In this lesson's episode, we're going to talk about how to escape the approval trap.

I'm going to show you why popular advice fails, why you need to stop making this safe choice,

why we're trapped in this system designed to keep you average.

We're going to talk about Winston Churchill.

We're going to talk about World War II.

And hopefully, by the end of this podcast, you're going to understand how to stop living for other people's opinions and start thinking independently about what you actually want.

This is going to be one of the most difficult truths for you to come to terms with, but it is one of the most important truths for you to come to terms with if you'd like to build anything meaningful, if you'd like to have a happy, fulfilling, successful life. Popular is usually wrong. We have been

conditioned to do what's popular. We have been conditioned to do what's likable, to keep the peace,

to avoid conflict, to make everyone comfortable. Society has taught us that success comes from

playing nice, following the rules, never making waves.

And there's a moment in everyone's life when they realize that they've been living for an audience that doesn't even care about the show.

The sad thing is, for many people, it's just really late in their life.

But for me, it happened when I was 25.

And I found myself explaining to my parents why I was quitting a job that looked perfect on paper. And the conversation lasts about three hours. And they used words like practical and realistic. And I used words like authentic and meaningful. And we were speaking very different languages. But what struck me wasn't their disappointment. I'd expect the disappointment. It was my own

desperation to make them understand. And even as I argued for my right to choose my own path,

I was still performing for their approval. And that conversation taught me something very important.

The desire for approval doesn't disappear just because you intellectually know that it's limiting

you. It's wired into us at a biological level. And for most of human history, social rejection

met death. Your nervous system still can't tell the difference between disappointing your family

and being exiled from the tribe. And this is why most advice about being yourself misses the point.

The problem isn't that people don't know what they want. The problem is that they know exactly

what they want and they also know it will disappoint the people they care about. But here's

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