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Expand your world and realize every challenge that s ever been brought to me has made me more.
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I ve become more so I can serve more.
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So I can enjoy more.
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That s why we re here in this life.
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To bring more good, more great.
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To bring insight, to bring strength, to bring action.
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That s why we re here.
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Welcome to the Tony Robbins podcast.
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You re listening to an episode that s part of a special season on contribution called Force for Good.
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We re exploring the 10 gifts of life, emotion, drive, growth, joy, gratitude, connection, consciousness, grace, presence, and forgiveness.
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You ll hear Tony explain each gift and then hear stories of true heroes that illustrate how they show up in real life.
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We hope you enjoy this episode on the power of forgiveness.
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I can still see it, like when I closed my eyes, I was totally conscious through the whole thing.
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And it was like the entire world just slowed down and it was silent, except for just this crunching sound of my bones breaking.
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I could see the ground, the sky, the ground, the sky.
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And then finally it stopped.
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And I could see how far I d flipped by how long it was taking Sean to get there.
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And he just got terror on his face.
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Sarah Foley was on a trip in southern Utah with her boyfriend Sean and their four dogs when something happened that would change her life forever.
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She flipped on a four-wheeler and the damage to her body was so severe that she would never fully recover the use of her legs.
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Like anyone who has experienced this level of tragedy, the kind of accident that changes your future in an instant.
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She was flooded with so many feelings, it was like a torrent of emotions.
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Yet there was a hidden feeling, deep underneath, that didn t come to the surface until much later in her journey.
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You re going to hear more about that in this episode.
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But first, let s hear from Toni about the F-word we often try to ignore.
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While we continue our series, this How to Have an Extraordinary Life on an Extraordinary Holiday, the power we re going to talk about today, let me ask you a question.
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It s a really simple one.
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Have you ever been stuck?
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Have you ever been in a place where you were frustrated, you re angry, you re sad, or you re worried, or you re stressed, and you just couldn t get yourself out of it?
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Usually that happens because there s a lack of forgiveness.
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Forgiveness to others or yourself.
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In other words, you ve established in your mind how life should be, and you want to make yourself crazy.
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You can tell life how it should be, but that s how life is.
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I can say how people should speak, how they should act, what they should do, but then people are going to do what they do.
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And most of the challenges we have in our life are because we have unmet expectations.
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And it s like, if you want to make God laugh, tell her your expectations.
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Tell her your plan.
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We ve heard these types of examples before.
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What I really want to say is if you re going to have a magnificent holiday, if you re going to have a magnificent, extraordinary life, you ve got to get good at forgiveness.
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Because the illusion is that there s something to forgive, that someone did something to us, when in reality, most of the time, people are doing the best they can with the resources they have.
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Listen, have you ever snapped at somebody unfairly and felt bad about it afterwards, had nothing
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you re in.
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It s not an excuse, but you understand.
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Well, then have you ever been snapped at?
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You might want to remember that you ve been a person who s snapped too.
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We re all doing the best we can.
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And yes, at sometimes we re resourceful and things slow and sometimes not.
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So if you want an extraordinary life, you can t have a life filled with joy and gratitude and happiness and fulfillment.
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If everyone has to behave a certain way, act a certain way, talk a certain way that meets your needs, because here s the real truth.
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You usually are really not forgiving yourself.
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The truth of the matter is, we don t all live the way we think we should, act the way we should, work out the way we should, treat our kids every moment that we should, have the mental mindset that we should every moment.
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I don t know, but he does.
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And so the ability to just let go, that s all forgiveness is, is let go and let God, or let go and move on.
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Let go and let s move to something better.
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rather than hanging on.
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The other day, I saw an interesting interview.
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I don t know where it was.
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It was on YouTube, or somebody sent me something.
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And it was this professor.
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And the professor held up a glass of water.
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He said, how much does this water weigh?
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One student raised their hand and said, 8 ounces.
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Another said, 12 ounces.
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He said, now, what s the absolute weight of this water?
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And there was a long pause, and no one could figure out what he was talking about.
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He said, well, if I hold it here for a moment, it might be 8 ounces.
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But if I hold it here for an hour, he said, it s going to weigh much more heavily on my body.
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And if I hold it for a month, I might actually destroy my shoulder.
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See, let it go.
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Just let it go.
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You want a holiday gift?
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Give someone forgiveness.
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Give yourself forgiveness.
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Just let it go.
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It s a gift you give yourself.
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I had the privilege of meeting Nelson Mandela, such an unbelievable soul.
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Talk about somebody for forgiveness.
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Somebody locks you up for doing nothing wrong for a quarter of a century.
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If he came out of there wanting to kill every white person around, you wouldn t condone it, but you d understand why he d feel that way.
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But instead, he said while he was there, he was preparing so that when he came out, he could help lead his country in a different place, white and black together.
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That s an incredible level of forgiveness.
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You go, well, he s an amazing soul.
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That s true.
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But so are you.
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And so am I.
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It s this capacity to understand that resentment just destroys us.
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The person you hurt and you don t forgive is you.
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Mandela himself said, resentment is like drinking poison and then expecting your enemy to die.
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This holiday season, why not have some radical forgiveness?
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Why not free yourself, your family, your in-laws, somebody who s hurt you by just thinking, hey, really we re in survival.
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We ve all been there.
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It s time to let go.
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You don t have to be Gandhi or Mandela or Mother Teresa or Dalai Lama to understand the power of radical forgiveness for your own good as well as for your family, your friends, your business, anyone else.
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It is the way to free yourself.
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So could you choose right now to forgive someone for something?
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Could you just not have to wait for a perfect apology or perfect conditions or them to prove themselves?
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What if you were just magnanimous?
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What if the spirit of the holidays is really about that concept of whatever religion or whatever belief you have, that concept of just letting go and loving in spite of whatever behavior we have?
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Human beings are not their behavior.
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We ve all done things we re embarrassed by, or we re sure you ve had things that have happened in your life that you hope no one would ever know.
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But what if you didn t have to hide that out?
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What if you ve understood that we re all on a path of growth?
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And instead of perfection, which no human being is, you are forgiving to yourself to say, hey, I learned and I grew.
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The people around me are learning and growing.
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We re all here at Earth School together figuring this stuff out.
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So here s my question.
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What could you let go of right now and for yourself?
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What wrong?
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What upset?
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What phrase?
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What behavior?
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Could you just truly give yourself the gift to free yourself of?
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And who else could you free?
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What would happen if you just let go?
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Could you just let it go?
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Would you set yourself free?
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And when?
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Now would be a good time to do it.
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If not on the holidays, then when?
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Give yourself a gift.
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Give the gift to someone today.
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Consciously, radically forgive.
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And no, you don t have to live in fear that it s going to happen again.
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We re all growing.
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We re all expanding.
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And each day is a new adventure and the exploring of what it means to be human.
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And the holidays are a time to maybe bring in some of the divine.
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Blessings to you.
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I hope this holiday season is touched with so much joy and so much let go that it s the best one of your life.
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As you heard Tony say, forgiveness is a feeling of letting go, of releasing yourself of all the expectations of how people should be, of how you should be.
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Listen as Sarah Foley, whom you heard in the beginning of this episode, describes this feeling that she had at her first Tony Robbins event.
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I made a commitment to myself that I would just not hold back, that I would play completely full out from my heart.
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And I felt like it was 37
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years of pressure being released of trying to keep other people happy and do the right thing and be perfect at all times.
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And I was able to let that go.
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I completely lost my mind.
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I absolutely lost myself.
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I played so fallout.
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I was bawling at every minute, happy, sad, every kind of tears.
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And I felt this absolute relief.
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I went to the event with a lump in my throat, a physical lump in my throat, and I left feeling a million pounds lighter.
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And I was able to really look back on the things that gave me the biggest struggles, such as my accident seven years ago and my parents  divorce, my dad leaving the picture.
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And I was able to use those as two very big and emotional things that I envisioned putting me on the stage.
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They put me where I am today.
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Let s go back seven years to September 22, 2012, the day of Sarah s accident.
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I had been newly dating this man, Sean, and we d been dating for about six months and just on cloud nine, we went for a weekend getaway in Southern Utah.
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That morning we went for a hike.
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We took all four of our dogs between the both of us and it was like we were on top of the world.
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It was these beautiful big red rock formations as far as the eye could see.
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And I looked to him and I just said, my life is absolutely perfect.
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There s nothing about it I would change.
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I m super in love.
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I ve got my dream job, made great money and beautiful family and friends.
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And there s just nothing about it I would change.
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Four hours later, we took some four wheelers out for a ride.
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It was us and another couple, super easy ride.
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We had a picnic planned and just easy.
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And we were on like the kind of this fire access road.
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There s one point where it kind of went up and around the bend, and we couldn t quite tell if it was going to be safe on the other side.
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So the guys went on up ahead, and me and the other girls stayed back.
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And at one point, we see the other guy, Jim, up on top of the hill, and he s waving to us.
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He says, come on up.
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It s safe.
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You re good to go.
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And what we didn t realize was that Sean, my boyfriend, was coming down the bend.
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So I went on up first, and as we came around, I saw him, and I absolutely froze.
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I didn t know what to do.
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I d been very ill-experienced on a four-wheeler, and I turned to get out of the way.
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He completely threw himself to the side, and had I just been going straight, I would have completely avoided him and carried on like no other day.
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But I jerked the handlebars to the side and hit a ditch, and my front wheels caught it, and I went flipping through the air.
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It s amazing the things that go through your head when you re hit with an accident like that.
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All I could think about was my second grade teacher.
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She s telling us this accident story of a man on a motorcycle.
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And she said, if they just hadn t moved him after the accident, he would have been fine.
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And so in my mind, I thought, OK, if I just stay still, by the time I get help here, then I ll be OK.
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And so I said, don t move me, call Life Flight.
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And then I said, how s my face?
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He still laughs at me to this day that that was like my next worry.
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And he gets up to me and says, babe, your face is beautiful, but I don t know about the rest of your body.
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I didn t have a single scratch of blood, not even like a carpet burn, but I couldn t feel anything from the waist down.
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I was in a lot of pain, a lot of agony.
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My clavicle had broken and I had kind of landed on my one side on the left side.
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So I was holding myself steady because the crunching and splitting of my clavicle was just excruciating.
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And it took about an hour and a half for lifelight to arrive.
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And during this time, I m keeping Sean calm.
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He s just beside himself.
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The terror, the worry, the guilt, everything just consuming him.
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And I made a few phone calls.
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You know, I called my mother and, you know, she still talks about that phone call.
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You know, I just said, Mom, I can t feel my legs.
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Life Flight finally arrived an hour and a half later.
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And they said, OK, you know, we ve got to get you on this board so we can get you on the lifelight.
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And they said, this is going to hurt.
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And they just said, three, two, one.
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And it was just the most excruciating pain all over again.
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They got me up in the helicopter and just started pumping me full of pain medicine.
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And I woke up 10 hours later.
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And I woke up.
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in the hospital and no one was in the room when I woke up and I was intubated and I just, I remember not being able to breathe and I just started thrashing all over the hospital bed and finally a nurse comes in and she just says, just breathe, just breathe.
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I never heard the words from the doctors, you ll never walk again, but no one really knew what to think.
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My aunt at one point comes in and she leans down to give me a hug and I just said, why?
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And she just pulls away and she looks me in the eye and says, don t you ever, ever ask why.
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That question s going to eat you alive.
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And that answer will only come when it s supposed to.
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Sarah went through so many stages, from denial, where she was convinced that she would walk out of the hospital, to distraction, as she was surrounded by friends and family, to starting over, learning how to do everything all over again, like showering and going to the bathroom.
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Then the boredom rolled in, and she remembers the days when the only thing she looked forward to was watching The Price is Right at 11 a.m.
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every day.
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Finally, it was the stage of getting back to normal and pretending it never happened.
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Within six months, she was back to work.
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She and Sean even got married on the anniversary date of the accident, because they wanted to make it a good day instead of a bad day.
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But no amount of normalcy or positive thinking could cover up the uneasy feeling that Sarah had around being disabled.
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She was uncomfortable with this new identity that had been thrust upon her.
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So when I became injured and I had to then be in a wheelchair and I had a disability, the only disability I had encountered were elderly people.
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They were frail.
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They were weak.
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They were unemployed.
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Or on the flip side, maybe they were a little bit younger, but they were never healthy, a lot of overweight.
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That s all I d seen.
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I d never seen anyone like me.
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I d never seen anyone still really being successful or being attractive.
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So these stereotypes exist.
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And I think when we think of disability, we think of those norms, unfortunately.
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And little by little, you think that that s what you re supposed to be.
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A few months ago, I saw a quote that said,
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People cannot be what they haven t seen.
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And I think that if all I d seen were these ugly stereotypes, I kind of subconsciously became that.
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I felt really awkward if I got dressed up in the morning, getting ready for work, it felt like I had to force it, like put on makeup, get ready, still be who you were before the accident.
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And you just don t think that you re like allowed to be anything great.
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because of these stereotypes that are in play.
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You think that, okay, now this is my group of people.
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Now this is my community.
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And to be frank, I wasn t very proud of that community because I hadn t really seen a whole lot of success, health, beauty.
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I hadn t seen those things before.
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Now that I m in it, I m seeing a lot more and I m seeing us rise up.
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But for a long time, it was this like emotional pull.
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And behind closed doors, I would hit my legs a lot.
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I would just yell at them and scream at them, like, wake up.
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Like, what is wrong with you?
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Just trying to make them wake up.
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Like, I couldn t understand why they were not cooperating.
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Why could I not feel them?
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I could see him, I can touch him, but I couldn t feel him, I couldn t move him.
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And it drove me insane.
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going to work, I tried so hard to be the boss and hold it together for the sake of everybody else.
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And then on my way to the car, at the end of the day, I could just feel it.
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The tears would rise up into my throat and under the back of my cheeks.
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As soon as that door would close, I had a 45-minute commute every day, and I would ball the entire way home.
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I was just like, what is going on?
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Who am I now?
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It just felt so unnatural.
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And I think that a lot of people go through that.
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And after you re injured, it s like, OK, now there s a lot of adaptive sports.
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I remember them really pushing adaptive sports.
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And it s like, I could care less.
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You see me dribble a ball or something, I m ridiculous.
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I don t care about sports.
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And then I d be like, OK, what else is there?
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And they d be like, well, you can paint.
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Like those are my choices.
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And then I found that there were so many other women out there like me that just didn t fit into these things that were offered to us in the disability community.
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There wasn t a really big push on still feeling beautiful and sexy and feminine.
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And there wasn t a big push on the emotional side of healing.
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There s so much focus that goes into being independent physically, but then emotionally, these people are just dying inside.
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And you get on, you know, online support groups and it s just no one has anything good to say.
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They re just pissed off.
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They re super sad and rightfully so to a point.
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But then no one was doing anything about it.
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No one was letting it push them to be something different.
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And then slowly I started realizing I got round two.
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Most people go through life and they get round one.
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But us that have gone through an injury like this or an accident, we got a second chance.
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And there s got to be something better out there for us.
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Sarah s round two came when she moved to Hawaii with her husband Sean.
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She immersed herself in healing, both physical and emotional.
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And not just to be independent, but to feel better.
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She started working with a personal trainer, improving her nutrition and enjoying herself
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again.
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Sarah started a blog and called it Vertical Blonde, not just representative of her desire to walk again, but of what she calls the vertical mindset.
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control and just allowed myself to heal in the ways I needed to, I was okay in ways that I didn t anticipate.
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I started becoming vertical in my mindset.
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I started allowing life to work for me, right?
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Instead of happening to me, it was happening for me.
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And I just thought, if this is happening, it s happening for me to elevate from, that I can use this.
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And then how can I use it?
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Then I just started getting contacted by women all over.
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I mean, I m talking not just the US, but Canada and across the world.
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Women wanting to know like, how do I get rid of the wheelchair tummy?
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And how do I get happy again?
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Like you seem so happy, you seem so fulfilled.
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How do I do that?
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All this information s out there, but they have to see it in order to be it.
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And so once they were able to see me feeling good, looking good, and really embracing this journey,
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They realized that they could do it too.
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Sarah didn t stop at just a blog.
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She started a program called Disability Icon, which aims to change the image of disability and handicap from the old icon, the little blue man in the wheelchair, with a new vision.
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My vision is that in the future you type disability icon.
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and you see these types of women that are strong, they are successful, they are healthy, they are vibrant, they are sexy, they are fulfilling their own dreams, that is what I want the new disability icons to look like.
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And I tell them, once you start this program, now you have a new responsibility of who you gotta be to the outside world as well, because you re changing who you are on the inside.
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And you are gonna be that person so that other people know that it s possible.
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You re a living permission for these other people.
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Frankly, everybody s got something that disables them if they choose to allow it to disable them.
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And so everyone s got something that they need to overcome.
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It s just been really powerful watching these women rise up to the occasion, to the challenge.
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And they re saying that it s impacting, you know, their friendships, impacting their marriages, them as mothers, them wanting to then be mothers because now they feel confident enough to do so.
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That is changing lives and that is changing an entire community.
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It is our time.
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It is the inclusion moment.
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You re seeing it in the media.
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You re seeing it on New York Fashion Week.
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We had women in wheelchairs on the runway.
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You re seeing it.
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And it s a really, really special time to be at the forefront of it and know that we re a part of it.
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It s been all virtual up until this point and meeting at this event and being able to hug each other.
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And, you know, I asked each one of them, why are you coming to this event?
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And they said, it s for the connections.
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I want friends that are like this.
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I want friends that are not a victim to this, that are doing something with it, having that really great mentality and can also say, I know exactly what you re going through.
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That s powerful.
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The event that Sarah referred to is Vertically, a four-day experience that she created and hosts in Park City, Utah, featuring speakers on the psychology of healing, health and wellness, and spiritual growth.
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Tickets were sold out well in advance as women came to learn about Sarah s vertical mindset and discover how to move forward in their own journeys.
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Vertical mindset is that everything that happens to us is there to elevate us.
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We also have the choice to let it destroy us.
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Absolutely.
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And a lot of people do.
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They choose to just stay comfortable in an uncomfortable state for a really long time.
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But I think that once we actually start looking at every single thing as there to elevate us, it s like the entire world opens up.
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Looking back, OK, my dad left me and absolutely broke my heart.
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That was probably one of the biggest things I ve been journeying through is that healing process.
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He broke my heart over and over again, coming back in and out of the life.
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And every time he did, it made me stronger and stronger and stronger.
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And it propelled me towards this achievement.
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And that s really how I was seeking love and significance.
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I can really appreciate that and see that now.
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But it really did instill this achievement in me of really, really wanting to perform well and do it for the sake of kind of proving them wrong a little bit.
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Like you had a really great daughter that you gave up on.
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God, without that, Tony, I ve heard him say, like, if my mom had been the mom I wanted her to be, I wouldn t be the man I am.
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Guaranteed.
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If I had the life that was so, quote unquote, perfect, that happened that day, the accident, forever, I ve been happy.
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I d had a great life.
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But there would be no kind of growth like I ve had.
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and the growth of this journey through being in this wheelchair and having to relearn who I am and what I m truly made of and that none of that has to do with anything superficial like it s what you have to dig deep inside because no one can do that for you.
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That is so powerful.
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And that is something that I actually really, really cherish.
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And I know that I m really lucky to have because not everybody goes through something as severe.
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And so therefore, they don t have that opportunity to go through that much growth.
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It s true that Sarah Foley s story, and that of many of the other women with similar experiences, is one of growth.
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But throughout the entire journey, there was something hidden underneath, a secret, disturbing emotion that even she could not face fully.
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It was blame.
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This entire time since the accident, she had held Sean responsible for what happened, and it was time to forgive.
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So as I m kind of walking out of UPW, I d made a good friends with Mario and Mario says, okay, you know, what s your next action step?
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And before the words even came out of my mouth, I said, I m going to go home and I m going to forgive my husband.
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I hadn t realized until UPW how I d been holding my husband responsible for the accident.
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And I d always said I hadn t, and I knew he felt responsible, but you know, I knew it was an accident.
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I knew he tried to keep me safe, but in actuality, I d held him really responsible.
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And I was finally honest with myself about that.
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And as I was talking to my husband the next day, and I m just kind of like sitting next to him on the couch and holding his hand, and I just turned to him and I said,
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I just need to apologize.
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I am so sorry for the way I ve treated you.
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And I fully, fully forgive you. 
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And he says, Oh, that s okay.
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And I was like, I know you don t hold me responsible.
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I said, No, I do.
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I did.
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I m sorry.
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And I forgive you.
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And I held him and I gave him a hug.
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And I could tell he s just kind of not feeling it.
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And I can remember what my girl Nyla taught me about holding it in my heart.
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And I can still feel it in there.
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And I just pressed my heart to his as I held him.
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And I just said, I forgive you over and over and over.
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And I just kept squeezing him harder and harder.
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And finally, there was that two millimeter shift.
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And he just broke down and he just started sobbing.
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And I started sobbing.
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And he says, you have no idea how much I need to hear that.
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We just had this moment of release and forgiving Him and then turning Him aside and forgiving myself.
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It was such a powerful moment of what is possible and the things that are necessary we have to go through.
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We really have to go through the acceptance
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and the forgiveness of the moment and loving everything about the moment for what it held.
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And I said, you know, it had to happen.
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My husband s like, no, it didn t.
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It didn t have to happen.
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I said, actually, it did.
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That accident had to happen.
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And my life is greater because of it.
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It was just such a powerful moment of forgiveness, possibility of healing.
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It s something that absolutely changed my life.
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It changed the relationship I have with him.
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There s a release there of a resentment and anger that I d held that I really had denied for so long.
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You re listening to the Force for Good season of the Tony Robbins podcast.
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To learn more about the 10 gifts that we re featuring this holiday season, including emotion, drive, growth, joy, gratitude, connection, consciousness, grace, presence, and forgiveness, please visit www.TonyRobbins.com slash gifts, G-I-F-T-S.
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And to find Tony Robbins products and events that can help you identify your gifts, go to TonyRobbins.com slash shop, S-H-O-P.
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Sarah Foley s accident and her husband s involvement in it is a pretty clear example of how one person can feel guilty and the other can blame.
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It was a single moment that both of them remember vividly.
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And the consequences of that event, her being confined to a wheelchair for the rest of her life, are also clear for everyone.
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But not all feelings of blame and guilt are that obvious.
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We re going to hear from Dimple Tharkar, a woman who harbored resentment for years, all against her partner, and she never really knew it.
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Her story, their story, begins in Bolton, a small town in the northwest of England.
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My parents were refugees in Africa, and mum came across with me seven months pregnant.
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So it was quite a tough time for them, kind of finding their feet, and dad setting up his business, and mum not being able to speak any English.
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So she was looking for a job.
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So I have a lot of respect for my parents, because that was tough.
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Dad was a very proud man, wouldn t
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let mum or anybody take any benefits or anything like that.
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He s like, I feed my family, I go out to work and I make sure that the food that they eat is paid from my work, not from the government.
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And so really strong work ethics.
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I m one of three girls, I m the middle girl.
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And Dad was really ahead of his time.
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He wanted his girls to be educated so that they would be independent financially.
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His belief was that if they were educated, they could support themselves irrespective of whether they had a man or not.
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So that was a great, great upbringing.
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And my best friend is my husband today.
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He was there the day I was born.
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He s six years older than me.
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His family and my family supported each other as refugees.
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Mum came across with my older sister, and Dad came across three weeks later.
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She didn t know whether she d see her husband or not.
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And in that time, my father-in-law now
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said to my mum, I will be your brother, I ll be your family here and took care of mum.
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My father-in-law is a phenomenal man, he s just wow, just incredible and he basically looked after mum.
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It was an abusive relationship, my mum s and dad s relationship was not pleasant and
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My father-in-law kept her safe and provided a safe home for her and a safe haven.
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So that s how I built my relationship with my husband.
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We were best friends.
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We were raised very close, very connected.
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He s always protected me.
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So Dimple and Atul grew up as best friends.
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But about the time when she was 17 and he was 23, their relationship started to change.
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Even though her father was more progressive in his views, like insisting that his daughters be educated and independent, she still had a very traditional Indian upbringing.
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She was not allowed to date, and no boys were allowed in the house.
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Atal was allowed in the house because he was raised almost like a brother and so he had privileges that no other boy would have.
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And I was 17, he was 23 and he was in my room and we were just chatting and he just kissed me.
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I still remember it now.
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It was the sort of kiss that my knees went, I had to sit down and life was just different after that.
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We kept that secret for a while and then my dad found out literally the week before my graduation ball and kicked Atul out of the house and basically didn t speak to me for three weeks.
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It was awful because I was his princess.
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And then he summoned Atul and I to his office, and we had to sit at his desk across from him.
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And he basically said to Atul, what s your intention with my daughter?
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Because I have doctors and solicitors asking for her hand in marriage, and you haven t even got a degree.
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You were a dropout, because he dropped out of university.
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He says, you re half qualified as an accountant.
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What makes you think that you re going to be fitting for my daughter?
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Besides which, she s going to go to university to be a dietitian, and I don t want you jeopardising that.
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Atul said, there s one thing I will let you know.
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I will always keep her in the standards that she s accustomed to because of the standards that you ve raised her with.
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and there s no way that I would ever stand in her way of becoming whoever she wants to be.
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Atul kept his promise.
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When it came time for Dimple to choose between Edinburgh and Leeds for university, her heart was in Edinburgh, but Leeds was where Atul was, and it was closer to home.
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He told her not to choose Leeds for the wrong reasons, and she needed to follow her heart, and that they would make it work.
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So we started dating, and I was at university for four and a half years.
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And we stood the test of time.
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We got married the year I graduated.
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It was really weird because Dad wanted us to get married in 95.
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We wanted to get married in 96.
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And Dad had had my astrology charts done, and it said I needed to get married in 95 and not 96.
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So Atul said, OK, we ll do that.
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It s so weird the way fate works out.
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Mum was then ill in November, and she died in 96.
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So she wouldn t have been at our wedding had that not had happened.
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And I lost my smile at mum s funeral.
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And I blamed it on Atul, because he was cross with me.
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And we had a massive argument that day.
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I realise now that it was frustration.
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It wasn t that he was cross at me.
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He was hurting because he had an amazing relationship with my mum.
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He was the son that she never had.
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I know now that I completely misinterpreted and misunderstood that whole story, that how the hell could he be shouting at me on the day of my mum s funeral?
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And that s when I lost my smile.
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And so for years, without even really knowing why or how, Dimple blamed Atul for not supporting her during that difficult day.
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And, of course, Atul was affected that day.
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This wasn t just his mother-in-law.
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This was a woman whom his father had protected his entire life.
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She was someone who was important to him, not just to the woman he loved.
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But Dimple carried that moment with her, even though Atul showed support for her emotionally for the next two decades, through periods just as difficult, if not more.
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I was blaming him for all the problems that we were having in our marriage.
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I was blaming him for not understanding me.
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I was so caught up in me and so caught up in stories and all the past of how he s let me down and...
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I didn t realise how many times he was actually right there.
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We have two beautiful children.
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I didn t want children, he wanted children.
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So we played Russian Roulette.
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I got pregnant with Maya.
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My God, we were blessed to have Maya.
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So then I decided we were going to have more than one, because I didn t want an only child to suffer the loss of a parent on their own.
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Because my sisters helped me through that with my mum.
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Then we tried for Kira, and we lost five babies in between.
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And he supported me all the way through that.
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And I never realized, and never once
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acknowledged that he lost children as well.
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It was all about me.
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Between stresses from their careers, miscommunication, and a growing distance between them, Dimple and Atul s marriage seemed to be nearing its end.
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They even had an exit strategy for their marriage.
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When Kyra was 18, they would divorce, split their assets, and time with the kids.
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Dimple had joined the Tony Robbins Platinum Partnership, though, and there was a relationship event coming up.
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She invited Atul.
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I was like, we need to go to a relationship, and you need fixing, because clearly there s a problem with you.
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And I laugh now, and I think, my God, what an idiot.
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I was like, relationship s going to fix us.
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It s going to be amazing.
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And so day one, he s meeting all my beautiful Platt family.
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And Tony says, how many of you don t want to be here?
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and have been forced to come here.
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Three people stand up in the room.
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He s one of them.
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I m going, oh my God.
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I m so embarrassed.
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embarrassed but I m also so proud that he s man enough to be who he needs to be and be authentic and true because it is true he didn t want to be there.
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So we went through the first day and it was a bit weird because I felt like he was intruding in my world.
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And I was a bit scared about how he would respond and I felt like I was responsible for him.
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And then in the evening he was tired and I was like, no, we have to come and socialise with all my friends.
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And he s like, I just need to go to bed.
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I m tired.
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So he went to bed.
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And then we had the hugest row because he was rude for going to bed.
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He s come all the way to Maui and he s tired.
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He s done back-to-back travelling prior to that because of the business and the challenges of taking on a new business.
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And the next day I said, I don t want to sit anywhere near you.
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You sit over there and I ll sit with my plat friends at the front.
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It s talk about significance.
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Is that right?
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At the front.
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Anne had the most ridiculous face on all day.
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It was awful.
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When I look back at some of the footage now, I think, God, and the pictures.
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As the event wore on, the topic of forgiveness came up.
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Dimple had asked, when do you not have to forgive someone?
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And she was, of course, talking about her husband.
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Through the 40-minute intervention, Tony worked with both of them to get to the root of the problem.
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Toward the end, he asked her a simple question.
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What are you going to do to make this different, to change?
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When he asked me that question, I had a flash into the future, actually.
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I was in my rocking chair in my eighties, and I couldn t imagine Atul not being next to me.
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And that was my answer.
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I was so in love with this man, there was no way I could ever let him go.
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But I knew that I had to change.
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That s the moment it shifted from significance to love and connection.
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And I had the hugest smile on my face.
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And my man burst into tears.
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And he had the hugest smile.
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He got me back.
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Dimple and Atua left the islands of Hawaii with a new way of looking at each other, a newfound respect, and, of course, forgiveness.
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They got each other back, and they both got their smiles back.
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And they weren t the only ones who noticed.
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So our youngest daughter, at Christmas time, I heard her having a conversation with Maya, our eldest.
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She was back from university.
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And Maya s going, what s going on with Mum and Dad?
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It s all a bit strange.
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They re not arguing.
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And Kiera said, it s really weird.
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If they fight, it s really just play fighting.
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They, like, wrestle with each other.
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It s, like, fun.
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Maya said to us the other day, can you two just go to your room, please?
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It s a bit embarrassing.
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The Tony Robbins Podcast is directed by Tony Robbins and produced by the Tony Robbins editorial team with audio editing and sound design by Jeremy Enns.
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Today s first guest was Sarah Foley, creator of Disability Icon and the Vertically Conference.
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You can find out more about her and her work at verticalblonde.com.
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Our second guest was Dimple Tharkar, a Platinum partner, reflecting on her experience at the Platinum private event about relationships.
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Copyright Robbins Research International.
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