winning, being better than everybody else, and we try to apply these same constructs to the afternoon of our life. And what happens is we end up living a lie for what was true in the morning, in the evening, has become a lie. The problem is we don't really know how to move into the meaning phase of our life. This is when we have to learn to go back to those first nine months, from the moment of our conception until the moment of our birth. Lao Tzu speaks about this in the Tao Te Ching. Let yourself be lived by it. He says that the Tao does nothing. It's leaving nothing undone. This is where we have to get to a place where we can surrender and have a knowing that we're not alone and that we're going to be guided and that we have a nature and that we can trust in this nature. It's not something that we have to always be struggling with. It's not something we have to be in charge of. Literally, think about it. Let yourself be lived by it rather than you taking over. But as we move into the meaning phase of our life, what's happening is we begin to think about fulfilling a Dharma, fulfilling a destiny, fulfilling something inside of us, a calling that only we can feel inside of us. No one else can tell you what that is. But if you feel it and you know it, winning and being ahead of other people takes a back seat to feeling fulfilled and living your life on purpose. I don't get it, to be honest with you. That really doesn't surprise any of us, David. Seriously, if I didn't have ambition, nothing would get done. Mom, is that supposed to be a comment about us? Can I have a napkin, please? You know what I mean. Like we're supposed to sit around and wait for things to happen to us magically? There's nothing wrong with a little magic in life. I can't trust magic. What I can trust is my own will to get things done. That's my main problem with what Dr. Dyer's saying. Okay, he's right there. You want to keep it down? He didn't hear me. Dr. Dyer, you want to come join us? Sure, I'd love to. How are you guys doing? Great. This chicken's great. Mmm, good, good. So, Dr. Dyer. Yes? We were all just discussing your first interview and all those things you said, and basically David thinks that it's all B.S. What? David? B.S.? Really? I don't think all of it is. I mean, I'm entitled to my own opinion, right? Absolutely, you are entitled to your opinion, and I respect it. And you know, David, you don't have to get this all at once. You know, just get a little bit at a time. That's all it takes. You know, you just start practicing it. Eventually it becomes a way of life, and you start living from a different perspective. I'm not really a spiritual person. I'm too busy. Yeah, spirituality's kind of like a luxury. That is true. I find it hard to find time to meditate. Let me ask you this. Do you think that you're an inspired person? Do you live an inspired life? Do you feel inspired? Um... I have no idea. Really? Well, let's take an example. Let's supposing I had an apple pie that we had just made, and out of this apple pie we take one slice. We take this, we take the rest of the pie, put it over here, and I take this slice and I give it to someone. Let's say I gave it to you, Ron, and I say, Ron, what is this? Um... That's an apple pie? How do you know that? How do you know it's an apple pie? Because it came from an apple pie. So... Well, you laugh, but I mean, the truth is, that's a very profound statement that you've just made. That everything in the universe must be like what it came from. You take an acorn and you'll never get a rosebush out of it. You look at yourself and you ask yourself the question, where did I come from? Who am I, and what am I like? You know, instead of making our choices out of the place that we really are, our authentic self, we're making them out of the ego. And every time we make choices out of the ego, all kinds of things begin to happen to us that take us away from finding meaning in our lives. So how do you know if you're making a choice from your higher self? You gauge everything on the basis of how you feel. Are you stressed out? Are you anxious? Are you fearful? Are you angry? Do you feel good about yourself? Do you feel like you're on purpose? Do you feel like your life has any meaning? When you're operating out of the only part of yourself that is authentic, bliss is your response. But what about the upside of ambition? I mean, I'm a filmmaker, and if I didn't... Doesn't ego serve me? I mean, if I was going with the flow, I'd never get a movie made. That's a conclusion that you've come to because you think out of the ego. The fact is that you might even be able to make much greater films if you came out of a higher place. Imagine yourself as being able to live and work and do everything that you do from this place that... Well, it's called dharma. What's dharma? Dharma is a spiritual principle that implies there is a purpose to our lives. Like an otter has a dharma, a bird has a dharma. Everything has a purpose. And when you find yourself living from that purpose, you have found your dharma. Your dharma is something that you will be living by. And rather than constantly using the ego, you will begin to say, this is what I'm here for. I call it a calling. It's like an inner calling. How do you know what your dharma is? Like, what if you can't even find your dharma? Yeah, I can't even find a date, let alone my dharma. Well, your dharma isn't anything you're ever going to find. Your dharma is something that you're always connected to. It is your divine purpose. It is something that you are aligned with through your entire life. The ego has kept us away from it. Excuse me, I have to take this. This is what I'm talking about. I'm sorry to interrupt. How does this help me find a date exactly? You don't need to find a date. If you live what I'm talking about, you'll understand that everything will be perfect and everyone that comes into your life will come in on time perfectly. You're a divine creation of God. You're a spiritual being. You don't need anyone else to confirm that. I love that. It's true. Dr. Dyer said it was. It is true. You know, I don't want you to think that I don't appreciate what you're saying. I do. Not that you would necessarily be concerned with what I'm saying because that's the ego telling you what to think, right? So you were listening? Yeah, I'm listening. I just think it's good to have a plan. Well, what's your plan? To be a successful filmmaker. To make a name for myself. To make money. To have a good relationship. So you're talking here about prosperity. You're talking about abundance. You're talking about happiness. I haven't any problem with that. I've been attracting abundance and prosperity into my life forever. I think it's actually quite easy to do. I really believe in that. For you. Well, you know, the problem, what you're talking about here is the ego. The ego and your attachments. You know, you become attached to, you know, how much money you're making and how well your film is doing and is everything working the way, you know, I've been told that it should work. When you become attached to things and they go away, you then lose who you are. But it feels so much like survival. We're not talking about survival here. We're talking about a shift. A shift away from the morning of your life and having to do everything for external reasons and moving into a higher place in your life. Why don't we start with that tomorrow? How to make this shift. It's a good idea. You know, I tell my audiences all the time that if this is something new to you and you've never heard it before, there's a shift probably heading your way as well. That's all I need. It could happen. When great thinkers talk about union with God, there's this theme that comes through. It's about being in silence when everyone else is asleep and there are no distractions, when you feel yourself alone with Source. This is the time when you're closest to Source. Being alone with Source is not just about feeling good. It's about a new awareness of my own divinity and what it's capable of achieving. It's all about returning back to the place that you came from. T.S. Eliot has a great quote. We shall not cease from exploration and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time. Rolling! Okay, we'll start with the transition from ambition to meaning. Great, that's a good idea. I can give you an example from my own life. It might be helpful. When I first started writing, I was very blessed to be considered, quote, successful. My motivation very often became how much money was I going to make on this book? What was my next contract going to look like? How many weeks did it appear on the New York Times bestseller list? What position was it? Did you get on the Tonight Show? Did you get on the Donahue Show? Hold on, I'm confused. Yeah? Yeah, if you were success, who cares what was motivating you? Well, I guess that you begin to change your definition of what it is that constitutes success. I mean, success can be identified in those terms, and there are other ways to look at it as well. But there's people listening to you. I mean, where would you be if you didn't initiate it? I mean, it got you started, right? I'm sorry to interrupt. Are we switching to a Q&A format? I'm just, I'm just curious. Sorry. No, that's okay. It's a very normal question. It's a very common concern that people have. For myself, we talked about my writing, David, and yes, by all means it was successful, but there was a part of me, inside of me, that said there's something more for me. I was writing books about psychology. Your erroneous sounds. Pulling your own strings. The sky's the limit. All of them were doing well. All of them were bestsellers. But inside of me, I was shifting. There was a calling to something else, and I could see the shift taking place in my life. And the shift was, it was more in the direction of spirituality. It was more in the direction of higher consciousness. I began to become excited and thrilled by reading people like Krishnamurti, by reading people like Muktananda. And I remember going to my agent and I said, I want to write a book about how to take some of these great spiritual ideas. He said, no, no, no, no, no. You're going to write a book about sex. He said, this is going to sell. This is like Dr. Ruth has got one, but you're way better than Dr. Ruth. You know, and he's going on and on. And he said, and then I've got a second book for you, and we're going to do a two-book deal, and you're going to write a book about how to make money. You know, Wayne Dyer's approach to making money. And I'd say, Artie, I said, I can't do that. I said, I have to write about it. And he said, no, nobody's going to buy this stuff. He said, this is just, he said, that's just for, that's the airy-fairy stuff. That's out there, that's all that new-agey stuff. He said, you don't want to. I said, but I have to write that. That's what I'm living, that's what I'm feeling. It's so exciting. And I remember submitting the proposal to him, and he said, all right, I'll send it in. And they reluctantly, they didn't give me much of an advance at all because they didn't even believe in it. But off I went. There was a strong inner kind of feeling that I had something greater to give. I had something that I had to do that was beyond just going through the motions, just doing what I had already mastered, what I knew how to do. I remember when I made the shift, even though there was a little bit of fear, I remember feeling probably the freest that I'd felt ever in my life. I wasn't motivated by whether people are going to buy it, how much money I'm going to make, whether people are going to put me on a best-seller list. Those became external kind of factors. Those became things that started to chase me rather than me chasing it. Basically, I think, David, what I'm trying to say to you is that you get to a place in your life where you start to be guided by something that's larger than yourself. Just stay aligned with what you're here for and stay in harmony with Spirit, with God, with Source. Stay there. And as you stay there, the meaning phase of your life begins to take over. And once you cross over into the afternoon of your life, it's impossible to go back. Testing, testing, 1, 2, 3. Can you hear me? Great. Dave. Dave. You want to stay with the same frame size, right? Yeah, sure. Okay, guys, ready. Okay. Crossing. Wayne, can you just shift your chair just a tiny... Sure. Oh, perfect, perfect. Perfect. Okay, so we good? We are good. All right. David. We're rolling. David? David, why don't we take it from where Wayne was talking about the shift? We can just continue from there. Sounds good to me. Okay, this shift, this movement from ambition to meaning, from the morning to the afternoon of your life, generally it's preceded by what we call a quantum moment. Sounds strange, perhaps, to use a term like that, but quantum moment really refers to the characteristics of what it is like when you have what Maslow called a peak experience. The first of these qualities, there's four of them. The first of them is that it's very vivid. The second quality or characteristic of these quantum moments is that it's a surprise. And the third characteristic of these quantum moments is that they are benevolent. They always feel good. The fourth and final quality is that it's enduring. That is, it isn't just something that comes and then goes and it's out the window. It lasts with you forever. For example, I left drinking behind in my life 21 years ago, and I couldn't even imagine that I could have given it up because I'd always had two or three beers every single day for the previous 10, 15, 20 years. I couldn't even remember a day when I hadn't. And I knew that I had to make that change. And it was 4.05 a.m. in the morning. I could remember the clock when it turned. I woke up, and there was like a breeze in the room, something that I'd never experienced before, the smell of roses. This was 21 years ago now. I can tell you what was hanging on the closet, the hook that I had there. On the mirror there, I had a little cartoon that I had there. I can still see that thing exactly as if it happened this morning. The vividness of this is something that I've never, ever been able to forget. I can remember how surprised I was at what was happening at that time. It was almost as if some kind of force had taken over, and I was just amazed by it. So if you're lucky, this happens to you? David, it has nothing to do with luck. It's like when the moment is right, when you are in a different state, in a different place in your life, exactly what is supposed to happen will happen for you. The low points in your own life, these times when you think that nothing could go any worse, oftentimes are the things that we need to propel ourselves to a higher place. Let me give you an example. The night before that moment that I just described to you, I had taken my entire family, five children and my wife, and we had all gone to this restaurant. And like I always did, every single time I went to a restaurant, I ordered not just one beer, but two. And that was so that in case the waiter wasn't there when I wanted my second one, I would be able to have it. And the waiter said to me, Oh, excuse me, sir, he said, I'm sorry, but I can't serve you alcohol. And I said, Why? He said, Well, last night one of our waiters served someone who was underage, and we had our license suspended. I said, Come on, we're getting out of here. And I made each one of my children get up, get back into the car, strapped into their car seats and so on. My wife, who God knows had so much to do, and it was such a hardship for her. But it didn't seem to matter to me at that time, because I wanted to have my beers, and I was making myself more important than everyone else. And we drove off and went to another restaurant. And I can remember thinking that night as I went to sleep how ashamed I was. My wife tried to talk to me a little bit about it, but I would have none of it. I was right, and that's just what the ego always makes you. It makes you right. And that night, that experience that I had at 4.05 a.m. the next day, not only did it get me off of alcohol, it probably saved my life. It transformed my life in so many different ways. And it was all because I was open to it. You don't believe that. It sounds like more sitting around until some sort of epiphany comes to you. It's not about waiting around. You know, in the Tao, one of the great lessons that I learned is that it teaches us how to be soft, how to be flexible, how to not be always in control. One of the great teachings of the Tao says that let yourself be lived by it. But you didn't do anything. That's the whole point. That's the place you want to get to where you just allow. In the recovery movement, it's called letting go and letting God, allowing this source that is always flowing through each and every one of us to do and perform its magic. And that magic will always work in our best interest if we just surrender to it, if you could just stop interfering in your own life and just let yourself be done. If you can get to that place, nothing will be left undone. Everything that you need will be there for you. It's mysterious for most of us because we believe that we're the ones who have to do everything. Isn't it interesting that you had everything you needed in the first nine months? Why isn't that true for the next 90 years? Because we interfere. When I was 19 years old, I was in the United States Navy and as an enlisted man. And I was given my assignment to join the aircraft carrier, the USS Ranger. And it was on deployment in Yokosuka, Japan. So I boarded a refrigerator ship, the USS Vega, in Alameda, California. And just as I was getting on that ship to take my 29-day voyage across the Pacific Ocean, my Uncle Bill, Bill Volick, who was a schoolteacher in Hayward, California, handed me a copy of a book. And the book was a collection of short stories written by Leo Tolstoy. He wrote not just great novels and great stories, but great spiritual literature as well. He was considered to be the soul of Russia. And the first story in this collection was called The Death of Ivan Illich. Now, Ivan Illich was a judge who lived in Moscow. One of the more important features of this story is his relationship to his wife, who he basically hated because he despised his work. And he felt that she had pressured him and pushed him into doing this, that it was a prestigious thing to do. And he was filled with internal rage and anger at what he had done. The title of the story kind of gives it away, The Death of Ivan Illich. You know he's going to die. Now, Ivan Illich was lying on his deathbed, and his wife is holding his hand, this woman that basically he despised for all of his life. And he looks up into her eyes, and his last words are, What if my whole life has been wrong? And he died. I was very shaken and very moved by that. And I took out a pad of paper, and I wrote a note to myself. And I said, Dear Wayne, don't die with your music still in you. And I've lived that for my entire life. When you die, you will return to that source, and you will be in that space of love. But the Tao says that you don't have to die to get there. You can die to the ego, and live from that space of perfect love while you're here. That vivid, surprising, benevolent, enduring quality that defines the quantum moment, that leads us into the shift, is really an indication that you're returning back to the source. You're beginning to live from the Tao. It's reconnecting with the field of intention. In Greek, the word enthusiasm breaks down to entheosiasm, which means the God within. When you have passion, when you have enthusiasm for something inside of you, that's really God speaking to you, and saying to you, Don't get to the end of your life, and have to be able to say what Ivan Illich said, What if my whole life has been wrong? I can't think of a greater tragedy than that. Come on, where'd you go? I'm sorry, it's just... It's so beautiful. Synchronicities. It's like a collaboration with fate. All of that becomes the norm, and the ego is no longer the driving force in your life. You begin to recognize that there's a powerful, organizing intelligence that's in all things, and it's working with you and for you, almost as if you're making it happen by just being connected to your source. The destiny that appeared to be imposed upon you by something outside of yourself is no longer the relevant driving force in your life. You're connected to the source, and it's almost as if this divine, organizing intelligence, God, the Tao, whatever you want to call it, it's almost as if it's saying to you, You play the music that you came here to play, and I'll be there to help you overcome any struggle or any obstacle that comes along. And it's not going to be a struggle because Source is supporting you. Yes, hi. Could I get a cab, please, to Monterey Motors? Yes. Thank you. Thank you very much. I can't stop thinking about what you said about a destiny being imposed upon you. Well, you know, I think all of us, each and every one of us, have a knowing within us. You know, it's been said that when you trust in yourself, you're trusting in the very wisdom that created you. It's there to tell us who we are and what we're meant to be. I know, but so much of society is putting stuff on people, it seems, all the time. Dr. Da, can I ask you a question? Sure. Are men and women different when it comes to this? Do they shift differently? It's very different, as a matter of fact. There's some recent studies that have just been published on that. I'd be happy to share them with you, if you like. That would be great. Okay, super. All right, I'm taking off. Okay, man. I'll catch up with you. So there was this incredible study done. I've got it right here. It's called The Moment That Turns Your Values Upside Down. And there's four components to it. There's men and women, before and after. Now, before one of these quantum moments, they were asked just to list the most important priorities of their life, from the most important to the least important. Now, for men, the very first and most important value that they had learned was wealth, the accumulation of money. It's not really that big a surprise, because we are taught as men, when we're growing up, that your job is to support your family, your job is to get ahead. The second most important value for all of these men was a sense of adventure, to go out there and, you know, what, conquer the world? Be the guy. Yeah, absolutely, be the macho guy. The third was achievement. You know, as men, we're raised to believe that you are what you do, what you accomplish, what you're able to create. The fourth is the idea of pleasure. You know, going out with the guys, getting as many dates as you can, having as much fun as you possibly can. The fifth of these is to be respected, all right? And we all know, as men, what that means, you know? You're not giving men any respect, man. And then you get out there, and when you're growing up and you're a kid, and if you don't get respect, you're having fights. Here are the top priorities of our lives, you know, be able to make money, to have a sense of adventure, to have, you know, to achieve, to feel pleasure, to be respected. That's basically the morning of our lives. This sounds like my list. What are you talking about? When was the last time you had fun? Oh, do not even listen to her. I know how to have fun. Do you mind? I'm trying to hear Wayne. Go on. Thank you. I appreciate that. All right. So the second part of this study, which is the after. A quantum shift has taken place. Same questions, only it's many years later, and they followed this over a lifetime. And the number one value is spirituality. Spirituality. The number one thing. It has gone from making money to spirituality, which wasn't even on the list before. You can't even find it. I've got the top 15 of them listed right here. It's not even on there. The second one is personal peace. Less anxiety, less stress, if you will. The third one is family. Now, family was on the other list, but it was way down before. Now, what happens after one of these moments, you begin to look around and say, what is it that's important to me in my life? And then the next is God's will. This is the one that says, I have a sense of purpose. And then honesty is the fifth quality. Not just honest that I don't steal, but how honest am I as a man with my feelings? Authentic. Yeah, that's exactly right. Those are the top qualities for men. So there's the before and there's the after. You can see what a significant change this is, what a shift has taken place here. Okay. I know what you're going to ask. I can already tell. What's the deal with the women? Bring it on. For women, it's even more astonishing. Before one of these quantum moments, the number one value is family. And it's not surprising, because women are kind of raised in our society, in our culture, to be a good mother, to be a good daughter, to support your family, to take care of your children, and so on. The second one, which may surprise you, was a sense of independence, of feeling as if I would like to feel independent. Women are very conflicted. Yeah, makes sense. The third was career. Now, very often, women never even felt that they had a right to go for a career because they were obligated to be taking care of their family. And this is not a put-down of that at all. What we're saying here is that there's something more. The fourth quality for women was fitting in, having to be like everybody else and so on. Yeah. And then finally, attractiveness. And this became not just like it's nice to look nice, but my whole values are how do I look, and where do we get this? You know what? That is so scary when you break it down like that, because where is it that we learn as women we're supposed to be pleasing everybody else all the time? Well, go on the newsstand. You know, all you see are magazines with pictures of girls with waists this big and, you know, with implants, lots of emphasis on makeup, having the right labels, carrying the right bags, and so on. So these became the top qualities or characteristics or values for women before one of these shifts. Well, I hope the after list is better. Their values shift dramatically. The number one value for women after having this experience, it's right here, is my own personal growth. Now, remember, before it was like taking care of everybody else, doing the right thing, fitting in, and now it's all of a sudden, how am I growing as a human being? How do I feel about myself? The second is a sense of self-esteem. Am I worth anything? How do I feel about myself? Am I a valuable human being? The third one is spirituality, my sense of my connectedness to something bigger and greater than myself. And then happiness. Again, this wasn't even on the list. It was almost at the bottom of the list before. How often have women been raised to believe that their happiness isn't an important thing, that doing what they are supposed to do rather than feeling, you know, a sense of, I'm entitled to be happy. And then a very interesting one. It's called forgiveness. This became very important in their lives. Forgiveness. That's good, because then you can forgive all those people that gave you bad information about what you're supposed to be doing. Yeah, there's a whole lot of resentment that begins to take place in people. It's what so many people just go along with. Whatever you're looking for in your life is there for you. It will show up where and when it's needed. It's always in your mind. Whatever you need to complete this project, whatever you need to create, it's all there. You can prepare and then let go. It's an easy trusting that everything will happen perfectly. We live in a world in which all things are possible. There are no accidents. There's a divine organizing and intelligence that supports all things. I think you have to get to the place where you're no longer focused just on yourself. And the things that you really want for yourself, you begin to say, how can I want them more for someone else than I want them for me? And that's God realization. One of the things that happens when you move away from ego is that you move from a sense of entitlement to a sense of humility. You realize you're entitled to nothing. That's just the ego speaking. So the fundamental truth is that you must be like what you came from. If you came from divinity, you must be divine. If you hold your hands up and say, these are the hands of God, then what does God do with his hands? God is just giving. That's all God knows how to do. So you shift your thoughts from what can I get to how can I offer, how may I serve? If your attention is off yourself and about giving, the universe will respond by giving back to you. The universe will say, how may I serve you? But you have to be in a place of service yourself. That's when the transition is complete, when you move into that place that is without ego. As we move into the meaning phase of life, it's not as if you no longer are ambitious. It's that you have ambition with meaning. You're ambitious about other things. So now your ambition is transformed into purpose, and you have to learn to become the observer, to step back. You begin to live in process, trusting where your source is taking you. You begin to detach from the outcome, and that detachment allows you to no longer be fighting. It allows things to just come to you, and you no longer being the person who's making things happen. You're allowing them to show up. The fight is gone. So I get asked over and over again, is there a purpose to the ego? And my reaction to that is, it's just not worth defending. The ego is the thing that is the false self, and when you're defending it, you're defending an illusion. You're defending something that really isn't who you are. Your authentic self is way beyond the ego. Every one of us knows that we came here with music to play, and yet we have a tendency to believe that we are separate entities, and that we have to fit in, and that's our role in life. And none of that is true. The shift can happen in many ways. It can be just a comment. It can be a coincidence that occurs. A particular event that you weren't expecting. It can be anything at all. But the result is always the same. You begin to realize that you're not here to push life, to make it a struggle all the time. You're here to enjoy and to be living in peace. That's what happens when you're in the afternoon of your life. I was just thinking about all the things I have to do to pack us up to leave. Oh, yeah? I'm like a walking to-do list. I think 90% of my day is spent managing everyone else's life and all their problems. Uh-oh. You are very appreciative. That's not what I mean. I love taking care of you and the boys. I do. I love my family, but... But? When I paint, I go somewhere. I feel connected. I... I feel blessed. And you're good at it. I miss it so much. On the hike yesterday, Jack told me that I don't paint. I realize that my own children have no idea who I am. They don't even know what I do. So do it. Yes, absolutely. Thank you. I want to stay here. What? Just for a week. Right now. Just this next week. What, you think I'm going to leave you here all alone? Jason, every cell in my body wants to stay here just a little bit longer. I'm hearing you, but I have no idea what you're saying. I need to reorient myself. I need to find my way back, and I need solitude to do it. Quinn, you're a mother of two small children. You don't get solitude. Jason, you have to know I love you. And I love the kids, and I... I am still us, but I am more than this. There's just one problem. See, I don't know how to do what you do. You'll be great. It's just for a week. You'll survive. And then we go back to normal. I don't know about that. Oh, oh, oh, you're good at this. Oh, that's not fair. You know what you're going to get good at? What? Laundry. I see lots of laundry in your future. That's great. That's great. If you want to see the doors open in your life, you detach yourself from what the ego says, and you allow yourself to live from this divine place called spirit. And what Lao Tzu called the virtues, he said there are four of them. The first of these is reverence for all of life, which is respect. The second is sincerity, which is really nothing more than just honesty. The third is gentleness, which manifests itself as kindness in our life. And the fourth is supportiveness, which just manifests itself as service, offering service to others. Those are the four virtues. And Lao Tzu asked us to live by them. There's a great quote by the poet Hafiz. He said, even after all this time, the sun never says to the earth, you owe me. Just think what a love like that can do. It lights up the whole world. How you doing? Thought you got everything you need? I think I got even more than that. Really? I'm actually inspired. I was looking at some of the footage. I'd love to do something with these interviews, something creative. Like what? Well, this place. There's something happening here. What you're talking about, the people, themes, I think I can really do something with it. Wait a second. Wait a second. I thought you were just a technician on this shoot. Isn't that what I heard you say before? I guess not. I think I'm getting it. Well, you know, David, the point is, we're all going to get it. Ultimately, we're all going to get it. There's a great line from A Course in Miracles where Jesus says, if you want to be like me, knowing that we are alike, I will help you. If you want to be different than me, I will wait until you change your mind. And you will change your mind. And really, isn't it the ultimate thing is, why should we have to die in order to get it? We ought to be able to get it while we're here. It's been a pleasure. Thank you, my friend. God bless you. Nobody needs to ask the question, what is my purpose? It will always be found in service. If you can just for one day put your attention on making life better for someone else, if you can focus on thinking like that, that's how God thinks. It's an ancient concept, but it's still relevant. To touch someone's life is more valuable than any amount of money. My friend Byron Katie says, to believe that you need what you don't have is the definition of insanity, that you can't be fulfilled until you get all these things. That's an illusion. Really. You don't need anything more. It doesn't matter what it is you do. You could be a cab driver, a teacher, a factory worker, a manager. What matters is that you put your attention on how may I serve. Think of the people you go to, whoever you are in your path. You can run an entire business this way, not being attached to outcome, putting attention on service. Your life becomes about living those virtues. How can I serve? How can I be gentle? How can I be reverent? Thinking like that means you're living in meaning. The messages of the morning are about what you can and can't do, about how society defines you. But in the afternoon, after the shift, it's about connecting to an energy that's taking care of everything, and we're all just being done. Try to stop yourself from breathing, from your fingernails growing. Living the virtues is all we need to do. The truth is, I feel something else is in charge of all of us. So it's really about surrendering to it, surrendering to something that is bigger than you, that you are connected to, and that's really in control of everything. There's a place deep within us that wants to feel fulfilled, that wants to know that my life has made a difference, that I've left this place, this planet that I've lived on, better than when I arrived, that someone's life has been profoundly touched because of my existence. We all want that. It's not about age or about finding yourself. Whoever you are, at whatever age, you're only a thought away from changing your life.