The Meaning of Your Life: Finding Purpose in an Age of Emptiness w/ Professor Arthur Brooks

6:27Arthur Brooks:She's a great thinker.

6:28Aliza Pressman:I actually, when the reason I had her on my dissertation committee at Columbia was because everybody knew she was like at the time, because now that research is so cool and interesting. everybody's into it but at the time she was like the nice one and so but then i reconnected with her years later yeah it's great if you were the waking brain yeah that's a great book yeah and i had her on the podcast to talk about it yeah she's great and i have to say that the exercises that she kind of covered felt like regardless of whether or not you feel connected to a higher power it felt like she really clarified the choices that we make and how we can connect to that.

7:15Aliza Pressman:Totally. I felt like, I think it's exciting to make science and spirituality live in the same place instead of always trying to separate them.

7:26Arthur Brooks:It's so absurd that we were to separate them because you actually don't understand one without the other. It's very hard to understand Picasso without understanding his paintings and very meaningless to look at Picasso

7:36Aliza Pressman:without knowing the man let's say more the creator and the creation reinforce each other

7:42Arthur Brooks:you can't find the creator in the creation you will like you'll find zero examples of jk rowling appearing in harry potter but harry potter would not exist without jk rowling and so if you if you if you're if you're a serious scientist you better have some if you're going to understand physics you better have questions about metaphysics yeah or you're not serious yeah about the whole experience of it you're looking at it through the through a soda straw on purpose well it's

8:12Aliza Pressman:interesting that you say that because i want to talk about the meaning like the the three parts of meaning and i'd love for you to define coherence purpose and significance yeah what i was going to tell you is that i recall many times when when my when penelope who loves physics and astrophysics in particular was like, don't you constantly question all of this stuff? And I was like, I didn't before you started to talk about it with me.

8:47Arthur Brooks:It's funny. That's one of the most popular at Harvard where I teach and she studies. It's one of the most popular classes for undergraduates is astronomy. And one time I asked one of the undergraduates, why are you all so crazy about this class? Are they professors and they're like, no, that's not it. And, and this woman said, this young woman said to me, a student, she said, you know, I don't know, but you know, I'm, I, I'll be like super stressed out because I had a big argument with my mom, or I think my boyfriend's going to break up with me, or I got a B, which is like the end of the world at Harvard.

9:20Arthur Brooks:And, and I go into my astronomy class and I come out an hour later and I'm like, I'm a speck on a speck on a speck. And it puts my life into perspective. And I don't know why, but it makes me happy. And that's actually one of the cosmic truths of life is that the psychodrama that mother nature throws us into is all me, me, me, me, me. But if you want to be happy, you need to get smaller, not larger. You need to be looking at something and standing in awe of something bigger.

9:47Aliza Pressman:Okay. So I want to talk about how to do that.

9:49Arthur Brooks:Yeah, exactly. And that's, you know, that's an experience that uses the brain in a very ancient way that we've gotten away from. And the cost of it is not understanding the meaning of our lives.

10:01Aliza Pressman:So when you talk about meaning, can you just just to put it in context? What is meaning?

10:07Arthur Brooks:What's the meaning of meaning?

10:08Aliza Pressman:What is the meaning of meaning, please?

10:10Arthur Brooks:Yeah, the meaning of and you know, this is what people have been asking for thousands of years, of course, but the modern behavioral scientists talk about in terms of three interlocking why questions. Meaning is about why, you know, all the stuff that's not about meaning is how and what, you know, what we're trying to do all day, but why? And then, you know, Simon Sinek talks about that. Start with why. that's really about mission and it's about meaning and if you understand the meaning of what you're doing you'll you'll work with a sense of of gusto and and you'll you'll actually be able to be able to dig in people will understand you better of course you'll understand yourself is the bottom line so the three questions are why why do things happen the way they do why am i doing what i'm doing and why do i matter you know why does my life matter the first is what we call coherence You know, why do things happen the way that they do?

10:58Arthur Brooks:And many people answer that with religion, like me. Many people answer it with science, also like me. And some people who are baffled by both or alienated from both, they'll answer it in all sorts of novel ways, like conspiracy theories. If you have a conspiracy theorist in your life who's going down the rabbit hole on the internet, don't yell at him and say, you unscientific moron, that's unhelpful. The conspiracy theory interest is a cry for meaning. It's actually, it's a cry for happiness because happiness requires meaning and meaning requires coherence. And that's a way to get coherence so that you help somebody like that is offering them a different kind of coherence, a different answer to the question, why do things happen the way that they do?

11:41Arthur Brooks:Which is why, you know, when people find love and religion, they tend to get less interested in conspiracy theories.

11:47Aliza Pressman:That's so, okay. So when young children ask all these why questions about meaning.

11:53Arthur Brooks:Yeah. have you ever thought about ways to start opening up those conversations yeah because you think

12:01Aliza Pressman:about those preschoolers that start to realize like death exists or purpose exists or what you love exists it's just all of these deep questions that they start asking but they don't really

12:14Arthur Brooks:understand what what it is yeah and and the truth is parents struggle with this with coherence and and the second part being purpose why am i doing what i'm doing the last part being significance Why does my life matter? Those questions don't have perfect answers. And kids, when they're starting to form, when they're forming cognitively, especially at three and four, when they're developing the property of transitivity, which is a very logical property, A is greater than B and B is greater than C. So A is greater than C, all that stuff. That's really a development of the left hemisphere of their brains.

12:47Arthur Brooks:And they come to believe that every question worth asking has an actual closed form answer. In other words, they're starting to believe that everything could be, if they don't know about Google yet, I hope, but that Google could answer any question. And the truth is that Google can only answer certain kinds of questions. AI can only answer certain kinds of questions. The big metaphysical questions that we all struggle with are questions that, and this is the test, are you asking a meaning question? AI can't answer it. It's like if you put into ChatGPT, hey, what would I give my life for? It'll start by kissing your butt.

13:25Arthur Brooks:It'll start by saying, that's a very smart question. You, like Aristotle, are asking the biggest questions. And then it'll give you a bunch of nonsense about how a bunch of different people throughout history have tried to answer that question. It won't answer your question because that's not a question that gets an answer. That's a question that gets an experience of understanding. And that's what kids are uncomfortable with. And that's what freaks parents out because they don't know what to do it's like you know why are there bad people in the world you know why you know why are there babies you know that you can answer that in some sort of biological way but fundamentally the kid is asking a metaphysical question and wants a clear answer and the way to deal with that to help a child is to say what do you think and actually turn it back and have them explore the why part because that will exercise the right hemispheres of their little highly synaptically plastic brains.

14:16Arthur Brooks:And the more they do that, the more they're going to find and have an inchoate understanding of the meaning of their own lives and set them on the right trajectory to live with these big questions for the rest of their lives.

14:27Aliza Pressman:I love that. Also, you know, after a while, it's great to just turn it right back on. Always.

14:33Arthur Brooks:Well, it's also to say, nobody knows specifically, here's how I think about it. Yeah. And then create an image. Part of the reason is because the language centers of your brain are in the left hemisphere, the how and what, the Broca's area and the Wernicke's area of your brain are over there. And so therefore, when you're trying to take a big, deep mystery or meaning concept and verbalize it, especially when you're not ready, it's going to be awkward and kind of lame. And kids know it. I mean, it'll be like, okay. It's not satisfying. Okay. But you know, it's funny because, you know, I talked to a lot of people in the religious world about apologetics.

15:09Arthur Brooks:Apologetics are arguments for the existence of God. That's how apologetics work. They always leave you cold. They never really convince you because they're left brain approximations for right brain truth. And so you can't do it, can't be done. What you need to do is to experience the existence and presence of God in your life through meditation and worship. and then you'll have an understanding that's ineffable, that goes beyond your ability to articulate.

15:39Aliza Pressman:And for some people that might look like just awe.

15:42Arthur Brooks:Yeah, for sure. I mean, standing, that's the reason that people love that astronomy course.

15:46Aliza Pressman:Yeah.

15:47Arthur Brooks:Because they're actually getting an ineffable experience of the metaphysical fundamentally. Some people will do that with Brahma Mukhurta, which is waking up before dawn and walking without devices as the sun comes up, or listening to Bach, or a Vipassana meditation practice. For me, it's going to mass every day. But the whole point is that we need that in our lives, because if we don't, then life gets reduced. It gets reduced to this left hemisphere, how and what world. And we start to marginalize the why world. And the why world is, man, that's where the action is.

16:17Aliza Pressman:And now for a quick break. Well, you know how little ones eat and they use their hands and they love good food and you think about the food they eat. Well, Ello Clean Start is also thinking about what they're eating on. And Ello's new Ceramic Toddler Tableware Collection is designed to help families feel good about the choices that they make at the table right from the start. Because what kids eat from also really matters. And it's made from premium porcelain ceramic, not plastic. It's got removable food-grade silicon bumpers to protect surfaces. and it's naturally non-toxic and non-porous. So it's not going to absorb odors or stains or leach into foods.

17:05Aliza Pressman:And it's of course free from BPAs and PVCs and phthalates and melamine and PFAS, those forever chemicals. And it is microwave safe and dishwasher safe so that you can use it easily every day. It's available in three thoughtfully designed options. They've got the divided breakfast plate, which is one large and two smaller sections for those pickier eaters. And then they have an everything plate that's just a modern all-purpose toddler plate. And then they have the toddler bowl, which is stackable and it's deep. So you can actually eat cereals and pastas. So visit LOProducts.com slash clean start and use the code RGH at checkout for 20 % off your first purchase.

17:50Aliza Pressman:that's elloproducts.com slash clean start and use the code RGH for 20 % off your first purchase and you know what grab a few presents for people with that 20 % off because it's a great shower gift I want to tell you about Experian because it can take the pain out of canceling subscriptions by handling it for you you keep the ones you want you put the money back in your pocket and over 200 subscriptions are cancelable or negotiable. And you can save money by letting Experian negotiate your best rate. They keep an eye out for new deals and savings opportunities, and they will negotiate directly with your provider on your behalf.

18:32Aliza Pressman:And the best part is that you keep 100 % of your savings. And here's another thing Experian just did for me last week. I wanted to make it so that somebody couldn't basically do identity theft and start something with a credit score and open up an account and, you know, part of adulting kind of thing. And I, it was a pain-free thing to do with Experian. So I really just want you to go check out the Experian app. They have so much to offer and so much savings and also just protection for your credit. So get started with the Experian app now. Of course, results will vary. Not all bills or subscriptions are eligible and savings is not guaranteed.

19:24Aliza Pressman:There is a paid membership with connected payment action required and you can see Experian.com for details. And again, you get to keep 100 % of your savings. I sort of want to talk about the idea, and maybe it's because you're talking about left and right hemisphere. So I'm thinking about, and I'm thinking about my kids and also parenting as a concept. It's all optimization right now. And it's all pretty sort of inconsistent with a lot of the things that you're talking about. except that we're doing it because of this incredibly meaningful, inspiring experience of seeing developing humans. So can you talk a little bit about how to come to terms with this and what is the antidote to kind of optimization culture?

20:19Arthur Brooks:Yeah, so we live in an optimization culture that's highly engineered. And so engineering is fundamentally the discipline that's propelling our economy and culture. And anybody who doesn't believe that's not paying attention to Silicon Valley. That's where the big advances are actually coming. And the belief, this neo-utopian view, is that they're going to solve all of our problems. What Silicon Valley will do is solve all of our complicated left brain problems. Complicated problems are those that have solutions, but they're really, really hard to find. And once you solve them, they're solved, like creating a jet engine or writing a piece of software, they'll find you a pizza at 10 p.m.

20:59Arthur Brooks:or, you know, all of that stuff is left brain complicated problems. The right brain deals with complex problems. Complex problems are those that are very easy to understand. Like she loves me. I love her. Very easy to understand. They can't be solved. I've been married 34 years. I have not solved my marriage. I mean, I'm married to a Spaniard, so that's a truly insoluble, you know, complex problem. but this is why I love my marriage by the way your kids your relationship with your kids is complex you understand it you love them unconditionally but you will never solve it because you don't know what's going to happen because kids are dynamic because they're alive and so are you and so the result is you need to love it and live it every day that's the way that it works but we live in a technologized culture that says that we can solve problems this becomes a cognitive dissonance that we We believe that we're bad parents because we're not solving this problem.

21:54Arthur Brooks:That's the most important problem to our lives. And so we're looking for the next book. We're looking for the next app. We're looking for the next podcast that will give us the solutions to these problems, as opposed to understanding that we need to live with these problems, that we need to love people, notwithstanding conflicts that we actually have. And to get a degree of comfort. You know, having comfort with these inevitable areas of suffering of life is really part of being alive. And that's how our brains always were supposed to work. I mean, your great grandfather never came home and said, hey, you know, honey, I had a panic attack behind the mule today.

22:31Arthur Brooks:Because his brain was working the way it was supposed to. He was bored a lot and he had a whole lot of suffering that he couldn't actually deal with. And he had nobody to answer a whole bunch of big questions. that's the way his brain was evolved. And that's your parent brain too.

22:46Aliza Pressman:So when our parent brains panic that our children are experiencing something terrible like being bored or feeling appropriately just like not happy all the time. Yeah.

23:03Arthur Brooks:Let's figure out how to deal with that. Yeah, let's figure out how to deal with that. So let me give you a slightly left brain way of looking at that big right brain problem. One of the things that you and I and everybody else listening to us as parents suffers a lot from is the suffering of their children.

23:19Aliza Pressman:Yeah.

23:20Arthur Brooks:But life, as the Buddha said in his first noble truth, is suffering. Dukkha, life is suffering. Actually, what he meant, the better translation is life is dissatisfaction. But anyway, close enough.

23:32Aliza Pressman:Really feel like it gets confused.

23:35Arthur Brooks:It does. It does. But there is tons of suffering in life, you know, and, you know, I'm, and, And I tell my students, I'm pro-suffering. And the reason is because suffering is actually how you understand meaning in life.

23:44Aliza Pressman:Yeah.

23:45Arthur Brooks:But it depends on how you deal with it. So the Buddhists have a little bit of math about suffering. Suffering equals pain multiplied by resistance. Pain times resistance. Now think about this in our heads. Something that you multiply one by the other, you can lower either of them to get less of the product or one or the other, right? Both. Both, neither, et cetera. So most people today in the technologized left brain world believe that they can find an algorithm to lower the pain, thus lowering the suffering. Now, pain and suffering, not the same thing. Pain is a neurophysiological phenomenon, either sensory, ouch, you touch the hot stove or affective.

24:26Arthur Brooks:I don't like it, whether it's mental or physical suffering, right? Pain. That's part of the brain. And that's just that we have to have that or we would die immediately because we wouldn't get signals. So that's automatic. What's not automatic is suffering, which is the struggle that ensues. What the technologized world has told us about parenting in every other part of our life is that we need to find a way to lower the pain, to lower the kid's pain, to lower their suffering. That's impossible. Life is painful and you're going to have pain and you want your kids to have pain because that's an advanced alarm system to keep them safe.

25:03Arthur Brooks:What you want to lower is their resistance. And that's our job. Your job is not to keep your kids safe, to, you know, proof the world against everything. Your job is to help your child understand how to deal with pain, how to lower their resistance to actual pain. And thus, they can have a lot of pain in their lives, which they will, but not as much suffering. This is how you know you're killing it in life, is if your pain is high, but your suffering is low. You're going through divorce, but your suffering is lower than it otherwise would be. you broke your arm or you're bedridden or you're depressed and your pain is very high, but your suffering is low because that means that you've lowered your resistance.

25:43Arthur Brooks:And that's what we need to be doing with our kids.

25:46Aliza Pressman:So some kids just because of their temperament are going to have a higher propensity toward that.

25:53Arthur Brooks:Toward pain.

25:54Aliza Pressman:Yeah.

25:54Arthur Brooks:More pain.

25:55Aliza Pressman:More pain.

25:55Arthur Brooks:Or more resistance. right some kids have super super high resistance to pain is what they and and what they hear and what they see from their parents is really important if you as a parent are going through life trying to avoid your own pain trying to eliminate your own pain your kids are going to see that in a heartbeat oh yeah no that's painful i gotta stop you know it's like somebody's bothering me i gotta cut them off right oh yeah it's like oh mom has no contact with her mom because that's a painful relationship okay so that's a that's an avenue and these all of these movements, these misguided movements, they're all about lowering pain as opposed to understanding the concept of resistance, which is not a Buddhist concept.

26:34Arthur Brooks:That's every religion and every serious philosophy talks about how you learn and grow from pain such that your suffering can be lower, even when pain is inevitably high.

26:47Aliza Pressman:Now, of course, I'm like, as a human, do you feel like you, you can, you don't have to keep this in the podcast, but I'm so curious, like.

26:55Arthur Brooks:It's all, everything's fair here.

26:58Aliza Pressman:Do you feel like you were, you were drawn to meaning making and all of this because it's easier, you like have a propensity toward pain and suffering?

27:11Arthur Brooks:Yeah, for sure. Happiness is hard for me.

27:13Aliza Pressman:Yeah.

27:14Arthur Brooks:Happiness is hard for me. And you know, about half, half of your happiness is genetic.

27:17Aliza Pressman:Yeah.

27:18Arthur Brooks:Meaning your mother literally did make you unhappy. We know this from identical twins who were separated at birth and given personality tests. You've seen those really interesting tests.

27:26Aliza Pressman:Yes, but tell everybody because I think it's actually really important. Otherwise, everybody's like, what?

27:31Arthur Brooks:What's wrong with me?

27:32Aliza Pressman:Yeah.

27:32Arthur Brooks:Yeah. So identical twins born between the 1930s and 1960s that were separated at birth and adopted as separate families. That doesn't happen anymore, but it did. And it's like a perfect, near perfect quasi-experiment for social sciences like me to have their clipboards out. And they were given personality tests. And then you were able to see how differing environment versus identical genes, how it affects your personality later in life. And what that shows pretty accurately is about half of your tendency toward positive affect is is is is positive is is genetic. And that's how you wake up in the morning.

28:06Arthur Brooks:You know, some people wake up in the morning and they're like, it's a great day. I mean, you know, folks watching us that you're you're annoying anyway. So and the rest of us are like, oh, gratitude. You need some intervention. from the very beginning. And, you know, I come from really, really gloomy stock, you know, a lot of mental illness, a lot of trouble, trouble, trouble, trouble. And, and so, so good. That means that the other 50%, some about half of which is circumstantial, which doesn't last, but another quarter, the last quarter is habits has to be on point. The reason I study happiness is because I want as perfect habits as I can possibly get, which is still not perfect, which allows me to manage my genetics.

28:49Arthur Brooks:There's a lot of things that are genetic that you can manage, like alcoholism. You know, there's this one big habit, if you have alcoholism in your family, that you can adopt called not drinking, right? And so if you have gloomy stock, if you have gloomy parents and grandparents, you got to live better.

29:05Aliza Pressman:Bless you.

29:06Arthur Brooks:And I wanted to be a happiness virtuoso in my habits. And one of the things that I found, by the way, that you've no doubt found this as well, is that the greatest secret of happiness is by bringing the secrets to others. That's why I teach it. Because happiness teachers, of course, program their brains to be accountable to the ideas that they're teaching.

29:25Aliza Pressman:And how challenging is it for you?

29:28Arthur Brooks:Well, it depends on the day. And you have to ask my wife. But the truth is I've gotten about 60 % happier based on the best protocols for measurement that exist out there. And some of them are very, very solid tests that we have. And I administer the tests every year because I'm teaching my students. I take the tests. And in the past seven years, since I've been completely dedicated to this, I retired as a CEO. I was a long time academic behavioral scientist, but I took an 11 year hiatus in the middle. And when I came back, I said, I'm going to do, I'm going to, I'm going to teach, write and speak about happiness per se as a scientist for the rest of my life.

30:03Arthur Brooks:And I started to, because I want it. And I started taking the tests and in the past seven years, my happiness has increased by 60%.

30:11Aliza Pressman:That's wild. Yeah. Okay. Can you just talk a little bit about those habits? Because I do think it's so cool that we acknowledge genetics because that seems to be like, also, you're not allowed to talk about like, there's some, some of this is just like, some of you got this. My dad also had a huge nose.

30:29Arthur Brooks:I mean, it's like, you know, my dad was also bald. I mean, it's like, thanks, dad.

30:34Aliza Pressman:But for some reason, we resist that when it comes to how we come to be who we are.

30:40Arthur Brooks:Yeah, I know. And because we want to be the captains of our own ship. Most of your audience is American. And as rugged individualists, we want to be in charge of our fate. I get it. And so it's not even just political correctness. It's just how we're wired. Yeah. We want to be in charge.

30:55Aliza Pressman:You want to feel like you've got agency.

30:58Arthur Brooks:And you do, just not all of it. Right.

31:01Aliza Pressman:So, so I love, I just love what you said about how, okay, for you, these happiness habits are kind of crucial. Maybe for someone else, they can be a little bit lazier about it.

31:12Arthur Brooks:Yeah. So it starts with an understanding of what happiness actually is, because most people think it's a feeling. And if you're chasing a feeling, that's like chasing a vapor.

31:20Aliza Pressman:Just moving all the time.

31:21Arthur Brooks:Yeah, yeah. Moving all the time. And because your feelings, your emotions are produced by the limbic system of your brain as an advanced warning system about threats and threats and opportunities that you perceived. And the reptilian brain, the brainstem and cerebellum and the lower structures in your brain that have been around for more than 40 million years, predating Homo sapiens, they give you all this information that is below your level of consciousness. That's delivered largely to your limbic system where it's made into emotions. Emotions are not there to give you a good day or a bad day.

31:51Arthur Brooks:They're there to tell you that something should be avoided or approached.

31:54Aliza Pressman:Yeah.

31:54Arthur Brooks:Negative emotions are supposed to be unpleasant. They're supposed to scare you or make you angry or make you sad or make you disgusted so you don't get poisoned or attacked or et cetera. And the positive emotions in the same way to say, hey, there's a possible mate or calories or, you know, we're still placed to seen animals. Our brains are the same as they were 250 ,000 years ago, approximately. So that's important to keep in mind because that shows us that there's a big biological basis for how our emotions work. And if you're looking for a feeling, you're looking in the wrong place. Happiness has feelings in the same way that the smell of your turkey is associated with your Thanksgiving dinner.

32:34Arthur Brooks:Happy feelings are evidence of happiness. That means you need to look at the real thing and understand what it is. Happiness has three parts to it, three macronutrients. So we're going to stay on the metaphor of Thanksgiving dinner. The protein, carbohydrates, and fat that you need in balance and abundance for happiness are enjoyment, satisfaction, and meaning. So we started the conversation talking about meaning because that's my new book, is about how to find the meaning of your life. But the other two are satisfaction and enjoyment. Satisfaction is the joy from an accomplishment after struggle.

33:03Arthur Brooks:That gives your life goals and direction. Enjoyment is pleasure plus people plus memory. The search for pleasure is not the secret of happiness. That's the secret to rehab, because all that's doing is tapping the limbic system, some very ancient structures of your brain. You know, people who want to feel good all the time, they wind up getting addicted, et cetera, and engage in all sorts of self-destructive behaviors. But when you add people in memory to your pleasures, you can manage your pleasures, make them social and permanent, and that's enjoyment. So the first thing for my personal search for greater happiness was understanding where I'm weak.

33:39Arthur Brooks:I'm pretty strong on meaning. part of it because I'm 61 and I've been married for a super long time and I have kids and grandkids and religion and all that stuff, which is, you know, the, some of the things that people typically look for in the right hemisphere of my brain is pretty active, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. My satisfaction is through the roof, a joy from accomplishment after struggle. I'm all struggling accomplishment, man, where I'm weak is enjoyment. That's my weak suit. I don't enjoy my life. My enjoyment is at the bottom. I'm in the, like the 10th percentile in enjoyment. it.

34:09Arthur Brooks:I've got a test on my website called the happiness scale. And people are taking it. I mean, thousands and thousands of people are taking it every week at this point of this happiness scale test, which is a beautiful thing. And you can find out, you know, where you're weak in your macronutrient profile for happiness means enjoyment. And, you know, that's a problem.

34:31Aliza Pressman:A lot of strivers suffer with a lack of enjoyment.

34:35Arthur Brooks:They're super high on achievement and on and satisfaction and they might have pretty good meaning, but I have to do like enjoyment bootcamp for billionaires and athletes and actors and superstrivers. I mean, you and I have the same friends. It's so wild.

34:52Aliza Pressman:Cause you're totally right. I've only recently just decided that Mahjong is my happy place.

34:58Arthur Brooks:You enjoy Mahjong.

34:59Aliza Pressman:I just started and I'm so amazed at how, first of all, so many, your grandmother on Long Island. I literally just became a 90-year-old old Jewish lady. But it's so weird because my husband was watching me. And also he was like, we are only a year in. This is too soon. But what I was noticing is like the women that I was playing with, we were like, because I was invited to do this when my kids were younger. And I was just like, I am working and raising children. You want me to have a hobby? Like to just like hang out? Right. and other than relaxing, which I'm very fond of.

35:39Arthur Brooks:Right. But relaxation is recharging. It's not, relaxation is actually not enjoyment.

35:44Aliza Pressman:Oh, good. Well, I was good at relaxation, but just for recharging. Yeah.

35:49Arthur Brooks:So you could go do more work.

35:50Aliza Pressman:But just to go do more work. Totally.

35:53Arthur Brooks:Leisure is not recharging for work.

35:55Aliza Pressman:Okay. So is my Mahjong leisure?

35:57Arthur Brooks:Yeah, for sure. So proud. So Josef Pieper, the great German philosopher from the 20th century, He wrote his probably his best book was called Leisure, the Basis of Culture. He said leisure is what drives us. But leisure is not chilling on a beach. Leisure is not getting ready to work more. Leisure is a serious business. You're just not getting compensated through earthly rewards for it. And so he puts it in the categories of deepening your religious faith, deepening your relationships, learning something new for the sake of learning it. But that's leisure.

36:34Aliza Pressman:I genuinely just took up leisure recently. There you go.

36:37Arthur Brooks:And you're going to get better at enjoyment as a result of it. Because leisure leads to enjoyment if you understand leisure.

36:44Aliza Pressman:That's very interesting.

36:46Arthur Brooks:Do your daughters, like your daughter in college, understand leisure and enjoyment?

36:50Aliza Pressman:No.

36:51Arthur Brooks:Yeah. This is what she needs to learn.

36:53Aliza Pressman:In fact.

36:54Arthur Brooks:Or she'll wind up like me. Yeah.

36:56Aliza Pressman:In fact, my younger daughter very much does. Yeah. she loves just sitting and drawing for hours and painting and I don't know if that's leisure if that's considered leisure but she's no no for sure okay my older daughter is always like

37:12Arthur Brooks:to what end are you doing that like points on the scoreboard yeah points on the scoreboard now a lot

37:17Aliza Pressman:of people that's why I couldn't believe she liked your talk yeah they came to see me at Harvard and and well part of it is because it it's an analytical approach and people understand

37:27Arthur Brooks:themselves. So my classes are oversubscribed because people understand themselves and people are endlessly fascinated with themselves scientifically. So I'm like the Cosmo quiz PhD.

37:37Aliza Pressman:Yes. Oh my God. That's so smart. But then what a way in.

37:41Arthur Brooks:Yeah, that's the way. And there's so much garbage out there, so much dumb nonsense on the feel good quasi scientific stuff. And if it's real science based on what we're supposed to be doing in the academy, but it's about you incorporated, then it gets really interesting to people. And it's especially true for people who We've never understood why can't I enjoy my life? I'm doing everything I'm supposed to do, but I'm not happy. Oh, that becomes an epiphany.

38:09Aliza Pressman:And now for a quick break. So you know how you need so much protein? Like we hear about this all the time. And don't you have trouble getting so much protein? Because I cannot get the necessary amount of protein that I'm supposed to have during the day without help. And I love cachava because two scoops of cachava helps you get 25 grams of protein, six grams of fiber, greens, adaptogens, and so much more all in just two scoops. So, and plus it comes in flavors like chocolate, vanilla, chai, matcha, coconut, acai, and strawberry. I'm a chocolate person and you can make a delicious drink, get just a little headstart on the nutrients that you need and, you know, stick with some of your wellness goals.

39:06Aliza Pressman:Go to cachava.com and use the code humans for 15 % off and they have a risk-free love it guarantee. So if you don't like it, just that's that you can get your money back. That's cachava, K-A-C-H-A-V-A.com with the code humans at checkout. And now I'm just making it a little bit easier for you to have something with no artificial flavors, colors, sweeteners. There's no GMOs. There's no soy. There's no animal products. There's no gluten, no preservatives, but there are 25 milligrams, not milligrams, 25 grams of protein. Life as a parent is nonstop and meals provide an extra added challenge because it's just constant.

40:00Aliza Pressman:And that's why I'm excited about Nurture Life. They've made serving healthy meals way easier and more enjoyable. So Nurture Life is a meal delivery service that makes nutritious meals and snacks your kids actually want to eat while giving parents the support they need. Nurture Life's whole menu is perfect for kids ages 10 months to 10 years. So the minute they're really digging into solids, their fresh meals and snacks are delicious, nutritious, and fully cooked. That means they're ready to serve in just one minute. Nurture Life lets kids enjoy healthy, nutritionally balanced diet while still eating all of their favorites like mac and cheese, spaghetti and meatballs, and you get it.

40:37Aliza Pressman:So how Nurture Life works is that you choose from more than 50 varieties of nutritious, balanced meals on their menu from finger foods for babies to toddlers or kids meals for the older kids. And then Nurture Life does the cooking for you. And the fresh meals are delivered straight to your door in refrigerated packaging. And along with full meal options, they also have on the go snacks and superfood smoothies so kids can eat well no matter where they go or what mood they're in. So head to nurturelife.com slash humans and use the code humans for 55 % off your first order plus free shipping. That's right.

41:15Aliza Pressman:55 % off plus free shipping. Once again, that's nurturelife.com slash humans and make sure you use the promo code humans. Even if you're not a parent with young kids, you maybe have a parent friend who is just feeling overwhelmed by mealtime. So share our code. So our show gets the credit. Remember, Put your little ones first with healthy meals from Nurture Life. So this feels like a large challenge, younger and younger. Like childhood used to be quite a bit of leisure. Yeah. And now it feels like a lot of stress to strive.

41:53Arthur Brooks:Yeah.

41:53Aliza Pressman:Strive big. and is there a world where you can be a healthy striver and also have leisure and have a proper experience so that you can get into adulthood a little bit more ready to be a person?

42:08Arthur Brooks:Well, the first part of your point is spot on, which is that it has gotten much harder in our technologized culture. Because in the past, you could be a very, very serious person, but your brain would be working the way it's supposed to work. Now, what's going to happen And if you're a very serious person that you're going to be all about countable metrics using technology and everything you're going to be doing is how and what, how and what, how and what. And that's all left brain. Yeah. And with a non-integrated brain between why, how and what, then you're going to be doing everything, but you're going to, but feeling nothing.

42:41Arthur Brooks:I have everything, but I feel nothing. I'm empty. I hear this again and again and again. Another thing that I hear a lot from superstrivers who are in their 20s is I feel like I'm living in a simulation. And that's when you technologize everything and everything is for points on the board. It's a fake life. You're not living a life in real life. And it's not just because you're online all the time. Well, that certainly hurts. You know, you wake up and the first thing you look at is your phone.

43:08Aliza Pressman:Right.

43:09Arthur Brooks:And then you look at your phone while you're, you know, you're checking on your messages as you're eating your breakfast and drinking your coffee. and then you go to work on Zoom and then you date on an app and your friends are on social media and then you're doing a bunch of gaming and you get my point. You can very easily be online 12 hours a day and that is The Matrix. Yeah. That's almost literally the plot of that Keanu Reeves movie from, I'm going to shock you now, 27 years ago.

43:31Aliza Pressman:Stop.

43:32Arthur Brooks:I know, I know, I know. So my kids are like, oh, that movie from before I was born. Shut up. But it's an amazing thing because the plot of The Matrix was that there was this artificial intelligence, machine artificial intelligence that was ruling mankind, humankind, and using their energy, attention, kinetic energy, and keeping them in pods, pacifying them with a fake pleasant existence while it took their energy. We're living that.

44:04Aliza Pressman:I didn't really understand the matrix when it came out.

44:06Arthur Brooks:That's what it was. It was artificial intelligence subjugating humanity and keeping them pacified, which is exactly what's happening right now. And that's the brave new world that a lot of people in Silicon Valley apparently want. Right. And so one of the great things that we can do as parents is deliver our kids from that by getting them interested in things that are not online, that are not for money, that are not for ambition. See, this is the world that we're in is basically technologized even when it doesn't use technology.

44:35Aliza Pressman:It's so tricky because I would imagine a lot of people listening have much younger kids, But as kids get older, the pressure gets more intense and the achievement and accolades and all of those things. Everybody says, well, even colleges and people looking for, I'm like, what's that word when you work for someone? An employee?

44:59Arthur Brooks:Oh, my God. I'm losing my mind. Because you're an entrepreneur.

45:02Aliza Pressman:It's so crazy. I'm like, what does that look like? But it's like in the job market, what are you looking for? and people say theoretically like authentic, curious, interested. And you talk about this in your book, the difference between curiosity and what is the word that you use? Maybe it is a simulate. Maybe it is simulation. It's like you can be curious and try to do things and accomplish things, but how are we getting people back to doing it for just like. The sake of doing it. Yes.

45:36Arthur Brooks:The sake of doing it. That was my 12 minute question. It's a good one because a lot of parents are asking. A lot of parents think that being a good parent is pushing your kids to higher and higher levels of ambition, a worldly accomplishment of measurable excellence. That's wrong. I understand that you want to give your kids goals, but that's not the way to raise your kids. Because here's what your kids are going to learn. And this is pretty well studied. I mean, you're a developmental psychologist. I'm in your territory right now. if you reward your kids for the things that they do really well and you give them attention and affection and energy when they bring home a good report card or get first chair in the orchestra or make the baseball team they will learn that love is earned and that love can be measured love is earned and can be measured that no nothing more nefarious could come out of silicon valley than that yeah that love is measured and earned and so the result is that they will wire their little synaptically plastic brains to only really get dopamine when they're winning in a measurable way.

46:37Arthur Brooks:That's what they will learn. That is the secret to a success addiction, self-objectification and workaholism. That's what you've set them up for. You've also set them up for bad marriages. Why? Because, you know, if somebody who's a success addict who believes that love is earned, what do you typically find? These are men who will work and work and work and work and work trying to earn their wife's admiration and love through more and more worldly success. I've talked to any number of, I've worked with my wife and I've worked with so many couples over the years and she'll say, all he does is work.

47:11Arthur Brooks:And he'll say, yeah, well, I noticed you like all of the fruits of this. And she'll say, I want you, but if I can't have you, I will take the money. And women who try to stay super young into their forties, into their fifties, into their sixties. And why? Because they're trying to give off fitness cues, which is trying to earn somebody's love. And that's just, where does that start? That starts with the overly technologized accomplishment culture of parents who drive their kids insane.

47:40Aliza Pressman:Okay, it's hard to do in practice. But what do you do when your kids are, when you're trying to live in both worlds? You know they're here and let's say they're in the United States and you want them to follow certain paths because you think it will lead to a better adulthood. How do you stop yourself while also supporting like the basic fundamental skills that they're going to need to develop?

48:06Arthur Brooks:So number one, heal thyself.

48:09Aliza Pressman:Number one, two and three, probably.

48:11Arthur Brooks:Yeah, I mean, it's like it doesn't matter what you tell them. All that matters is what they see. You know, if you want to, people often ask me, how do I, how do I raise my kids so they'll practice my faith? Religious parents, while their kids have practiced their faith. And so many kids have fallen away and, you know, their, their friends' kids don't go to temple or church or synagogue and the mosque or whatever your thing is, right? I mean, you want that. All that matters is they see you being religious. And especially the physically most imposing individual in the household being religious, which is in a traditional family, be dad.

48:44Arthur Brooks:if he's big, you know, he's a big guy. I thought my dad was like eight feet tall. And my dad was, he would lift the house on his knees next to my bed. Wow. Every night saying his prayers with me next to my bed. My dad would have been on his knees in front of no man, but he was worshiping something greater than himself. And for me, I was a little dude. I'm like, oh, that's what it means to be a man. That's what it means to be a man. So if you're a success addicted, workaholic, self-objectifying number counter in the search for worldly accolades, guess what they're going to see? And they're going to see that's what it means to be a meritorious individual.

49:26Arthur Brooks:That's what it means to be growing up. And if you're a mom, not that this is now,

49:32Aliza Pressman:this will probably have to cut this out, but.

49:34Arthur Brooks:Don't cut it out.

49:36Aliza Pressman:But I can see a world where part of the splendor of your accomplishments is what you're producing in terms of like your kid and like getting accolades for being number one mom and at school and in, you know, like...

49:50Arthur Brooks:You're living through them. And living through them, it's no different. Yeah, well, you're serving your mom. You're showing your mom. If you're that mom, you're giving them love because of what they do, not who they are. Now, so here's the first principle. Heal thyself. Principle number two. Remember what love is. What is love? Love is a free gift freely given is to will the good of the other, not because of what they do, because of who they are. Your kids need to know that you love them no matter what under all. So you can rob a bank. I will still love you. And it's because of you, not because of what you do.

50:25Arthur Brooks:If you love them disproportionately when they do something really well, they will become human doings, not human beings. Your choice, because their little brains are wiring up with everything that happens right now. You got to love them as a grace, as a free gift, freely given. And then the things that they do that are really fun and excellent, they should incorporate a whole lot of how we just defined leisure. Things that don't pay and the world doesn't clap for, but that are awesome. You know, what do you know? What did you learn? How deep did you go? How healthy are your relationships? And once again, how do they learn leisure?

51:05Arthur Brooks:From you. they'll watch you in leisure and if dad's never had a minute in leisure and mom's never had a minute in leisure well i mean we'll be into us and by the way it's like i'm so perfect to this are you kidding me i'm a super striver par excellence i was putting points on the board when i was nine years i was a classical musician anybody who knows classical musicians that's like being a gymnast yeah you know it is crazy the number of hours that you're putting in from you know, pre pubescent days. And then as an academic, and then as a CEO, and you know, I worked that 14th hour before the first hour with my kids.

51:40Arthur Brooks:And the reason is because I wanted to be special rather than happy. I chose special over happy. And my kids got revenge. They grew up, right? And, and the result of it, thank God they have a normal mother, a normal person. And, and the result of it is there was a whole lot of healing in my own life. I had to do it by, and I studied my way into it. Right. And so I'm not just giving other people advice. I'm trying to take it myself and I've become a much more equilibrated person. I still have a lot to do.

52:09Aliza Pressman:How are you as a grandfather?

52:11Arthur Brooks:Better. It's the only thing in life that's truly not overrated, but here's the interesting thing about it because of that, you know, it's, I never had a close relationship with my parents. It was cordial. It was fine.

52:22Aliza Pressman:Yeah.

52:23Arthur Brooks:But you know, I moved, I grew up in Seattle. I move when I was 18 and I was I was hustling man I was grinding I was you know I was making my way I wanted to be the world's greatest French horn player and I was touring Europe you know through my 20s and doing my thing and I thought you know I want to get to know my parents my father was a brilliant mathematician my mother was a painter of some significant renown of Pacific Northwest and I thought there's such interesting cultured artistic people scientists and artists and all that yeah I'll get to know them I'll get to know them they died young and that was I don't have very many regrets but that was a real regret until i realized i get a do-over with my kids and grandkids and man i'm not messing it up so the result is i'm we actually have an intergenerational family in the same house we made a family decision like i eat my own cooking i read the research and i try to change my information can change your life knowledge is power and intergenerational intergenerational homes that are not forced you know it's just because you know mom got addicted to drugs and the kids had to be raised by their grandparents that's i mean whatever happens i'm not talking about this i'm talking when you voluntarily live together it's way better for junior and it's way better for grandpa and grandma yeah you're gonna live way longer and the kids are gonna grow up with better cognitive development and more happiness that's the bottom line and so we made a family decision we got moving vans and we all moved to the same place wow it's not you know, seven families in one house.

53:49Arthur Brooks:I mean, we've got two families in one house, but tons of people and the other kids live up the street. And, and I didn't have that. I mean, my, my kids, their one set of grandparents was in Barcelona and the other set of grandparents was in Seattle and I didn't know them.

54:03Aliza Pressman:What's your family meal time like?

54:06Arthur Brooks:It's cacophony. It's chaos because there's babies and there's lots of babies. There's babies, babies, babies, you know, it's like my kids have been having kids annually since they got married and they got married in there early. It's like, I mean, not exactly. They're like 13 months apart, but that's really close. Raise them Catholic. They do Catholic stuff. I was just going to say they are really hard. But they're into it because they know part of it is because we're there and, and we help and we're doing, it's old school. It's 1940 in this way. And it's not, everybody can do it. I got it. Not everybody can do it.

54:40Arthur Brooks:It's not, it's not available to everybody. It's a privilege in this way, but it's also a privilege that people could do it. do and pass on is to be parents and grandparents and, and, and just annoy each other and get in each other's way. And, and, you know, there's always rice on the couch and, you know, it's just, it, it's, there's always rice on the couch. We're tidier than they are, but it's fine. And, and I hope they never move.

55:08Aliza Pressman:That's so wonderful. Okay. You have a few pro tips for just good marriages?

55:15Arthur Brooks:Yeah, so the greatest gift that you can give your kids is a good marriage. And not everybody can have that. My mouth. Not everybody can have that. I mean, it's like stuff happens is what it comes down to. And it takes two to tango, right? It's like you can have all the best intent to have a great marriage. And, you know, if you don't have a partner there. And a lot of people don't relate to that. But a lot of marriages can be saved. And in the absence of abuse or abandonment or disloyalty, a lot of marriages, they just, they fade. They just get cold. And so for marriages that are just cold, no catastrophe, just cold.

55:50Arthur Brooks:Just kind of meh. Yeah. There's a lot of work that shows how you can reheat it quick. Okay. It's like this is the microwave of marriage. What is it? There's four things. Four things to do. Two are neurochemical and two are more psychological. On the neurochemical side, number one is eye contact. and this is something that a lot of guys they don't know women have three times as much oxytocin as men and the reason for that is because women bond to babies and when babies are nursing, you remember when you nursed your children right? and they would stare up at you and it was like the 4th of July it's oxytocin and that's a neurochemical it's a neuropeptide that functions as a hormone and that's human bonding women have three times as much as men men still have a lot and men need it but women need it more.

56:39Arthur Brooks:And one of the best ways to get that is eye contact from your beloved, especially when you're talking. The big mistake that husbands make is they don't stare at their wives in their eyes when they're having a conversation. They stop making eye contact when they're talking. If you, it's like, guys, if you're listening to this, and I realize there's probably more women, but for guys who are listening to this, is do this without telling her and actually start for a week, all just be staring at her as you're talking to her and watch how she weirdly gets happier. And that helps. It helps a lot. And you'll be happier too, dudes.

57:12Arthur Brooks:Second is touch. The rule is ABT. Always be touching. Always be touching. Your soulmate and you should be connected physically. You know, one flesh, people take that really sexually. What it really is, is the right hemispheres of the brain connecting because your marriage, your partnership is an antenna to the divine if you let it be that. But it really helps a lot when there is more physical contact. Men actually need this a little bit more than women. So ladies, when you're with your guy and you're walking down the street, hook your arm in his. That thing will make him feel like he's seven feet tall.

57:46Arthur Brooks:Just do that. And so every time you're together, you're touching. Touch, touch, touch, touch. Watching TV, you're touching. No matter what you're doing, you're touching. I mean, I realize that if there are inappropriate moments, like, you know, you need both hands, for example, but always be holding hands. Always be holding hands. That's the second rule. Third rule is less time rehearsing grievance and more time just having fun. So a lot of trouble with couples therapy is it's a rehearsal of grievances. It's like, you did this, you did this. Well, let's talk about why you did this. Well, why did you say this?

58:17Arthur Brooks:And a lot of times it's like, just go have fun. Go ride your bikes together. Go do something that's really fun that you both really like. That just covers a multitude of sins. Having more fun, have more fun. And the last is actually worship or meditate together. Is pray or meditate together. That's one of the most intimate things that couples miss. Sex is way less intimate than prayer. And praying together is super intimate. I know couples that are religious who are 50 years into their marriage and don't pray in front of each other. Because it's too embarrassing.

58:49Aliza Pressman:So I don't even know what that... I know I do meditate.

58:55Arthur Brooks:Is your husband a meditator?

58:56Aliza Pressman:No, no. He's amazing. He should start praying. but he does he i think he feels like his workouts are his meditation yeah that's it's i you know i

59:07Arthur Brooks:can talk about the neurophysiology of how workouts affect uh are it's very significant for lowering negative affect that's one of the ways that i self-manage is that i work out a lot because i have very high levels of negative affect negative emotionality i mean i'm a mad scientist high positive high negative which is a quarter of the population right and uh and self-management is really, really important. And one of the ways to do that, I mean, is drugs and alcohol bad,

59:32Aliza Pressman:right?

59:33Arthur Brooks:For, for affect management, workaholism, bad, right? Workouts, good. Religion or spirituality, good. Or meditation, good. And so the fact that he says, I feel a lot better when I work out, yeah, that's probably because he's self-managing his negative affect levels.

59:51Aliza Pressman:He won't go a day.

59:52Arthur Brooks:Yeah. Yeah. Right. Okay. I can guarantee you right now that he has high negative affect naturally. and so that helps because people who have low negative affect they don't feel better when they work out and they have a hard time staying on an exercise routine yeah so if you have a high negative affect you'll be like yeah i gotta work another way to do that i really feel like it's

1:00:08Aliza Pressman:got to be better to have because i work out because i have because i'm 52 years old and like i want to be agile and and you want to be there for my grandkids but my mood is the same either way yeah and and i was thinking my husband's so lucky that like he sees real a real difference in working out yeah for mood because then he does it his negative affects high so he's

1:00:37Arthur Brooks:what's what about his positive affect is also high yeah okay so he's a mad scientist like me

1:00:41Aliza Pressman:i mean he he's very he's so managed that you would not no that doesn't you would not notice

1:00:48Arthur Brooks:It's not me presents. No, it's.

1:00:50Aliza Pressman:But inside, like we were doing, I had him do the sensitivity test because I wanted to prove my point, which is that he's kind of an orchid.

1:00:58Arthur Brooks:Right.

1:00:58Aliza Pressman:And but he presents as like a finance guy who's like on the rowing team. And I probably you would think I was more of an orchid and more highly sensitive and because of what I do or whatever. And actually. Probably not. We're the total, like he's such an orchid and he's just incredibly self-managed.

1:01:21Arthur Brooks:Yeah. And you're more of a cheerleader, which means you have higher positive affect and more and naturally lower intensity. You have negative affect than everybody else. Plenty. Lower intensity. Yeah. Now the other two profiles are the poet, which is high negative and low positive. Very creative, very romantic, depressive. Yeah. And then there's the low, low, low affect people. Those are the judges. People want to know what they are. that they take the happiness scale at my website. You'll find out what they are. You'll find out that, that. And that's really super important information because then you know whether your bigger challenge is happiness or unhappiness.

1:01:53Arthur Brooks:Whether positive or negative is your bigger challenge. Because if you naturally are high and positive, but you're just trying to drive up the positive and wondering why you still feel unhappy a lot is because you're working on the wrong side of the ledger. And so for me, negative is more important. And so I work out every day, but I also follow up my workouts by going to mass every day because they reinforce each other. And so spiritual life is really important. And is that what you do when you say to pray, when you pray together, you're literally going to mass together to pray.

1:02:19Aliza Pressman:Yeah, we also pray at the end of the day too. Okay, that's what I want.

1:02:22Arthur Brooks:We also have meditative prayer. This is an ancient Catholic meditation called the rosary. Very much like in style like Vipassana meditation. Yeah. And we do that every day too. So couples finding something like that. And a lot of couples who are not religious, but they do believe in God, for example. So pray. So pray together. Why don't you talk to God? If you believe in God, why aren't you talking to him? You know, you're building a relationship with somebody or something that you believe in, but you're not practicing it. That's odd in its way, but that's just because of habits. And so, you know, you believe in God, you believe in God.

1:02:54Arthur Brooks:If that's true, then you could pray together.

1:02:57Aliza Pressman:Even though we are, yeah, from very different.

1:02:59Arthur Brooks:Sort of different. I mean, you know, I'm a Christian. I'm just like from a minor Nazarene sect of Judaism.

1:03:04Aliza Pressman:Right, right.

1:03:06Arthur Brooks:Called the Catholic Church.

1:03:07Aliza Pressman:But Catholics and Jews have a similar situation. Yeah.

1:03:12Arthur Brooks:constitutional situation we're supposed to understand Jews as our older sisters and brothers I mean you understand us you understand us and we literally believe in the same God and if we believe that God exists why aren't we talking to him together and then it's like sharing sharing is on my heart this thing is on my heart because you're talking to your wife too and that's real hard really intimate but boy are you wiring your batteries together and that one is It's just an absolute, like, super glue for marriages.

1:03:44Aliza Pressman:And are you talking to each other or facing outward? I'm talking to God.

1:03:47Arthur Brooks:And that's the funny thing. That's an Aristotelian idea. So Aristotle talked about perfect friendships as those that have a third love and where the friends will walk forward into the future together. Like, walk forward together facing the thing that they love. It's a very beautiful image.

1:04:01Aliza Pressman:And that's what you do?

1:04:03Arthur Brooks:Yeah, because you're talking to God. You're usually sitting next to each other and praying.

1:04:07Aliza Pressman:Isn't that, I've never thought about like, I talk in my head, like I have plenty of conversations, but they're not like focused, intentional at a particular moment. But it's never, I've never really known how one does that. Like when you said your father prayed every night. Yeah. I mean, I can see it because you said he got on his knees.

1:04:25Arthur Brooks:Heavenly Father. I mean, it was like a very traditional Catholic Christian prayer, right? And Jews pray in a different way. But, you know, when you go to temple, I mean, they're praying to God. It's interesting because I've learned a lot more about this. Every year I give at least one talk on a high holy day in one of the temples in Washington or Boston. Really? They say, you're our favorite Catholic. I'm like, yeah, you say that to all the Catholics. But it's very interesting because I was actually doing one at one of the big temples, Temple Beth Emanuel in Newton Mass, which is a really famous place, as you know.

1:05:00Arthur Brooks:And afterward, there's a really well-known rabbi, West Garden Swartz, who's a great rabbi, he's a famous guy. And he's like, would you lead our congregation in prayer? And he exposes, you know, he takes out, you know, draws back the curtain, you know, for that. And it's like, and I'm going to pray extemporaneously in a packed congregation on Yom Kippur, which includes the president of Harvard, by the way, where I'm a professor. And I'm thinking to myself, don't say Jesus. Don't say Jesus.

1:05:33Aliza Pressman:I feel like everybody would get it.

1:05:36Arthur Brooks:It was great. It was great. Not the performance, obviously. It was a great experience of wiring my batteries together with my sisters and brothers in the congregation who hadn't eaten in a long time. Right, right. And they were very hungry. It was a 25th hour meditation that I had done.

1:05:53Aliza Pressman:Yeah. It was a really beautiful experience. That is beautiful. I just, it never. how much are you willing to expose yourself i mean to the divine if you believe in the divine

1:06:05Arthur Brooks:or how you understand the divine in with your soulmate and so you sit and you do this every evening yeah and we pray together today every day do you have a moment where you're like it's time well generally speaking it's you know like all the details it's 20 minutes before we go to bed okay 20 minutes half an hour before we go to bed it takes about 20 minutes so you're not going to bed watching like the pit no i mean we don't have tv in the room actually because that's the other

1:06:30Aliza Pressman:blue screen is bad yeah maybe that's bad another tip you should probably put your phone away for

1:06:35Arthur Brooks:the last hour yeah that you're awake and you know prayer together it's just because and then usually in bed we'll we though we before we turn the light off we talk with a direct eye contact for about five minutes it's so and we hold hands because i need it and that's what we do i mean we don't it's like sometimes we're so exhausted, but, but we have pretty good hygiene for this stuff, you know, because we've been married 34 years. We want another 34 if we get them. Right. And this is, I mean, I literally want to be staring at her as I take my dying breath in the eyes, eye contact. My last gift to her will be oxytocin.

1:07:13Aliza Pressman:I want to end the conversation here, but I promised Penelope, I would ask you her questions. Just like cheating a little.

1:07:20Arthur Brooks:My student, my student at Harvard. So I'm going to pull her questions up because she was kind of like, wait a second. You're right on. It's like my mom gets direct questions.

1:07:30Aliza Pressman:And what's funny is that they're so different from questions that I would have.

1:07:38Arthur Brooks:Yeah, of course.

1:07:39Aliza Pressman:But I think they're so interesting. She's 19, right? Yeah, she's 19. Okay. You explain that technology hijacks us because we're biologically wired for connection and reward. Right. Given that these systems are so deeply ingrained, how do we think honestly about limits without pretending it's just a willpower issue?

1:07:58Arthur Brooks:Yeah. And the answer is just disciplines in the same way. So, you know, you get it takes about 42 days to build a workout routine. Takes about six weeks. And the way to do that, if somebody who's never worked out is really dedicated to their couch for workouts that are identical. OK. And they're half an hour each and they're not very hard. zone two cardio and do only exactly that for seven weeks so that you've done the neural programming for discipline. So the discipline and habits are not willpower. It's first hour of the day. Don't look at your device. That means get a real alarm clock. Go for a walk when you first wake up, whatever you do.

1:08:33Arthur Brooks:Last hour at night. So there's no blue screens, screwing up your pineal gland and messing up your inhibiting your melatonin and during meals. Just that.

1:08:41Aliza Pressman:Okay. Just that. Okay. Rapid fire questions from a 19 year old. Yeah. You argue that modern life over trains the left hemisphere and starves the right. What do you think people most misunderstand about what gets lost when life becomes dominated by optimization and problem solving?

1:08:59Arthur Brooks:Smart question. These are great. That the questions that really matter the most are not the ones that you can answer specifically. They're the ones that you have to live with. That's what gets lost. You get lost with the magic of doing nothing and being bored. You get lost in what it actually means to have experiences of life that you can't articulate or even understand. And that's the life in life.

1:09:25Aliza Pressman:Okay. You describe coherence as trusting that life isn't random, even when it's painful. How does someone develop coherence without clinging to overly simple explanation?

1:09:37Arthur Brooks:Yeah. Coherence, once again, is a why question. is not going to have a simple one. Anybody who says, you know, why do things happen the way they do? Because God wills it. Well, that's just the very beginning of an understanding. Tell me what that means. Who is God? What does God's will actually even mean? How would you experience it? How would you know? That's really where that should lead. In other words, these are not closed form questions like calculus problems. These are open form questions. If Google can give you an answer, it's not a real answer to a meeting question.

1:10:16Aliza Pressman:Right, right, right.

1:10:17Arthur Brooks:Yeah.

1:10:18Aliza Pressman:You define a calling as work that aligns values, purpose, and being needed by others. How do people confuse passion with calling and why does that matter? In this world of all the hyper-focusing on expertise, how do we approach steering kids and ourselves in the right direction?

1:10:34Arthur Brooks:How do you know the difference between passion and calling? Passion is part of calling, but it's not all of it. Okay. Passion is part of calling. You feel passion when there is a calling because your calling is what you're meant to do. That has the word meaning in it. What you're meant to do is your calling, but that's not just passion. That's not just drive. It has a lot to do with, there are a lot of things that people feel like they're meant to do that they don't feel passionate about every day. Yeah. You know, being a CEO is 80 % taking out the garbage.

1:11:01Aliza Pressman:Right. Right. Totally.

1:11:03Arthur Brooks:When your calling is as a mom, there are a lot of days where your heart just doesn't feel like it's in it.

1:11:08Aliza Pressman:Right.

1:11:08Arthur Brooks:And if you only did it when you have passion, then you're relying excessively on the limbic system. Here's basically what it comes down to. If you're looking for your calling, your gut gives you three sensations when you have an opportunity. So maybe it's a proposal of marriage. Maybe it's moving to San Francisco. Maybe it's becoming an accountant. How do you know if you should do it? There are three sensations that your gut gives you. There's excitement, a.k.a. passion. There's fear. And there's a sense of deadness.

1:11:39Aliza Pressman:Deadness?

1:11:40Arthur Brooks:Deadness. Emptiness. You know, if somebody, a man you didn't love, proposed marriage to you, you'd be like, even if on paper it made sense, you'd be like... Yeah. You feel dead. Yeah. It makes you feel dead inside. You know, people ask me to run companies a lot because I've done that before. It makes me feel dead inside. That's how I know not to do it. Don't do it. The right combination to find your calling with a new opportunity, Penelope, dear Penelope, is 80 % excitement, 20 % fear and 0 % deadness.

1:12:10Aliza Pressman:I mean, what a great and clear answer that is.

1:12:14Arthur Brooks:It's not perfect because sometimes there's more fear because that's the option. You know, I've taken jobs that are like 50 % fear.

1:12:21Aliza Pressman:Yeah.

1:12:22Arthur Brooks:Because I couldn't dial it, but it should always be as close to 0 % deadness as possible. and it shouldn't be 100 % excitement because that's passion and that will wane.

1:12:33Aliza Pressman:And what happens if you are, you're listening to this and you're like, shit.

1:12:40Arthur Brooks:I made a mistake. Yeah. Yeah, I know. And then it sort of depends on what the mistake is because, you know, you can leave a job. You know, people can change. They can move cities. It's a little bit trickier to get out of a marriage. I get that. In which case, sometimes you need to increase the excitement. I don't recommend increasing the fear per se.

1:13:00Aliza Pressman:But just go back to the earlier part of the conversation. Okay, last one. Okay. You note that periods of change through uncomfortable often increase meaning. And hell yeah, everyone needs change. Why does stability alone fail to produce depth?

1:13:20Arthur Brooks:Yeah. Because you could be perfectly stable in an environment that's not deep. you know people sit you know they skate along the top like a bug on a on water a lot a lot of people do that how do you know if you're doing that or not you know that because you're actually you're you're you have a sense of stability without a sense of meaning and so you can say i can you know i'm doing something and it's very comfortable but i'm not it's not deep and people know when they're when they lack meaning you know people are in very very stable and easy but loveless marriages they're in jobs that pay a lot but they're not actually learning people are in these environments a lot.

1:13:54Arthur Brooks:That's the reason that I ask people to do these tests on meaning. And if your life is stable but not meaningful, that's a sign that you're missing an opportunity.

1:14:04Aliza Pressman:What if young people are like, my life doesn't feel meaningful, but they're like in high school?

1:14:08Arthur Brooks:Yeah, that's why I wrote the book. It's actually, you need to, number one, engage in particular protocols that will stop pushing you to the left side of your brain systematically, aka use of technology and the way that you're being pushed by culture and maybe your parents. And so there's a lot in there about rebelling against the left side, the left brain culture, get clean. In other words, and then you need to live like your great grandparents a little bit more fall in love, go outside, touch grass, experience beauty, give of yourself, look for calling, seek transcendence in serving other people and looking for the divine, learn how to suffer.

1:14:45Aliza Pressman:But you're 61, right? And I'm 52.

1:14:50Arthur Brooks:You're a kid.

1:14:51Aliza Pressman:If you're a child, baby but if there's a you know 16 year old that's like i want that but that's not the culture i live

1:15:05Arthur Brooks:in right how do i access it yeah the answer is you gotta rebel and that's the most fun of all i have a whole chapter of this book on how to rebel on the rebellion culture you gotta stand you gotta rage against the machine and that is super super fun is to be your own person it is a blast. It's the greatest adventure. Rebellion is the best. That's why teenagers love it. That's why teenagers get energy from the act of rebellion. Well, guess what? You know, it's like I've talked about this with my kids. What's rebellion? You know, we used to rebel when I was in the 1980s against squares and, you know, our parents' rules and the whole thing.

1:15:43Arthur Brooks:And my kids are rebelling against a culture that's making them miserable.

1:15:46Aliza Pressman:Yeah.

1:15:47Arthur Brooks:Against a culture that's monetizing and productizing them against a media that wants us to be mad about politics. politics all the time about a kind of an academic establishment that's giving these weird newfangled theories about actually what it means to be a real person that's telling them they shouldn't fall in love that they should I mean it's craziness and fight back man fight back I love that okay so

1:16:10Aliza Pressman:what's something that like a kid is walking into a room what's what what's a small way they can start to think about being rebellious I mean turn off your phone and go into the room here now

1:16:22Arthur Brooks:now. And I don't know what I'm going to find in this room. The one thing I'm not going to find is what's on my screen. I'm going to be here now. And you know what? It's probably going to be boring. And that's good.

1:16:33Aliza Pressman:Was that what Ram Dass was going for?

1:16:36Arthur Brooks:Be here now? Yeah. I mean, what he was fundamentally talking about was engaging the default mode network of the brain, the set of structures that you and I have studied in which your brain is fundamentally dealing with right hemisphere phenomena. Being bored is how you're designed to be a lot of the time. And that is just gone. Well, and here's the fundamental point. We time travel. We live in the past. We're thinking about the past. We're thinking about the future constantly, castles in the sky. But you can only love in the present. You can only love in the present. You can't be in the future loving.

1:17:08Arthur Brooks:You can only love now. To be here now is to love your life and to love other people. And if you miss that, you haven't been fully alive is what it comes down to.

1:17:19Aliza Pressman:What a beautiful thing to really, really, really, really commit to. Because I just think about all of the young people fighting against not being here now.

1:17:29Arthur Brooks:Yeah, I know. I know. And this is the generation that can actually save humanity by being here now, showing us the rest, the rest of us the way. Thank you, Penelope, for your beautiful questions. Looking forward to seeing you on campus.

1:17:49Aliza Pressman:Please note that this episode may contain paid endorsements and advertisements for products and services. Individuals on the show may have a direct or indirect financial interest in products or services referred to in this episode.