July 25, 2022 • 26 mins
David R. York is an estate planning attorney and CPA with more than 20 years of experience and has worked with over 7,000 clients, including billionaires and business owners, celebrities and sports figures, and entrepreneurs of all shapes and sizes.
He has represented first generation wealth creators, fifth generation wealth maintainers, and everything in between. He has also worked with individuals, couples and families across the wealth spectrum and countless non-profits looking to make a difference in an all too broken world.
Speaking with him about money and society was highly interesting, let us know what you think?
Remember you can get ahold of us, book speaking engagements and support this channel via our link: https://linktr.ee/LondonsLeadership_Podcast
He has represented first generation wealth creators, fifth generation wealth maintainers, and everything in between. He has also worked with individuals, couples and families across the wealth spectrum and countless non-profits looking to make a difference in an all too broken world.
Speaking with him about money and society was highly interesting, let us know what you think?
Remember you can get ahold of us, book speaking engagements and support this channel via our link: https://linktr.ee/LondonsLeadership_Podcast
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Whether you believe it or not,you are a leader in your everyday life.
Whether it's within your family, inyour work environment, or even online,
you can and will affect change inthose around you. Join me in
conversation with authors, professors and leaders, so together we can learn all things
regarding leadership and life. I'm yourhost, Fananda Carrillo, and welcome back
(00:22):
to another episode of London's Leadership Podcast. Hello everybody, Welcome back to London
Leadership Podcast. So a few episodesago, we spoke to David York and
we were talking about the eight linesof money, meaning, and happiness,
and we got through four of thoselies, which I just found fascinating.
I was thinking about them all week, and I was just telling you just
(00:44):
before we came on, I justthink you're so brilliant at capturing and articulating
these ideas, and I think it'sa real gift that you have, so
honestly, I was so excited toget to speak to you again and keep
on learning. So what are theother four? What the other four?
Why don't you tell us what arethe four lives we spoke about last time?
Just in case anyone missed that episode, but please listen to it,
(01:06):
and then what's the four that we'regoing to talk about today? Yeah,
so again I loved our conversation aswell as excited to get back on.
So the four myths we talked aboutbefore were that the life's formula for happiness
is simple, right, that moneyequals happiness, and the reality is that
is just simply not the case.The second is that a dollar equals a
(01:29):
dollar or a pound equals a pound, right, you know, And so
we talked about the fact that reallydepending on the cost of something to you,
that's where value comes, and sometimesthings can be worth more or less
to us simply for the cost that'sassociated, not the value of the thing.
Third is that all we need inlife to be content is just a
(01:53):
little bit more, right, thatmirage of if I had a little bit
more then I would be happy.And then the last is that achievement and
happiness come from focusing on achievement andhappiness. Right. That seems intuitive,
and yet the realities show, especiallyamong children, that if we focus on
(02:14):
achievement, it tends to add stressand not produce anymore achievement. We focus
on happiness, kids tend to bemore self centered, less likely to be
able to cope and actually less happy, and that really the key is to
help teaching kids empathy and other centerednessactually helps with both achievement and overall happiness.
(02:35):
So those are the first four thatwe talked about. Great, Yeah,
I found them so helpful, andI think, yeah, please go
and listen to that episode. Solet's crack on with these, with these
full the next four. Yeah,So the next one, and I hear
this all the time, and thatis you have to have money to make
money, right, or the richget richer. So I literally said that
(02:55):
today. Well, and the realityis, you know, money, wealth
is oftentimes more of a lag indicatorof time and effort than it is a
lead driver of wealth. Now,the reality is, and I totally agree
with people who have little to noresources, it's very very difficult. So
(03:21):
people who are in extreme poverty havevirtually no access to resources. Is very
hard to change those circumstances. Butthe reality is that even as if you
have just a small amount of resources, you combine that with time and effort,
you actually produce wealth. In theUnited States, we have what's called
(03:44):
the Fortune five hundred. It's thefive hundred largest companies in the in the
world, and they did a study. Nearly half of those businesses were founded
by first or second generation immigrants,So these are people who came to the
United States with little to no money. Nearly half of all patents are issued
(04:06):
in the United States to first orsecond generation immigrants. Now immigrants represent fourteen
percent of the US population. Soeven though they represent fourteen percent, they
start nearly half of the largest businesses, and yet nearly half of all the
US patents. And then Forbes haswhat's called the Richest four Hundreds. They
(04:30):
look at the four hundred wealthiest peoplein the United States. Two thirds of
those are self earned and started lifewith little to know financial resources. So
there's notion that, oh, you'rewealthy because you've always been wealthy, just
simply isn't the case. Yes,I think that's so fascinating. I think
(04:59):
people who who first generation second generationimmigrants as well, coming from nothing,
it's almost like they have an innatedrive to pursue something greater. And I
think it's the drive to achieve,the drive to win, that drive to
overcome that eventually puts them in theposition where they're able to do those things.
(05:21):
I was wondering, Yeah, Yeah, that's that's that's true. That's
really made me think because even ifyou don't have necessarily because you know,
sometimes you think, oh, ifI want to invest in this, or
if you want to invest in this, I need money to invest, but
I don't have the money to invest. If I had money, I could
(05:43):
make money. So I guess that'swhere the lie comes in. So what
so yeah, yeah, well I'mstill obviously processing it. So what do
you do with people who want tomake an investment they don't have the money,
and they say, well, moneymakes money. I can't invest,
I can't multiplied because I don't haveenough to start the initial investment. Yeah,
(06:03):
and that's why I say that wetend to think money is a lead
indicator of wealth, and to me, it's actually a lag indicator. And
what I mean by that is thevast majority of clients I've worked with anecdotally
empirically, as you look at thesestatistics, it really starts with an investment
(06:25):
of your own time and a developmentof your own talents or your own abilities.
And the reality is, the funnything is time is the great equalizer.
You know, we can talk aboutpeople who have more money, we
can talk about people who are quoteunquote more talented, which you know,
again, there's studies that show thatmost talent has developed. It's not natural
(06:50):
and innate to people. But thereality is they took their time, which
everyone has an equal allotment of,they developed their talent, and from that
they began to develop financial resources,which they then reinvested in those things,
(07:11):
and so it becomes kind of thisupward spiral as opposed to again, by
and large, as long as youhave some modicum of opportunity, the fact
that you lack financial resources is moreoften an excuse for not investing in yourself
(07:35):
than it is a reason why you'renot wealthy. So good, really really
brilliant. Nice. I think everybodyjust rewind everything he just said and listened
to that again, that is justscold. I was thinking back to my
friend Liz Wiseman, who's she's theauthor of the book Multiplieres and most recently
(07:56):
Impact Players, and I was witha conference and we were talking about we
want to talk about money. Wewere just talking about how do people get
recognized or how do people achieve orhow do people and then she just says,
don't worry about self promotion don't worryabout In other words, and I
guess we could truy you could takethat word out and say, don't worry
about making money, don't worry aboutself promoting, do good work, work
(08:22):
on yourself, and it's almost likeworking on yourself. Doing good work will
be the result of that will bethat money will come. Don't necessarily think
about, oh I don't have money. Now, it's focus on yourself,
do good work, and the resultof that would be that more money,
(08:43):
that money will come. Is thatright? Am I articulating that right from
what you've said, Yeah, Ithink so. And again setting aside some
of these myths and notions of wellI need to have this and then I
can do this, as opposed torealizing that if you have the ability to
listen to the podcast, you probablyhave access to all the resources you need
(09:05):
to accomplish what you want. Andso we need to set this aside,
this notion that well I have tohave this one thing before I can accomplish
something else. Yeah, so good, Okay, Well, well, thank
you so much. I really likethat one. Okay, let's get to
the next one. The next mythand this comes from all of us who
(09:28):
took psychology is that the top ofthe pyramid is self actualization. Right,
So you may have studied Abraham Maslow. He had that hierarchy of needs,
you know, the pyramid of wantsand needs, and we tend to think
of the top of the pyramids selfactualization, in other words, achieving and
accomplishing everything you can yourself. Andactually he said that the top of the
(09:54):
pyramid is actually self transcendence, notfreedom for yourself, but actually freedom from
yourself. On what he saw wasthat focusing on higher experiences like serving others,
caring for others, empathy. Whenwe actually started to engage with others,
(10:18):
that's when you see things like peaceand joy and feelings of freedom.
And so often we try to focuson all the things that we can do
and accomplish for ourselves. And yethe said that there was something bigger than
that, that self transcendence. VictorFrankel, he wrote Man Search for Meaning,
(10:43):
rated one of the most important booksof the twentieth century. He talked
about the dual responsibilities of freedom andresponsibility. So often we talk about freedom
and what that means for us andthe United States we were very freedom oriented,
but he talked about the importance ofresponsibility. And in the United States,
(11:07):
as you as you know, wehave on the East coast in New
York City, we have the Statueof Liberty, and it's to represent freedom.
Frankel actually proposed it. On theWest coast, we create a statue
of responsibility because he saw these astwo pillars of any society. And really,
I think it's two pillars for usas people. Freedom but which is
(11:33):
about ourselves, and responsibility, whichis about others. And how important it
is to more those two together andnot simply just focus on one to the
exclusion of the other. David,that's just again just I'm in gold,
(11:58):
you know, as you say thosethings, it's just it's brilliant. And
we were talking last time about howhow how you know true joy actually comes
when we serve others and when wewhen we die to ourselves. And I
think so much of what the worldis saying at the moment is do everything
(12:18):
for yourself, love yourself, takeyou know, take care of yourself,
protect yourself, enjoy yourself, doeverything for yourself. But what we're finding
in the world where there's the mostamount of freedom is people are are suffering
the most with with all sorts ofpersonal trauma and difficulties and and and crises,
(12:43):
and and I wonder what the worldwould look like today if we if
we were able to do that,we were able to help personal freedom,
Definitely take care of ourselves, Definitelydo everything that we can to to make
sure that we're healthily healthy, emotionally, spiritually, mentally, and but at
the same time have a responsibility forthe people around us. There's that famous
(13:09):
saying that Jesus said, love yourneighbor as yourself. And what would the
world look like if we were ableto love the person next to us,
love the world around us just asmuch as we were able to love ourselves,
if we were to if we wereable to have the statue of freedom
in our hearts and also the statueof responsibility with everyone around us, If
(13:31):
we just picture that world right now, doing everything that we do for ourselves,
we were to do put that sameamount of care into the people around
us, in the world around us, What could we do? Yeah,
you know, I talk about ita lot because I do a state planning
and I talk about this with clients. You know, what is entitlement?
We talk so much about entitlement,entitlement, mentality. It is a focus
(13:52):
on our right in the absence ofany responsibility. Right, what am I
entitled to? What's about me?What is enslavement? Enslavement is a focus
on responsibilities in the absence of rights. Right. It is when I only
have duties and obligations to others andnot for myself, then it's a form
(14:13):
of enslavement. But when you haveboth at a balance of rights and responsibilities,
that's really when you're intrusted. That'sreally someone who has that healthy balance.
And that's what I love about whatJesus said there is he's acknowledging both
of those things. Because you know, if everyone else has value, that
(14:37):
actually means you also have value too, right, And so it's not about
one to the exclusion of the other. But I think sometimes we create this
pendulum swing where it's all about everyoneelse and we lose ourselves, or it's
only about ourselves and we lose thegreater. Yes, yeah, yeah,
(15:00):
have that balance of freedom and responsibilityand and the top is not self factualization
but self transcendence. How can weserve others? And that's really where where
we're meaning, where meaning and happinesslies where we have that balance. It's
not when we care, where weput ourselves first, it's not it's not
(15:22):
it's when we when we when weserve and have that balance. So helpful.
Okay, what's the third thing.It's the it's the myth that anyone
can be an entrepreneur, you know, and I see this especially among entrepreneurs.
Everyone thinks everyone can be an entrepreneur. The reality is that entrepreneurs are
among the most uncommon, gifted,and quite frankly challenged people in the world.
(15:43):
You know, They've done studies andonly about eight percent of the US,
the of the US population is entrepreneurial, and I think that's that falls
across other cultures. And then theydid a study entrepreneurs or twice as likely
to suffer from depression, six timesmore likely to have ADHD, three times
(16:03):
more likely to deal with substance abuse, eleven times more likely to be bipolar
than the general population. And evenamong entrepreneurs who don't say they have any
diagnosable mental issues, they say they'retwice they're twice is likely to say they
come from families with mental issues.So, you know, it's fascinating to
(16:23):
me because it's a whole chicken andegg analysis, right, you know,
does entrepreneurism cause all these issues ordoes entrepreneurism draw people who have these challenges
and challenges can create strength and resilience. I mean, look at someone like
Elon Musk right, diagnosed with aspergerself you know, self reporting. And
(16:47):
so I think while entrepreneurism is great, one, I think we need to
understand the challenges of it, andtwo we need to have a level of
empathy. And that's one of thehard things is I think we saw often
want to valify people who have lotsof money or build lots of things without
realizing the struggles and challenges that theygo through because of that more exaggerated personality.
(17:15):
I just, David, the thingis, you're you're just you're brilliant.
I just want you to know.Just say that again. I'm sure
you know that I keep telling peoplethat no one believes me. Well,
I hope, Well, I'm sureI'm for people know. I've I did
a podcast with Gino Whitman. Doyou know Whitman? I think, and
he writes an entrepreneurship a lot,and then one of the things he says,
(17:38):
he gave eight characteristics of an entrepreneurand why why you're not. He
basically says, why you're not anentrepreneur? And he's an entrepreneur and he
started things and it's and it's so, so so fascinating. And I've been
close up to a few entrepreneurs nowand I think it's a very very difficult
life and you need to be Youneed to be you need to be wired,
(18:03):
like you're saying, quite uniquely,to live that life. You need
to be ready to sacrifice so much. You need to be ready to to
to be a certain type of personto enjoy certain types of hardships and be
and almost enjoy it and enjoy thethe uncertainty, enjoy and thrive in the
challenge, in the in that specifictype of challenge. And I think in
(18:26):
the world today that that's almost likesaying, Oh, everyone can do a
startup. You go and go andstart something, and it's almost and you're
I mean, I've almost felt like, oh I haven't. I haven't got
a startup. There's that felt likea failure because of it, of or
I felt like, oh maybe I'mmissing out on something. I think it's
(18:47):
so important to know that anyone couldbe an entrepreneur is a lie you need
to you know, with the statistics, that statistics that you mentioned, it's
it's only a certain type of personthat's wired to live that kind of life.
And and if you're not why tolive that way, that that life
will kill you. Yeah. Well, I and we'll recavo on everything else
(19:08):
you want to do. Yeah.So yeah, I mean, and I've
got a friend who's who's an entrepreneur, and it's and I and I just
think it's so it's so hard.It's so so so hard. Not that
I don't enjoy challenge. I enjoychallenge, but I don't enjoy that type.
I don't think i'd enjoy that typeof what it takes. Yeah,
(19:29):
And I think there's that corollary,right that just if you're not an entrepreneur
don't have that wiring, doesn't meanyou can't make an incredible impact in this
world. And it's just simply anexpression of certain traits and tendencies and characteristics.
They're no better, they're no worse, but but they are fairly different.
Yeah. Yeah, I guess Idon't mean this is I'm just I'm
(19:53):
just kind of saying I don't knowif it would be if this is exactly
right, but it's just saying anyonecan be a professor. Yeah, well
no, well you can't. Really. Well you could possibly want to be
a professor, but whether or notyou'd be good at it is another thing.
Whether or not you're wired to thinkthat way and do that kind of
thing is slightly so it's almost thesame thing, but entrepreneurs seems to be
(20:17):
slightly more sexy, and everyone wantsto do it, but not everyone's designed
to live that life, I thinkis so good. Okay, so let's
get to the fourth one. Well, yeah, the last one is is
that we need to change our thinking. Right, We're all about, oh
I just need to change my thinkingand it'll change. The reality is we
need to start thinking. You know, there's a fascinating study done by Matthew
(20:40):
Killingworth and Dan Gilbert and they foundthat nearly half the time, nearly half
of our day were spent on what'scalled autopilot. We're not even thinking about
what we're doing. And the realityis, to a certain extent, we
have to have that for survival.Right. If you if you watch a
toddler learning to walk, their focusand their concentrat is only on that you
(21:00):
can tell everything they do with theirfoot, where they're touching, how they're
balancing. It has one hundred percentof their concentration. It took one hundred
percent of our concentration to walk around. We couldn't accomplish anything. So our
brain, as we develop, naturallystarts moving things from the conscious to the
subconscious. As we get that down. The problem is we don't pick and
(21:21):
choose what we move to the subconscious. You know, you don't suddenly say,
okay, well I know how todrive now, so I'm going to
move that to the subconscious. Andyet how many of us, you know,
when we show up someplace, howdid I get here? Can't even
remember how we drove there or howwe walk someplace. And so some of
that is needed for life, butthe reality is it comes at a cost.
(21:42):
The more that we move to autopilot, the less engaged we are in
the world. And the studies showedthat when we autopilot the least. When
we're most engaged, we're actually thehappiest, and when we are autopiloting,
we're actually the least happy. Andso they did a study they said,
(22:03):
okay, look let's look at twentysix different things, and then they randomly
would text people throughout the day,Okay, what are you doing right now?
And how happy are you? Andwhat they found is that the three
things that people said they were happiestdoing, and this may not be a
surprise, we're having sex, exercising, and engaging in conversation. And that
(22:23):
also correlated to the most mindfulness.The activities that had the least level of
mental engagement were resting, working,and using an electronic device, and those
all correlated with low levels of happiness. And so you know, it makes
me think of the three p's.Right, we need to focus on purpose
(22:45):
people and polse right, we needto we need to figure out what is
our purpose live in that because that'swhen our brains are engaged. When we're
with other people, we have higherlevels of happiness, higher because we're higher
levels of mental engagement. And thenwe need to get out and move when
we when we have a higher pulserate, when we're moving around, we're
actually more engaged, we're more happy. And so I think it's really important
(23:10):
is to be mindful of when we'renot being mindful, and that tends to
correlate with lower levels of happiness.I think how you started that we don't
need to change our thinking, weneed to start thinking. And I think
just now, as you said thesethings purpose people and pulse, I think
what I've noticed from you probably whyyou're so good at this is that is
(23:32):
that I feel like you're really inthe room. I feel like you're you're
engaged, and I think it engagesme as I'm speaking to you and as
I'm learning, And I think it'sso it's so interesting in a world as
well, where where it's so easyto be an autopilot because almost like the
law of of our phones, thelaw of everything, it just makes us
almost you don't get that that timeto just be present with the people around
(23:57):
us and to really align us withthe purpose that we have around us.
It's so easy to be an autopilotthe whole time, but we're not kind
of really ever engaged with anything.And then I think the more we're able
to pull away from those things,to center ourselves, to be present with
the people around us, to beaware of our purpose and who who we
(24:21):
want to be and what we wantto do, I think that's so so
interesting that you've mentioned that and theway you've articulated that I haven't heard it
said that way when you're on,when you're an autopilot, the least we
are happiest, so so clever,David. Thank you so much. I've
(24:45):
learned so much over these past twoepisodes, and I'm sure everyone else has.
Yeah. I love that. It'sbeen great. Is there anything else
you just want to say, justto just to end, No, Like
I said, really appreciate it.If people would like to learn more.
I just finished a book stewardship calledThe Gift of Lift and it's on Amazon
and it's all about stewardship and allof these myths and realities are in that
(25:10):
book. And if you also goto David Ryork dot com, I've got
a ted talk on on wealth,what wealth really is and inheritance really is.
So anybody is looking for more resources, those are a couple of places
to check out. Brilliant. Thankyou so much, David. I've loved
speaking with you and I hope tosee you against sin. Yeah, it
sounds good. Please keep in touch, see you. Let everybody on London's
(25:33):
Leadership podcast. Thank you so muchfor joining me today. I can't wait
to see you next time, rememberto leave a review, let me know
what you think and if you needhelp implementing anything we've discussed, or you
just want to say hello, feelfree to email me at Fernando at London's
Leadership podcast dot com. Until nexttime, remember to live and lead with
love every day,
Whether you believe it or not,you are a leader in your everyday life.
Whether it's within your family, inyour work environment, or even online,
you can and will affect change inthose around you. Join me in
conversation with authors, professors and leaders, so together we can learn all things
regarding leadership and life. I'm yourhost, Fananda Carrillo, and welcome back
(00:22):
to another episode of London's Leadership Podcast. Hello everybody, Welcome back to London
Leadership Podcast. So a few episodesago, we spoke to David York and
we were talking about the eight linesof money, meaning, and happiness,
and we got through four of thoselies, which I just found fascinating.
I was thinking about them all week, and I was just telling you just
(00:44):
before we came on, I justthink you're so brilliant at capturing and articulating
these ideas, and I think it'sa real gift that you have, so
honestly, I was so excited toget to speak to you again and keep
on learning. So what are theother four? What the other four?
Why don't you tell us what arethe four lives we spoke about last time?
Just in case anyone missed that episode, but please listen to it,
(01:06):
and then what's the four that we'regoing to talk about today? Yeah,
so again I loved our conversation aswell as excited to get back on.
So the four myths we talked aboutbefore were that the life's formula for happiness
is simple, right, that moneyequals happiness, and the reality is that
is just simply not the case.The second is that a dollar equals a
(01:29):
dollar or a pound equals a pound, right, you know, And so
we talked about the fact that reallydepending on the cost of something to you,
that's where value comes, and sometimesthings can be worth more or less
to us simply for the cost that'sassociated, not the value of the thing.
Third is that all we need inlife to be content is just a
(01:53):
little bit more, right, thatmirage of if I had a little bit
more then I would be happy.And then the last is that achievement and
happiness come from focusing on achievement andhappiness. Right. That seems intuitive,
and yet the realities show, especiallyamong children, that if we focus on
(02:14):
achievement, it tends to add stressand not produce anymore achievement. We focus
on happiness, kids tend to bemore self centered, less likely to be
able to cope and actually less happy, and that really the key is to
help teaching kids empathy and other centerednessactually helps with both achievement and overall happiness.
(02:35):
So those are the first four thatwe talked about. Great, Yeah,
I found them so helpful, andI think, yeah, please go
and listen to that episode. Solet's crack on with these, with these
full the next four. Yeah,So the next one, and I hear
this all the time, and thatis you have to have money to make
money, right, or the richget richer. So I literally said that
(02:55):
today. Well, and the realityis, you know, money, wealth
is oftentimes more of a lag indicatorof time and effort than it is a
lead driver of wealth. Now,the reality is, and I totally agree
with people who have little to noresources, it's very very difficult. So
(03:21):
people who are in extreme poverty havevirtually no access to resources. Is very
hard to change those circumstances. Butthe reality is that even as if you
have just a small amount of resources, you combine that with time and effort,
you actually produce wealth. In theUnited States, we have what's called
(03:44):
the Fortune five hundred. It's thefive hundred largest companies in the in the
world, and they did a study. Nearly half of those businesses were founded
by first or second generation immigrants,So these are people who came to the
United States with little to no money. Nearly half of all patents are issued
(04:06):
in the United States to first orsecond generation immigrants. Now immigrants represent fourteen
percent of the US population. Soeven though they represent fourteen percent, they
start nearly half of the largest businesses, and yet nearly half of all the
US patents. And then Forbes haswhat's called the Richest four Hundreds. They
(04:30):
look at the four hundred wealthiest peoplein the United States. Two thirds of
those are self earned and started lifewith little to know financial resources. So
there's notion that, oh, you'rewealthy because you've always been wealthy, just
simply isn't the case. Yes,I think that's so fascinating. I think
(04:59):
people who who first generation second generationimmigrants as well, coming from nothing,
it's almost like they have an innatedrive to pursue something greater. And I
think it's the drive to achieve,the drive to win, that drive to
overcome that eventually puts them in theposition where they're able to do those things.
(05:21):
I was wondering, Yeah, Yeah, that's that's that's true. That's
really made me think because even ifyou don't have necessarily because you know,
sometimes you think, oh, ifI want to invest in this, or
if you want to invest in this, I need money to invest, but
I don't have the money to invest. If I had money, I could
(05:43):
make money. So I guess that'swhere the lie comes in. So what
so yeah, yeah, well I'mstill obviously processing it. So what do
you do with people who want tomake an investment they don't have the money,
and they say, well, moneymakes money. I can't invest,
I can't multiplied because I don't haveenough to start the initial investment. Yeah,
(06:03):
and that's why I say that wetend to think money is a lead
indicator of wealth, and to me, it's actually a lag indicator. And
what I mean by that is thevast majority of clients I've worked with anecdotally
empirically, as you look at thesestatistics, it really starts with an investment
(06:25):
of your own time and a developmentof your own talents or your own abilities.
And the reality is, the funnything is time is the great equalizer.
You know, we can talk aboutpeople who have more money, we
can talk about people who are quoteunquote more talented, which you know,
again, there's studies that show thatmost talent has developed. It's not natural
(06:50):
and innate to people. But thereality is they took their time, which
everyone has an equal allotment of,they developed their talent, and from that
they began to develop financial resources,which they then reinvested in those things,
(07:11):
and so it becomes kind of thisupward spiral as opposed to again, by
and large, as long as youhave some modicum of opportunity, the fact
that you lack financial resources is moreoften an excuse for not investing in yourself
(07:35):
than it is a reason why you'renot wealthy. So good, really really
brilliant. Nice. I think everybodyjust rewind everything he just said and listened
to that again, that is justscold. I was thinking back to my
friend Liz Wiseman, who's she's theauthor of the book Multiplieres and most recently
(07:56):
Impact Players, and I was witha conference and we were talking about we
want to talk about money. Wewere just talking about how do people get
recognized or how do people achieve orhow do people and then she just says,
don't worry about self promotion don't worryabout In other words, and I
guess we could truy you could takethat word out and say, don't worry
about making money, don't worry aboutself promoting, do good work, work
(08:22):
on yourself, and it's almost likeworking on yourself. Doing good work will
be the result of that will bethat money will come. Don't necessarily think
about, oh I don't have money. Now, it's focus on yourself,
do good work, and the resultof that would be that more money,
(08:43):
that money will come. Is thatright? Am I articulating that right from
what you've said, Yeah, Ithink so. And again setting aside some
of these myths and notions of wellI need to have this and then I
can do this, as opposed torealizing that if you have the ability to
listen to the podcast, you probablyhave access to all the resources you need
(09:05):
to accomplish what you want. Andso we need to set this aside,
this notion that well I have tohave this one thing before I can accomplish
something else. Yeah, so good, Okay, Well, well, thank
you so much. I really likethat one. Okay, let's get to
the next one. The next mythand this comes from all of us who
(09:28):
took psychology is that the top ofthe pyramid is self actualization. Right,
So you may have studied Abraham Maslow. He had that hierarchy of needs,
you know, the pyramid of wantsand needs, and we tend to think
of the top of the pyramids selfactualization, in other words, achieving and
accomplishing everything you can yourself. Andactually he said that the top of the
(09:54):
pyramid is actually self transcendence, notfreedom for yourself, but actually freedom from
yourself. On what he saw wasthat focusing on higher experiences like serving others,
caring for others, empathy. Whenwe actually started to engage with others,
(10:18):
that's when you see things like peaceand joy and feelings of freedom.
And so often we try to focuson all the things that we can do
and accomplish for ourselves. And yethe said that there was something bigger than
that, that self transcendence. VictorFrankel, he wrote Man Search for Meaning,
(10:43):
rated one of the most important booksof the twentieth century. He talked
about the dual responsibilities of freedom andresponsibility. So often we talk about freedom
and what that means for us andthe United States we were very freedom oriented,
but he talked about the importance ofresponsibility. And in the United States,
(11:07):
as you as you know, wehave on the East coast in New
York City, we have the Statueof Liberty, and it's to represent freedom.
Frankel actually proposed it. On theWest coast, we create a statue
of responsibility because he saw these astwo pillars of any society. And really,
I think it's two pillars for usas people. Freedom but which is
(11:33):
about ourselves, and responsibility, whichis about others. And how important it
is to more those two together andnot simply just focus on one to the
exclusion of the other. David,that's just again just I'm in gold,
(11:58):
you know, as you say thosethings, it's just it's brilliant. And
we were talking last time about howhow how you know true joy actually comes
when we serve others and when wewhen we die to ourselves. And I
think so much of what the worldis saying at the moment is do everything
(12:18):
for yourself, love yourself, takeyou know, take care of yourself,
protect yourself, enjoy yourself, doeverything for yourself. But what we're finding
in the world where there's the mostamount of freedom is people are are suffering
the most with with all sorts ofpersonal trauma and difficulties and and and crises,
(12:43):
and and I wonder what the worldwould look like today if we if
we were able to do that,we were able to help personal freedom,
Definitely take care of ourselves, Definitelydo everything that we can to to make
sure that we're healthily healthy, emotionally, spiritually, mentally, and but at
the same time have a responsibility forthe people around us. There's that famous
(13:09):
saying that Jesus said, love yourneighbor as yourself. And what would the
world look like if we were ableto love the person next to us,
love the world around us just asmuch as we were able to love ourselves,
if we were to if we wereable to have the statue of freedom
in our hearts and also the statueof responsibility with everyone around us, If
(13:31):
we just picture that world right now, doing everything that we do for ourselves,
we were to do put that sameamount of care into the people around
us, in the world around us, What could we do? Yeah,
you know, I talk about ita lot because I do a state planning
and I talk about this with clients. You know, what is entitlement?
We talk so much about entitlement,entitlement, mentality. It is a focus
(13:52):
on our right in the absence ofany responsibility. Right, what am I
entitled to? What's about me?What is enslavement? Enslavement is a focus
on responsibilities in the absence of rights. Right. It is when I only
have duties and obligations to others andnot for myself, then it's a form
(14:13):
of enslavement. But when you haveboth at a balance of rights and responsibilities,
that's really when you're intrusted. That'sreally someone who has that healthy balance.
And that's what I love about whatJesus said there is he's acknowledging both
of those things. Because you know, if everyone else has value, that
(14:37):
actually means you also have value too, right, And so it's not about
one to the exclusion of the other. But I think sometimes we create this
pendulum swing where it's all about everyoneelse and we lose ourselves, or it's
only about ourselves and we lose thegreater. Yes, yeah, yeah,
(15:00):
have that balance of freedom and responsibilityand and the top is not self factualization
but self transcendence. How can weserve others? And that's really where where
we're meaning, where meaning and happinesslies where we have that balance. It's
not when we care, where weput ourselves first, it's not it's not
(15:22):
it's when we when we when weserve and have that balance. So helpful.
Okay, what's the third thing.It's the it's the myth that anyone
can be an entrepreneur, you know, and I see this especially among entrepreneurs.
Everyone thinks everyone can be an entrepreneur. The reality is that entrepreneurs are
among the most uncommon, gifted,and quite frankly challenged people in the world.
(15:43):
You know, They've done studies andonly about eight percent of the US,
the of the US population is entrepreneurial, and I think that's that falls
across other cultures. And then theydid a study entrepreneurs or twice as likely
to suffer from depression, six timesmore likely to have ADHD, three times
(16:03):
more likely to deal with substance abuse, eleven times more likely to be bipolar
than the general population. And evenamong entrepreneurs who don't say they have any
diagnosable mental issues, they say they'retwice they're twice is likely to say they
come from families with mental issues.So, you know, it's fascinating to
(16:23):
me because it's a whole chicken andegg analysis, right, you know,
does entrepreneurism cause all these issues ordoes entrepreneurism draw people who have these challenges
and challenges can create strength and resilience. I mean, look at someone like
Elon Musk right, diagnosed with aspergerself you know, self reporting. And
(16:47):
so I think while entrepreneurism is great, one, I think we need to
understand the challenges of it, andtwo we need to have a level of
empathy. And that's one of thehard things is I think we saw often
want to valify people who have lotsof money or build lots of things without
realizing the struggles and challenges that theygo through because of that more exaggerated personality.
(17:15):
I just, David, the thingis, you're you're just you're brilliant.
I just want you to know.Just say that again. I'm sure
you know that I keep telling peoplethat no one believes me. Well,
I hope, Well, I'm sureI'm for people know. I've I did
a podcast with Gino Whitman. Doyou know Whitman? I think, and
he writes an entrepreneurship a lot,and then one of the things he says,
(17:38):
he gave eight characteristics of an entrepreneurand why why you're not. He
basically says, why you're not anentrepreneur? And he's an entrepreneur and he
started things and it's and it's so, so so fascinating. And I've been
close up to a few entrepreneurs nowand I think it's a very very difficult
life and you need to be Youneed to be you need to be wired,
(18:03):
like you're saying, quite uniquely,to live that life. You need
to be ready to sacrifice so much. You need to be ready to to
to be a certain type of personto enjoy certain types of hardships and be
and almost enjoy it and enjoy thethe uncertainty, enjoy and thrive in the
challenge, in the in that specifictype of challenge. And I think in
(18:26):
the world today that that's almost likesaying, Oh, everyone can do a
startup. You go and go andstart something, and it's almost and you're
I mean, I've almost felt like, oh I haven't. I haven't got
a startup. There's that felt likea failure because of it, of or
I felt like, oh maybe I'mmissing out on something. I think it's
(18:47):
so important to know that anyone couldbe an entrepreneur is a lie you need
to you know, with the statistics, that statistics that you mentioned, it's
it's only a certain type of personthat's wired to live that kind of life.
And and if you're not why tolive that way, that that life
will kill you. Yeah. Well, I and we'll recavo on everything else
(19:08):
you want to do. Yeah.So yeah, I mean, and I've
got a friend who's who's an entrepreneur, and it's and I and I just
think it's so it's so hard.It's so so so hard. Not that
I don't enjoy challenge. I enjoychallenge, but I don't enjoy that type.
I don't think i'd enjoy that typeof what it takes. Yeah,
(19:29):
And I think there's that corollary,right that just if you're not an entrepreneur
don't have that wiring, doesn't meanyou can't make an incredible impact in this
world. And it's just simply anexpression of certain traits and tendencies and characteristics.
They're no better, they're no worse, but but they are fairly different.
Yeah. Yeah, I guess Idon't mean this is I'm just I'm
(19:53):
just kind of saying I don't knowif it would be if this is exactly
right, but it's just saying anyonecan be a professor. Yeah, well
no, well you can't. Really. Well you could possibly want to be
a professor, but whether or notyou'd be good at it is another thing.
Whether or not you're wired to thinkthat way and do that kind of
thing is slightly so it's almost thesame thing, but entrepreneurs seems to be
(20:17):
slightly more sexy, and everyone wantsto do it, but not everyone's designed
to live that life, I thinkis so good. Okay, so let's
get to the fourth one. Well, yeah, the last one is is
that we need to change our thinking. Right, We're all about, oh
I just need to change my thinkingand it'll change. The reality is we
need to start thinking. You know, there's a fascinating study done by Matthew
(20:40):
Killingworth and Dan Gilbert and they foundthat nearly half the time, nearly half
of our day were spent on what'scalled autopilot. We're not even thinking about
what we're doing. And the realityis, to a certain extent, we
have to have that for survival.Right. If you if you watch a
toddler learning to walk, their focusand their concentrat is only on that you
(21:00):
can tell everything they do with theirfoot, where they're touching, how they're
balancing. It has one hundred percentof their concentration. It took one hundred
percent of our concentration to walk around. We couldn't accomplish anything. So our
brain, as we develop, naturallystarts moving things from the conscious to the
subconscious. As we get that down. The problem is we don't pick and
(21:21):
choose what we move to the subconscious. You know, you don't suddenly say,
okay, well I know how todrive now, so I'm going to
move that to the subconscious. Andyet how many of us, you know,
when we show up someplace, howdid I get here? Can't even
remember how we drove there or howwe walk someplace. And so some of
that is needed for life, butthe reality is it comes at a cost.
(21:42):
The more that we move to autopilot, the less engaged we are in
the world. And the studies showedthat when we autopilot the least. When
we're most engaged, we're actually thehappiest, and when we are autopiloting,
we're actually the least happy. Andso they did a study they said,
(22:03):
okay, look let's look at twentysix different things, and then they randomly
would text people throughout the day,Okay, what are you doing right now?
And how happy are you? Andwhat they found is that the three
things that people said they were happiestdoing, and this may not be a
surprise, we're having sex, exercising, and engaging in conversation. And that
(22:23):
also correlated to the most mindfulness.The activities that had the least level of
mental engagement were resting, working,and using an electronic device, and those
all correlated with low levels of happiness. And so you know, it makes
me think of the three p's.Right, we need to focus on purpose
(22:45):
people and polse right, we needto we need to figure out what is
our purpose live in that because that'swhen our brains are engaged. When we're
with other people, we have higherlevels of happiness, higher because we're higher
levels of mental engagement. And thenwe need to get out and move when
we when we have a higher pulserate, when we're moving around, we're
actually more engaged, we're more happy. And so I think it's really important
(23:10):
is to be mindful of when we'renot being mindful, and that tends to
correlate with lower levels of happiness.I think how you started that we don't
need to change our thinking, weneed to start thinking. And I think
just now, as you said thesethings purpose people and pulse, I think
what I've noticed from you probably whyyou're so good at this is that is
(23:32):
that I feel like you're really inthe room. I feel like you're you're
engaged, and I think it engagesme as I'm speaking to you and as
I'm learning, And I think it'sso it's so interesting in a world as
well, where where it's so easyto be an autopilot because almost like the
law of of our phones, thelaw of everything, it just makes us
almost you don't get that that timeto just be present with the people around
(23:57):
us and to really align us withthe purpose that we have around us.
It's so easy to be an autopilotthe whole time, but we're not kind
of really ever engaged with anything.And then I think the more we're able
to pull away from those things,to center ourselves, to be present with
the people around us, to beaware of our purpose and who who we
(24:21):
want to be and what we wantto do, I think that's so so
interesting that you've mentioned that and theway you've articulated that I haven't heard it
said that way when you're on,when you're an autopilot, the least we
are happiest, so so clever,David. Thank you so much. I've
(24:45):
learned so much over these past twoepisodes, and I'm sure everyone else has.
Yeah. I love that. It'sbeen great. Is there anything else
you just want to say, justto just to end, No, Like
I said, really appreciate it.If people would like to learn more.
I just finished a book stewardship calledThe Gift of Lift and it's on Amazon
and it's all about stewardship and allof these myths and realities are in that
(25:10):
book. And if you also goto David Ryork dot com, I've got
a ted talk on on wealth,what wealth really is and inheritance really is.
So anybody is looking for more resources, those are a couple of places
to check out. Brilliant. Thankyou so much, David. I've loved
speaking with you and I hope tosee you against sin. Yeah, it
sounds good. Please keep in touch, see you. Let everybody on London's
(25:33):
Leadership podcast. Thank you so muchfor joining me today. I can't wait
to see you next time, rememberto leave a review, let me know
what you think and if you needhelp implementing anything we've discussed, or you
just want to say hello, feelfree to email me at Fernando at London's
Leadership podcast dot com. Until nexttime, remember to live and lead with
love every day,
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