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 Bring a little optimism into your life with The Bright Side, a new kind of daily podcast from Hello Sunshine, hosted by me, Danielle Robay.
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And me, Simone Boyce.
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Every weekday, we're bringing you conversations about culture, the latest trends, inspiration, and so much more.
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I am so excited about this podcast, The Bright Side.
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You guys are giving people a chance to shine a light on their lives, shine a light on a little advice that they want to share.
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 Listen to The Bright Side on America's number one podcast network, iHeart.
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Open your free iHeart app and search The Bright Side.
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Hey, everyone, this is Molly and Matt, and we're the hosts of Grown Up Stuff How to Adult, a podcast from Ruby Studio and iHeart Podcasts.
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It's a show dedicated to helping you figure out the trickiest parts of adulting.
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 like how to start planning for retirement, creating a healthy skincare routine, understanding when and how much to tip someone, and so much more.
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Let's learn about all of it and then some.
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Listen to Grown Up Stuff How to Adult on America's number one podcast network, iHeart.
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Open your free iHeart app and search Grown Up Stuff.
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This is the story of how a group of people brought music back to Afghanistan by creating their own version of American Idol.
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 The joy they brought to the nation.
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You're free completely.
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No one is there to destroy you.
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The danger they endured.
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They said my head should be cut off.
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I'm John Legend.
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Listen to Afghan Star on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
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SPEAKER_05
 Hey, everyone.
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So I've got an extremely, extremely special treat for each and every one of you today.
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What I'm going to be sharing with you is chapter one of the audio book for my book, Think Like a Monk.
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Now, if you've been reading along, you can hear this chapter for absolutely free today.
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And if you love it, you can go and grab yourself a copy at thinklikeamonkbook.com.
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It's on Apple Books, Audible, audiobooks.
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I can't wait for you to listen to this.
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 It's one of my favorite chapters in the book and I can't wait to share it with you.
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So listen in, share your best insight and thank you so much.
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I am what I think I am.
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It is better to live your own destiny imperfectly than to live an imitation of somebody else's life with perfection.
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 Bhagavad Gita, 335.
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In 1902, the sociologist Charles Horton Cooley wrote, I am not what I think I am, and I am not what you think I am.
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I am what I think you think I am.
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Let that blow your mind for a moment.
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Our identity is wrapped up in what others think of us, or more accurately, what we think others think of us.
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 Not only is our self-image tied up in how we think others see us, but most of our efforts at self-improvement are really just us trying to meet that imagined ideal.
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If we think someone we admire sees wealth as success, then we chase wealth to impress that person.
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If we imagine that a friend is judging our looks, we tailor our appearance in response.
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In West Side Story, Maria meets a boy who's into her.
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 What's her very next song?
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I Feel Pretty.
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As of this writing, the world's only triple Best Actor Oscar winner, Daniel Day-Lewis, has acted in just six films since 1998.
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He prepares for each role extensively, immersing himself completely in his character.
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 For the role of Bill the Butcher in Martin Scorsese's Gangs of New York, he trained as a butcher, spoke with a thick Irish accent on and off set, and hired circus performers to teach him how to throw knives.
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And that's only the beginning.
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He wore only authentic 19th century clothing and walked around Rome in character, starting arguments and fights with strangers.
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Perhaps thanks to that clothing, he caught pneumonia.
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 Day-Lewis was employing a technique called method acting, which requires the actor to live as much like his character as possible in order to become the role he's playing.
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 This is an incredible skill and art but often method actors become so absorbed in their character that the role takes on a life beyond the stage or screen.
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I will admit that I went mad, totally mad, Day-Lewis said to The Independent years later, admitting the role was not so good for my physical or mental health.
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 Unconsciously, we're all method acting to some degree.
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We have personas we play online, at work, with friends, and at home.
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These different personas have their benefits.
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They enable us to make the money that pays our bills.
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They help us function in a workplace where we don't always feel comfortable.
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They let us maintain relationships with people we don't really like but need to interact with.
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 But often, our identity has so many layers that we lose sight of the real us if we ever knew who or what that was in the first place.
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We bring our work role home with us and we take the role we play with our friends into our romantic life without any conscious control or intention.
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 However successfully we play our roles, we end up feeling dissatisfied, depressed, unworthy and unhappy.
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The I and me, small and vulnerable to begin with, get distorted.
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We try to live up to what we think others think of us, even at the expense of our values.
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 Rarely, if ever, do we consciously, intentionally create our own values.
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We make life choices using this twice-reflected image of who we might be without really thinking it through.
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Cooley called this phenomenon the looking glass self.
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 We live in a perception of a perception of ourselves and we've lost our real selves as a result.
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How can we recognize who we are and what makes us happy when we're chasing the distorted reflection of someone else's dreams?
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 You might think that the hard part about becoming a monk is letting go of the fun stuff.
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Partying, sex, watching TV, owning things, sleeping in an actual bed.
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Okay, the bed part was pretty rough.
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But before I took that step, there was a bigger hurdle I had to overcome.
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Breaking my career choice to my parents.
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 By the time I was wrapping up my final year of college, I decided what path I wanted to take.
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I told my parents I would be turning down the job offers that had come my way.
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I always joke that as far as my parents were concerned, I had three career options, doctor, lawyer, or failure.
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There's no better way to tell your parents that everything they did for you was a waste than to become a monk.
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 Like all parents, mine had dreams for me, but at least I had eased them into the idea that I might become a monk.
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Every year since I was 18, I'd spend part of the summer interning at a finance job in London and part of the year training at the ashram in Mumbai.
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By the time I made my decision, my mother's first concern was the same as any mother's, my well-being.
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 Would I have healthcare?
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Was seeking enlightenment just a fancy way of saying sitting around all day?
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Even more challenging for my mother was that we were surrounded by friends and family who shared the doctor-lawyer-failure definition of success.
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 Word spread that I was making this radical move, and her friend started saying, but you've invested so much in his education, and he's been brainwashed, and he's going to waste his life.
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My friends too thought I was failing at life.
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I heard, you're never going to get a job again, and you're throwing away any hope of earning a living.
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 When you try to live your most authentic life, some of your relationships will be put in jeopardy.
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Losing them is a risk worth bearing.
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Finding a way to keep them in your life is a challenge worth taking on.
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Luckily to my developing monk mind, the voices of my parents and their friends were not the most important guidelines I used when making this decision.
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Instead, I relied on my own experience.
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 Every year since I was 18, I had tested both lives.
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I didn't come home from my summer finance jobs feeling anything but hungry for dinner.
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But every time I left the ashram, I thought, that was amazing.
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I just had the best time of my life.
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Experimenting with these widely diverse experiences, values, and belief systems helped me understand my own.
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 The reactions to my choice to become a monk are examples of the external pressures we all face throughout our lives.
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Our families, our friends, society, media.
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We are surrounded by images and voices telling us who we should be and what we should do.
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They clamor with opinions and expectations and obligations.
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Go straight from high school to the best college, find a lucrative job, get married, buy a home, have children, get promoted.
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 cultural norms exist for a reason.
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There is nothing wrong with a society that offers models of what a fulfilling life might look like.
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But if we take on these goals without reflection, we'll never understand why we don't own a home or we're not happy where we live, why our job feels hollow, whether we even want a spouse or any of the goals we're striving for.
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 My decision to join the ashram turned up the volume of opinions and concerns around me.
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But conveniently, my experiences in the ashram had also given me the tools I needed to filter out that noise.
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The cause and the solution were the same.
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I was less vulnerable to the noises around me, telling me what was normal, safe, practical, best.
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I didn't shut out the people who loved me.
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 I cared about them and didn't want them to worry, but neither did I let their definitions of success and happiness dictate my choices.
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 It was, at the time, the hardest decision I'd ever made.
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And it was the right one.
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The voices of parents, friends, education, and media all crowd a young person's mind, seeding beliefs and values.
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Society's definition of a happy life is everybody's and nobody's.
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The only way to build a meaningful life is to filter out that noise and look within.
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 This is the first step to building your monk mind.
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We will start this journey the way monks do, by clearing away distractions.
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First we'll look at the external forces that shape us and distract us from our values.
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Then we will take stock of the values that currently shape our lives and reflect on whether they're in line with who we want to be and how we want to live.
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 When you find that bright spot to help you get through your day, it's powerful.
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That's where The Bright Side comes in.
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A new daily podcast from Hello Sunshine that's bringing you a daily dose of joy.
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I'm Danielle Robay.
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And I'm Simone Boyce.
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Listen, both Danielle and I are reporters.
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We've covered the news and we know the world can feel heavy, but The Bright Side podcast is a space to have a little fun, to learn something new and get into some friendly debates.
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 That's right.
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Join us five days a week to see how life can look from the bright side.
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We'll hear from celebrities, authors, experts and listeners like you, whether it's relationships, friend advice or figuring out how to navigate life's transitions.
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We'll talk through it all together.
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Listen to the bright side from Hello Sunshine every weekday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
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 When the Taliban banned music in Afghanistan, millions were plunged into silence.
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Radios were smashed.
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Cassettes burned.
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You could be beaten or jailed or killed for breaking the rules.
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And yet, Afghans did it anyway.
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This is the story of how a group of people brought music back to Afghanistan by creating their own version of American Idol.
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SPEAKER_10
 The danger they endured.
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SPEAKER_06
They said my head should be cut off.
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The joy they brought to the nation.
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You're free completely.
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No one is there to destroy you.
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I'm John Legend.
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Listen to Afghan Star on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
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 A new season of Bridgerton is here.
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And with it, a new season of Bridgerton, the official podcast.
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I'm your host, Gabrielle Collins.
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And this season, we are bringing fans even deeper into the ton.
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Colin Bridgerton has returned from his travels abroad.
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Is Betrothal written in the stars for the eligible bachelor?
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 Meanwhile, the ton is reverberating with speculation of who holds Lady Whistledown's pen.
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We're discussing it all.
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I sit down with Nicola Coughlin, Luke Newton, Shonda Rhimes, and more to offer an exclusive peek behind the scenes of each episode of the new season.
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 Watch season three of the Shondaland series on Netflix.
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Then fall in love all over again by listening to Bridgerton, the official podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
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Subscribe to catch a new episode every Thursday.
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SPEAKER_05
 Is this dust or is it me?
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Karangadasa offered me a beautiful metaphor to illustrate the external influences that obscure our true selves.
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We are in a storeroom lined with unused books and boxes full of artifacts.
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Unlike the rest of the ashram which is always tidy and well swept, this place is dusty and draped in cobwebs.
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The senior monk leads me up to a mirror and says,
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 What can you see?
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Through the thick layer of dust, I can't even see my reflection.
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I say as much and the monk nods.
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Then he wipes the arm of his robe across the glass.
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A cloud of dust puffs into my face, stinging my eyes and filling my throat.
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He says, your identity is a mirror covered with dust.
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 When you first look in the mirror, the truth of who you are and what you value is obscured.
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Clearing it may not be pleasant, but only when that dust is gone can you see your true reflection.
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This was a practical demonstration of the words of Chaitanya, a 16th century Bengali Hindu saint.
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Chaitanya called the state of affairs cheto-darpana-marjanam, or clearance of the impure mirror of the mind.
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 The foundation of virtually all monastic traditions is removing distractions that prevent us from focusing on what matters most, finding meaning in life by mastering physical and mental desires.
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Some traditions give up speaking, some give up sex, some give up worldly possessions, and some give up all three.
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In the ashram, we lived with just what we needed and nothing more.
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 I experienced firsthand the enlightenment of letting go.
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When we're buried in non-essentials, we lose track of what is truly significant.
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I'm not asking you to give up any of these things, but I want to help you recognize and filter out the noise of external influences.
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This is how we clear the dust and see if those values truly reflect you.
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 Guiding values are the principles that are most important to us and that we feel should guide us, who we want to be, how we treat ourselves and others.
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Values tend to be single word concepts like freedom, equality, compassion, honesty.
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That might sound rather abstract and idealistic, but values are really practical.
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They're a kind of ethical GPS we can use to navigate through life.
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 If you know your values, you have directions that point you toward the people and actions and habits that are best for you.
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Just as when we drive through a new area, we wander aimlessly without values, we take wrong turns, we get lost, we're trapped by indecision.
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 Values make it easier for you to surround yourself with the right people, make tough career choices, use your time more wisely, and focus your attention where it matters.
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Without them, we're swept away by distraction.
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Where values come from.
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Our values don't come to us in our sleep.
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We don't think them through consciously.
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Rarely do we even put them into words, but they exist nonetheless.
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 Everyone is born into a certain set of circumstances and our values are defined by what we experience.
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Were we born into hardship or luxury?
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Where did we receive praise?
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Parents and caregivers are often our loudest fans and critics.
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Though we might rebel in our teenage years, we are generally compelled to please and imitate those authority figures.
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 Looking back, think about how your time with your parents was spent.
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Playing, enjoying, conversation, working on projects together.
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What did they tell you was most important?
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And did it match what mattered most to them?
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Who did they want you to be?
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What did they want you to accomplish?
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How did they expect you to behave?
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Did you absorb these ideals?
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And have they worked for you?
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 From the start, our educations are another powerful influence.
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The subjects that are taught, the cultural angle from which they are taught, the way we are expected to learn.
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A fact-driven curriculum doesn't encourage creativity.
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A narrow cultural approach doesn't foster tolerance for people from different backgrounds and places.
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And there are few opportunities to immerse ourselves in our passions, even if we know them from an early age.
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 This is not to say that school doesn't prepare us for life, and there are many different educational models out there, some of which are less restrictive.
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But it is worth taking a step back to consider whether the values you carried from school feel right to you.
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 The media mind game.
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As a monk, I learned early on that our values are influenced by whatever absorbs our minds.
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We're not our minds, but the mind is the vehicle by which we decide what is important in our hearts.
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The movies we watch, the music we hear, the books we read, the TV shows we binge, the people we follow online and offline.
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What's on your news feed is feeding your mind.
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 The more we are absorbed in celebrity gossip, images of success, violent video games, and troubling news, the more our values are tainted with envy, judgment, competition, and discontent.
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Observing and evaluating are key to thinking like a monk, and they begin with space and stillness.
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 For monks, the first step in filtering the noise of external influences is a material letting go.
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I had three stints visiting the ashram, graduated college, then officially became a monk.
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After a couple of months of training at the Bhaktivedanta Manor, a temple in the countryside north of London, I headed to India, arriving at the village ashram in the beginning of September 2010.
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 I exchanged my relatively stylish clothes for two robes, one to wear and one to wash.
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I forfeited my fairly slick haircut for no hair, our heads were shaved, and I was deprived of almost all opportunities to check myself out.
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The ashram contained no mirrors except the one I would later be shown in the storeroom.
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 So we monks were prevented from obsessing over our appearance, ate a simple diet that rarely varied, slept on thin mats laid on the floor, and the only music we heard was the chants and bells that punctuated our meditations and rituals.
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We didn't watch movies or TV shows, and we received limited news and email on shared desktop computers in a communal area.
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 Nothing took the place of these distractions except space, stillness, and silence.
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When we tune out the opinions, expectations, and obligations of the world around us, we begin to hear ourselves.
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In that silence, I began to recognize the difference between outside noise and my own voice.
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I could clear away the dust of others to see my core beliefs.
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 I promised you I wouldn't ask you to shave your head and don robes.
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But how, in the modern world, can we give ourselves the space, silence, and stillness to build awareness?
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Most of us don't sit down and think about our values.
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We don't like to be alone with our own thoughts.
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Our inclination is to avoid silence to try to fill our heads to keep moving.
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 In a series of studies, researchers from the University of Virginia and Harvard asked participants to spend just 6 to 15 minutes alone in a room with no smartphone, no writing instruments and nothing to read.
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The researchers then let them listen to music or use their phones.
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Participants not only preferred their phones and music, many of them even chose to zap themselves with an electric shock rather than be alone with their thoughts.
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 If you go to a networking event every day and have to tell people what you do for a living, it's hard to step away from that reduction of who you are.
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If you watch Real Housewives every night, you start to think that throwing glasses of wine in your friends' faces is routine behavior.
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When we fill up our lives and leave ourselves no room to reflect, those distractions become our values by default.
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 We can't address our thoughts and explore our minds when we're preoccupied.
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Nor does just sitting in your home teach you anything.
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There are three ways I suggest you actively create space for reflection.
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First, on a daily basis, I recommend you sit down to reflect on how the day went and what emotions you're feeling.
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 Second, once a month, you can approximate the change that I found at the ashram by going someplace you've never been before to explore yourself in a different environment.
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This can be anything from visiting a park or a library you've never been to before to taking a trip.
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Finally, get involved in something that's meaningful to you, a hobby, a charity, a political cause.
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 Another way to create space is to take stock of how we are filling the space that we have and whether those choices reflect our true values.
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 Try this.
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Where did your values come from?
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It can be hard to perceive the effects these casual influences have on us.
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Values are abstract, elusive, and the world we live in constantly pushes blatant and subliminal suggestions as to what we should want and how we should live and how we form our ideas of who we are.
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Write down some of the values that shape your life.
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Next to each, write the origin.
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 Put a checkmark next to each value that you truly share.
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Here's an example.
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Let's say the value you wrote is kindness and the origin is your parent.
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Is it true to me?
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Is it something that resonates?
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Yes.
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Now let's look at another value or what you've chosen to value, a specific type of appearance.
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What is the origin?
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Maybe it's media.
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 Is it true to me?
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Do I really want to look that way for me?
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Not in the same way.
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Now let's look at another value of wealth.
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Where did our values around wealth come from?
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Maybe the origin is our parents.
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Is it true to me?
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No, maybe I don't value wealth in the same way my parents did.
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And let's take a look at a few more.
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Let's say you value good grades and the origin comes from school.
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And is it true to me?
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 It's interfered with real learning.
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The value of knowledge, how you value knowledge and to what degree, what's the origin, school, is it true to me?
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Yes.
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And the value of family, the way you perceive family, where does that come from?
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The origin is tradition.
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Is it true to me?
0
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Family, yes, but not in the traditional way.
0
SPEAKER_03
 Guess what, Mango?
0
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What's that, Will?
0
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So iHeart is giving us a whole minute to promote our podcast, Part-Time Genius.
0
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I know, that's why I spent my whole week composing a haiku for the occasion.
0
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It's about my emotional journey in podcasting over the last seven years, and it's called Earthquake House.
0
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Mango, I'm going to cut you off right there.
0
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Why don't we just tell people about our show instead?
0
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Yeah, that's a better idea.
0
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So every week on Part-Time Genius, we feed our curiosity by answering the world's most important questions.
0
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Things like, when did America start dialing 911?
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 is William Shatner's best acting work in Esperanto.
0
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Also, what happened to Esperanto?
0
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Plus, we cover questions like how Chinese is your Chinese food?
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How do dollar stores stay in business?
0
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And of course, is there an Illuminati of cheese?
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There absolutely is.
0
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And we are risking our lives by talking about it.
0
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But if you love mind blowing facts, incredible history and really bad jokes, make your brains happy and tune in to Part Time Genius.
0
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Listen to Part Time Genius on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts.
0
SPEAKER_08
 Hey everyone, this is Molly and Matt and we're the hosts of Grown Up Stuff How to Adult, a podcast from Ruby Studio and iHeart Podcasts.
0
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It's a show dedicated to helping you figure out the trickiest parts of adulting.
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Like how to start planning for retirement, creating a healthy skincare routine, understanding when and how much to tip someone, and so much more.
0
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We're back with season two of the podcast, which means more opportunities to glow up and become a more responsible and better adult, one life lesson at a time.
0
SPEAKER_08
And let me just tell you.
1
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 This show is just as much for us as it is for you.
1
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So let's figure this stuff out together.
1
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This season, we're going to talk about whether or not we're financially and emotionally ready for dog ownership.
1
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We're going to figure out the benefits of a high-yield savings account.
1
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And what exactly are the duties of being a member of the wedding party?
1
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All that plus so much more.
1
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Let's learn about all of it and then some.
1
SPEAKER_02
Listen to Grown Up Stuff How to Adult on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
1
SPEAKER_05
 Parents, ready to discover a new educational and interactive podcast for kids?
1
SPEAKER_05
Join Stories for Kids by Lingokids, where episodes are packed with fun activities.
1
SPEAKER_05
Right, Elliot?
1
SPEAKER_04
Oh, yes!
1
SPEAKER_04
We learned how to recycle at the beach.
1
SPEAKER_04
 That was great fun!
1
SPEAKER_04
Cowie, what do you say?
1
SPEAKER_04
It was!
1
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And that time when we did the science experiment and Billy made raisins dance!
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That is so cool, Billy!
1
SPEAKER_05
He did!
1
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Not to mention when a certain Elliot took up swimming classes with Lisa.
1
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That was me!
1
SPEAKER_05
Bet you can't catch me!
1
SPEAKER_05
I'm going to get you!
1
SPEAKER_05
 All this fun and more in our Stories for Kids.
1
SPEAKER_05
Lingokid Stories for Kids is now available on Story Button, the kid-friendly device for screenless podcast listening.
1
SPEAKER_05
Listen to Stories for Kids on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
1
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 No matter what you think your values are, your actions tell the real story.
1
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What we do with our spare time shows what we value.
1
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For instance, you might put spending time with your family at the top of your list of values, but if you spend all your free time playing golf, your actions don't match your values, and you need to do some self-examination.
1
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Time.
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First, let's assess how you spend the time when you're not sleeping or working.
1
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 Researchers have found that by the end of our lives, on average, each of us will spend 33 years in bed, 7 years of which will be spent trying to sleep, a year and 4 months exercising and more than 3 years on vacation.
1
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 If you're a woman, you'll spend 136 days getting ready.
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If you're a man, this number drops to 46 days.
1
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These are just estimates of course, but our daily choices add up.
1
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Try this.
1
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Audit your time.
1
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 Spend a week tracking how much time you devote to the following, family, friends, health and self.
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Note that we're leaving out sleeping, eating and working.
1
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Work in all its forms can sprawl without boundaries.
1
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If this is the case for you, then set your own definition of when you are officially at work and make extra work one of your categories.
1
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 The areas where you spend the most time should match what you value the most.
1
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Say the amount of time that your job requires exceeds how important it is to you.
1
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That's a sign that you need to look very closely at that decision.
1
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You're deciding to spend time on something that doesn't feel important to you.
1
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What are the values behind that decision?
1
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Are your earnings from your job ultimately serving your value?
1
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Media.
1
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 When you did your audit, no doubt a significant amount of your time was spent reading or viewing media.
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Researchers estimate that on average each of us will spend more than 11 years of our lives looking at a TV and social media.
1
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Perhaps your media choices feel casual, but time reflects values.
1
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 There are many forms of media, but most of us aren't overdoing it on movies, TV or magazines.
1
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It's all about devices.
1
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Conveniently, your iPhone will tell you exactly how you're using it.
1
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Under settings, look at the screen time report for the last week and you'll see how much time you spend on social media, games, mail and browsing the web.
1
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 If you don't like what you see, you can even set limits for yourself.
1
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On Android, you can look at your battery usage under settings.
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Then, from the menu, choose show full device usage.
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Or you can download an app like Social Fever or My Addictometer.
1
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Money.
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Like time, you can look at the money you spend to see the values by which you live.
1
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Exclude necessities like home, dependence, car, bills, food, and debt.
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 Now look at your discretionary spending.
1
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What was your biggest investment this month?
1
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Which discretionary areas are costing you the most?
1
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Does your spending correspond to what matters most to you?
1
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We often have an odd perspective on what's worth it that doesn't quite make sense if you look at all your expenditures at once.
1
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 I was advising someone who complained that the family was overspending on after school classes for the kids until she realized that she spent more on her shoes than on their music lessons.
1
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 Seeing posts on social media that compared spending and our priorities got me thinking about how the ways we spend our time and money reveal what we value.
1
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A 60-minute TV show?
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Flew by.
1
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A 60-minute lunch with family?
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Will it ever end?
1
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Everyday coffee habit.
1
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$4 a day, almost $1,500 a year.
1
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Need it.
1
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 Fresh, healthy food choices, an extra $1.50 a day, about $550 a year, not worth it.
1
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15 minutes of scrolling social media, me time.
1
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15 minutes of meditation, no time.
1
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 It's all in how you see it.
1
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When you look at a month of expenses, think about whether discretionary purchases were long or short term investments, a great dinner out or a dance class.
1
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Were they for entertainment or enlightenment for yourself or someone else?
1
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If you have a gym membership but only went once this month and spent more on wine, you have some rethinking to do.
1
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Curate your values.
1
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 Doing a self-audit tells you the values that have crept into your life by default.
1
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The next step is to decide what your values are and whether your choices are in alignment with them.
1
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Contemplating monk values may help you identify your own.
1
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Our teachers at the ashram explained that there are higher and lower values.
1
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Higher values propel and elevate us toward happiness, fulfillment, and meaning.
1
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 lower values demote us toward anxiety, depression and suffering.
1
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According to the Gita, these are the higher values and qualities.
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 Fearlessness.
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Purity of mind.
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Gratitude.
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Service and charity.
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Acceptance.
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Performing sacrifice.
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Deep study.
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Austerity.
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Straightforwardness.
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Nonviolence.
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Truthfulness.
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Absence of anger.
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Renunciation.
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Perspective.
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Restraint from fault finding.
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Compassion toward all living beings.
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Satisfaction.
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Gentleness or kindness.
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Integrity.
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Determination.
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 Notice that happiness and success are not among these values.
1
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These are not values, they're rewards, the end game.
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And we will address them further in chapter four.
1
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 The six lower values are greed, lust, anger, ego, illusion, and envy.
1
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The downside of the lower values is that they so readily take us over when we give them space to do so.
1
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But the upside is that there are a lot fewer of them.
1
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Or, as my teacher Gaurangadas reminded us, there are always more ways to be pulled up than to be pulled down.
1
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 We can't pull a set of values out of thin air and make sweeping changes overnight.
1
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Instead, we want to let go of the false values that fill the space in our lives.
1
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The ashram gave us monks the opportunity to observe nature, and our teachers called our attention to the cycles of all living things.
1
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 Leaves sprout, transform and drop.
1
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Reptiles, birds and mammals shed their skins, feathers, fur.
1
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Letting go is a big part of the rhythm of nature, as is rebirth.
1
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We humans cling to stuff, people, ideas, material possessions, copies of Marie Kondo's book, thinking it's unnatural to purge.
1
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But letting go is a direct route to space.
1
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Literally.
1
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And stillness.
1
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 We separate ourselves, emotionally if not physically, from the people and ideas who fill up our lives and then we take time to observe the natural inclinations that compel us.
1
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 Choices come along every day and we can begin to weave values into them.
1
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Whenever we make a choice, whether it's as big as getting married or as small as an argument with a friend, we are driven by our values, whether they are high or low.
1
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 If these choices work out well for us, then our values are in alignment with our actions.
1
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But when things don't work out, it's worth revisiting what drove the decision you made.
1
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Try this, past values.
1
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Reflect on the three best and three worst choices you've ever made.
1
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Why did you make them?
1
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What have you learned?
1
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How would you have done it differently?
1
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 Take a close look at your answers.
1
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Buried in them are your values.
1
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 Why did you make a choice?
1
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You may have been with the right or wrong person for the same reason, because you value love.
1
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Or maybe you moved across the country because you wanted a change.
1
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The underlying value may be adventure.
1
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Now do the same thing for the future.
1
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Look at your biggest goals to see if they're driven by other people, tradition, or media-driven ideas of how we should live.
1
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Try this, value-driven decisions.
1
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 For the next week, whenever you spend money on a non-necessity or make a plan for how you will spend your free time, pause and think.
1
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What is the value behind the choice?
1
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It takes only a second, a flash of consideration.
1
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Ideally, this momentary pause becomes instinctive so that you're making conscious choices about what matters to you and how much energy you devote to it.
1
SPEAKER_00
 Filter OEOs, don't block them.
1
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Once you filter out the noise of opinions, expectations and obligations, OEOs, you will see the world through different eyes.
1
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The next step is inviting the world back in.
1
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When I ask you to strip away outside influences, I don't want you to tune out the whole world indefinitely.
1
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Your monk mind can and must learn from other people.
1
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The challenge is to do so consciously by asking ourselves simple questions.
1
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 What qualities do I look for or admire in family, friends or colleagues?
1
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Are they trust, confidence, determination, honesty?
1
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Whatever they may be, these qualities are in fact our own values.
1
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The very landmarks we should use to guide ourselves through our own lives.
1
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When you're not alone, surround yourself with people who fit well with your values.
1
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 It helps to find a community that reflects who you want to be.
1
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A community that looks like the future you want.
1
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Remember how hard it was for me to start living like a monk during my final year of college?
1
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And now, it's hard for me to live in London, surrounded by the people I grew up with and their ways of living.
1
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I'm tempted to sleep in, gossip, judge others.
1
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A new culture helped me redefine myself.
1
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And another new culture helped me continue on my path.
1
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 Every time you move homes or take a different job or embark on a new relationship, you have a golden opportunity to reinvent yourself.
1
SPEAKER_00
Multiple studies show that the way we relate to the world around us is contagious.
1
SPEAKER_00
A 20-year study of people living in a Massachusetts town showed that both happiness and depression spread within social circles.
1
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 If a friend who lives within a mile of you becomes happier, then the chance that you are also happy increases by 25%.
1
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The effect jumps higher with next door neighbours.
1
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 Who you surround yourself with helps you stick to your values and achieve your goals.
1
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You grow together.
1
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If you want to run a 245 marathon, you don't train with people who run a 445.
1
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If you want to be more spiritual, expand your practice with other spiritual people.
1
SPEAKER_00
If you want to grow your business, join a local chamber of commerce or an online group of business owners who are similarly driven toward that kind of success.
1
SPEAKER_00
 If you're an overworked parent who wants to make your kids your priority, cultivate relationships with other parents who prioritize their kids so you can exchange support and advice.
1
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Better yet, where possible, cross groups.
1
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Foster relationships with family-oriented spiritual entrepreneurs who run marathons.
1
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 Okay, I'm kidding.
1
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Yeah, in today's world where we have more ways to connect than ever, platforms like LinkedIn and Meetup and tools like Facebook groups make it easier than ever to find your tribe.
1
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If you're looking for love, look in places that are value-driven, like service opportunities, fitness or sports activities, a series of lectures on a topic that interests you.
1
SPEAKER_00
If you're not sure where others fit in relation to your values, ask yourself a question.
1
SPEAKER_00
 When I spend time with this person or group, do I feel like I'm getting closer to or further away from who I want to be?
1
SPEAKER_00
The answer could be clear cut.
1
SPEAKER_00
It's obvious.
1
SPEAKER_00
If you're spending 4 hours at a time playing FIFA soccer on PS2, not that I've ever done that, versus engaging in meaningful interactions that improves the quality of your life.
1
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Or the answer could be more vague.
1
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 a feeling like irritability or mental fuzziness after you spend time with them.
1
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It feels good to be around people who are good for us.
1
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It doesn't feel good to be around people who don't support us or bring out our bad habits.
1
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Try this companion audit.
1
SPEAKER_00
Over the course of a week, make a list of the people with whom you spend the most time.
1
SPEAKER_00
List the values that you share next to each person.
1
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 Are you giving the most time to the people who align most closely with your values?
1
SPEAKER_00
Who you talk to, what you watch, what you do with your time, all of these sources push values and beliefs.
1
SPEAKER_00
If you're just going from one day to the next without questioning your values, you'll be swayed by what everyone else, from your family to hordes of marketing professionals, wants you to think.
1
SPEAKER_00
I remind myself of the moment in the storeroom all the time.
1
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 A thought comes into my mind and I ask myself, does this fit my chosen values or those that others have selected for me?
1
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Is this dust or is it me?
1
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When you give yourself space and stillness, you can clear the dust and see yourself, not through others' eyes but from within.
1
SPEAKER_00
 Identifying your values and letting them guide you will help you filter external influences.
1
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In the next chapter, these skills will help you filter out unwanted attitudes and emotions.
1
SPEAKER_03
 Guess what, Will?
1
SPEAKER_03
What's up, Mango?
1
SPEAKER_03
I've been trying to write a promo for our podcast, Part-Time Genius, but even though we've done over 250 episodes, we don't really talk about murders or cults.
1
SPEAKER_03
I mean, we did just cover the Illuminati of cheese, so I feel like that makes us pretty edgy.
1
SPEAKER_03
We also solve mysteries like how Chinese is your Chinese food and how do dollar stores make money?
1
SPEAKER_03
And then, of course, can you game a dog show?
1
SPEAKER_03
So what you're saying is everyone should be listening.
1
SPEAKER_03
Listen to Part-Time Genius on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts.
1
SPEAKER_01
 A new season of Bridgerton is here.
1
SPEAKER_01
And with it, a new season of Bridgerton, the official podcast.
1
SPEAKER_01
I'm your host, Gabby Collins.
1
SPEAKER_01
And this season, we are bringing fans even deeper into the ton.
1
SPEAKER_01
Watch season three of the Shondaland series on Netflix.
1
SPEAKER_01
Then fall in love all over again by listening to Bridgerton, the official podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
1
SPEAKER_01
Subscribe to catch a new episode every Thursday.
1
SPEAKER_05
 Discover a new educational and interactive podcast, Stories for Kids by Lingokids.
1
SPEAKER_05
Our episodes are packed with fun activities.
1
SPEAKER_05
Right, Elliot?
1
SPEAKER_04
Oh, yes!
1
SPEAKER_04
We went shape hunting around the block, and we found spheres and cubes on the street.
1
SPEAKER_04
That was great fun.
1
SPEAKER_05
Join Stories for Kids, the Lingokids podcast, inspiring you to learn while having fun.
1
SPEAKER_05
Listen to Stories for Kids on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.