#107: Chris Griffin: Struggling to Find Meaning? Start Here.

0:00I got asked a question recently. Someone said, Chris, what is the meaning of life? And I had to sit there and ponder a little bit. Firstly, hey guys, welcome back to the show. It's a solo episode today. And firstly, you're going to watch the sunset while we're sitting here on Malibu on the mountain. And I hope you guys really enjoy and appreciate the set. I'm amazed. I'm in an interesting state being up here. It's a lot calmer than the chaos. It's so beautiful. And yeah, so enjoy the sunset and enjoy some deep dive conversation with me today. I've got a few things that I've been pondering on and yeah, we're just going to have a chat back and forth.

0:48But someone asked me what the meaning of life was. And I sat there and thought about my response. And the conclusion I came to was life itself, it has no meaning. Life is an opportunity to create meaning. Think about it. If all of the things that you have in your life right now were given to you, would they mean as much? if you didn't have to embark on a really unknown uncertain challenging path to achieve the things that you have in your life do you think they would hold as much meaning they probably wouldn't so that there implies that life itself it has no meaning life is just an opportunity to create meaning and the sad part about that is i see so many people go through life in fact most people go through life and they never even amount to anything.

1:49They never really strive for any meaning in their life. They feel like things should just get handed to them on a platter. Or perhaps it shouldn't be hard to achieve the thing, but that's like wanting a lie. Wanting all of the things that you dream of, but then wanting to have a smooth sail is kidding yourself. And meaning in itself is so subjective, we don't actually really have a black and white answer for that, I feel. I feel like it's unique for everyone, but I think what it strips down to is, is this aligned with our true self? Is the soul leading the way? Is the person that is our best self, our highest self, the person that gravitates everyone around us, the person that attracts all the things that we want in our life.

2:41Is it evolving around that? Because I think if it is, we're on the right track. I don't think we're ever going to have a crystal clear understanding of what our true meaning really is. But at least we can have some sort of compass that points us in the right direction, that makes us strive towards something that we think it might be. You know, for me, when I look back at my life and I reflect on the last few years more specifically, like it hasn't always been like this. It really hasn't. In fact, a few years ago, I literally had nothing. I had no career. I had no money. My girlfriend had just broken up with me.

3:32I had no idea what I was going to do. I'd started a couple of businesses. I'd had investors on board. I had to walk into boardrooms and tell them that we're hanging up the boots. It's time to go. We've, we've failed. We've lost all your money. I've had all of those experiences, but they've all left me in this state of like, what's next? Because this clearly didn't work. This wasn't the thing. I never really had something that worked. I spent so many years of my life trying and not getting any licks of the ice cream. And there were many moments where I didn't even know if I was ever going to get the ice cream to eat because fuck, it didn't look likely.

4:14I kept trying and then I kept failing. And all the people kept saying, I told you so. And they were right. They did tell me so. But now, you know, when I've got this massive show and I am lit up by my life and the things that I'm doing and I get excited about getting out of bed in the morning because I would rather try and delegate my sleep or not do something else than do the thing that I get to do every day, which is this work, recording, making the show, making the impact. When I had that one thing two years ago of starting a podcast, do you think the people just changed their mind on all my other things and was like, yeah, okay, all the other ones were bad, but this one's a great idea.

5:01No, they didn't believe in it. And rightly so. You can't expect them to believe in your dream and your goal because they've probably got their own. Or maybe they don't even have their own goals and they are definitely not going to believe in yours if they don't even have a version of their own. They're just missionless. So whether it's their mission or your mission, they're not going to understand it. And so you have to have that trust that that thing that feels right in the moment is going to work. You're going to have to trust that whether you embark on the journey and it works or it doesn't, you're still grateful that you embarked on the journey and you took those steps.

5:45And for me, two years ago, I was doing that. I was, you know, leaving one thing behind and starting something new. This podcast thing that's called The Pocket and no one even knows what that means. I made it, I thought of the name while I was on MDMA on New Year's at a festival. And I thought of it and then I woke up the next morning and I was like, that's my podcast name. And I seemed to like have this little vision. And then next minute I'm in Malibu watching a sunset and filming a podcast, I'll pan to the wide angle over there that shows me setting all of this up. It's just me. And there's no one else here.

6:40There's no team. It's just me. And but the crazy thing about all of that is like when I started, it was just me. And right now it's just me. And yeah, I've got some team and people helping me with, you know, editing and I've got a manager that might help bring me some brand deals, but I'm not really doing anything with that at the moment. You know, I had an assistant and, and, you know, I've had help along the way, but at the end of the day, like it's for the most part, just been me. Whether it's in a little studio apartment or whether it's overlooking Malibu, it's me and there's something about that that is so special the fact that i can feel so calm and complete with just me i don't feel like i need people and i can sit alone and i don't need to blast music all the time.

7:52I can just sit and think and feel and see where my mind goes. And I'm grateful that I'm able to do that because there's certainly times where I couldn't. And I couldn't think, I couldn't walk without calling someone. I couldn't be alone. And I think the last couple of years, starting this show, building this show, having friends come and go, it's really taught me to be okay with me and be proud of me and be comfortable with me and nothing else. And I think that's something that I'm really proud of. and I guess it's something that's important to throw onto you guys listening to this or watching this right now and experiencing what I'm experiencing right now in Malibu but you guys are seeing it through a few screens what is holding you back

9:01why haven't you embarked on that journey that you've got in your mind that you know you want to do what is the thing that is holding you back?

9:17Because I know that there's so much more in you and it's not about just this macho energy of like, go, go, go, go, go and constantly chase the next thing. It's not about that. What it's about is that you're probably doing things in your life right now that you do not want to do. They're red light tasks. They're things that just drain you. And if someone could come with a wand and say, I will take all of those away from you so you can focus on all the things that you love, would you say yes? You probably would. Now, the reality is you can do that for yourself. You can do all the things that you want in your life, but you just seem to get in your own way.

9:58It's the most common thing when I speak to people is that they are struggling to take the leap. They're struggling to bet on themselves. They're struggling to commit to themselves. It's actually not even about the other people. It's about them. It's about what they're going to feel people are going to think about them. It's not even about the other people. It's about themselves. They're getting in their own way. And so I want to ask you, what is that thing? And ponder on that. Maybe even like shut your eyes and just imagine the life that you could truly have if you went all in on you. What would that life look like?

10:46Now take it that step deeper. What is the car that you want to drive? Where do you want to live? What do you want? Do you want family? Do you want children? What school do they want to go to? What's the dream body you want to have? What in your life do you want to do? Do you want to swim in the ocean in the morning when the sun is rising? Do you want to live in the mountain like up here in Malibu? What do you want? And get clear on that. And then take it one step deeper and get even clearer. And I think when you can truly imagine how amazing that life would be, It will not matter how much shit you need to go through on the journey to getting there.

11:30You will keep going because the journey's tough. It's uncertain. It's unclear. It's unknown. And that's the best part. Remember, there's no rainbows with no rain. So when the rain comes, understand that what's on the other side of it? Rainbows, big ones, bright ones, amazing ones. and those, those rainbows, they're your dreams. That's the life that you really want, not the one that you're just fitting into now. You're a triangle trying to fit into a square and then you're wondering why you're not happy. And I've had moments in my life where I've been that triangle trying to shove myself into a square and then I wonder why I'm not fulfilled.

12:22And you might feel the same. But like, think about it for a second. Like, just get some common sense and like, kick it into yourself. Like, just punch yourself with a bag full of common sense and go, do I really think if I continue this life that I'm living, that's not for me, I'm going to live a life filled with fulfillment? Like, what are you doing? what are you doing? And I know a lot of you guys listening to this right now are not the people I'm describing because that's why you're listening to this podcast. You want to better yourself. You're hungry. You're driven. You prioritize self-improvement over just mindless consumption.

13:09That's why you're listening to this. That's why you're even tuning in right now. So I'm not saying that you are this person that's just living a life that's not for you. But what I know is because even in my life right now, I have some. What I do know is that there's things in my life that do not serve me. And the sooner we get them out, we free up space to invite things in that do serve us. And that is the freeing thing. That's what's like, that's what at the end of the day, when we think about like our life in 10 years, 20 years, 30 years time. And when we think about that and we get a smile, eliminating all of the things that don't serve us is what's going to unlock that smile.

13:52And so don't get 30 years down the line and think that, yeah, think that you're going to live a life of fulfillment if right now you're not doing things that are progressing you to a life filled with fulfillment. I've wrote some other stuff down here. And one of the ones is look at the sunset

14:13how the fuck did I get here? Are you kidding me right now? How the fuck did I get here? This is Malibu right now. I'm just a kid from a small town in Queensland of Australia called Ailey Beach. Now, anyone that's American that's listening to this right now, you probably thought what I just said, a bunch of gibberish. Airlie Beach, a tiny little town in Queensland, north of Australia. I need you to understand this because I think this is going to give you enough context to realize that anything really is possible. And not only it's possible, but you can achieve it far quicker than you can ever imagine.

14:57For me, I'm going to give you a little bit of a timeline, right? My parents, thank God, my amazing mom and dad took me out of Airlie Beach when I was 12 years old. I was 12 and I remember it was the worst thing that could have happened to me. I was so sad that they were taking me away from my friends, my hometown, and I was moving to a place called the Gold Coast just to like, to like, what dad? Like, what mom? Like, why are we moving there? I don't want to move there. I want to stay with my best friend, Harry, and I want to do this. And they knew something that I didn't know back then. They knew that there was no progress there in that small town.

15:44I needed to think bigger. I needed to break out of that mold. And it's funny. We leave. We drive. We pack up our old van. And we drive from North Queensland and Airlie Beach down to the Gold Coast, about a 13-hour drive. We had three flat tires along the way. We had a few stops in at the mechanics. It wasn't a smooth sailing drive, but then I remember we drove down and we saw the sign Surfer's Paradise. And I thought that was the thing. I was like, Surfer's Paradise? Are we going to be able to surf there? And then dad quickly warned me that like Surfer's Paradise is actually not the nicest place.

16:22For anyone that's got their eyes set on the Gold Coast, just do me a favor and do yourself a favor. Just don't go to Surfer's Paradise. But anyway, we see the sun and we drive a little bit further and we turn off on exit 69, I believe it was, and going into Ashmore. You know, they call it Trashmore at times, but that's where we moved, a suburb in the Gold Coast. And while looking back at it, that's such a small town comparatively to where I am right now. But we moved there and as we're driving up the hill to the house that we were moving into that my dad was renovating, I see this massive football stadium, Metricon Stadium.

16:58and I remember I freaked out. I was a massive football fan, an Australian football fan, and I just freaked out. I was like, there's no way we live right next to a stadium. And when I look at that stadium now, I think that's a small stadium and honestly my eyes won't even raise the slightest when I think about that stadium. It's probably one of the worst football stadiums that there is in the whole country of Australia. But what I'm sharing here is the comparison of how much my mind opened when I moved to a new place. I was in a small town. Then I moved to another town that was quite small, but it was bigger than the one before.

17:40And what happened to me then was my mind was completely open to what else is out there. And it gave me this excitement to go and see what else is out there. and too many people are in that small town and they grow up there and their parents never take them out of that town and then they stay there and then they think about the jobs and the careers that they can have but they're only thinking in the lens of the small town that they're in when in reality there might be two jobs available for you at that town but if you move into a different town that's bigger there might be a hundred jobs and so if you're in the lens of the small town you're almost guaranteed to find a job that fits for the small town and uh and when you break free from that, your mind gets opened.

18:23And it's one of those things where once your peripherals open, you can't unsee it. Once you see it, you can't unsee it. And so like, for me, I just look at this and I go, how the fuck did I end up here?

18:41I don't really know. but what I do know is that I just took steps in the dark. I was curious enough and I had enough trust in myself to go, mate, what's the point otherwise? You may as well try something out, have a crack. You may as well just like maybe see what's on the other side of the fence because right now you're in black and white and what you might find is if you jump over that fence, you'll see some color. You may as well, like just see what else is out there. And if you're listening to this and you're in a small town and you don't fully love your life, the first step is getting the fuck out of that town.

19:30Not because the town is bad, but it's because it's enclosing your mind into what's possible. and for me when I look at my journey it's this constant state of opening and expanding my peripherals to the point where I go holy shit the more I see the less I know and uh there's something liberating about that there's something liberating about about having like zero idea on life. And like, look, I might know a lot more than some, but in comparison to what else is out there, I'm such a little speckle in this earth. Like, I don't really know what I'm doing. You know, I might know more than some, but I don't actually really know.

20:16I'm navigating through all this life just like you are, just like everyone is. And so, like, for me, I just go that the the emphasis here is how can I expand my consciousness, expand my awareness to the point where I feel like I'm not big and I am small because when I'm small and insignificant, I don't really have any ego. I don't put myself on a pedestal and I'm able to be more of a sponge to soak in what else is around me. And, uh, and that's how I got here. You know, two years ago when I had this idea of my show and I launched it and the first episode gets like 60 downloads or 70 downloads or something in the first couple of weeks.

21:01Like it was humbling, right? And, uh, and, and, and like to think that that was in February of 2024, it's now October of 2025. So I'm talking like a little bit over 18 months, like, like not like, like not a crazy amount when I started this show and, you know, without having hundreds of thousands of you guys tuning in every single month, um, watching the show, listening to the show, sharing it, liking it, it's unlocked this whole life for me that like is so fruitful. Like it's, I mean the fucking Malibu mountains. And sorry, if I say this all the time, like, like I'm in a small, I'm from a small town with nothing.

21:50Like, this is not something that like my family are watching this right now. They know that this is not, this is not normal. This is not like, this shouldn't be what it is. Like, I mean, my dad might come in and he might be like, yeah, it is, it is what it is. It's, it's actually meant to be here. You were destined for this. And I'm forever grateful for my mom and my dad's belief in me, especially over the last couple of years. Um, like I'm, I'm so grateful for their support. They're my biggest fans. Um, but like this, this shouldn't be the case. It's a, it's a very, it's a very different life than, than anyone in my family.

22:32And I'm not saying it's better or worse. It's just so different. Like it's, it's, it's no better. It's no worse than anyone else. It's just different. But more importantly, it's so aligned and it's so true with what I set out to do and with what I want for my life. It's so aligned to the point where I literally, no word of a lie, I randomly, maybe four times a day, just start jumping up and down and screaming like of excitement right now. Like I'm not even making that up. Like it's literally this thing in me that just like I just feel, I just feel so, everything just feels so right. It like, yeah, it really does.

23:30And I think you need to have a comparison of what wasn't right for you to realize what is right. Like you can't truly understand if something feels right if you haven't been in a spot where something feels really bad. For me, I had so many moments where I didn't want to get out of bed. and I was doing something for someone else that I didn't want to do and it ate me up every single day. And those are the moments that I lean on when I'm in the highs like this, when I'm at Malibu recording in front of a bunch of really expensive cameras and lights, something that I could have always dreamt of as the sun is setting behind me overlooking the water in Malibu in California, in America.

24:22like those the moments the hard times that felt so wrong they felt cruel it felt like i was in a prison in a cage those moments are what i lean on right now to make these moments feel so great because if it wasn't for them none of this would be valuable it would just be a thing it would just be normal. Just like as I said at the start, life itself, it has no meaning. Life is an opportunity to create meaning. So go and create some meaning and see what's on the other side of that.

25:04The final thing I'll just add on that is just what's the point if you don't? what is the fucking point if you are not willing to take a risk and have a crack at life, chase those dreams that you've always wanted to do? What is the point? And that's not a question for me to answer for you. That's a question for you to answer for you. That's something that you need to truly ponder on. And get to the bottom of. Your primary mission on this earth should be to find that. Disregard everything else because everything else won't thrive as much as it will if you are crystal clear on why you're here and what you really want to do and what will really light you up in your life.

26:06Your relationships will suffer if you don't have that. Your fulfillment will extremely suffer if you don't have that. Your connection to anything in your life will suffer if you don't know what to do. That's not about knowing every step of the way. It's about knowing what lights your soul up. It's about knowing what deep down inside of you aligns with what you're doing. Like you truly feel something inside and then you have thoughts that are on your team. They're not against you. So you're truly aligned with what's deep down. Your thoughts are reinforcing that identity and that soul of what you truly want.

26:55And then those thoughts come out into life and you speak your thoughts. You shorten the gap between your thoughts. You shorten the gap between your thoughts and what you say. Be more authentic. And without knowing deep down what that soul wants. How the fuck are you supposed to be authentic? And for that, I think we read some poems. Recently, I've been writing some poems. you know i i like writing poems and the the reason i i do i think i've reflected on a little bit but the reason i i like writing poems is because i was a horrible writer at school i just got the girls to do my assignments for me i actually i actually like i was in the i wasn't even in normal english i was in the english that all the special ed people were in like i was in the like the special needs English class.

28:03Like that's how, that's how like not good at reading, at writing, at anything to do with English. Like I was not good at that. And I know people can find that hard to believe right now when this is what I do for a living. I talk and I communicate, but I literally could not write a fucking sentence. Even right now, like, like my spelling's off. I make mistakes from time to time but like yeah so I think I think a reason why I like poems is because because of that like it's because I I uh I wasn't good and now I'm okay and so I've got I've got two poems here and I'm just going to read them and just see where my mind goes uh these are the two last poems that I've wrote and so um I don't know where this is going to go but I'm going to read you the poem, and then I'm just going to elaborate my thoughts on the poem.

29:00So let's dive in. Poem one. Tunnel vision. Momentum building. Fog is clearing. I don't see a ceiling. Long days, short nights, sleeping little passion lots. It's meant to be. At least for now. Anyway. Is it easy? No. Is that the point? Yes. Do I take the risk? No brainer. Do I play it safe? Would rather die. Let's sprint another day or 20 because gaining momentum won't make you win, but keeping it, that's a different story. You'll be like a Ferrari in a race full of Toyotas and no shade to Toyotas, but they're all going to get smoked. You see? Be that fucking Ferrari, man. Like, fly past those Toyotas.

29:53and when you do that you feel unstoppable dude you feel you feel like no one can stop you and that is the most freeing feeling ever you know look i might be naive to think that i feel unstoppable and for the last few months i've been holding off saying i feel unstoppable because i hadn't experienced loved ones pass away touch wood i hadn't experienced extreme traumas touch wood. But right now, in this moment, with the experience that I've had, I can truly say I feel unstoppable. I feel like the Ferrari against a bunch of Toyotas. No one can stop me. I feel so crystal clear. I feel so focused. I feel so aligned.

30:38And I don't feel like anyone can stop me. I'm shortening the gap between my thoughts and what I say. I'm being authentic. I feel like the truest version of Chris Griffin, not the fat guy from Family Guy, but the one sitting in this chair right now, I feel the truest version of him is showing up every single day right now. And I am fucking pleased about it. And a byproduct of all of that is that I feel un-fucking-stoppable. I'm the Ferrari. I don't feel like anyone in the world is doing what I'm doing. You know, one of the realizations that I had on this podcast tour is I was about seven weeks in, I was questioning my whole fucking life.