Do NOT Trust Anyone Until You Watch This | Robert Greene

Key Takeaway

Today, practice a 60-second pause when a negative thought or person hooks your emotions. Label the reaction: “This is a thought” or “This is their issue, not mine,” then return attention to something concrete—your breath, body, or surroundings. This creates distance before you react. Over time, use the same pause to assess people by character under criticism, stress, and power—not by charm, intelligence, or status.

Episode Overview

Robert Greene and Jay Shetty explore how to handle negative and narcissistic people, assess character, and avoid being drawn in by charisma or drama. They also discuss meditation, questioning inherited beliefs, authenticity, creativity, and how language, history, and unfamiliar cultures expand consciousness.

Full Transcript

Transcript of Do NOT Trust Anyone Until You Watch This | Robert Greene from On Purpose. Auto-generated from episode audio; may contain minor errors.

How do I deal with negative people? How do I deal with negative people in my family? How do I deal with negative people in my friend circle? How do I deal with negative people at work in close intimate circles? I feel a lot of people feel they're dealing with negativity. Well, you know, it all depends on the details. The kind of negative person you're dealing with. There there are several kind of ways of looking at it. some kind of micro and some kind of much larger.

The larger picture is we all have negative traits. We all have dark traits, right? And so you kind of if you have this idea that it's just humans, human beings are like this. It's like a a flower or a rock or a tree. It has its nature, you know. I just accept it. I accept people for who they are and I deal with them on that level. I don't judge them etc. Now of course when you're dealing with negative people it can be very difficult because negative people like to stir up a lot of drama around you around them and that's the kind of power that they get.

They like the attention that they get from making people upset, from pulling on your emotions, right? So, you have to have this kind of larger look at them where I it's not about me, right? They're dealing with their own issues, their own problems. There's a history behind it. It could be their parents. It could be their family. It could be their spouse, their children, whatever. And they're venting it on me in this particular moment. But it's not personal. I tell people don't take everything so personally, right?

But then, you know, so there all these different levels and it's it all really depends on the specifics because a lot of people come to me for advice. But a lot of times you're inshed with a negative person like it's your boss, it's your spouse, etc., etc. And it's very difficult to do what I'm talking about, right? And so you have to try and get a little bit of distance from them. You have to be able to to say to yourself, um, they're not me, right?

They have their own problems. I'm separate from them. The sense of being separate from them is very liberating, right? So, they have issues and they're trying to drag me into it. They're trying to drag me down, but I'm not them. I have my own life and I'm not going to get involved. Sometimes you need to have empathy, but sometimes you need to shut that off. And so the best thing in life though is that's why I say there's just so many angles to approach this from is if they're like a deep narcissist and um that's probably the most common type of negative person you deal with in the world today.

And we all have come across this. The power that you have is to recognize people like that before you get involved with them and to not get involved with them, right? And so they have signs, things that you can pick up in advance. People who are toxic, I don't know if we're going to toxic and negative are the same here. They don't show it immediately. They're good at deceiving you. They can be very charming. They can be very dramatic. They pull you in with their great stories.

They have sometimes they're even charismatic. A lot of important CEOs in the world, people like Elon Musk are raging narcissists. They appear very exciting and you want to get to know them, but you have to recognize that these are people that are probably going to use you, right? They don't see you as an individual. And the people you associate with, we're very um as as humans, we're very open to the emotions of other people, right? And so the people you associate with have a huge role on who you are and the energy you have, you know, your daily life, etc., etc.

And so you have to be very very careful who you let into your life, right? And um God Jay, I don't know. There's so many different angles to approach it from. No, that's I tell I tell people that don't judge people as far as who are you going to let into your life. Don't be um deceived by the appearances. Don't judge people based on their intelligence, on their charm, on whether they're good or bad, etc. judge them on their character, whether they have a weak or a strong character.

What are some of the signals, the signs we can look out for? Because I think what you just said is so true that we naturally get attracted to people's appearance, intelligence, charisma, access because we haven't really been trained to view character. Yeah. So I remember when I lived in the monastery, the highest quality or character trait that was considered the epitome of internal emotional evolution was humility. And so when you met someone who was humble and you met someone who didn't have false ego, they were considered of high character.

And we were trained in order to understand that. But in the modern world, that isn't how the material world works. We're almost attracted to people who can come off arrogant and showboaty and and even if we sense we don't like that, we still believe that person has power. And so what are things that we have to look out for? Well, also there are people who appear to be humble, but they're not really humble. There's a lot of people now who feain humility because it's seen as a positive trait.

Yes. So humans are born actors and you have to kind of look behind the mask. So I tell people I I view it as strong or weak character. A strong character is a person who can take criticism, right? Who can work with other people, right? Who can deal with stressful situations, who can handle responsibility and if there something goes wrong, they take I am to blame for. They don't look at other people. There's somebody you can rely on. You lean on them and there's something there to lean on.

You can rely on them in situations. A weak character is somebody who cannot take criticism. That is probably the number one characteristic, the worst trait I think in people and a definite trait of of negativity is somebody who can't take any kind of criticism, right? They're so defensive. So that means they can get away with anything. They can say anything they want and there there's there's just like a wall, a shell around them, right? So the ability in a work situation, in a relationship to um to take criticism and not and be able to use it constructively is an incredibly useful and powerful trait to me that reveals strong character.

How people handle stress is a really good sign of their character. So in a work situation, people are good at faking it and and pretending that they're very strong. But when it gets really stressful and there's a lot of pressure on it, the mask falls off and they reveal that they can't handle it. They're too weak. They're reacting to everything. They can't get out of the moment. They're so impatient, you know, and fragile. And so the ability to handle stress shows that somebody has something strong inside of them, right?

How they handle power, right? So when people are kind of climbing up the ladder in in a group or in a job, they they generally wear they generally try and pretend like they're they're they're with the group, but once they have power, that all falls off and they could become abusive and they feel like they can get away with any things that they couldn't get away with before. They treat people below them miserably, etc. So when people have power, how do they handle it? Are they responsible?

Do they suddenly become somebody different or do they maintain the character that they had beforehand? Right? What kind of partners do they choose? Do they choose a spouse, a husband, a girlfriend, etc. Somebody that they can push around, somebody that's inferior to them so that they can feel [clears throat] better about themselves? How do they look when they're playing like a game or they're in outdoor activities or something that has nothing to do with work? Are they so competitive they have to win at everything even when it's like outside of that kind of environment?

You know that those these are kind of traits that help me sort of judge a person's character. Yeah. And these are often the things that we either ignore or we actually let them kind of fall by the wayside or or don't pay enough attention to them because we think, "Oh, no, but they're so smart and they're so this." And I wonder how much of that is also like what what does that say about us that we often get attracted to the wrong things within people. What does that say about us?

Does that make us of strong or weak character? I know that uh I tend to be I tend to get involved with narcissistic people. It's a weakness of mine, right? Um, and maybe it's because of my upbringing and maybe it's because I feel a kind of emptiness inside of me and that their charm and the attention that they tend to they pretend to give you is kind of enchanting or cast a spell on you and it draws you in. Yes. So, if you're dealing with your own weaknesses and your own emptiness inside, you're going to be drawn to people who fill that fill that up.

Are you going to be drawn to causes and charismatic leaders that pretend to give you a purpose in your life because you don't have a purpose but they have it for you kind of thing. So a lot of it has to do yeah with ourselves and we're attracted to we're even attracted to negative people and uh there are people who have patterns in their life where they deliberately choose the wrong the worst kind of person for them. Right? and uh over and over and over again because at least that makes them feel alive at least the pain of it you know gives them a sense of something's half something dramatic and so they deliberately bring on those kind of that kind of pain.

How have you found over time with meditation and other practices? What have you used in order to start quietening, emptying, whatever the right word is for you, releasing those thoughts so that you can connect with the vastness, be creative or selfexpress? Wow. It's uh it's not easy and it's an ongoing process and I could say I'm maybe 10% of the way where I'd like to be. Um, but first of all, uh, you recognize, you go through a thing where a thought pops up and it's like, why am I thinking about that?

I don't like it. You you realize that it's just a thought. And what is a thought? Now, I know we're getting really weird and metaphysical here. I like it. But it's not it's it's not real. It's a phantom, right? It has no reality. Reality is your body, the present moment, the birds outside, the sky, where you are sitting, the fact that you're alive, that your blood is pumping. These are real. But that thought in your mind is a shadow. It's a phantom. It doesn't exist. It has no reality.

And so I go through this process where don't engage with it. And it's really weird because then my mind plays tricks on me and it pulls up a thought that's definitely going to engage me. right? Because it wants that. It's like a sugar rush. And so I go, "Okay, no, I'm not going to engage with it." And it made me realize as I went through that process that this is what social media is based on. Social media has mirrored the human brain on a large scale.

We have thoughts that are designed to grab our emotions and make us think about them repetitively over and over again compulsively, right? And there's probably a purpose behind that. But social media is is actually a genius at that picking out putting up things up there. They're going to engage our emotion. So we have to pay attention. So I always try and every time that happens I withdraw and I say it's just a thought. It's not real. It's not who I am. This is a very important part of meditation.

Your thoughts are not who you are. They're a separate part of yourself. You are something different from your own thoughts. I don't know if that means anything to you. It does. It does definitely. And while we are not our thoughts and we are not our mind, our thoughts become our reality. We find that a repetitive thought turns into a habit that turns into a pattern that turns into an action becomes our reality. for example, I am a unorganized lazy individual usually translates into, oh, I forgot to send that.

It didn't happen because now it's a belief that's built up. And so, it's so fascinating that something that's so not real becomes so real. Well, there was a something I read recently um in in one of the Buddhist uh books that I like to read that said our minds are basically topsyturvy. They're upside down. So the reality is we don't re I mean I don't want to get too deep into this but we don't really have a self. The self is a construction of our minds.

There actually is nothing there. And that kind of emptiness that egolessness is enlightenment. It's a beautiful feeling. And maybe in your life you've touched upon it briefly. I know I've touched upon it briefly. It's not the reality I have every day. But that's the real that's real. And what's not real are the thoughts. But everything is turned upside down in our worlds. And so these delusionary thoughts about of of about people about who I am about my habits etc. they become our reality when it's exactly the opposite.

Right? You have to be able to to be aware of that. And so, you know, meditation is all about being aware of is becoming aware of these things because we walk around like automatons. You know, I I'm very into this writer named Gerf. I don't know if you've ever heard of Gerf. He was this um he's basically from Armenia. He was in the beginning of the 20th century. He was this man who was very interested in in mysticism and he traveled throughout Asia trying to find the the uh the essence of all the different esoteric philosophies and he created his own philosophy and it's very interesting very exciting stuff he wrote a book called in search of the miraculous that I highly recommend people and it's not woo woo stuff he was a very very practical man he puts it in very practical terms but his idea is that we walk around asleep.

We're on automatic pilot constantly. We're not really aware that we're breathing, that we're existing. We're not aware where our thoughts come from. We're not aware of how our body moves, etc., etc., etc. And so it's a process of slowly becoming aware of these kinds of things that has really kind of I've been doing this 14 15 years now and it's really really kind of changed the course of my life. I have to say I was thinking that in in one sense you have reality externally the visible world but how I make sense of that visible world is all in the invisible space and ultimately how I make sense of it is the reality that I experience regardless of what's happening around me which is why we realize that people who well we all are telling ourselves stories and narratives all day long, but how we're processing what we're experiencing is our reality as opposed to the event or what someone said or social media as you gave an example.

Like I can either sit here and say like I know that when I wake up in the morning and I start scrolling on social media, my mind is now moving 10 times 100 times faster than if I don't do that. And I know that brushing my teeth and showering is a much more peaceful process if I haven't looked at my phone than if I do. Right? And so that choice is being made in the invisible world. And the visible world is simply something I'm interacting with and taking from or being affected by.

Well, so we mostly live in amid things that are invisible. Yes. Right. Symbols, etc. Yes. Language is is is a symbol. it's not reality. And so, um, things like government and and social behavior, they're rules and codes that we abide by, but they're not visible, they're invisible, right? Yeah, definitely. And and we're not aware of that. And so, we're trying to raise our awareness of the invisible world. I'm always trying to raise my awareness of why do I process this this way? Where does this come from?

Where's this idea taking root? That's a very Yeah, it's very interesting process to go through. Yeah, it's hard. It's like Yeah, it's not clear. It's not It's not like a here's the step-by-step process. It's just something I've been engaging with a lot. Yeah. Yeah. I like to try and um go through a thing where I I question all of my beliefs and things of why where does that come from? Why do I believe that? Why has that become something that's so hardened into my brain? I believe that about myself and who I am, about other people.

I continually try to challenge it and look at what might be the source of it and then maybe say it could be the opposite, right? And actually it can be it can lead to a lot of problems because it's like my mind is always swimming and I never really think anything is certain. I'm always, you know, seeing the opposite side of it. But um I think it's in the end it's a very healthy process. How how do you I I love I love where we're going because it kind of comes back to your same point early sorry your earlier point about how someone of strong character knows how to take criticism which means they know how to deal with the opposite of what they think or feel.

And so this idea that you're sharing now that it's healthy to be able to question to evaluate to assess our beliefs and values but like you said it's one of the hardest things to do because you get into a space of uncertainty you question your identity. you lose a sense of direction. How do we question ourselves without losing ourselves? You know, like who who really are you in the end? You know, what what what constitutes you, the essence of you, what were you meant to accomplish in this world, right?

Your sense of purpose, you know, to use the title of your show, what is it that makes you an individual, makes you unique that you alone are meant to accomplish in life? Well, it's not given. We don't know it. And a lot of people really, really struggle with trying to figure that out, right? Because they've been programmed by their parents, by their siblings, by the culture, by their teachers to say, "This is who you are. This is what you should believe in. This is what you were meant to accomplish in life.

This is what's cool and what's not cool." Okay? And so, you have to question yourself. You have to say, "Is this really who I am? Do I really am I really interested in this subject? Am I really interested in this kind of person in getting in a relationship with this kind of person? And so question yourself on that level, you're getting at a deeper and deeper core of maybe who you are at essence. You're you're cutting away all of the social stuff that has been foisted upon you that it has nothing to do with you, right?

So in some ways, you're kind of a mystery to yourself and you're sort of trying to solve that puzzle. And you have to ask these questions. Is this something I'm actually really interested in? Is this an intrinsically important thing to me? Or is it something that's in the culture or something that other people have told me? And questioning that over and over and over again is not to lead you into this abyss where there's nothing real. It's to get you closer to who you are, to what really matters, to what that essence of you is, to what you're meant to accomplish in life.

And once you reach that that inner kind of gold then you have you have a degree of certainty. So I know I knew from a very young age that I wanted to be a writer right I had a struggle to figure out what kind of writing I wanted but knowing that that's who I am probably about at the age of eight it allowed me to go I'm not interested in that. I don't want to do that. This isn't important. Why am I following this career path?

Why am I wasting my time here? And then so knowing that kind of core, you don't have to keep questioning yourself. So I'm never going to question myself. Why are you a writer? Why are you writing books? You should have been a a pop star. You should have been a rock singer. You should have written poetry. You should have been a lawyer. No, I'll never go there because I have that that firm ground beneath me. And that's what your questioning is supposed to lead to. Get to the essence of who you are.

And once you're there, you have a degree of certainty in your life. M how much Robert do you care what people think of you and how have you made sense of that over your time as someone who obviously writes that a lot of people enjoy your reading people may disagree with you they may agree with you people as you said debate discuss but how have you made sense of that and what's been your process of dealing with how you think people think about you there's there's how people think about me who know me personally and there's how people think about me in in the social realm who don't know me personally and who have an idea of who I am which is often very different from their reality.

But naturally as a human being I care that people understand that I'm I'm a certain way that I have a certain character that I actually love jokes and silly bathroom humor and that you know I like stupid movies and that I'm not always you know reading heavy philosophy. You know, my wife can tell you all about this childish side of my personality. So, you know, it's always been important to me to feel kind of authentic and sincere. And I've always hated and it's probably why I wrote the 48 Laws of Power.

I hate people who are pretending to be something that they're not. Deeply, deeply wounds me. And I don't know why. I don't know why it's been like this because I was a child. Maybe I suspected that in my parents. the kind of falseness that upsets me deeply. And so I wrote the 48 laws of power because I felt people are such hypocrites. They pretend that they're not interested in power, but that's all they're interested in, right? They wear this front like, "Oh, I just want to help people.

I just want to rate make movies and culture and art know you're interested in power." So, it's always been deeply important to me to kind of reveal what's really going on in someone and to sort of feel that way about myself. So, when I don't feel like I'm myself, when I feel like I'm faking it and sometimes, to be honest with you, Jay, being a kind of quote unquote self-help guru, it feels false. It doesn't feel like who I am. I feel like a bit of an impostor.

That's not really what I wanted to be. Can relate to that? I just wanted to write books. I love ideas. I love thoughts. I love expanding my consciousness. Right. So, the feeling that I'm not being who I am and that other people are kind of glomming onto that is upsetting to me. Yeah. I don't know if I'm answering your question. Oh, no. That that's I mean that's resonating so deeply with me. I think it's so interesting, isn't it? How your self-perception is so different from people's projection onto you.

And so I I can identify with that. I do what I do because I'm just sharing what I love. So I love meditation. I love uh wisdom books. I love traditions. I love ancient wisdom and modern science and seeing the parallels between the two. And I just love talking about that and sharing that. Yeah. And I don't think I've ever thought of myself as a guru or a guide or a or that kind of individual. But we in society if someone shares or teaches or gives insight or advice we box them or bucket them as that.

the same as you. We'd go in the same bucket even though we kind of do similar things but very different things and we probably have some similar interests and some different interests. And it's interesting how there isn't a space like I often say to people, I'm just trying to be everyone's spiritual friend. Like that's my goal. Like I'm that guy who's introducing my friends to cool things that they may not have come across whether it's Eastern spirituality or wisdom or whatever it may be. like I'm that guy and that's all I want to be.

I I don't want to be anything else. Right. But it's hard when you almost get put on a pedestal even though you didn't ask for that. I didn't want that. Well, people's perception of you can almost become what how you perceive yourself if you're not careful. For sure. You know, and so um that's why I keep coming back to myself and going, is that really who I am? I don't think so, Robert. you know, and also [snorts] I actually um am very I'm a flawed individual.

I'm a flawed human being. I have, you know, blind spots in my nature. I have compulsions that I wish I didn't have. And I don't like this idea that people think I'm this powerful person who's figured everything out because I'm not. I have that's why, you know, I write the wrote the book, The Laws of Human Nature. It was because I understand that I shared these same flaws that I have narcissistic tendencies that I too can feel envy that I have moments of grandiosity. So I'm not comfortable with the idea like that I'm this somebody that I'm not that that that the perception of me is but that's what happens to a lot of successful famous people.

They become trapped in what other people are thinking about them. They become trapped in that image. And I honestly think I I could be way off base, but I'm thinking of somebody like Anthony Bourdain who committed suicide. I think he was burdened and weighed down so much by how people thought of himself and it wasn't who he was and it kind of made him feel deeply uncomfortable. Now, I'm sure there were many other issues going on, but a lot of times it can make you uncomfortable in your own skin, the way people perceive you, and it can lead to deep feelings of depression and and a loss of who you are kind of.

Yeah. Since that moment of where you became quote unquote successful because externally because of 48 laws, how did that change your creative process? How did you hold on to the the roots of this kind of thinking? So after the 48 laws of power came out and it was successful, I was at a turning point in my life and it's a turning point that a lot of people I think have faced was do I just continue redoing the 48 laws of power? It was successful. It worked well.

Why don't I just write the 48 laws of power part two? It'll bring in money. It'll bring in attention. I'll just riff off what I wrote there. And something about me was not comfortable with that. It seemed cheap. It seemed easy. and it seemed lazy and I know myself that if I'm not challenged by something different, I grow bored. So, I have to write something that feels like there's energy behind it. There's anger, there's love, there's something powerful behind it. I have to feel it or it won't be in the words.

So, if I'm just doing the 48 laws of power part two, it won't be there. It'll have an emptiness. And damn it, a lot of artists and writers fall into that trap and it's why their books kind of have this sort of hollow ring to them, right? They're just going through the motions just repeating what worked before. And I can't stand that feeling. I have to feel like I'm off into a new land if with this new book. So each book has to represent a challenge, right?

And so the one I'm writing now is completely different from all seven of the other books. And it's an incredible challenge, but it makes me excited about every day because I know I cannot repeat the same kind of books over and over over again. My soul becomes dead and I have to feel alive with each project. M I find vocabulary so needed and I feel like I grew up with a smart vocabulary but not the biggest and I feel reading of course expands that and especially when you read history and other books and I found that it's language is just so powerful and I I worry that social media exposes us to such limited language that the brain and the mind and the consciousness doesn't have the opportunity to be expansive because the words don't allow allow for it.

If we're all reading the same memes and the same trends and the same hashtags and it it kind of just creates this very very limited space of consciousness. Well, that's why I like looking at other languages. I' I've speak several other languages and I'm constantly learning them. And I'm right now I'm reading about a lot about an African culture called the Akan um in West Africa and Ghana and they their concepts of the soul, the spirit and the body and they have a word in there called sunsum and we translate it to spirit.

But then I'm reading the African philosophers who actually know that word and they go it's not the same as the word spirit and then they go on and describe it and that one word contains all of these other worlds that are so weird and interesting that the word spirit in English does not convey right you know and other languages have that sense and so language can have that possibility where it opens up it's not just this un this one track meaning it has other valances, other possibilities to it, right?

And so, yeah, we're kind of deadening our language in a way. And you know, if you study like other cultures, you know, Eskimos had like a thousand words for for snow and we have one word. You know, Russians have like 40 words for the color blue and we have one word kind of thing. Our as the language gets smaller and smaller and more uniform our thoughts become more and more limited in uniform. So to know hear a word like inner sky it opens up all these other ideas in your mind whereas we don't have a word like that in English you know and and then cuz I'm I'm doing things with Zen Japanese language is so rich with things that we can't possibly even begin to express in English you know so yeah what what have been other ways of people opening up their minds this has been something one of my favorite things to you I remember reading a quote from Robin Sharma years ago that said um ordinary people have big TVs, extraordinary people have big libraries.

Uhhuh. And and it was one of those, you know, little dreams I had that was like one day I have a home, I'm going to have a big library. And and that was one of my most favorite things to kind of put together when I when I moved here. And um I started spending more time in when I would travel. I've always collected books. So I've always and and I started also collecting expanding my audio library. I realized as I grew when I was growing up we listen to a very limited form of music in my home.

And even as growing up as a teenager I listen to like one genre of music. What was that? Uh rap and hip-hop. Like that was and again I love rap and hip-hop. I love rap and hip-hop history. It's super cool. I have no issues with it. I just think that my audio library was so limited in my teens that now that I'm in my 30s, I'm now listening I'm trying to listen to so many random different things which again inspire different thoughts, different feelings, different emotions.

And so I've realized that vocabulary was one thing, audio has been another thing. What are other things that you've discovered that help open up that consciousness and mind? because as we both keep referring to social media technology is is almost making us more limited, more singular, more one-dimensional. Well, um, [clears throat] as I said, it's something I'm I'm writing about right now. So, music and the audible stuff is very very interesting and very exciting. So this is new phenomenon where musicologists have been able to recreate music from eras that we never could listen to before.

So I was writing at one point about um a a uh festival in ancient Greece and to put me in the mood I wanted to hear ancient Greek music that well that doesn't exist. I mean there no recordings of it but sure enough there are and the rhythms and the sound is so weird and alien that it makes it music captures the spirit of a time right so if we're only hearing these same melodies you hear cars going by with that same kind of pop song it's such a limited circle of harmony such a limited circle of what music can be but when you open up to African music to music from ancient Babylonia to Greece to music in South America, other rhythms, other poetry in in music and sounds.

It's mindblowing. It's interesting. So that's what I'm saying that the human animal is much more interesting than we think it is. reading about ancient cultures is a very mindexpansive um project you can go on because any books you'd recommend in that regard you know what's so exciting now is they have these books called the daily life in ancient Babylon the daily life in um I forget which city in India the daily life in ancient Greece etc and you get a feel for not just the grand philosophical issues, but how people ate, what their houses were like.

And so, um, so I was writing I just wrote a chapter about our relationship to time and history. And I was trying to take the reader in my new book, I'm giving them exercises, and I'm saying, try to imagine yourself in a world a thousand years ago, and you walk out your front door. There's no mechanical sounds. There's no airplanes. There's no cars. There's no machines. It's just birds. Maybe a saw and a hammer is the most you're going to hear. That's a strange thing. There are no signs.

There no advertisements. There's no words everywhere. It's kind of empty, right? You're just wandering around. There all these kind of rancid weird horrible smells cuz people aren't bathing. There's no but they're very human smells, right? Your whole sensory experience is on another level. But when you live in this 21st century world where things are so sanitized, where we don't smell these things, we only hear these packaged mechanical sounds, your sensory world is shrinking down and down and down. And you realize, yeah, ancient world, they had some bad stuff.

They weren't very good. You know, they had slavery. I I I understand all the negatives, so I'm not painting this portrait. But on another level, their realm of senses, their realm of language, their internal worlds were far richer than ours. And by connecting to that, by reading these books, by reading books, not just the daily life thing I said, but actually text from those times, as I was mentioning, when I read a monk, a Zen monk from the 11th century and the different thought processes, it opens my mind to a different way of thinking, to a different way of accessing reality.

But like I'm reading a lot about Aztecs because I'm sort of obsessed with the Aztecs. I don't know why. And they had these amazing spectacles. That was the thing about the ancient world. These festivals and spectacles that are far beyond burning man or any rock concert, right? You know, I could describe the fire ceremony in Aztec culture that only occurred every 70 years. There is nothing you can ever imagine in your life that would be like that. It is so utterly spectacular. And so I have this 800page book called Aztec philosophy and it's very theoretical but God it gives you an an entree into a totally different way of thinking about the world right where they have these metaphors um that the universe has this energy some of the energy is like string that's being wound around in a certain way it's like weaving like other other things like that.

This kind of energy that the world has and wow this is fascinating. You know our ancestors were actually thinking but they're not our us. It's a human being. We're all human. We all have those same kind of consciousness. Yeah. You know I I love also finding things in cultures that match but are in different languages. And so what so I went to Hawaii a few years ago which obviously for someone who grew up in London it's not normal. people in America or LA travel to Hawaii fairly often.

I went to Hawaii and um well, not often, it's more accessible, but I went recently and my wife and I went went on one of the tours there and they showed us uh the paraglys which are there obviously like markings and storytelling technique and tool. And they were showing us how when a child is born, they used to place the umbilical cord on the ground and they would then draw a spiral around it and that would be seen as a place that the child could always come back to to feel the energy and reconnect with the earth.

How exciting. And I was thinking that's spectacular. I wish everyone felt this connected to the earth. And then we would go out every morning on a canoe. I forget their name for it, but they had their version for it. And they would pay respects to the sun and the ocean. And we would take part in this ceremony with them. [snorts] And in India, there's something known as surya namashkar which it translates to sun salutation. Sure. Which again I've talked to Andrew Huberman about this. It's like kicking off the circadian rhythm.

But the goal is you pay your respects to the sun for everything it offers to you and the energy that it provides. And so to see that in Hawaiian culture, Indian culture and then I was in Bhutan recently. I went on a trip to Bhutan which I'd always wanted to visit. And this is a culture that really feels like you're going back in time. Like you walk out there and it feels like what you just described a thousand years ago. Where is Bhutan? Pakistan landlocked between India and China.

So right in between it's where they're having their tensions the kind of wars that's going on a little bit or Bhutan doesn't have a war. No, they don't even have a military. It's not part of their culture. Wow. They they believe in uh they're a Buddhist nation. Is it a Buddhist nation? Yes. Yes. And their practices are very protected. Their culture is very protected. Like everyone generally still wears the the the cultural dress. How exciting. Um it was it was spectacular. There's no there may be a couple of these now, but until very recently there's no malls, no cinemas, no restaurants like completely.

And it's beautiful because it's just hills and mountains. They believe that the forest will always be 70% of the land mass because they believe they're sacred. You can't trek up to or ski on any of their mountains because they're sacred. They protect them. So there's a re and and you almost I almost felt like what you just said. There's no signs. You can't hear anything. There's no machinery. Like it really does feel like that. Yeah. And we all all of us who were there experience this sense of slowness that you don't experience anywhere else.

And not in a bad way in a in a the mind the the gravity almost of the space was really really powerful to experience. That's very exciting because, you know, you can go out into nature into the mountains and you can feel that and you can feel like this is what it was like 2,000 100,000 years ago. But we don't have that feeling with human things because every city has its Starbucks, its malls, it's generic culture that we've transported throughout the world. So to have a place where you can actually go back in time is fantastic.

Mhm. But I wish it wasn't so far away, you know. Yeah. Yeah. It's f it's fine. It's fine. It's worth visiting for anyone who wants to. It was a really special trip. But Robert Green, these are your final five. The first question is, what is something you had wished you'd learned earlier? The piano. I mean, I know you were probably thinking about that's beautiful something [snorts] about life, but I love music and I wish I had learned the piano when I was young. Do you still play?

Do you play now? No. No. Okay. Uh, second question. What is something that you used to be sure about but that you now are less sure about? I guess a sense of um, right and wrong or good, good and evil. Mhm. When I was young, I had a very strong sense of it. That's a great answer. And now I'm not so sure about what it is. It's a great answer. Uh, question number three. If you could go back and live in any age, I'm thinking you're going to say the Aztecs, but uh where would you like to go and where would you want to live?

And what would you ask? I would go back to the Paleolithic era and our earliest ancestors because I'm fascinated by their world and what they were like. So, the Paleolithics 20,000 years ago. Okay. And I would uh like to know about their their religion, their spirituality. I'm interested in origins of human consciousness. So have you read any books on that that Yes. What would you recommend if someone's a subject I was just my last chapter I was writing about? Wow. The origin of language is the origin of of human consciousness.

Wow. It's the same time that there were the cave paintings, right? The famous cave paintings in France, but they're all over the world. Aboriges etc. And that was the beginning of symbolic consciousness. Yeah, there are all sorts of books written on that subject. Amazing. Question number four. If you could have three people over at your dinner party, any three people you choose, living or dead, who would they be? One would be Friedrich Nichze because I'm reading a biography of his right now that's unbelievable. Um, the other would be Buddha.

Why not? And [clears throat] then the other would be uh it's very odd mix of people, so I don't know if they're going to get along. That's a good pie, isn't it? [gasps] Um yeah, I I'd say uh I'll give Socrates. Okay. And and let the fur fly. Fifth and final question, Robert. I find these stressful. They are. They are stressful. um something you're trying to learn right now to be more forgiving about myself because I'm extremely unforgiving with yourself. Yeah. Not easy. It's not been my life pattern.

Where did the pursuit begin and why is it a worthy pursuit? Well, I think because um of my upbringing, I always had a feeling of never good enough. I'm never smart enough. I'm not doing enough. I'm not a good enough person. And I internalize that. And so, um, it's probably partially led to my stroke. Probably let me drive makes me drive myself too hard. And so sometimes I just have to be more forgiving. So instead of thinking, God, I'm never going to write anymore. The well is dry.

The the forgiving aspect is, Robert, you're tired. You're exhausted. you're doing fine. It's going to come. It will come. Just trust it. So, it's kind of like, you know, being indulgent towards yourself. I can be indulgent towards other people, but I can't be indulgent towards myself. So, just learning to forgive myself for not being perfect and for not getting exactly what I want in life. It does the hardest thing for me. That's beautiful. It'd be very good for my health if I could ever get there.

That's beautiful. Thank you, Robert. You're welcome. Everyone, Robert Green. I hope you enjoyed this episode of me and Robert truly just having a genuine, passionate conversation about things we love.

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