Do you want to help create a happier workplace?

In the latest episode of the Happier at Work podcast, I sat down with the inspiring Rob Dubin, a renowned motivational speaker and advocate for employee happiness. Rob brings a wealth of wisdom and insights on the power of gratitude, happiness boosters, and meditation in fostering a fulfilling work life. 

Rob sheds light on the feel-good chemicals like serotonin, oxytocin, and dopamine that are released when we engage in gratitude and happiness-boosting practices. Over time, these practices become associated with feeling good, making them easier to maintain as habits.

Rob's optimistic mindset played a crucial role in his survival during a harrowing snowstorm, highlighting the importance of cultivating optimism and spending energy on finding solutions. He shares invaluable advice on cultivating eudaimonic happiness at work, including setting boundaries, leveraging strengths, and finding purpose in what we do.

Rob's insights are a powerful reminder of the profound impact that happiness and fulfilment can have on our work lives. By adopting strategies for happiness and finding purpose in our daily work, we can create a more engaged and productive workforce.

The main points throughout this podcast include:

• Debunking misconceptions about material possessions bringing long-term fulfilment and emphasising the importance of pursuing eudaimonic happiness, which is more sustainable than fleeting pleasure.
• The importance of cultivating optimism and spending energy on finding solutions. 
• Invaluable advice on cultivating eudaimonic happiness at work, including setting boundaries, leveraging strengths, and finding purpose in what we do.
• The profound impact that happiness and fulfilment can have on our work lives.

As a special gift to our listeners, Rob is offering a free ebook with happiness strategies. If you're in the US, simply text "happy" to 33777 to receive your copy. International listeners can visit Rob's website through the link below and fill out the contact form, mentioning "happier at work" in the comment field to receive the ebook.

Connect with Rob

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/robdubinspeaks/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robdubin/ 

Email: rob@robdubin.com

Website: https://www.robdubin.com

Do you have any feedback or thoughts on this discussion? If so, please connect with Aoife via the links below and let her know. Aoife would love to hear from you!

Connect with Happier at Work host Aoife O’Brien:

Website: https://happieratwork.ie 

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aoifemobrien/ 

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/happieratwork.ie/ 

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/happieratwork.ie

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@HappierAtWorkHQ

Twitter: https://twitter.com/HappierAtWorkHQ 

Previous Episodes:

https://happieratwork.ie/195-workplace-culture-dynamics-creating-a-positive-work-environment-with-caroline-collins/

https://happieratwork.ie/191-the-pursuit-of-purpose-shifting-perspectives-with-will-polston/

https://happieratwork.ie/184-a-framework-for-building-happier-work-cultures-with-aoife-obrien/

Rob, you're so welcome to the happier at work podcast. I know this has been scheduled for a few weeks now, so I'm really excited to have this conversation. Do you wanna introduce yourself to listeners and let people know a little bit about your background and how you got to doing what you're doing today?

Well, thank you so much for having me on your podcast. Yeah. My name is Rob Dubin, and I've been a a motivational speaker for a couple of years now, and I speak on employee happiness. And I had a rather a Unique journey to arriving at that place. I was a filmmaker by profession, and the film industry is a Sort of different than most, large corporations. I might have 20 or 30 people on the set with me, But they only work for me for a a week or a few days while we're on set, and then they go off and work for somebody else. And So I never had the challenge of trying to motivate people the way a corporation does to keep them engaged day after day Because they were all highly paid independent contractors. And so that was I started that business when I was in my early twenties and I I had a very successful film company.

But when I then, built into a a different business and a larger business and had more staff and full time staff, I had the same attitude. I just expected them to come to work, raring to go every single morning, and of course, that didn't work. So I had a little bit of a an awakening, and I was, I was the kind of boss that an HR person wouldn't like because we had a bit of Revolving door because I just didn't focus on my employees happiness.

Yeah.

And my younger brother ran a large corporation and had hundreds and hundreds of employees. And one day, he sat me down and sort of told me how the world worked. And overnight, I changed because I was a very empathetic person in that sense, and I started focusing on my employees' happiness. And then for the next 3 or 4 years, we had 0 turnover. So it was, quite an awakening that brought me to that.

Yeah. A brilliant I've I mean, I have a few questions based on that. This idea of an overnight change, like, how did people react to that? Were they open to it, or were they bit kind of, wary of it. Were they a bit like, did they believe that you had changed so much just overnight?

I think they did. I also I I can't remember if the timing was exactly the same, but I started doing a lot of work with Tony Robbins At the same time.

Okay. Yeah.

And so that had a massive, impact on how I saw the world and what I did. And So I think between the 2, people didn't they they understood the transition, why had the change had occurred. And Then they just realized that I was very sincere in caring about their own personal happiness, and I instituted a whole bunch of things in our office, Oriented That Way, and that I believe is the game changer. And I I speak at HR conferences now, and I do workshops corporations all over the country and actually all over the globe on employee engagement and motivation. And what I do is I actually teach happiness.

A few years.

But the strategies I'm teaching are partly from my own awakening, so to speak.

Yeah. Brilliant. I'd love to know more about those because when you talk about happiness and, like, obviously, that's what I talk about is what the podcast is all about. But different people will have different definitions of what that means. That's the kind of the first thing I'll say. And then the other thing I'll say is a lot of people think that happiness is very fluffy. It's not scientific. It can't be proven.

And why do we want to be happier at work? Because we're here to do a job and you don't have to be happy. You might need to be motivated or engaged, but you don't need to be happy. So do you wanna kinda talk around some of those points and then tell us a little bit about your strategy and what specifically you talk about in relation to happiness at work.

Certainly. Well, my wife and I actually retired when I was 42 years old, and we Sold our home and bought a sailboat.

The dream, Rob, is it?

Well, we because we were focused on doing what made us Tappy and Yeah. You know, working more years and making more money wasn't happiness and Yeah. I had been making sailing movies, so I was Involved with the people in the sailing community that were millionaires and billionaires, and I saw a lot of them were very unhappy.

A year.

And, so we made the decision. So we spent the next 17 years sailing around the world.

Wow.

And we visited over a 100 different countries. We were in Tenerife where you live. And I focused as we started traveling, I focused on what created happiness for people. Because we were out there literally waking up every morning saying what's gonna make us happy. And then we started focusing on how we could Contribute to the people in the places we sailed, and learned what made them happy. So we sort of studied happiness in over a 100 different countries. And we came back to the United States, and I was very content, continued to be retired and waking up every morning going skiing or mountain biking or Doing the things I did. But during COVID, I realized how many people in America and in the world Had suddenly had time to look at their lives, and they thought they had checked all the boxes that told them they should be happy, and they were not.

And so I knew a lot about happiness. So that started my speaking business on happiness. We were just going through the great resignation, And I realized the correlation between happiness and happiness and work engagement and motivation.

Mhmm.

And So that's sort of how my career had developed. I've been speaking then since the middle of COVID. Wow. And The the, I I I studied happiness, as I said, as I sailed around the world, and then I studied it later on more academically. I read all the research on happiness, and I took the happiness studies course at Yale University.

Oh, yeah. That's brilliant. A lot of Yeah.

And I've had a chance to speak on happiness at Harvard University.

Oh, wow.

And I've done a TED a TEDx talk on happiness as well. And specifically, when I speak at HR conferences, I get the exact pushback that you mentioned. People roll their eyes. And it's usually the the HR department usually gets it. But the c suite, why do I have care if my employees are happy, why do I have to pay for happy, and what's the return on investment for making them happy. Yeah. And those are all legitimate questions, and I was a c, you know, I ran my own businesses, so I I understand how the c suite thinks. And I relate the idea of happy of teaching happiness.

People say, well, can you teach it? Because that's what I do. I have a a name tag that says my name and it says I teach happiness. And of course, it's always a ice breaker at these conferences, but what I say to the c suite is Think about anything else that you're good at in your life. Maybe you play a musical instrument, maybe a sport you do, a Or a craft you do, or your job itself. Every one of those things, you first decided if you want if you you decided you wanted to learn to play piano, And then you took some piano lessons, or you watched some YouTube videos, and you got some instruction, and then you practice piano, and over time, you got better at it. And your job is the same way. You went to a university, or you studied HR somewhere, and went to through HRCI, or, or SHRM or something, And you studied happiness, and you practice it, and you get better at it. So happiness is no different.

It can be taught exactly the same way. There are skills and strategies for happiness. They start with making the decision that you're gonna focus on happiness, and then you learn some of the strategies that create happiness, And you practice those, and over time you get better at being happy. So, when the C suite wants to make you happy, They're gonna bribe you with recognition programs or, you know, unlimited PTO or money more money or Taco Tuesdays, or Kombucha on Tap, or the yoga classes, or whatever it is. Yeah. And those I'm not saying those things are unnecessary. A But that is like buying somebody a better guitar instead of giving them a guitar lesson. Oh, good to hear.

Don't know how to play guitar, If you don't literally know how to be happy, giving them more yoga classes isn't gonna make them happier.

Yeah.

What will make them happier is teaching them how to be better a At being happy. How to get the joy out of life that is there in front of you every day. So one of the if you look I mean, I know you know this and your viewers if they've listened to your podcast probably know it. One of the simplest ways to start being happier is a gratitude practice.

Yes.

So that's just one simple thing that I teach when I, I have, keynote speeches that I do that I talk about 2 or 3 things, and then I have a full day workshop that a It's more of a deep dive, but the gratitude practice is a simple one that

everybody learns. Yeah.

Yeah. And so Doing those things, you teach people how to be better at being happy. So if you spend your day if you know you're gonna keep your gratitude journal, and I tell people Toward the end of every day, spend 5 minutes and write down 5 things that you're grateful for. And it may only take you a minute to write all 5, but you have Spend 5 full minutes feeling the feelings of gratitude and why you're grateful for that thing.

Yeah.

So if you wake up this morning and you know you're going to do your gratitude journal sometime tonight. You're looking around all day long for what might, what you might wanna write in your journal tonight. So now you're looking around for things that are gonna make you happy and grateful. So you're paying attention to it.

Yep.

You know, we all do this thing. If you buy a a new red pickup truck, suddenly you're driving down the road and you notice red Chevy pickup trucks everywhere.

A yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

And you've you've queued your brain.

Activating system.

Exactly. You've queued your reticular activating system to notice those things. So if you Cue your reticular activating system to look for what's good in your life. You're gonna see more good. Yeah. So that's just one simple thing. Yeah. And I know you've done many episodes on the ROI of a happier employee in terms of engagement, and how much more productive people are, and how much longer they Stay with your company, how it changes the whole corporate culture.

So we know that there's many many benefits of a happy workforce. So what I do is I teach people how to be better at being happy.

Yeah. Brilliant. That's a really nice, succinct way to say it, I think. Rob. I'd love to know in your 17 years, and I think people will aspire to this. They'll be inspired by this as well. 17 years sailing on a sailboat, visiting over a 100 countries. Like, what did you learn about happiness by doing that?

Well, we certainly looked for the things that were universal, that were the same from country to country to Country. You know, there are definitely things that are unique to 1 country that don't exist in another country, but there are things that are universal, you know. And we would be with I mean, before I left because I was a filmmaker and I started making sailing movies, and I was filming people that do the America's Cup and these high end yacht races. So I was literally with all these millionaires and and and billionaires, people with their private jets and all that. And they they would fly into the regatta with their private Jet and the crew would deliver the boat, and then we would get to go sailing with them. And I realized a fair number of them were not happy. And then a few years later, we were sailing around the world visiting developing nations and spending time with people in dirt shacks, you know, that made $200 in a year. And the percentage of each group that was happy was not wildly different.

Mhmm.

The 1 group could afford to buy anything they wanted. They could indulge their happiness to any level, and they weren't markedly happier than the other group that was very poor. They were happier for sure. They had less problems in their lives, but not what you as much as you would think. And, the There's 2 types of happiness. 1 is called hedonic happiness Yeah. Which has to do with pleasure, you know, having a glass of wine, a piece of chocolate, having sex, Buying a new car, getting a raise, all those things. And then there's eudaimonic happiness, which has to do with things that fulfill us, that add purpose and meaning to our life.

And so much of what I teach is how to find this eudaimonic happiness. This this happiness that comes from meaning and purpose. And of course, one of the things that we're seeing recently. You know, we had the great resignation, and then what they're calling the great reset, and then, of course, quiet quitting. A few years. And quiet quitting comes from a reasonable response to being overworked. You know, your job requires you to work 40 hours a week, and then 50 hours a week and then 60 hours a week, and then you're supposed to answer emails on Sunday night at home. And so people rebel against that, and then they quiet quit and they do the bare minimum possible.

The problem is and and so that's a reasonable response

Yeah. A

To that overwork, but the problem is it's actually detrimental to themselves. They do it for a reasonable reason, But what happens is most of us, we work a third of our lives and our jobs have the possibility or the opportunity a of providing that eudaimonic happiness for us. If we do something that is fulfilling for us, we're getting that really juicy happiness that we want that that affects our life. And so if you quiet quit, you're eliminating that possibility from your life. So you're still spending a third of your your waking life at work, But now that 3rd doesn't have the possibility to provide you with with life satisfaction if you quite quit. So not only are you stealing From your employer and not giving them your best. You're stealing the potential for your own happiness. So what I suggest is People, it's fine if they make some kind of boundaries.

Look, I'm not gonna check my email on the weekend, or I know in France, it's actually illegal To send your employees emails on the weekend. In America, of course, you're expected to work all the the grind. Yeah.

Yeah. 247.

Exactly. But so I tell people, set a boundary if you have to, that's reasonable for your organization, and that's health that part of it is healthy. But then figure out the part of your job that you love and see if you can work with your team or your your supervisors And do more of that, that thing that you love. And maybe there's some way to job share or do something else and unload a part of the your job that you don't love. And there was probably still be some part of it. Every job has some part that is just sort of work that has to get done that maybe not is the satisfying part. And I recommend people just do the opposite of procrastination.

Mhmm.

Because that part of your job that you don't love, If you leave it till Friday afternoon, or till next Friday, or the Friday after that, it's constantly hanging over your head, and it's stealing the joy from the a part of your job that you do like and that you are doing. Whereas if you come in and you get that part of the job out of the way on Monday morning, Then on Tuesday, when you do the part of your job that brings satisfaction, you can fully embrace that satisfaction.

Yeah.

And a You can be in what we call flow. There's been a lot of happiness studies about getting into flow state. And so that's where you can get into that flow state It delivers that deep eudaimonic happiness for you.

And I suppose one of the the points I want to pick up on that, The Opposite of Procrastination, Brian Tracy has a book all about this and destination. Brian Tracy has a book all about this, and he refers to it as eat the frog. So eat the frog means do the difficult task first. I don't know if you've you've heard of that, Rob. But I just think it's a it's a nice way to think about it because if you eat the frog at the start of the day, the the day is only gonna get better from there. You've done the worst thing by eating that frog. You've done the worst thing at the start of the day, and now your headspace is clear. And I know certainly from my own if there's something hanging over me.

You're so right that you're thinking about it and thinking about it. And the worry associated with it or the procrastination itself, or it's still taking up mental space because you know you still have to do it. That impacts you more than probably you realize. So getting that stuff out of the way, and no one expects anyone to be happy 100% of the time. There's always gonna be bits of your job that you don't like. I loved what you had to say about identifying what parts of the job that you love. Maybe we'll kinda circle back to that in a second. But, again, something that occurred to me there and something I talk about in in my happier at work framework is this idea of strengths, knowing what your strengths are, finding people who have complementary strengths.

So if there's elements of the job that you don't like, for example, then there might be elements that other someone else does like, and they probably like it because they're good at it, and it comes easily and naturally to them. And the example I always share because a lot of people don't like this stuff. I love doing spreadsheets. I love doing calculations. I love using Excel, figuring out problems, how to how to write formulas, you know, stuff like that. I love that. A lot of people don't love that. So you might want me on your team because I can pick up some of that stuff that you don't like, but it's it's applying that logic to your own situation.

And, you know, what parts of the role. Do you like? What parts are you really good at? Who can you team up with within your team, or is there someone kind of beyond your team that you could potentially team up with where you have complementary strengths that that you can take on more of their role for the parts that you really enjoy, and they can take on more of your role for the parts that that you. Enjoy less, let's say. And it's not to say that one thing is more important than another. It's about teamwork, and it's it's not saying, you know, all of the different parts are required, but it's yeah. It's about kind of bringing it all together. A but as I was saying, I'd love to circle back to this idea of, like, what part of your job do you love? And, you know, I'm kind of thinking about my own situation. I'm thinking about some clients.

I'm thinking about friends as well. Sometimes people find it really hard to identify any aspect of a job that they Enjoy. Any thoughts around how to take a step back and and think about what are the parts of the role that I enjoy? Maybe if in your you're in a toxic situation, you're in a job that doesn't really suit you very well. Any thoughts around how we can uncover that for ourselves?

Well, part of it is what I said earlier. It's how to be better at being happy. So There's certainly a legitimate, you know, if you're mismatched. If you love to do spreadsheets and your job doesn't ever let you do spreadsheets, that's a a A mismatch, and you should do what you can to turn that around. So there is a reality of to that. But there is also this inner thing of How to be better at being happy. So for instance, my wife loves to go to the, the symphony And I don't. And so we've been married 41 years now.

And, now I don't often go with her anymore. But for many years, I would ask myself a question that I learned from Tony Robbins, what he calls the problem solving questions. How can I go to the symphony with my wife and enjoy it? And I love people watching. So I would sometimes go to the symphony and just spend my whole time with her, sitting there looking at the people in the audience, or looking at the the players and not really involved so much with the music. So I asked myself, how can I do this thing and still enjoy it? And a lot of a Life is asking better questions. You know, your brain is programmed to answer. The process of thinking Is the process of asking yourself a question and answering it. And you've got that monkey brain sometimes that goes nonstop.

What does this mean? What does this mean? What do I need to do about it? And so we're all asking questions all of the time. But if you start asking better, more empowering questions, You can change the world that you live in because life isn't what actually happens to us. Life is what we how we think about what happens to us.

Yep.

And so if you change the way you think about the things that happened to you, The experience actually changes. So many years ago, my wife and I were on a backcountry ski trip to a cabin deep in the Colorado mountains. And partway there, the weather changed dramatically and it turned into a white out blizzard. Wow. And we couldn't find the cabin, and we spent 5 days in the wilderness Look, in in the worst snowstorm in Colorado's history, and we were given up for dead. And the sheriff said that they would recover our frozen bodies the following spring. And we eventually did get out of the mountains. And actually, when we got out, the first phone call I got was from the president of the It states because our story had gone so viral.

Millions of people around the country were watching this. Yeah. And, But we had but we so we survived, and we got out. But we had another woman with us this the whole time. And on the 2nd day, She was ready to lay down in the snow and die because she thought there was no point in this we were never gonna get out alive.

Yeah.

And we thought completely differently about it. We thought We after the 1st night, we said we survived 1 night, we can certainly survive 2 nights. Yeah. And after 2 nights, we said we survived 2 nights, we can survive 2 more nights.

Yes.

And she said after 1 night, I survived 1 night, I can never survive another night. So that our optimism, our optimistic mindset was enough to get all 3 of us out alive. So we all survived, but we were having the 3 of us were having the same physical experience. We were in the same snowstorm, we did not have a tent, we didn't have enough sleeping bags, we didn't have enough food, we didn't have stoves or anything else. Yeah. So we were all 3 experiencing the same experience physically, but in our minds it was a completely different experience.

A year.

And so I believe happy people see the world differently

Yeah.

Because of the an optimistic mindset. And one of the things I talk about is cultivating optimism.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that kind of brings me on to this question about teaching people how to be happy. A and let's let's assume that, you know, for for anyone who's listening out there who thinks that it can't be taught, that you're you're kind of you're born with this set level of happiness, whatever it might be. Let's assume that you can because I know that you can. So for anyone who's listening today, let's assume that happiness is something that can be taught. What are the things that you teach people? So you mentioned already optimism.

You mentioned about this idea of getting into a flow state. You mentioned about gratitude. What are some of the other things that people can do? How can you teach people to be happy?

So let's just talk First about optimism a little bit. So, you know, we often hear optimism that's where you see the glass is half full instead of half empty. And I don't believe that's a a Valid a good definition of optimism.

Okay. Yeah. Yeah.

Because after we had been out in the wilderness for 2 nights of the 5 days that we were out, the sheriff we had a 10% chance of survival.

Yeah.

So maybe our glass was only 10% full.

Okay.

So sometimes the glass isn't half full. Sometimes it's only 5% or 10% full.

Yeah.

And I think you have to see it to see the glass as it really is And acknowledge the empty part of the glass first. So I when I speak with corporations, I say, look, you can do this in your team meetings. You can do this in a product launch. You can do this in a customer service challenge. See the glass as it really is. And if it's 80% empty, Acknowledge that 80%. Acknowledge the challenges ahead of you on this new product launch for instance. What do we have? We have a supply chain problem.

We have a this problem. We have a that problem, marketing thing, whatever. So acknowledge the empty part of the glass, and think about what challenges you face. But then focus on the full part of the glass, what you have going for you. You've got a good team. You've got a great marketing department. You do have a good product. Whatever it is you've got going for you.

And the secret is, spend 3 times more time and energy Focused on the solution than you do did in on focusing on the problem. So if you go into a meeting and you spend 20 minutes talking about the challenges ahead of you. You now have to spend 60 minutes focused on the solutions. And if you do that with every part of your life, you'll Cultivating optimistic mindset that will change the way you see the possibilities before you. Just as my wife and I saw the possibilities of survival very differently than our friend did. So that's number 1 is building that optimistic mindset. We talked a little bit. I'm sorry?

I was just gonna say, is that linked it sounds like it's linked to this idea of gratitude as well. So gratitude and and optimism are are potentially interlinked. I'm not sure.

I I guess if you for me, I have been doing all of these things for, like, 25 or 30 years. And to be honest with you, gratitude is the predominant emotion where I spend almost all of my waking hours. I mean, literally, I feel gratitude, I think about all day long every day and the love I feel for my wife. And those are my 2 predominant emotions. I almost never experience anxiety or worry or self recrimination. I mean, if I added up how many hours a year I spend on those 3 things, maybe a Half a dozen hours a year. Yeah. I just never feel anxious or worried because I've replaced those negative emotions with positive emotions.

And you can't Simultaneously feel gratitude and anxiety, for instance.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

So, so the gratitude is a big one. I also teach something in when I do my short, keynote speeches, I teach what I call happiness in 11 minutes a day.

A Yeah. Yeah.

And this is very good for busy corporate people. And I talk about doing a 3 minute happiness booster sometime during your morning hours, And a 3 minute happiness booster sometime during your afternoon hours, and then 5 minutes at the end of the day with a gratitude practice. And the happiness boosters Can be something as simple as stop work for 3 minutes, put in your headphones, and put on your favorite song from your playlist, and dance at your desk. And it's not listening to music while you work. It's stopping and focusing on the music. Take 3 minutes and call a family member, and Tell them you got 3 minutes to check-in and see how they're doing. Spend 3 minutes looking at pictures of your last vacation, or thinking about where you wanna go on your next vacation. So I have a whole list of of gratitude, I mean, of happiness boosters that I recommend people try.

Meditation, a 3 minute meditation, or walk outside and a year. Look at the sky and breathe deeply for 3 minutes. And what happens when you do these things, you release Serotonin and oxytocin and dopamine, the feel good chemicals. And the chemicals stay in your body much longer than the 3 minutes. So you can brighten up your entire morning by doing a 3 minute gratitude I mean, a 3 minute happiness booster in the middle of your morning. And we know it takes scientists tell us it takes 66 days to form a habit. So if you do a happiness booster in the morning, and a happiness booster in the afternoon and a gratitude practice at night. And you do all 3 of those for a couple of months, two and a half months.

Each time you do them, you will be triggering those feel good chemicals. And over time, your brain relates doing the thing, Doing the writing down your gratitude practice, writing down your what you're grateful for. Your brain associates doing that with the feel good chemicals that are released, so that you feel good doing it. So on the after doing it for a couple of months, you just wanna keep doing it. So that's why after me doing this for 20 years, I just wake up every morning and look around and say, what's great about today? What's gonna be wonderful about today? You know, I'm racing to an appointment that I'm late for, and there's a road Closed sign, and I have to take a detour. And my first response is, Oh, crap, this is going to make me even later for my appointment.

A year.

And within a millisecond, my brain says, gee, I've never been down this road. What cool scenery am I gonna see on this road that I've in the detour road I've never been on before?

Yeah.

A year. I just do that stuff innately after doing it for so many years. But you train yourself, and then you spend your life looking for what's good about your life, and Sure enough, you see more and more of it. And we think happiness, we think success leads to happiness. It's actually the other way around.

Yeah.

Yeah. Happiness, If you're a happier person, you're gonna be more productive, you're gonna be more creative, you're gonna do more, and think more, and see more opportunities, and then you're gonna be more successful. And, you know, I've built 3 different, 7 figure companies over my life, all while I was doing the things that made me happy every day anyway.

Yeah. A brilliant that is the the idea that if you're late for something and you have a detour, like, that's obviously it's quite stressful. But what I kinda took from that is that's something that's out of your control. You cannot control that that has happened, and you must take that detour. Like, there's nothing that you can do about it, so there's no point in worrying about it. And I love that you put this positive spin. You're like, well, I've never actually taken this road before. So, like, what if I'm gonna get new scenery or see go past new building or, see different people, whatever it may you know, whatever that might be because if you like people watching like you do.

I love that you have all of these different very specific things that people can do. So, like, just go outside and have a look at the sky. Like, how when is for anyone listening today, when is the last time you did that? And and, you know, I have listeners all over the world, but I'm kinda thinking very specifically for my listeners in Ireland right now where maybe it's gray skies. But, like, try and find something a bit like, oh, there's a lovely shadow on the clouds or or something like that.

There's all all that rain gives you those 40 shades of green.

It a. This is it. Yes. Have a look at the grass and how how green it is and how soft it is. If you ever go to another country, I always find that the grass is quite spiky because it just doesn't have that same level of rain. So things like doing a meditation, for example, putting on your favorite song, calling a friend for even for 3 minutes, for 5 minutes. Like, all of these things that we don't make time to do. We don't actually carve out time in our day.

We're so busy being busy that we don't take that time to do those things that do make us happy. I'd love to kinda circle back to this idea of you being surrounded by millionaires and billionaires. And even with all of that money, a lot of them still weren't happy. And just this perception societally that what we're going for or what will make us happy is fame, success, money, you know, when I get all this thing, then I'll be happy.

There's 2 different things there that, that you bring up that I speak about often. And Yeah. The first one is that we've all been trained To believe that when we check all the right boxes in life Yeah. Happiness will happen to us. Like, it's gonna you know, we're gonna we go to school, and we get the good degree, and we get the good education, vacation, and we get the right job, and we meet the right partner, and we have a couple of cute kids, and happiness is gonna fall out of the sky on us. And of course, it just doesn't work that way. So we've been programmed improperly. And if you're an American, you've learned about our declaration of independence, the a founding document of our country refers to the pursuit of happiness.

Mhmm.

As if it's something you have to chase. Yes. And it's not. So that's one part of it. And when I took the Yale University happiness studies course, the 1st 3rd of the course Was spent talking about things that don't make us happy. And there's there's a wonderful term the psychologist a called miss wanting, and that's what you just referred to the success and the money and all these things are gonna make us happy. And it's We miss want. Our brain tricks us into thinking these things are gonna make us happy.

So if you think about happiness on a scale from 1 to 10, And you're a 6, and I say if you won the lottery tomorrow, you know, where would you be? And most people are gonna say, oh, I'd be a a 10.

Yeah. Yeah.

And my life would be perfect from then onwards.

Yes.

And of course, that doesn't happen.

Yeah.

And so what we think it's gonna move us from a 6 to a 10, And what really happens is it moves us from a 6 to a 7, and a year later we're back where we start. Whether we still have the money or not, a few years. Is gone because it's that hedonic happiness. Yeah. So Yeah. Yeah. You need to cultivate that happiness that is eudaimonic happiness. So The very wealthy people we were with, they could indulge their hedonic happiness to any level they wanted.

Yeah. But Hedonic happiness is short lived. You know, you eat a piece of chocolate, it's wonderful. But you want another piece, you know, tomorrow. And there's another thing that happens. You get used to it, and it has less effect. So not only is the whatever effect it has is short term, But there's a decline in the effect. So when you Yes.

Get an ice cream cone, the first taste of it is incredible. When you're at the bottom of the cone, it's It's great, but it's not the same as that first taste. Yeah. So you would that's called hedonic adaptation. You adapt to it. So

the same money. So you get you get a promotion, you get that salary increase, you get that high from the recognition that you've had, but then you get used to having that amount of money and spending that amount of money and whatever it might be. And then you're at that same level of happiness that you were before. So can we come back to this idea then of the you eudemonic happiness, and how do we uncover that for ourselves? So it's not about pursuing what it is. It's about uncovering within ourselves what that means to us.

Exactly. And so eudaimonic happiness, it it's a term that Aristotle, a the greatest philosopher of all time coined. And Aristotle believed, as I do, that our purpose on Earth is simply to make ourselves happy. I believe my purpose here is to make myself happy, and help others find their own happiness. And Aristotle said, it's the meaning and purpose of life. And so, this idea of eudaimonic happiness is happiness that adds meaning and purpose to our lives. And so, the dirt a poor farmer that I was with in Tonga, who, you know, had to walk 2 miles to his little plot of land and harvest a gourd, so they had something for dinner that night. He still has the same ability to find things that give meaning and purpose to his life regardless of how much or how little money or other things he has.

And we all have that. So early on, when you were talking about finding the part of your job that you love, that can be a part of it is finding out your purpose. And I believe your purpose is and I'm quoting a friend of mine, a brilliant speaker named Gab Bosche. And Gab says, your purpose is the best of what you have to serve others. And if you are doing that, because one of the other things besides gratitude And the happiness boosters. The other thing that delivers big long term happiness is contribution, contributing to others. And our focus for most of the 17 years we sailed, The 1st couple of years, we were focused on ourselves and how to do it and, you know, stay alive and not die on our sailboat. But very quickly, once we got past that phase, We really focused on how we could serve other people that we in the communities we sailed to.

And so that gave us tremendous amount of gratitude, which is why we kept doing it for 17 years. Yeah. And and so contribution to something bigger than yourself is really the the nugget that Keeps on giving. And when we sailed into Indonesia, we were met on the beach by a young woman who wanted to practice her English, and so she offered to be our guide. And she was such a smart inspiring young woman. If she was in America, she would have been on a a full ride scholarship to Harvard or something.

Yeah.

And we were so inspired by her, we wanted to help her, and she actually had gotten a scholarship to university. Your parents only made about $200 a year, but she had gotten a scholarship. But we knew there must be hundreds of other women just like her that were smart. And in 3rd world countries, helping women is the biggest bang you can get for your for your dollar. And so we started a scholarship program Designed to help primarily women who had both great academics and had a financial need. And we only spent 1 week in a This town in Indonesia's medium sized city called Kupang, and we set up a scholarship program because we knew all the other sailors like ourselves, just itinerant sailors passing through. We knew that in that year and in the future, they would wanna help as all because we had just knew the sailing community. We've all out there doing our own happiness, and trying to make others happy.

So we set up a scholarship program that would be funded literally just by itinerant sailors sailing through, And that was in 2007, and we've now sent 29 kids through college.

Wow. That's incredible.

Yeah. And it's the best thing we did during the 17 years that we sailed for sure. But that's the kind that kind of contribution Continues to benefit our lives in so many ways knowing that we've helped so many people. And the the college that we sent them to is a teacher's college. So so many of them have gotten their teaching degree, and now they've gone back to those villages that they came from and they're helping others up that ladder.

Amazing. A that's so it's such a nice story, really powerful. Something about what you're saying reminds me of something that Adam Grant talks about as well. So I think sometimes we become so fixated if we're thinking about contribution to others the impact that we want to have on the world. We've become fixated with this idea of having a grand plan. We want to be have this huge contribution, and we want to, again, have maybe the fame associated with it. And the examples that he shared would be Mark Zuckerberg and his invention of Facebook. And, you know, it may be a kind of a whole thing around save the whales.

It has to be this big noble purpose that you have. But, actually, what you're talking about, what you're doing, and if people who are listening today are thinking it's really just about the communities that you're in and the communities around you, however you want to define that. So that could be the community where you live. It could be the community of people that you work with. And thinking about what contribution do you want to make with them. It could be thinking about the customers that you have. It could be thinking from a very personal perspective so you don't even have to find that through work. You can find it through what you're doing outside of work as well.

But thinking about what what what is the contribution that you want to make to the world a I'm kind of building on that point. I always love to talk about this idea of strengths using our strength at work. I think if we can recognize and own our strengths and use our strengths for good in the world and use that to make a contribution to society at large, but even, like, on a small scale, just 1 or 2 people within your network, within your community, within your organization. I think, that in itself is such such a noble purpose. It's thinking about the contribution that you make to other people.

Absolutely. And that comes back to the what you talked about where you love to do spreadsheets and other people don't love to do spreadsheets. So, You know, my mission today is to speak to large groups. I've done a TED talk a few months ago. It's had a 250,000 views in a few months. Right. So Yeah. That's my mission, and I love it.

When we got back to where we live in the mountains after sailing, My wife has since started 2 different nonprofits, and they are organized around helping seniors to stay in their home, and Somebody to take them shopping, or mow their lawn, or do things like that. So she's doing just the opposite of what I am. We both have a want to contribute.

A year.

And she would rather make a massive impact on 1 person's life, 1 senior who gets to stay in their home. The impact she's had on that person That they can stay in their home instead of have to go to a a a facility is massive.

Yes.

And I'm doing it just the opposite. So I'm not having that kind of massive impact on 1 person's life. I'm having a smaller impact on a lot of people's life.

A lot

of people. The all of that is finding your own personal a Zone of genius, your own purpose. And, you know, that idea of purpose, I think it's a lot of us take for granted what our own Skill set is. We think that if this comes easy to me, it comes easy to everybody.

You're speaking my language now, Ralph. A talk about this all the time. Yes.

I can't go to a piano. You could play if I closed my eyes and you hit 2 notes on a piano, you could hit 2 notes at the opposite end of the keyboard, and I couldn't tell the difference between them. I am so tone deaf, I have 0 ability. And so to me, My nephew who can hear a song on the radio one time, and then sit down and play it, that is magical. And to him he's like, hey, it's a skill he's had. He was doing it when he was 6 years old. And he's not a musician by he doesn't have it to do anything in music now. But when he was a little kid, he are had that ability.

So to him, it's not magical.

Yes.

And so we tend to downplay our own things that we're good at. So one of the ways, you know, I speak sometimes at schools and kids asking, you know, how do you figure out your purpose in life? And as I said, I think your purpose is the best of what you have to serve others. But the way to Figure out your own purpose. I think it's asking 3 different questions. 1st, it's, what am I good at? What do my friends ask me for help with? And what can I do where I get in that flow, and when I'm doing it, time just seems to disappear? I start doing it at 10 in the morning, and the next thing I know the sun is setting. So figure out what that thing is for you. And for my nephew, it could be playing the piano because it just comes so naturally to you. So something that you're good at or that you would willing to Be willing to study to get good at, but something that gives you satisfaction.

You get into flow state, your friends ask you for help with And you don't think it's a big deal maybe, but they do. So that's number 1. And then, ask yourself, Who could I solve a problem for by doing that thing? So let's take something as esoteric as writing poetry. Now you might think writing poetry is not something you could ever turn into a career or your purpose. You know, you might think that's something you can do on the side a while. You know, flip burgers for a living. But if you love to write poetry, and you're good at writing poetry, who could you solve a problem for by writing poetry? Well, country western singers and pop singers are desperate for song lyrics. So if you could write poetry, you could Solve a problem for those people.

And then the 3rd quest so who can you solve? What are you good at? Who can you solve a problem for by doing that thing? And then how can you get paid doing that? Well, obviously, if you wrote song lyrics, you would get very, very well paid. So writing poetry books doesn't pay very well, but Writing song lyrics for pop stars or country western singers pays really well. So now you've turned something that you're good at Into solving a problem for rock stars who need song lyrics and they'll pay you well for it. So those are the 3 things that could become your purpose. And now, you go after your purpose. And not only are you making a living doing it, you're helping others doing it and giving the best of yourself to others. And that's what I did. I was I was very lucky.

When I was a teenager, I knew I wanted to go into photography and film. Yeah. And when all of my friends were applying we were in high school. All my friends were applying to liberal arts colleges, and like most people, they changed their major 2 or 3 times along the way. I was really lucky. I knew I wanted to be a photographer. And then when I got to photography school, I actually converted to film, and I became a filmmaker. But then I spent my entire career making films that I wanted to make, Inspiring other peep I did a lot of sports documentaries and things like that.

So I did a, you know, film about skiing, or climbing or kayaking or sailing to inspire others to wanna go do those things. I had a television series on the travel channel, -So I traveled all over the world before our sailing. I traveled all over the world with my camera, making movies to inspire other people to, you know, see cool places in the world. And so I've always focused on doing things that gave me that eudaimonic happiness. So that's sort of where I come from in that regard.

But I think it's it's inspiring, Rob, just to hear that because so many people do things because they feel they should. The it's the expectation. They go down a certain road because that's what they think they want, and then they think it's too late to change their mind. And I think we have to remember that it's never too late. You can always a go down a different road. Like, you always have a choice. Maybe you have to make some sacrifices along the way, but you will always have a a choice over what it is that you do. This conversation has been so inspiring for me as well.

I've loved it. It ties in very closely with the work that I do. It's given me some fresh ideas as well of how I can, how I can do my work and and how I can manage my career as well that I have. So thank you for that. It almost feels redundant to ask this question since we've been talking about work happiness this entire time. But the question I do ask everyone who comes on the podcast is what does being happier at work mean to you?

Well, many many years ago, again, my reference to Tony Robbins at a Tony Robbins, program called a date with destiny. I wrote down what I thought my purpose was. And I said, my purpose is to live my dreams so I can inspire other people to live their dreams. And so that's what I've done my whole life. When I was out making a a film about, you know, travel or some wonderful place or wonderful inspiring thing to do, That film then was seen by others to inspire them to do that. And I hope that my story as I tell it about sailing or or or survival a whole experience or whatever other stories we've talked about. I did them to live my own dreams hoping that I could also inspire other people to live their dreams. And my TED talk is about that.

My TED talk, I'll just give you the title of people they can find it on YouTube if they search for my last name and the word happiness. But it's about facing your fear, so that you can find happiness. And a big part of that eudaimonic happiness is getting outside of your comfort zone. So I would say the answer to your question is figuring out what will what is your big dream that you're maybe afraid to try And go try it.

Yeah. No. That's so inspiring. And people say to me that I'm really inspiring for living my life the way I've lived it, and I've traveled quite a bit, and I've worked all over the world. I didn't do that deliberately. I just sort of you know, I'm not setting out to be an inspiration, or I'm not setting out to to blaze a trail or anything like that. I'm just living my life the way I want to live it, but other people have told me that. It's inspired them to to pursue things that they want to do, and and I love what you're saying as well about, like, facing your fear and, like, maybe there's something that you've always wanted to do.

And I know certainly there are things still in my life that I've always wanted to do that I haven't and a would take that offline. I think, Rob, I've I've always been interested in film and photography and how to turn those moments into something that inspires or gives, you know, people a feeling that maybe they didn't have before. But absolutely loved this conversation. So you you've told us about how to find your TED Talk, and I'll put a link to that in the show notes as well. If people want to connect with you, what's the best way they can do that?

Well, let's see. If they're in the United States, I'll give you a text. They can text the word happy to 33777, And I will happily send them an a short ebook with a lot of these things we've talked about here and other strategies on how to create more happiness in your life. And if they're not in the United States or either either way, they can go to my website and fill out the contact form at the bottom of my landing page, And, they and they should put, happier at work in the comment field there, the where did they hear about Where where did they hear me speak? If they put happier at work, I'll offer them a free ebook on many of the things we've talked about, and these strategies, and skills for creating more happiness in your life, starting immediately.

Love that. And it's not too fair to when you get that promotion or when you meet the partner or when you have the kids. It's right now, it's today. So absolutely love that. Thank you so much for your time today, Rob. I really, really enjoyed that conversation.

So did I. Thank you so much for having me.