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The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk

596: Arthur Brooks - The Art & Science of Happiness, Defining Your Purpose, Working with Oprah, Living Authentically, and Building The Life You Want

The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk

Ryan Hawk

Careers, Management, Business

4.81.3K Ratings

🗓️ 18 August 2024

⏱️ 62 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Read our book, The Score That Matters https://amzn.to/3XxHi7p

Full show notes at www.LearningLeader.com

Notes:

  • Arthur grew up with one goal - To be the world’s greatest French horn player. He learned that striving for something was fungible across all fields of life. It was a great laboratory for learning.
  • Intrinsic vs Extrinsic motivation - Intrinsic motivation comes from an internal desire to accomplish a goal, while extrinsic motivation comes from external rewards and praise.
  • "Misery comes from excessive auto-focus." Misery comes from thinking about yourself too much and not enough about helping others.
  • The curse of the strive... All happiness comes from progress.
    • The arrival is not the goal.
  • How to be happy while striving:
    • Be grateful - Write it down. Do it daily.
    • Always look to help others.
  • "All research is 'me-search.'"
  • The Four Idols:
    • Money, Power, Pleasure, and Prestige/Fame. We talked through ours… What are yours?
  • The Four Focus areas to help with happiness
    • Faith
    • Family
    • Friendship
    • Serving Others
  • Define your purpose. Write it down. Understand why you're here. Mine = "To inspire others to value and pursue excellence." Too many people are ok with mediocrity. We should strive for more.
  • Oprah Winfrey is the same person everywhere she goes. She is genuine and authentic to all.
  • Arthur's column helped Oprah stay positive and happy through the pandemic. So much so that she called him and asked to meet. And eventually, write a book together. That book became a #1 best-seller.
  • #1 Life Hack: "Don't lie ever."
  • Arthur is jacked (in great shape).
    • Taking care of your body helps with unhappiness.
    • Wake up 1.5 hours before dawn. Work out hard. Lift weights. Do challenging cardio.
  • Life/Career Advice:
    • Don't worry too much about the first job out of college. Don't sacrifice relationships.
    • Bring love to every relationship and be great at what you do. Be excellent.
      • Emanate love and show excellence.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Striving and learning to be excellent and hard work and personal responsibility and discipline are completely fungible across all fields.

0:07.5

All the things that I was doing were making me incredibly good at doing what I wanted to do, get me where I wanted to go, and not make me happy.

0:15.0

That was the problem.

0:17.0

What are the habits of happy people?

0:22.0

Though that's a big question.

0:23.1

Getting less unhappy is different than the habits

0:25.7

for getting more happy.

0:26.8

All happiness comes from progress.

0:28.9

That very little happiness comes from winning.

0:31.5

It comes from progress toward a goal. These are the

0:34.5

great secrets. When it comes to writing with Oprah, like how did that whole thing

0:38.8

come about? I've learned so much from Oprah, I gotta tell you, literally one of the

0:42.0

five most famous people in the world and who has equanimity.

0:45.4

The way to do that is to live a life that is impeccable in public and private and then never lie to anybody.

0:52.8

Don't lie ever.

0:54.1

Don't lie.

0:55.1

Jim Collins told me on episode number 216 that the single greatest determining factor in my long-term

1:06.8

success or failure would be my who, who I chose to surround myself with and that conversation has had a huge impact on how I've designed my business and one of the most important elements that I provide is my learning leader circle.

1:26.9

And I open up applications one time per year and that time is now at learning leader circle.com is where you can apply.

1:35.6

Now this is the most inefficient element of my business because I personally read

1:41.5

every application and I personally choose who will go on to the next round

1:46.3

and then who will ultimately be one of the 12 people to be in my next learning leader circle.

...

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