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August 7, 2025 19 mins

In this My Legacy Bonus Drop, best-selling author and leadership visionary Simon Sinek reflects on the joy he witnessed in rural Kenya—and how one woman’s story shook his beliefs about success, wealth, and what it means to live well. 

  • What a mud-hut village taught him about true happiness 
  • Why connection—not comfort—is the antidote to our addiction to wealth 
  • The surprising science behind fulfillment and imagination 

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Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is My Legacy. Welcome to this week's bonus Drop.
Today we're sharing more from our conversation with Simon Sinek,
best selling author and leadership visionary, as he reflects on
how one extraordinary woman challenged everything he thought he knew
about happiness and helped him finally confront what he was
truly addicted to.

Speaker 2 (00:18):
Simon, I wanted to ask you a really important question
that's based on the philosophy of the book, What is
my legacy? And what we try to do is really
lean into doctor King's concept of the bloved community. But
we find that around connection, and we find that around
the idea of fulfillment and leading a fulfilled life. And
you being a philosopher and an incredibly practical leader, So

(00:39):
putting those two hats on a practical philosopher.

Speaker 3 (00:41):
I love that.

Speaker 2 (00:42):
I love that you can coin that in your opinion
based on your experience, how does one live and lead
a fulfilled life?

Speaker 3 (00:49):
So I think fulfillment comes from.

Speaker 4 (00:53):
Knowing that your life and or your work are contributing
to something bigger than yourself, and that is relative to
one zones, ambitions, and goals. You know, somebody who's devoted
themselves to parenthood and sees a child flourish and going
to be something bigger than themselves. Will find that feeling,
but coming to work simply to make money. It's exciting

(01:16):
at the beginning, but it doesn't contribute to a feeling
of lifelong contribution.

Speaker 3 (01:23):
And this is where vision matters. You know. Vision is.

Speaker 4 (01:28):
An idealized version of the world we want to live in.
And when your dad said I had a dream, he
was articulating a world that did not exist, still doesn't exist.
It's an ideal state that we strive towards. We'll never
get there, but we'll die trying. And that's sort of
the point, and all of the markers, all of the progress,
all of the waypoints, you know, three steps forwards, two

(01:50):
steps back, three steps forwards are proof that we're getting
closer and closer and closer to this idealized state. And
that's what leads to a fulfilled life. That I'm making
progress to a world that is better than the one
we live in now.

Speaker 2 (02:02):
And how do you find fulfillment and your unhurt?

Speaker 3 (02:05):
So I have a vision of the world that doesn't exist.

Speaker 4 (02:08):
I imagine a world in which the vast majority of
people wake up every single morning inspired, feel safe wherever
they are, and end the day fulfilled by the work
that they do. And I strive to build that world
in my work. You'll see it in my writing, You'll
see it in my speaking, You'll see it in the
products that we sell on our website. They're all contributing
to advancing towards that vision. But it's how I work

(02:29):
very hard to show up.

Speaker 3 (02:30):
As a person. That's how I am as a friend.

Speaker 4 (02:32):
You know, if you ask my friends what do you
love about Simon, you know, invariably they'll say something to
the effect of I can sit in a room with him,
I don't even have to talk to them, and I
feel inspired. You know my standard. When I come off
a stage, I don't want to be It's very nice
when people say that was interesting. It's very nice when
you say you're entertaining. You know, that's all lovely, and
I appreciate those those compliments. But the one that fills

(02:54):
me is when you when people tell me that was inspiring.
And so it's work.

Speaker 3 (03:00):
You know, it's work to do those things.

Speaker 4 (03:03):
But when I when I when I'm advancing that and
it's imperfect, and I'm imperfect, and it sometimes doesn't work,
and sometimes I'm grumpy and sometimes I forget, But when
it works, it is deeply satisfying on a very very deep, deep,
deep level.

Speaker 5 (03:18):
Simon, I don't know if you realize this, but I
used to monitor the klu Klux Klan and Neil Nazis
and skin his I tell you that, you know, one
of the things that we we play a lot when
things get very heavy in our home is Doctor King's
speeches and sermons. And I love the way. There's one
in particular that that I that recharges me. And he

(03:40):
talks about the fact of liking and loving. He says
that he's happy that in the Bible it says that
you don't have to like your enemies. And he went
on to say, because there's some people that you just
won't like. And he said, you know, I won't like
the man that bombed my home and almost you know,
killed my child. Now I won't like them. I can't
like the man who you know bombed the church and

(04:02):
killed you know, four children. But then he went on
to talk about love. And I think that it always
is a misconception when we talk about love, because people
automatically think about the sentimentality of love. It's an acknowledgment
and when we start from number one, separating if we're
talking not from our friends and those who we have
love for, but society at large. It starts with separating

(04:25):
the evil act from the individual. And I also think
it for me, it gives me great relief to know
that I don't have to like everybody, you know, and
that's okay to not have to like everybody. It is
the acknowledgment of our shared humanity and coming I think
from that place, which I think is another way of
what you're saying.

Speaker 3 (04:44):
That's so good and.

Speaker 4 (04:46):
It's so right, which is, you know, we're supposed to
love our fellow human being, but we don't have to
like everybody.

Speaker 3 (04:53):
I think we.

Speaker 4 (04:54):
Conflate and confuse these words and these feelings because we
add the sentiment mentality.

Speaker 3 (05:01):
You know.

Speaker 4 (05:01):
It is an interesting comparison. Have you ever watched the
TV show First forty eight. It's kind of an insane show.
It's reality TV where it's basically following homicide detectives, and
homicide detectives are not like regular beat cops. You know,
cops are some of the most cynical people you'll ever meet.
Because they generally see people at their worst on a

(05:22):
day to day basis, you know, But homicide cops are
completely different breed, and they have the sense that everyone,
no one deserves to have their life taken. And like
they'll investigate the deaths of drug dealers, no one's gonna
miss them. They've been a blight on society, They've done damage.
They may have caused harm themselves, but damn it, it's

(05:45):
not for another person to decide when they live or die,
and they seek justice, and I just I'm always fascinated
how they seem to have love, but they definitely don't
have like yes, and to see how it affects the
way that they approach the world is very, very different.

Speaker 5 (06:03):
Like follow and subscribe to my Legacy podcast and most importantly,
share this with someone who needs their reminder of their
strength today. Back in a moment, now, back to my
legacy Simon.

Speaker 6 (06:19):
As we as we sat here talking, and what kept
running through my mind was you described solitary confinement is
a form of torture. How we need each other in
connection and the last time we spent meaningful time together,
we were in a far off corner of the world
and we were reflecting on the McMansions, the gated communities,

(06:40):
the closed doors, and how in North America people seem
to strive to work so hard to earn enough money
to pull themselves away from everyone else. They want to
be on the private plane, they want to be on
the McMansion, they want to be in the gated community.
And the irony is that they are shutting themselves off
from others. And so when I look at our time
in Kenya, I was reflected by the fact that you

(07:01):
said one of the most inspirational people you ever met
was Mama Jane yep. And you know, to our listeners
and those watching, they're gonna go Mama who they won't.
But like you were with President Biden for God's sakes
last month and you said, one of the most inspirational
people you met was Mama Jane.

Speaker 3 (07:16):
So can you share her story.

Speaker 4 (07:18):
So one of the things that is for anybody who
comes from the West when you go to Africa, especially
when you go to rural Africa, which is where we were,
where there is real poverty, like the tropes of the
mud huts yep that live in mud huts. Yeah, that
we have this assumption that because they have less in

(07:40):
terms of money or material wealth, that they are unhappy.
And yet you meet people who are in these circumstances
who don't die of heart disease, they don't get as
many cancers as we do, they don't have diabetes, and
they're smiling all the time. Now, let's not confuse feeling

(08:05):
wealthy and happy with struggle. They absolutely struggle. Their lives
are absolutely difficult, and they are with each other and
help each other. And I came to the lesson that
I learned from that trip is we are so arrogant
in our wealth that we just assume that people who

(08:26):
don't have our wealth must be unhappy, which is the
same mentality as a heroin addict feeling unhappy for all
the people who don't do heroin because they don't have
hour high. Ah, all you people who are sober, you
don't feel how good I feel, completely neglecting the fact
that we're addicts. We are addicted to money and they

(08:48):
are not. And yes they have struggle, and yes they
have needs, and yes we want to help them and
they should be helped, and they're learning how to help themselves.
But they are happier. And you look at the kids too.
And there's data on this. There's data that shows that
kids who have fewer toys have better imaginations and actually

(09:10):
have more excitement. So like, again, we go from the
West and we go to Africa and we see the
kids playing with a stick and attire and we're like, oh,
poor kids, they only have a stick and attire. And
yet they're laughing and they're smiling and they're giggling the
whole time. You know why, because they have an imagination
that is not a stick and attire, that is something
that is a game they're playing in their minds. And

(09:32):
I came back from that trip realizing that I'm an
addict like everybody who lives in the West, and I
would rather foster a relationship and relationships like theirs, and again,
the ability to separate struggle from happiness, they're not the
same thing. And Mama Jane is this community leader, self

(09:53):
appointed community leader because she decided she wanted a house
that wasn't a mud hut a brick house, which is expensive,
and she figured out a way to sell the milk
from her cows. That she would walk hours to go
to the center of the city to sell her milk
and over the course of time, she saved up enough money.

(10:14):
She goes into the village, She goes into the center
of town, finds a builder and says, I want to
build a house. She says, this is the money I have.
He goes, well, that won't build your house. That'll build
you a couple of walls. She goes, well, let's start there.
And she eventually saves up enough money and works hard enough,
and she builds a house, a house that she invited
us into and is immensely proud of. And she helped
the other mamas, the other women, the other mothers in

(10:37):
the area, to teach them how to also save up
and also build their own houses. And the part that
really got me was the joy that she had, the
smile on her face, the expression of absolute pride when
describing one of her friends or one of the people
in her community who built a better house than hers. Now,

(11:00):
we don't do that in the West. We want our
house to be the biggest, We want our house to
be the best. We want You know, what did Teddy
Roosevelt say? You know, comparison is the thief of joy.
And I love that he used the word thief. It
steals a feeling from me.

Speaker 3 (11:17):
That's why he was like, yeah, that's comparison is the
thief of joy.

Speaker 4 (11:20):
And we live a world where we watch social media,
where everybody's friends are prettier, everybody's vacations are better, everybody's
life is more complete, everybody's achieving their financial goals, everybody's
in shape, everybody's.

Speaker 3 (11:31):
Going out to great meals.

Speaker 4 (11:33):
I can know because they keep taking pictures of their food,
and and we sit at home by ourselves, scrolling, thinking,
I hate my life. And the thing that I found
so amazing about these magical human beings is also when
we went to one of the schools and we met.
We went to a girls school of high school, as

(11:55):
you know because you took me there. And they have
cell phones, they have Instagram, they have social media, they
have access to the internet. They are not addicted because
they spent a life fostering relationship and they're just not
addicted because they have real friends. And it immediately goes.

(12:15):
It reminds me of an experiment. You know, most of
our understanding of addiction comes from some experiments that were
done in the fifties and sixties where they put a
rat in a cage and they gave it two flasks
of water, one just plain water and one that's laced
with drugs. It tries both of them. It likes the

(12:37):
drug laced one. It eventually gets addicted and drinks so
much of the drug laced water until it dies. Okay,
and most of our understanding of addiction comes from these experiments,
except the experiment is flawed. A guy by the name
of Bruce Alexander recognizes that rats, like human beings, are
social animals, and if you put a social animal by
itself in a cage with drugs, it's going to get

(12:58):
addicted to the drugs. So he recreated the experiment, except
he made it more realistic.

Speaker 3 (13:03):
He called it rat Park. He put a.

Speaker 4 (13:04):
Huge cage with lots of rats and mazes and wheels,
and they are having babies and community and friends, the
whole deal. And they put up two flasks of water,
one plane, one drug lace. They all tried both. They
all tried enough of the drug lace one to get addicted,
except they didn't. They can see from the data that
they drank the plane water. So it starts to give
evidence that if we have a strong set of community,

(13:25):
and if we have close relationships, we become less susceptible
to all addiction, and so, yes, social media is insidious. Yes,
the social media companies actually absolutely bear some responsibility and
they can't do buyer beware.

Speaker 3 (13:38):
That's nonsense.

Speaker 4 (13:39):
That's like giving somebody you know a fentanyl and saying, well,
not our problem.

Speaker 3 (13:44):
No no, no, no no.

Speaker 4 (13:45):
Buyer beware is you don't get You don't get a
free pass. If you don't like it, turn it off.
That doesn't it's not how addiction works. But if you
take lonely people and you give them an addictive thing,
they're more likely to get addicted. These kids in this
high school in Kenya, because they had such close friendships
and they were taught how to be friends and they
help each other because they had to, just aren't addicted

(14:07):
to the same addictive things that we are. And so
it becomes I think we have a lot more to
learn from rural Kenyans than than than we can teach them.
I think we are so arrogant to think that they
should learn our way of life. I think we should
learn theirs.

Speaker 3 (14:27):
Yeah. I came away pretty humbled.

Speaker 5 (14:28):
My greatest takeaway from Kenya is that, well, first of all,
when we were traveling, we saw all of the satellites
on the houses, so I thought initially maybe the difference
was not having technology to your point, and that's that's
not it. What I loved too was that you said, Mama, Jane,

(14:49):
is that all of the mothers are called mama, and
you call each other, you know, so it doesn't matter
who is the the biological mom. You know, it's like
you know, and so it to me it represented that
that sense of community and connection, that you truly are
mother to all and that you know you that it

(15:10):
really is that it takes a village. We see the
embodiment of that even in the power of language and words.

Speaker 3 (15:18):
It's an horrific right.

Speaker 4 (15:19):
Yeah, it's just such a good observation, and you see
it in places like India and other parts of Asia
as well, where friends family friends are auntie and uncle.
And it also bestows not only a respect, but also
a sense of community and responsibility.

Speaker 2 (15:34):
Simonelri and Kenya, you were so kind to join the
four of us to another five of us to become
co chancellors of a college called Legacy College. And it's
this amazing facility where we do programming for students in
business tourism and nursing and then also international programming. And
you were inspired by that college and you inspired the

(15:55):
students of that college. Why did that college speak to
your heart?

Speaker 4 (15:59):
I mean, it's pretty humbling to recognize that my work
has made.

Speaker 3 (16:03):
It to rural Africa in a big way.

Speaker 4 (16:05):
You know, where the kids there had my books that
they wanted me to sign. I mean, that's pretty humbling,
you know, so superficially that's that struck me.

Speaker 2 (16:17):
Of course, they were so excited to meet you, Timon, but.

Speaker 4 (16:19):
Thank you and I them. But I think the thing
that inspired me more than anything was the purity of
their desire to learn.

Speaker 3 (16:28):
They are such good students with you know here.

Speaker 4 (16:32):
You know, if another tech startup tells me about their
first principles, you know, I'm gonna like just gagmas with
a spoon, just like nobody knows what they're talking about
when they're talk about first principles, which is beginner's mindset
and all beginner's mindset and first principles means is I'm
going to pretend that I don't know anything and be
a student of whatever it is, except we're not very

(16:53):
good at it, and they really are, and they show
up with unbridled curiosity.

Speaker 3 (17:00):
They show up with no ego.

Speaker 4 (17:02):
They show up humbled that they have so much more
to learn from people who know more than them. They
have nothing to prove, and as a result, they are
smarter than us, They are more communal than us, they
are more successful than us. I mean, let's be honest,
the speed at which they learned. I mean, let's just
talk about those high school girls again. Microsoft generously donated,
I think it was Microsoft generously donated a bunch of

(17:24):
computers to this high school and they show up. The
story that we were told is they showed up with
all these laptops all connected to the internet, and these
kids had These are teenagers, these are high school girls
that have never seen a laptop in their lives. They've
never touched one, they've never used one, they've never used
a computer. And Microsoft said they would train them and

(17:44):
expected this would take months and months and months for
something that we all grew up with. And I think
it was days, days that the kids were completely fluent
and ready to go.

Speaker 2 (17:53):
Days they were shocked, like they.

Speaker 3 (17:56):
Couldn't believe it.

Speaker 4 (17:57):
And it's because you talk to these kids. They speak
multiple languages, they they ask the most brilliant questions, And
I think you can tell a lot about someone's level
of curiosity and intelligence by the questions they ask. And
these high school kids were asking me better questions than
I get from most adults in the United States. So

(18:17):
so again, I think there's a I think there's a
humility we need to learn. We have a lot more
than they do, for sure. But but it's not always healthy.
It's not always healthy.

Speaker 2 (18:29):
So we've talked about love, connection, fulfillment, friendship showing up.

Speaker 3 (18:34):
Now we have to talk about cats.

Speaker 2 (18:35):
We can talk about cats and dogs.

Speaker 3 (18:37):
I'm a dog.

Speaker 4 (18:38):
Person, but you know the difference between cat people and
dog people. Dog people wish their dogs were people, and
cat people wish they were cats.

Speaker 3 (18:51):
Think about it.

Speaker 4 (18:52):
It's right, there's no Andrew Lloyd Weber musical about dogs.

Speaker 3 (18:57):
That's weird.

Speaker 4 (18:58):
Nobody dressed up as a dog for Halloween.

Speaker 3 (19:00):
Yes, it's cats for Halloween.

Speaker 2 (19:01):
Well, my wife's I have one hundred and twenty pound
Bernize Mountain dog and my wife lovely says, there's three
of us in the relationship.

Speaker 3 (19:06):
Right there, you go, because people who are dog people
are people.

Speaker 1 (19:13):
Thank you for joining us. If you enjoy Today's conversation. Subscribe, share,
and follow us on at my Legacy movement on social
media and YouTube. New episodes drop every Tuesday, with bonus
content every Thursday. At its core, this podcast honors doctor
King's vision of the beloved community and the power of connection.

(19:35):
A Legacy Plus Studio production distributed by iHeartMedia creator and
executive producer Suzanne Hayward Come executive producer Lisa Lyle. Listen
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