Inner Excellence: Train Your Mind for the Best Possible Life with Oprah and Jim Murphy

0:00This episode of The Oprah Podcast is presented by our partner, Geico. In a short span of just like 20 days, I heard this book, Inner Excellence, sold 200 ,000 copies and shot to number one on the New York Times bestseller list. I feel like the reason Inner Excellence is helpful for anybody is that I realized that we all have this deep need for unconditional love and a fear of not getting that love. That's right. We all want to have a life where we're learning and growing and feeling fully alive. The year that I made$1.5 million, I had to get an emergency hysterectomy. And my commission check hit my bank account the day I was lying in my hospital bed.

0:47And that was such a super crazy surreal moment when I just realized this isn't it. One of the reasons why inner excellence has been such a powerful tool for so many people is, well, it's the first time they've tapped into there is more. Hi there. Welcome to the Oprah podcast. I certainly appreciate you joining me here. And I wanted to ask you all a question. if you would just think for a moment and try to imagine this for yourself, a life where you feel completely free to make decisions that continue to enhance your every experience. You feel free from self-doubt. You are not held back by fear.

1:38A life where you feel effortlessly connected to your true self, living as the person you believe yourself to be created to be. Imagine that. Well, my guest, Jim Murphy, is the author of the book that went viral last fall. It's called Inner Excellence. And he believes that that life is possible for you, for me, for everybody. So let me explain first who Jim Murphy is, in case you haven't heard of Jim. Hi, Jim. Hi, Oprah. When an eye condition ended Jim Murphy's lifelong dream of playing professional baseball, he moved to the desert to write and research inner excellence. He spent five years studying the science of peak performance, interviewing sports psychologists and elite coaches.

2:25And when the book came out in 2009, it barely sold. Jim reworked his book and self-published a new edition in 2020. That version didn't sell either. One fateful moment changed everything. During an NFL playoff game with nearly 40 million viewers watching live, Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver A.J. Brown was seen reading Jim's book on the sidelines. In an instant, inner excellence took off, going from, listen to this, ranking 523 ,497 on Amazon, all the way to number one. And then Heisman Trophy winner, NFL number one draft pick, Fernando Mendoza, read the book, right? And in a short span of just like 20 days, I heard this book, Inner Excellence, sold 200 ,000 copies and shot to number one on the New York Times bestseller list.

3:21So how did you process that velocity? Yeah, Oprah, it was very intense. And that week was actually a very intense week because my mother was dying. January 12th was the wild card game. And then she died January 16th. So four days later. It was an answer to prayer because she was suffering. But so that week, very somber and kind of lonely. Business was slow. I hadn't paid off my credit cards for the first time in years. I just didn't have the cash flow to pay off the credit cards. And then Sunday night, I get all these texts. I thought my mom had died. and so it said you know you got to turn on the game and that week everything was going crazy with all the interviews and everything and that's 3 a.m and my heart was racing in the middle of night and I was like what is happening and then I just felt like it was just so much coming at me and then in the morning it was just this huge relief because I felt God saying Jim you're not the one that did this you're not the one doing it you can relax your purpose stays the same just continue to do what you're doing.

4:23And that was such a huge relief because I was like, I don't know how to do this. What am I supposed to do? So was that a voice or a feeling or what? You know, I think the number one thing that, and you're a very spiritual person and I think it's to realize that there's a power greater than you, no matter what you believe that. There's something causing the sun to rise every morning. Yes, and connecting with that power is the most important thing that you could ever do. And so for me to connect with God and to feel like we have a relationship where I can hear his voice is so important to me. And so, but it's not always a voice.

5:01It's like... And annoying. I felt like God's saying, like in my mind, it was like God saying, Jim, you don't have to worry about all that. So I want to talk about your path to inner excellence. So tell us about the moment you decided to give away all of your possessions and move to the desert. Yeah, I was, I'd always, since I was little, I always dreamed that I was going to be a superstar. And what I thought that meant was to be the guy that every guy wanted to be and every girl wanted to be with and hitting home runs and the superstar. So when my career ended, it was such a devastating thing and I was so lost.

5:38And so I went back to being a personal trainer like I was in grad school. But I always had this sense that I wanted to make a bigger difference than just the physical. And then I get a call from a teammate in pro baseball in Tucson, Arizona, Ricky Scruggs. He's building a baseball academy. He said, can you come down for the first weekend to launch it? And it was just the perfect timing. I just, I had this screensaver that said, those destined for greatness must first walk alone in the desert. And I just thought, you know what? I need a fresh start. And I think part of it was leaving behind everyone that would say, Jim, why would you change anything?

6:15Your life is great. and I didn't want to be thought of as my past. I wanted to make sure I come to a blank slate. If anything is possible, what could I do? Because I wanted to make sure that when it came time for me to die, that I had fully lived. And so when you've always had your identity as one thing and you can no longer have that identity any longer because of an illness or medical condition or you lose your job or whatever, What is the first road back to finding your true self versus your role or your identity? Yeah, so when I start with anybody, it could be working with you, a pro athlete or anyone, the first thing I want to know is how you want to feel in your life.

6:58Because when you're at your best, when you're having a great day, when you're performing your best, you feel a certain way. Okay, so this is interesting because all those years I was doing the Oprah show, I would sit and talk to the audience afterwards. and this led me to asking people, okay, so what do you really want? And people would always just say, I just want to be happy. But a lot of people could not identify what that was. And I say, well, what does that mean? And they say, well, I want my kids to be happy. And I, you know, I want to have a happy family, but what does that mean? So when you identify happiness for yourself, how do you tell people to do that?

7:34What, how you want to feel, what does that mean? Everyone wants to be happy, but happy is far too limiting. So first of all, I think we really need to identify terms here. So I define happiness as a positive temporary feeling based on what's happening. You get good circumstances, you're happy, bad circumstances, things you don't like, you're not happy. And so it's far too unstable. And in a way, people come to me very often when they're underperforming and I help them perform better. And so in a way, it's like they want better transactions. They want better results. And so it's kind of like, I just want to be happy, Jim.

8:12I want better circumstances and results. Can you make me happy? And what I do is I teach them how to have joy. Yeah. And I define joy as a deep sense of well-being, freedom, and gratitude. It's an inner buoyancy and delight that comes from sacrificial love. It's a very different pursuit. Was there a moment in your life when you realized that success on the outside did not necessarily equal peace on the inside? Yeah, I think in the desert, realizing that I'd always had this dream of being a superstar and that what I've always really wanted is to feel fully alive. Because I would ask my clients, like, what is it, like, as a pro baseball player, what is it, like, why do you play?

8:57And then I started to ask everyone that, like, why do you do what you do? And then I realized that I wanted to feel fully alive. And the problem that most of us run into is we have a single story for our life, like I did. My single story was I have to be a pro baseball player that becomes a superstar. And if that doesn't happen, then I'm a total failure. And that was an illusion. When you realize that you want to feel fully alive and that you have your idea of how that's going to happen, but that's, it may not be anything like that. That may not be the path. That's super important to understand.

9:29Okay. So what are the other, I think that's just such a, that is so articulate so beautifully what I think most people are looking for. I always say everybody wants to be able to live to the truest, highest expression of themselves as human beings. That's what we're all looking for. The path that you take to get there is up to you. But that's the reason why I can relate to anybody in the world because I know no matter who you are, where you come from, what your station or place in life is, you want the same thing I want. Exactly. I feel the same way. I feel like the reason inter-excellence is helpful for anybody is that I realize that it's about optimizing the human.

10:12We're all human. I mean, we all have this deep need for unconditional love and a fear of not getting that love. That's right. We all want to have a life with amazing experiences and deep, enriching relationships where we're learning and growing and feeling fully alive. Do you think that is still true now, even with, I just was reading the other day that 86 % of 16 to 38-year-olds want to be influencers. that this drive for fame and this notion that fame will bring you the ultimate success and that everything is aligned with how famous you are, how many clicks you get, how many people know you, how many likes you get.

10:50Do you think that that's still true that people have the deeper yearning just to be alive? Or has that changed? Fully alive. To feel fully alive. Yeah, it doesn't matter what that person thinks that they want to do. like I want to be an influencer, I want to be rich and famous, whatever it is, it's because they want to feel a certain way. They're looking for the best possible life. And they're like, okay, influencer is the way I'm going to do it. I'm going to be like Oprah. I'm going to be rich and famous, whatever it is. They see that. But in the end, everyone wants that same thing, to feel fully alive and have that deep contentment.

11:24And then that's why so many people, for when they were seeking the wrong thing, if you're seeking to be an influencer, you're seeking just to be famous, you realize how empty the acquiring of those things are without a deeper reason. And the great thing is that when you develop yourself and you learn to say walk in love and not fear and master your ego, we'll talk about these things, then you become better at anything that you do. And then so maybe you're working on being an influencer, but then maybe you switch to something completely different, but it doesn't matter because you've been developing yourself.

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12:38Those of you who watch the Oprah podcast or listen to us, you know, every story we share, every guest we welcome is chosen with purpose. And when people share their stories, we're reminded that we're not alone in this journey called life. As the official insurance partner of the podcast, the folks at Geico understand that the way we move through life and who we move through it with matters. And I know that life starts to move even faster as a new school year begins. Fall routines get underway, the calendar fills up, whether you're waiting in the school pickup line, loading up the car for a weekend getaway, taking a quiet drive home after a hard day, or cheering on your son or daughter from the sidelines.

13:17These moments remind us the road is not always a straight line. GEICO is there with insurance designed to help keep you covered along the way. Because life happens, and with the right support, we all just keep driving forward. And that, dear listener, is everything. So inner excellence is about training your mind for extraordinary performance and the best possible life. That's why so many athletes love this book. And that's how it started trending in the first place. But you say that we've never actually been taught how to manage our mind. So how do we go about doing that? Eckhart Tolle's book has had a huge influence on you.

14:00This first book, The Power of Now. And then, yes. One of the things that's so great about what Eckhart talks about is that you are not your mind and you are not your thoughts. And your mind is something that we need to train. But what I learned in the desert, and this is the number one thing that I learned that's so important for everyone to understand, is that your heart is more important than your mind. We use the mind to train the heart, but your heart, your spirit, your will, your heart sends a signal to your mind that gives it the foundation to think clearly and to see beauty. Yeah, and you also write that how you feel comes almost entirely from what you think and you move towards what you think about.

14:44I want to unpack that concept for a moment. How does what you think about become your actual experience in life? So one of the number one things about inner excellence is learning to expand what you believe is possible. And beliefs are feelings and thoughts become feelings. And so learning how to handle feelings is one of the most important things anyone can ever do because most people are never going to reach their potential in life. And because they come to the edge of their beliefs, the edge of their feelings, and they're too uncomfortable, and then they back away. And so, but one thing that I did with a couple of guys that had a mental block that I've been using with every single client now is help them understand how to deal with these feelings and these fears.

15:30So there's five questions to ask yourself. Like, say you're really nervous about some event or something that's giving you anxiety. One is, am I willing to face my fears? Two is, am I willing to fail? Three is, am I willing to look foolish? Four, am I willing to face any feeling? This is a big one because most people are not willing to face any feeling. And five, am I willing to face any feeling and sit with it if it never goes away without trying to push it away? Well, that's a lot. That is a lot. Most people don't even want to look foolish. I mean, number three, you know, most people don't want to do it if it's going to make me look foolish or other people are going to think that I'm foolish.

16:13Right. And that's the ego mastery that we need. If you want to live a great life, we have to learn about this part of our mind that's always threatened, always comparing, always puts you on trial. And how not to get a slave to that. Page 108, you talk about the ego. Everything is here to teach me and help me. It's all working for my good. The ego is caught up in temporary pleasure, while mastery is focused on permanent and powerful virtues. That's been one of the guiding light principles in my life. How did you come to know this? Well, in the desert, I realized that the heart is the key. But then the big question was, well, how do we train the heart?

16:52Like, I've never heard anyone say this. I didn't know what that meant. And then I really just looked at the Bible and understood that humans were created for relationship. And the deepest need that we all have is for unconditional love. It's our greatest need, our greatest desire, and our greatest power. Yeah. Because love is fearless. What happens as humans is we get so caught up in our own lives and so caught up in the transactions. I just want better results. Yes. but realizing that you don't know what's best for you and that my continually thinking about myself is what's limiting my life. That self-centeredness is the biggest challenge that we face in performance and in life.

17:35And if you can get outside of yourself and so there's no self-protection whatsoever, that's when you got possibilities. Well, you say there are two paths in life, a life of freedom on a narrow, risky path that involves facing your fears to pursue your dreams and true self or a guarded life where you travel a wider path of relative comfort and safety to pursue false temporary rewards with less risk and fewer possibilities. Really, what I've learned, you're either walking towards fear or you're walking towards love all the time. Yeah, exactly. When I think about inner excellence, I think about self-mastery.

18:09And when I think about self-mastery, I think about mastering the ego, the part of your mind always threatened, always comparing, never satisfied. And when I think about mastering the ego, I think about being three things. unembarrassable, unoffendable, and unirritable. Unembarrassable, unoffendable, and unirritable. And so most of my life, I've been a slave to my ego. And so in other words, I didn't want to be embarrassed. I didn't want to look foolish. I was constantly comparing. And what do people think about me? It's human nature. Yes, that's what human beings do. Yes. And so now you have your...

18:47I was talking to somebody the other day, and they were saying, I said, And so now have you mastered the ego or managed it? And they said, no, I've alchemized it, which I think is pretty powerful. Yeah. So like I said, in just a few weeks, Inter Excellence sold hundreds of thousands of copies. And now the message is connecting with readers across generations. Jyoti is joining us. Welcome. Hi there. Hi there. So great. Welcome to our conversation. Thank you. I'm so excited to be here. So my story is, you know, like every little girl, I dreamt of a Cinderella story, the white picket fence, two kids, the dog, the man.

19:27But my life ended up taking a slightly different path. Couldn't find a man. So I jumped into my career. And early on in my career, I had this whiteboard where I had written 200 grand, made the 200. Then it was 500, made the 500 grand. Then it was a million. And the year that I made$1.5 million, I had to get an emergency hysterectomy. And my commission check hit my bank account the day I was lying in my hospital bed. And that was such a super crazy surreal moment when I just realized this isn't it. And five years later, you know, I'm just still on the same hamster wheel of the corporate world because I don't know really what else to do.

20:16And I feel like I sort of set a table for a life that did not come to sit with me. So my question for Jim is when your identity gets shattered and you don't even get the opportunity to try, where do you go from there? Yeah, I think that's so common. In Western culture, especially, there's this obsession with being successful materially. And in the book, I talked about possessions, achievements, looks, money, and status. And realizing that what you really want is so much more. You want to feel fully alive. You want to have a life with amazing experiences and deep, enriching relationships where you're learning and growing and making a difference.

20:58And you can absolutely have that and you can start pursuing that today. but it's understanding okay well part of it i'm going to have to learn um more self-awareness about my ego the ego the part of me that's always comparing always threatened um always on trial am i good enough did i do am i okay do people love me am i accepted and until you really get um more self-awareness on that it's going to be really hard to pull yourself out of that trap and no one's going to pull you out of it. That's what, you know, I left for the desert because I had to find a way to stop and pull myself out of it. And I'm not saying you have to stop everything and quit your job and move to the desert.

21:38But if you want to live an extraordinary life, you're going to need to learn that, what do I really want in my life? Are you thinking about that question right now? You know, I am. And I wonder, is it possible to do both in parallel? So, you know, can I still keep on this high-paced, high-fast, high-demanding tech sales job and not have to move to the desert? Or is it sort of like you have to make that drastic shift? The most important thing is to understand, well, what is my number one? Everybody worships something. Everyone has something that they love most, and you've got to make that decision now.

22:13What is it going to be my number one? Oh, that's a good question, Jim. Because if you don't make the decision, then the decision is made for you, and it's going to be making money in your job and being successful. and that's okay if that's what you want, but you've already told me that was empty. And so realizing, okay, what is the most important thing to me? And then you can start taking steps towards it. Do you have any idea? You know, I think that it is a family or giving back or being able to have children or raise children. But again, I think I'm so stuck in this well, because this goal of hitting this financial goal wasn't what I wanted it to be in my mind, what if it's the same thing and I can't like give a kid back, right?

22:58So I think I'm just sort of stuck in this. You can start with how you want to feel. Because like, can you share with us like how do you want to feel in your life? If anything's possible, like when you're having the best day ever, like how you feel? Carefree, free-spirited, light. When's the last time you felt that? it's been a very very long time I'm not gonna lie have you ever felt that in your whole life when you're a kid yeah I've definitely felt that when you know I met my now fiance and fell in love and was just so super in love with him and still am so I feel that every time I I'm in his arms or if we're at a music festival or, you know, I think that would be the biggest moment that I have felt that way.

23:51Well, you can feel that again. With Inter Excellence, what we do is we start off with how you want to feel and we start to design our life around getting that feeling more often. We don't want to be a slave to our feelings, but when you're at your best and the life that you want to live, the best possible life feels a certain way. And the more you understand, okay, I want to feel peace and joy and freedom. Then if you think about that every day and you're like, okay, am I feeling that today at work? What do I need to do to get that feeling today, right now? What do I need to do that right now?

24:21And then you might realize, okay, I got to make a few changes, whether it's changing the whole job or changing how you're arranging your days. We have given you some food for thought here today. I love it. I love it. To tap into your own inner excellence and have the best possible life. That's what I'm excited about because I can see it in your eyes that you're having your own ahas here. You're thinking about it differently and you're thinking about the questions you need to start asking yourself. Thank you, Joydi. Thank you. Thank you. Try not to cry. Thank you. Good to meet you. Now go ahead.

24:58Have a full on cry as soon as we hang up, okay? No, these are really important questions for your life. And one of the reasons why inner excellence has been such a powerful tool for so many people is I think for a lot of people, particularly young people, it's the first time they've tapped into there is more. There is more than the doing thing that you've been doing. And what Jim has so beautifully articulated is that it's possible for you to get to the more by asking yourself the right questions to get there. And so none of us has to just take the path that we always thought was the way. Because you have just exactly shown what I was saying earlier.

25:41So many people want to be influencers. They want another thing so that they can get to the$1.5 million. And you get to that and you realize, what is this? It's wonderful. I can have the things. I can have my beautiful things and accoutrements, but what is it really? And so the fact that you're having these thoughts as you are sharing with us today, that this is big. This is big, girl. Let's celebrate this. This is big. This is what the journey is all about. Absolutely. Thank you for writing the book, Jim. I'm just, yeah, can't wait for what's next. So great to meet you. Great to meet you. And so your advice to somebody who's on the journey and seeking to remove themselves from being controlled by their ego and wanting to master that in a way that allows them to be the greatest advantage to themselves is what?

26:36You know, one of the things that you can think about is when you have something that you're really, your ego is saying, I really have to have this. It's really important and I can't screw this up. It's to ask yourself, what do I want more? To be successful in this moment or to master my ego? To get what I want right now, even though I don't know what's best for me. Do I just want what I want or do I want to live a great life and get better at these moments? because obviously the wise answer is I want to get better at these moments and I don't want to be a slave to my ego. And if that's the case, then we know that the best thing for you may not be to get what you want so you can learn to embrace that uncomfortable feeling.

27:15I hope you're enjoying my conversation with Jim Murphy. Jim has now written a new book called The Best Possible Life, How to Live with Deep Contentment, Joy, and Confidence. Pick up a copy and while you're at it, maybe one for a friend. This is, first of all, a beautiful book title, The Best Possible Life, because everybody wants the best possible life. Do you think it's possible, Jim, that everybody can have the best possible life? Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So in the past, as I was growing up, I just really thought it was about getting really, really good circumstances. Yes. Which as we know now that I define as happiness and it's just so fleeting based on, you know, there could be a worldwide pandemic, it could wipe everything out.