You're Living In The Matrix And Don't Know It | Arthur Brooks

0:00Arthur Brooks:When you invest with Fidelity Go, it does all the work for you. So while Fidelity Go monitors the markets, rebalances your portfolio, and tracks your progress to keep your investments aligned with your goal, you can invest your time however you want, all while paying no advisory fees under$25 ,000. Invest your money, not your time, with Fidelity Go. Get started at fidelity.com. Advisory services offered by Strategic Advisors, LLC, a registered investment advisor. Brokerage services provided by Fidelity Brokerage Services, LLC. Member NYSE and SIPC. Hi, my name is Lewis Howes and welcome to the Daily Motivation Show.

0:42I saw a video recently, speaking of being on my device, but I saw a video talking about a guy who's probably in his 40s, probably around my age with, I don't know, eight, nine, 10-year-old son having a conversation. And he said, you know what our punishment used to be growing up, you know, back in the 80s and 90s? Just staying inside. I know. Not being able to go outside was our punishment. And the son was like, what do you mean? I know. Like, I want to be a punishment for me because I want to be on my phone or on the computer or on like video games all day.

1:12Arthur Brooks:We're living the punishment voluntarily. Here's the weird thing about it. Here's what's crazy about when you're living in the wrong side of your brain because you're living in the matrix. You're living in the simulation of ordinary life. your great-grandfather like great-grandpa house never came home and said to great-grandma i had a panic attack behind the mule today it's laughable because his brain was working the way it's supposed to work they might have hard days and stress but not this type of but and here's the weirder part his moment-to-moment life was actually pretty boring because he was behind that mule but his life wasn't boring a lot of young people today who are living in the matrix, living in the left hemispheres of their brains, moment to moment, they have zero boredom, but their life is grindingly boring.

1:58Yeah.

1:58Arthur Brooks:See, that's the thing. There's the micro boredom and the meta boredom. Interesting. And that's the way to think about it. To say, have I eradicated boredom for my life, but my life is actually boring? Then you know you're on the wrong side. And you'll never find meaning until you can break out of that. Because no one's actually bored anymore is what I'm hearing you say. No. We solve the problem. They can find, you know, all day long getting a dopamine hit on something, watching something entertaining or funny or what's next or gambling or whatever it might be, some type of hit that they don't allow for space to listen to what they're meant to do.

2:28Arthur Brooks:I have a colleague at Harvard, a guy named Dan Gilbert. You ever had Dan Gilbert on the show? I haven't, but I know that. You know him, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's the world's leading expert on boredom. He's a visionary social psychologist. He's the best in the business. And he's done these experiments where you bring people into the lab, young people, like undergraduates, they do anything for 20 bucks, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And he makes them sit in a room where there's nothing on the walls, nothing to do, completely silent. They have one choice besides sitting there quietly, where they have a little key fob with a button on it.

2:57Arthur Brooks:If you touch the button, you self-administer a painful electric shock. I don't know how he got through this through the internal review board, right? Right? That's all they can do. Because he wants to know whether they choose boredom or shocks, boredom or pain. A quarter of the women shock themselves. Wow. Two-thirds of the guys. I can't take any more. Give me something to do. That's all you need to know, man. Right. But altogether, more than half the people gave themselves pain over boredom. We solved the boredom problem. Your iPhone is the solution to your boredom problem, your device. The problem is that it makes your brain work wrong because when you're never bored, you don't use what's called the default mode networks that are structures in your brain.

3:39Arthur Brooks:And you won't find meaning. You'll be in the wrong side of your brain all day long. And so if you wake up and the first thing is you're falling next to your bed, big mistake, and you look at your phone, then your brain is programmed to that for the rest of the day. And so you're looking at it while you're having your coffee and breakfast. And then you go to work, which is in your guest room, which is a Zoom screen. And then you're going to date by swiping right, right? And then your friends are a lot of them mostly on social media. And then you do a lot of gaming because, you know, that's how you get your sense of fun and accomplishment.

4:08Arthur Brooks:And connection. And then you're 12 hours a day online. And guess what you don't have? There's one thing. That's a simulated life. That's the Matrix. That movie was popular. I'm going to shock you. 20 years ago, right? 27. 1998? 1999? I know. Is he right? I know, I know. But that movie said that there was a great artificial intelligence, a mechanical artificial intelligence that was subjugating the human race. It was sucking energy out of them in the form of attention, keeping them in these pods and giving them a simulation of real life that was pleasant. And the reason that there's a rebellion against that is because Neo, Keanu Reeves, wants meaning.

4:49Arthur Brooks:Lewis, we're in the matrix. And the one thing you can't simulate is the meaning of your life. And that's what's actually happening.

5:03I have a brand new book called Make Money Easy. and if you're looking to create more financial freedom in your life, you want abundance in your life and you want to stop making money hard in your life but you wanna make it easier, you wanna make it flow, you wanna feel abundant, then make sure to go to makemoneyeasybook.com right now and get yourself a copy. I really think this is gonna help you transform your relationship with money this moment moving forward. We have some big guests and content coming up. Make sure you're following and stay tuned to this episode of The Daily Motivation Show.

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7:09Arthur Brooks:Fidelity Go. by Fidelity Brokerage Services, LLC, member NYSE and SIPC.