Living a Legacy: Dr. Demartini on Values, Priorities, and Lasting Fulfillment
Episode 217
Welcome back to another episode of Integrative You Radio. We're thrilled to have a very special guest today, the renowned Dr. Demartini, who has dedicated the last fifty-one years to research, writing, teaching, and traveling the world, focusing on helping individuals maximize their potential, awareness, and achievements. In this episode, we dive deep into the topic of values, a transformative element. Dr. Demartini shares insights into the specifics of his values, emphasizing teaching, research, and travel. He explains the importance of understanding one's true values, and offering practical advice on how to align actions with priorities to create a life that reflects one's core values. The conversation explores the concept of leaving a legacy across various aspects of life, from business to social impact, providing a holistic perspective on the pursuit of fulfillment and success. Join us as we uncover the wisdom of aligning values with actions to unlock your fullest potential. Interested in learning more about Dr. Nick & Dr. Nicole’s courses, memberships, or private work? Learn more at Integrative You . Have a quick question, Would you like to schedule a call, or just want to say hi? Text us at 732.913.0009. Our mission to innovate humans & Healthcare does NOT start and stop with us! This is why we are also dedicated to helping other practitioners in evolving healthcare too! If you are a healthcare leader and are looking to up-level your clinical + business excellence Learn more about our course membership: Limitless Healthprenuer and start boldly disrupting this industry! About Dr. John Demartini: Introducing Dr. John Demartini; one of our cherished Colleagues, Friend, Human Behavior Expert, Polymath and Internationally Published Author. He has studied over 30,650 books across all the defined academic disciplines and has synthesized the wisdom of the ages which he shares online and on stage to over 100 countries. We recently joined Dr. Demartini on his “Coming So
Topics: values, demartini, unknown, legacy, fulfillment, integrative, teaching, actions
Key takeaways from this episode
- ## Living a Legacy: Dr. Demartini on Values, Priorities, and Lasting Fulfillment
- Values Drive Actions:** Aligning your daily actions with your highest values is crucial for unlocking intrinsic motivation and achieving fulfillment.
- Redefining Legacy:** Explore the broader concept of legacy, encompassing not just business success but also social impact, personal growth, and global contributions.
- Wisdom in Prioritization:** Learn how to make wise decisions by prioritizing tasks and commitments based on your authentic values for sustained success.
- Inner and Outer Alignment:** Achieving a truly fulfilling life means integrating your inner motivations with your outer actions, where your core beliefs guide your behavior.
Pull quotes
This is the place where you become limitless. **Unknown:** We are covering the latest and greatest topics, of course, in a disruptive fashion, around integrative medicine, mental health, and human behavior.
We will be sprinkling in some truth bombs for our healthpreneurs so they can join us in our mission to evolve healthcare.
If you are health curious and growth focused, you are in the right place. **Unknown:** But buckle up, because this is real, this is raw, and this is disruptive.
Transcript
**Unknown:** Welcome to Integrative U Radio, hosted by Dr. Nick Carruthers and yours truly, Dr. Nicole Rivera. This is the place where you become limitless.
**Unknown:** We are covering the latest and greatest topics, of course, in a disruptive fashion, around integrative medicine, mental health, and human behavior. We are also covering how those topics affect the human and family dynamics. We will be sprinkling in some truth bombs for our healthpreneurs so they can join us in our mission to evolve healthcare. If you are health curious and growth focused, you are in the right place.
**Unknown:** But buckle up, because this is real, this is raw, and this is disruptive. This is Integrative U Radio. Hey, everyone. Welcome back to another episode of Integrative U Radio.
**Unknown:** We are unbelievably excited for our special guest here. We have Dr. Demartini. You guys have heard us talk about him about a million times.
**Unknown:** And we feel so, so fortunate for him to be here and share his gifts with our audience. And we are c- of course, are going to be talking about values, which is something that has radically changed both Dr. Nick and I's lives, and we get so excited talking about values with other people, and here is literally the guru. So Dr.
**Unknown:** Demartini, I would love for you just to give a little brief introduction. I know that nobody can ever do justice to an introduction, especially when you've accomplished so much in your life. So can you tell everyone just a lil- little bit about yourself? Um, my life is dedicated for the last 51 years to teaching...
**Unknown:** well, researching, writing, teaching, and traveling the world, and also in the healing arts. So those are my main areas of focus. Anything that might assist people in maximizing their potential, their awareness, um, their evolvement, achievements, I have been devouring. And the second year of teaching, I'm 51 now, and I just love it, and that's what I do.
**Unknown:** So I just, every single day I research, write, travel, 'cause I'm in, I'm right now in Antarctica for anybody who may be doing it. Right out the window is, is Antarctica. And I'm, uh, on my ship sailing in the, in Antarctica right now. So I travel...
**Unknown:** teach, research, write, and travel. That's about it. I'm useless everywhere else. And that's because that is your highest values, correct?
**Unknown:** Those are it. I mean, my highest value is teaching. Second-highest is research and writing, learning. Um, third is traveling, and that's basically it.
**Unknown:** I, I also wanted to be f- financially, you know, well off, so I, I invested. I've been investing for all these decades, and I've been blessed. So I've traveled world, around the world on my... in sailing around the world.
**Unknown:** Let's put it that way. So I have a question around what you just said, because I think the beautiful thing about values is it, it's your blueprint. It's your uniqueness. And you're mentioning your value's teaching.
**Unknown:** But your version of teaching and someone else's version of teaching can look really different. So can you just speak to, you know, values, like what are values, and then how do you... do you further just define your values? Is it just about teaching, or is it your specific version of that?
**Unknown:** Yeah. Yeah, uh, when I say teach, research, write, and travel, it's a bit vague in general. Teaching on the s- on the path of self-mastery, on awakening awareness and potential, on empowering the seven areas of life, these are more specifics in the field of teaching. So teaching is sort of a generic, but the actual specifics is anything that allows a human being to maximize their contribution on the planet and wake up their authentic leadership and mastery.
**Unknown:** So yeah, that's... Every discipline, every field that I've been blessed to devour has been for that aim, and I started that at age 18. I'm 69 now. And so at, at 18 I, I wanted to, I, I, I wanted to master life.
**Unknown:** I was, I was watching, uh, a show c- with David Carradine, uh, called Kung Fu. Now, some people may be watching this may be too young to remember it, but some may, may be old enough. And it was, uh, this master martial artist that walked around and kinda taught philosophy and helped people solve problems and things, and I thought, "Wow, I like this." And he was talking about his Shaolin master martial artist that taught him, and the... when he talked about that, I said, "Wow, I wanna be a master." Sounded cool when you're 18.
**Unknown:** And I said, "Okay, what is that, what does that look like? What, what exactly is a master?" Sounded really cool, but what was that? So I tried to narrow it down and I divided life into seven areas. And I believe that we have an inspired mission in life, our spiritual quest, a desire to wake up our genius and contribute original ideas that serve human beings, our desire to create a contribution with sustainable fair exchange in business, where we have a source of income and a feeling of fulfillment by making a difference in people's lives through serving people.
**Unknown:** Uh, financial remuneration, and I wanted to master my finances where I was not having to work because I had to, but work because I love to, and have my money working for me instead of me working for it. I want to have a global family. I want to be a citizen-Of the world, and the name of the ship is The World, uh, and goes around the world. I wanted to have social influence and meet amazing people and go to amazing places and different cultures, which I've been and spoken in 194 countries now.
**Unknown:** And I wanted to have, uh, physical vitality, and, you know, of, uh, I wanted to be in Benjamin Button, going backwards instead of forward- Mm-hmm ... an aging kinda thing. And, uh, even though I have aged, I'm at 69, I got more energy than most people. So I wanted to empower all seven areas of life and contribute to something in each of the areas, and to wake up, uh, the immortal effect of empowering those areas that it has through exemplification on other people, and live an exemplary life.
**Unknown:** And that, to me, the measurement of my goals or my obi- you know, objectives was, how well am I living it as a demonstration? It's the demonstration of it more than anything. And so that was my, my objective since I was 18, and I've been working on that every single day since. I know you- When I- ...
**Unknown:** probably have a question, Nick, but I have a question too. Mm-hmm. So who goes first? I saw your face.
**Unknown:** Ladies first this, this time. So what you just described, I resonate with so much, and I feel like in the beginning stages of, of really understanding your work and your amazing wisdom is, I felt like I had an identity crisis of, I want this and I want this and I wanna, uh, you know, I wanna have the financial freedom and I wanna teach and, and it could feel like a lot for people. Who am I? What am I?
**Unknown:** What's my purpose? I have all these interests, and they're all different and separate. So when, what are your words of wisdom for people that feel like they have a lot of passions, they have a lot of interests, and they don't, they're, they're having trouble with how to create a life from that. They're having trouble really narrowing down, like, what is at my core?
**Unknown:** What are my core true values? Well, I believe it's wise to first stop and introspect and reflect. And on my website, drdemartini.com, I have a value determination process that I developed over the last 45 years to help people discern what their life demonstrates is valuable to them, not what they think it is. Mm-hmm.
**Unknown:** And many people have impulsive, um, seeking mechanisms or instinctive avoiding mechanisms and injected values of outer authorities in their life, confusing them about what's really deeply meaningful and purposeful to them. And narrowing that down, what's truly most important and really, really priority to them, I think is a first step in defining and creating the life that you would like to create. So much of us we, a- anytime we live with comparisons between ourselves and other people and put people on pedestals, we're gonna inject some of their influence and values into our life, and cloud the clarity of what we think is important. And that's where the passions come from, 'cause the passion means to suffer.
**Unknown:** People don't realize that. Compassion means to suffer with somebody. And the passions are all the pursuits that are not congruent with what you value most, that eventually lead to futility and frustration as a feedback to get you on to what is really truly important. All the symptoms in our life, in every area of our life, is nothing but a feedback mechanism guiding us back to what is really truly priority and authority, real auth- uh, authenticity.
**Unknown:** So first start with what's really, really your life demonstrates is most important, where you're spontaneously are inspired to act, where nobody has to motivate you extrinsically to get you to do things. Find out what that is. And it may not be your fantasy. It may not be matching the, the, the people that you admire.
**Unknown:** It's, but what it's true to you. Then take the seven areas of life once you identify that, and link how are the highest priority actions that are proven to deliver results and empowerment in each of these areas, how is doing those action steps helping you fulfill what is highest on your value? So you can link whatever the action steps that you'd like to empower those areas, and then you will find out you're focused and you're congruent with that objective. And so you're finding yourself now doing habits that lead you to the outcome of empowering all areas.
**Unknown:** You know, I don't live to eat, I eat to live and perform, so I don't need to be reminded not to overeat or eat this or eat that. I have things that I've learned through discernment day by day on what is the thing that allows me to maximize my vitality and stability and inner levels and wellness levels. So once you do that, and it's linked to your values, you're very disciplined, and you're automatically consistent on that pursuit. So finding out what's really important and linking the seven areas of life and the priority actions that are proven to empower those areas to that which is highest increases the probability of stability and allows you to integrate, um, those seven areas into your pursuit.
**Unknown:** Otherwise, you'll scatter yourself and try to juggle seven different balls, and that's not easy to do. Been there. Well, and also, I mean, that confusion of, quote-unquote, "doing too much" that's scattered and not congruent with the values, you know, somebody that can... Like, one of the first steps always working with clients is like getting crystal clear on what's most important to them.
**Unknown:** 'Cause if you're out of alignment there, like you said, uh, you just don't have a strong foundation to build upon. But one of the next best things that we've found is really getting that clarity of the vision of what are the, how do they wanna use those tools? And, you know, I guess that's one of the big things that I wanted to ask you today is, you know, what are some of the best, uh, recommendations that you can give to constantly push that vision?To make that vision- Well- ... bigger and bigger and bigger so we don't become stagnant in life.
**Unknown:** Well, the... When y- you have a hierarchy of values, a set of priorities in your life, things that are most to least important, any time you're doing the very highest priorities, which are intrinsic, you spontaneously act, and nobody has to motivate you to do them. You just do them. I spontaneously teach and research every day.
**Unknown:** I can't... I, I, I, I, I can't even go through the internet without finding new articles to summarize. It's just what I do. And to read, and to study.
**Unknown:** And anything that's low on your values becomes more extrinsic, and you require more external motivation to get you to keep doing it. So if you need to be reminded to do something or motivated to do something consistently, it's not what's really important to you. You may think it is, but it's not. You don't need to be externally motivated to do it.
**Unknown:** Now, the second you live in your highest value, you find out what that is, and get really clear on that, and start pursuing that, the blood glucose and oxygen goes into the forebrain. That medial prefrontal cortex, that forebrain, that foresight area, literally has connections neurologically to V5, V6 associative areas in the secondary associated visual cortex. And that's where you have the greatest creative imagery to be able to create what you envision, and it spontaneously emerges in your mind to the degree of your congruency with what's highest on priority. So it automatically awakens.
**Unknown:** So I love when I'm working with people and get, get them clear about their values, when they all of a sudden get prioritized on their actions, their inspired vision surfaces. It just comes up, and they see it in their mind's eye, kinda like Michael Phelps sees it to get his gold medals. The moment you do that, every action step you take that is highest in priority that's aligned with that vision, and you hold that vision, you automatically expand. Because you achieve more, you tend to expand the space and time horizons.
**Unknown:** And when those space and time horizons keep getting bigger and bigger, the vision gets bigger, and eventually the vision gets beyond your life, and you now emerge with the power of creating a legacy, an immortality quotient in your life that leaves an effect on people that you touch. And now all of a sudden, you, you don't have to worry about just children leaving genetic legacies. You now leave a legacy socially, and leave a legacy in your business, and leave a legacy in your economics. And I wrote a book many years ago called The S- The Secrets to Immortality, and how to leave a legacy in all of those areas by living congruently and by priority.
**Unknown:** 'Cause you build incremental momentum that becomes unstoppable, and the expansion of your awareness and potential every time you live pri- by priority. If you fill your day with high-priority actions that inspire you, it doesn't fill up with low-priority distractions that don't, and you build momentum, and you're willing to embrace both pleasure and pain equally in that pursuit, and therefore are more objective, and therefore are pursuing challenges that inspire you, w- whi- which wakes up genius and innovation, creativity, and original ideas. So now you not only become empowered and, and, and unstoppable, but you also birth new original ideas that leave a mark that's also legacy gen- generating. That's awesome.
**Unknown:** I, I never really thought about it that way, with leaving a legacy in all those different areas. You know, I think a lot of people think about leaving a legacy either, you know, in a, in their business, like their business contributions, or leaving a legacy with family, but are not necessarily considering those other, those other areas. So I, I think that's a really- All of them can... You, y- you can, you can have an impact, uh, if you care about humanity, to care to serve humanity, and lead by being congruent and exemplifying what's possible, you can leave a, a social legacy.
**Unknown:** Mm-hmm. And, uh, it was Seneca, the Roman poet and philosopher and, and, uh, politician who said, he said, "You measure an individual by their most distant ends. How, how great is the magnitude of space and time in their thought?" You know, we have people like Elon Musk right now that's got a broader vision of space and time in his mind than most people, and look at the legacy he's leaving. Look at the impact he's making already.
**Unknown:** Here's a classical example of somebody who's knows what they want, and is willing to prioritize it, and delegate lower priority things to people who are more advanced, and more scholarly, and more skilled in the talents to delegate, to liberate that individual to keep visualizing and ste- keep seeing the vision. And you now build an unstoppable organization by doing that. So he's a classical example of a, a broader vision and a broader, um, space and time horizon than the average person, and the legacy that he's gonna impact. Very few people have ever accomplished things like this man.
**Unknown:** In so many different industries, too. Yeah, it's pretty, pretty amazing. Bec- because there's, there's no, there's no real boundary on the human c- psyche that's when they're congruent. Uh, uh, I was just reading, I'm summarizing right now, um, an article by Charlie Munger, who just passed, as you know.
**Unknown:** And he was talking about, you know, how do you build wealth, obviously. And if you look very carefully, of the 15 things he recommended, five of them were about gaining wisdom, and knowledge, and, and continually expanding your knowledge of history, of life, of philosophy, and that was his advice on wealth building. And most people are looking for, what st- stock, stock tip do I buy? Yeah.
**Unknown:** What's that immediate gratification? What do I need? What's that new company in? You know, how do I get in that ladder of the real estate market, you know?
**Unknown:** And he, he wasn't talking about that. He was about framing your mind of worthiness, and contribution, and caring about humanity to build wealth. And that is right on the money from what I can see. Literally right on the money I just love that these conversations are happening because there has been so much of that saturation of the instant gratification.
**Unknown:** So much of our society is built on that, especially in the healthcare arena. So I feel like there is a lot more conversations about the deeper work, the bigger vision, um, tapping into energy, tapping into leveraging, you know, the, the principles of physics. So I just, I love that, um, that's where the world is going. At least a part of it.
**Unknown:** Uh, but- Well, the- Go ahead ... the wisdom, the wisdom of the ages, um, is sitting inside all of us, waiting to emerge in direct proportion to our congruency with what we value most. Yeah. That's...
**Unknown:** It's so, so significant. And every symptom, every symptom in our life is a feedback to guide us there. Our business creates symptoms. See, when we're down in our amygdala, in our subcortical area of our brain, because we're not fulfilled, and we're looking for immediate gratification to try to get fill- fulfillment, we go into avoiding pain and seeking pleasure, avoiding predators, seeking prey, avoiding challenges, seeking ease, and we want immediate gratification.
**Unknown:** When we do, that also leads to immediate gratification, the sense of pride over shame. We wanna be proud, and we wanna, we, we wanna pursue our f- pleasurable fantasies. Hedonistic pursuits, some people call it. When we do that, we're- we become blind to the two sides that life has to offer, and when we do, we bang our head against the wall, and we create symptomatology in our physiology and psychology in our business, for that matter.
**Unknown:** Because now we're wanting to be narcissistically proud, and when we don't care about the people that we're serving, or the people that are serving with. And then we get humbled by our pride to eventually, you know, lower that and back into equilibrium where there's a sustainable, equitable, fair exchange with people. And everything is guiding us to equanimity within ourselves, and equity between ourselves and others to maximize sustainable fair exchange, to maximize the rewards in the fulfillment in life. 'Cause if you ask people, and I've asked millions of people, if you're...
**Unknown:** At the moment you've had the most fulfillment, what were you doing? And most people will say, "I was doing something that contributed to somebody's life," and they said, "Thank you." And that brings tears to their eyes. They make some sort of contribution, and people are being grateful for their contribution. So that's an important part.
**Unknown:** Our sensory re- rewards in life is proportioned to our motor services in life, and when those are in perfect balance, we maximize our brain function and our physiology. So when, when it comes to leaving a legacy, would... I mean, this is multifaceted, and it's probably partly 'cause so many people aren't clear on their values to be able to just continue that process to expand space and time, to be able to leave that legacy. But it seems like today we're, we're polarized in programming that, A, it's just all about me, or B, I give all of myself to everyone else.
**Unknown:** And to really leave a legacy, you have to have that balance. You have to have that, that fair exchange of that equal dynamic of self-love, b- well as loving humanity. That's it. If you, if you go into pride and exaggerate yourself over your employees and your customer, uh, you'll get humbled by rejection from the customer, you'll get humbled by the anarchy of the business, and you'll end up being an autocrat trying to control people and push them uphill, which raises the cost and lowers the margins.
**Unknown:** If we minimize ourselves and sacrifice for the customer and think, "Oh my God, they're, they're more important," then we sacrifice, which people do if they meet some celebrity or whatever. They do business with a celebrity, they'll sacrifice profit. Don't, um, they basically subordinate themselves to employees and let them have anarchy. Both of those, then you don't keep the money.
**Unknown:** So you don't make the money when you're narcissistic. You don't keep the money when you're altruistic. And so both of them will create symptoms, because the narcissist eventually gets humbled, and the altruist gets, gets frustrated, say, "I deserve better, betterness." And so those are basically bringing people into authenticity where there's a fair exchange. Uh, Jeff Bezos is a great example.
**Unknown:** Jeff, Jeff studied, you know, um, Sony over there in Japan, and Sony was dedicated to a great cause of serving people, and wanted to upgrade the standards and the image of Japan for not being copycats in the marketplace, like China was also. And so they decided he was gonna create a real company that was dedicated to customer service. Well, Amazon was, by Jeff Bezos, de- dedicated to customer-centric service, and he's done an incredible job doing that, and he focused on making sure that the customer had the greatest, most efficient service possible. And he did it, and he grew to enormous size, one of the biggest companies in the world.
**Unknown:** But then he was not paying attention to the employees. And so as this grew and grew and grew and grew, the employees eventually said, "Hey, we deserve betterness." And it wasn't an equitable system according to equity theory. And all of a sudden they had, they created a union, a Teamsters union, to go against Jeff to try to get that back into balance. So this Teamsters union was a symptom that he was customer-centric, but he wasn't employee-centric.
**Unknown:** It wasn't balanced there. So then all of a sudden they got more income, and he ended up lowering a little bit of his profit margin. When he did, now he's customer-centric and employee-centric. Well, when that occurred, the margins going to the stockholders was a little less.
**Unknown:** So then he goes, "Well, if I, I'm gonna have to give a little bit more to the stockholders, then they're gonna drop out, and we don't have continued investment." So then he brought himself down a bit, lowered his, his margins, brought the stockholders up a bit, got them a better, uh, yield. When in the process of doing it, now all of the people that are involved are now incentered. They're all involved. And now the business grows because of it, and then he ends up making more money in the long run, even though he's making less per, per unit of service.
**Unknown:** So the whole thing went up because he maintained an equitable position with all the people that were primarily involvedAnd that's the lesson. And, uh, when we see that in companies, I see... I've been consulting 41 years in g- uh, business companies, and I've watched the behaviors of people, and when they get things right, there's a maximum return on there. It's efficient, and it's giving symptoms until it gets there.
**Unknown:** And if you know how to interpret the symptoms, you'll realize it's, it's trying to get people into sustainable fair exchange in a state of equanimity and authenticity. One of the questions that I have is that you said a couple of things. You were talking about pain over pleasure, and we were talking about the injection of society and, you know, different programs, different belief systems, et cetera. W- what do you feel like is, is one of the biggest foundational reasons why majority of the population don't know what's important to them?
**Unknown:** They, they don't understand this concept of values. Would you say that it's just a multitude of things, or there's something at the foundation of it all? Well, imagine going back thousands of years ago, and supposedly we're a little bit nomadic, although we keep finding more and more civilizations back there that were organized farther back in time. But let's just go 25 to 35,000 years ago, and we got supposedly nomadic males and females out there and living in, in little families or little communities or kinship.
**Unknown:** Eventually, that turned into a township, and eventually, you know, it went into a f- the first city, or town, and then city, and then eventually state, nation. It kept growing. And as the numbers grew, um, a division of labor emerged. And the division of labor, instead of one person by themselves out in the middle of nowhere doing everything, now, you know, you're a builder of a, of a, of a, of a, a house.
**Unknown:** You make furniture. You end up growing produce. You are making a metallurgy. Everybody starts doing specialties, and you really can't function without their specialty as you get more and more specialized.
**Unknown:** So people become more and more dependent on them, and if they're without them, they don't make it well out there because they've not adapted to the generality of the nomad anymore. So what happens, people are frightened of losing, um, their connection with society. They're afraid of banishment and rejection and alienation and pushed away and having to do it all on their own. Um, that'd be like me right now doing anything but teach, researching, writing, and traveling.
**Unknown:** I, I mean, I depend on a lot of people, so they do all the specialties. So in the process of doing it, the fear of not fitting in and the fear of rejection, the fear of a banishment, and the fear of, of alienation makes most people try to fit in and please them. Instead of learning how to communicate what they want and what they value in terms of those people, they immediately subordinate themselves to those they depend on and look up to and need and, and couldn't live without. And when they do, th- each time they put people on pedestals and fear the loss of them, they automatically inject the values of those people and cloud the clarity of what they want.
**Unknown:** And their uncertainty and cloudiness makes them give, in a sense, decisions over to other people, th- decision offload to other people, and lose their own inner authority, and they lose their individual heroism inside. Instead, they go to a collective heroism, and they depend on fitting into the society and become sheep instead of shepherds. And this is a natural process of the development of numbers of people, and very few people are unborrowed visionaries that walk the path of a, you know, an original thinking process and have the courage to be rejected, uh, in the pursuit of it, and then learn the skill of communicating it as a leader to inspire other people to do what their, their dream is. And that's an art, and it, and it...
**Unknown:** And I think that E- Emerson really helped me with a statement called, "To be greatest is to be misunderstood." That's... If you're not willing to be ridiculed and violently opposed and self- until you're self-evident, be prepared to fit in instead of stand out, even though we all wanna make a difference standing out. I don't think I could have said that better myself. But that's, like you said before, just a part of that puzzle and part of the process is the feedback to give you that challenge to be able to gain that strength and your true authenticity.
**Unknown:** Exactly. All of it is a feedback. Any area of our life we don't empower, people overpower us. I say, tell pe- don't empower yourself in financial, be told what you're worth.
**Unknown:** If you don't empower, like Social Security, if you don't empower yourself in a relationship, you'll be do- honey-do things around the house that you could be delegating to specialists. If you don't empower yourself socially, you'll be told what misinformation and propaganda campaigns are out there. If you don't empower yourself in b- in, in health, you'll end up, uh, you know, having organs removed and drugs taken. If you don't empower yourself spiritually, you'll probably live in a geocentric, uh, antiquated model of cosmology.
**Unknown:** But if you empower those areas of life and give yourself permission to originally think, as Munger says, take the time to think and reflect on your life and actually look at what, what you're being inundated by. Is it really true, or is it just opinions? You know, there's a saying that opinions are the cheapest commodities on Earth, and that which circulates the most usually has the least value. Are you willing to go and really go and educate yourself and expand your awareness and define what's true and, and objective instead of what's mostly taught and dispersed amongst the masses?
**Unknown:** So my question- Can I ask- Oh, go ahead. So this has been on my mind a decent amount lately, 'cause I'm always trying to, like, optimize my performance, prod- productivity, and I don't know if there... if it's unique person to person, or if there is, like, some ground, you know, what you've seen in people. But is there that percentage between putting the time in to being, like...Constantly increasing who you are and that authenticity from using tools for meditation and journaling and just, you know, getting out and being yourself versus the, the doing aspect of life.
**Unknown:** Kind of like the external- Is- ... versus the internal ... i- is, in other words, is there a delay sometimes between starting to do it before you start to see results? Is that what you're asking?
**Unknown:** No, like living your life, is there, is there like a percentage almost, um, a percentage to be like put this much of your time, energy into the inner work and this much time and energy into the outer work? Or is that always gonna- Living your values ... back, back to that 50/50? Well, you're...
**Unknown:** I always say when the voice and the vision on the inside is louder than opinions on the outside, you mastered your life. But I see that the outer and the inner becomes one thing. My outer life and my inner life are really become more blended as you go through life, because your integration and authenticity as you know yourself becomes stronger, and the world around you, you, you prioritize and you delegate, and you do the things that are most significant. So the external world that you inter- involved in is matching what you're envi- envisioning.
**Unknown:** So I find that that's, that's automatically go- going up as to the degree of our congruency, to the degree that we're actually walking our talk instead of living our life. Which I guess makes like chaos is just the perception of, you know, the opposites split, and then getting back into order and unity, bringing those two sides to one. That make sense? It, it, it's like a, a rocket when it first takes off.
**Unknown:** It has a lot of correction at the bottom, and when it goes up higher and higher and higher, it gets more stable and steady, and the corrections are at different angles, and eventually booms. And so I think that's our life. We go through and we learn about who we are, we think we know, and then we have refinements, and then we get more clear about it, and we keep polishing it, and eventually we know who we are and we're on our track. Unless we've been subordinating...
**Unknown:** Unless we keep subordinating and keep g- trying to please everybody, and, you know, people who do that, and people that are looking for a one-sided world and trying to get, live in other people's values will automatically self-depreciate as a mechanism to guide them back to what is authentic and what is true and what is priority. Well, that's kind of my question is that for the individual that's listening, that is resonating with this, but they are being honest with themselves, I've been pleasing a lot of people for a really long time, and I don't even know what I want anymore. I, I, everything is about what I have to do or what I should do. So when someone like that embarks on doing the values determination, they learn their values, what does it look like for them to start to live in their values?
**Unknown:** Do, do you find that in, in your own s- situation or other people you've worked with, that they end up doing it in phases? Or they're, they're able to just get that clarity and start living in their values? Well, it, I think there's a whole spectrum of responses. Some people, you know, it's like, um, they just get up and ride the bicycle the first day, and others take a while before they get the bicycle understood.
**Unknown:** My observation is if you were to take any human being, and let's say that they were to, uh, sit and meditate for 20 minutes in the morning and contemplate what is the highest priority, they already know their values, what's the highest priority actions they can do today that can help them fulfill their values on planet Earth? And they sit and contemplate that, and they write down, "What are those very highest priority things that I could do today that would increase the probability of a fulfilling of what is most meaningful to me?" And let's say they write seven things down. And then they go and knock those out and check them off, knock the next out, check it off. And at the end of the day, they had an extra hour or so and they knocked off one more, and they got eight major high priority actions done that day.
**Unknown:** Their gratitude for that day will be up. They won't be proud, they won't be cocky, they'll be grateful. If they come home, even if there's chaos at the home, they'll be able to manage it and not react to it, and be able to bring order to the chaos. But if they go to work, let's say, they don't take the time to meditate, they don't look at their values, they don't look at what's priority, and they just go in there and then there's fires to put out all day, and there's all this stuff going on in X time.
**Unknown:** Because I learned a long time ago by Parkinson's law and the law of entropy that if you don't fill your day with high priority actions that inspire you, it is going to fill up with low priority distractions that don't. It's raining out. If you don't put your money into assets, it's gonna go into unexpected bills. If you don't target the people you wanna associate with, you'll end up being distracted by opportunists.
**Unknown:** It's a basic law of entropy. So the second you prioritize it, you end up coming out on top of the world and have a broader view and less reaction, and more unconditional appreciation for life. But if you're doing lower priority things, you're a bear when you get home. You're ready to have a fight.
**Unknown:** You're going, "What a frigging day. What a hell of a day." A hell of a day means you're down in the dumps, you might say, and a heavenly day is when you're on top of the world. So there's a, there's a different perspective when you prioritize. When you live by highest priority, you, your self-worth goes up and you become more stable.
**Unknown:** When you live by lower priorities, your self-worth goes down and you become more volatile. And when you do, you tend to have more subjective bias, misinterpret communications, have alternating monologues instead of dialogue. You pay the price, and that's essential that you pay the price to associate the pains and suffering of not being authentic and not living by priority. It's a way of getting you back onto priority.
**Unknown:** Well, I think that was a beautiful example of the inner and outer work that Dr. Nick was talking about. You know, the meditationYou know, the, the reviewing of your values, the meditation is that inner work, but then creating that action plan for the day is that outer work. And I, I think that was a really key thing that a lot of listeners are gonna take away, that it's not one-sided.
**Unknown:** It's really about bridging that together, and that's really where the magic happens. Yes. If... Some people think that they can just sit and meditate into, uh, great achievements.
**Unknown:** I don't know about you, but I, I, I, I had to work my butt off a bit, and I got a small butt because I work for- I put the hours in. I don't, I don't know of anybody, I don't know of anybody that's achieved something great with doing, you know, little activity. Most of them work. Most of them have a work ethic, and they put the hours in.
**Unknown:** I, I had a lovely gentleman about, oh, April this year, uh, who is one of the greatest pianists in the world. I mean, he's played in almost every major city of major countries around the world. He's 80 years old. I had lunch and dinner with him.
**Unknown:** Plus, I went to a performance and watched him rehearse. Um, and as we were going to dinner and talking, I said, you know, "When did you first... How did you start on this?" He said, "I was three years old, I picked up the piano. I started playing the piano at three.
**Unknown:** At nine, I started doing concert piano performance. Um, from there on out, it just kept growing." I said, "Well, how much hours do you put into it?" And I was expecting in my mind a certain number, but he kind of just went blow past me. He said, "13 hours a day." And I said, "13 hours a day?" He said, "I have 8,000 classical songs memorized verbatim. I don't have to look at any piece of music, of any classical piece of music by any of the great m- you know, composers.
**Unknown:** I have them all done by heart. I can recite them and repeat them, and I practice them hours a day, and I still do it." And here he was, 80 years old, in the... We have four grand pianos here on the ship, and he was in there working on one of them. If there was somebody in that area, he would move to another one, and he just practiced piano.
**Unknown:** And then when he performed, you could not be in that performance without tears in your eyes. It's like B- Bocelli, Andrea Bocelli singing. Somewhere in the moment when he's singing, you're gonna get tears in your eyes on some of those notes, on some of those sections. That's the way it was when he was playing.
**Unknown:** So here's a master in operation, but 13 hours a day added up. I had a gentleman that came to my program in the Breakthrough Experience, and, uh, he was 29 years old. He'd spent... I asked him, you know, he's a concert, um, p- uh, violinist, and he's gone all over the world himself, and I asked him how many hours has he, has he calculated he's practiced.
**Unknown:** So he started calculating, I mean, looking and estimating it was. It came out just under 44,000 hours, he was 29 years old, that he'd already prep- he'd already practiced. So Gladwell says 10,000. I, I've been teaching the Breakthrough Experience that one program, um, 25 hours times 1,100 and...
**Unknown:** well, 1,200 times now. And, um, you add that up, times 25 hours, that's 30-something-thousand hours just presenting one program. So if you put the hours in, you'd be surprised what you get. You get major outcomes if you put the effort in.
**Unknown:** So I'm, I'm not a... I don't wanna teach people a fantasy that, oh, you just, just visualize it and you'll end up with all this. I'm, I'm a firm believer that most people who do extraordinary things put extraordinary effort into it. Do you have a question- Nothing- ...
**Unknown:** Nick, before I go to mine? I was gonna say, but that's just honestly obeying the laws of the universe. It's, that's the, the balance of the inner and the outer, the, the energy, the transformation, the, the alchemy, you know, going from a low vibration to a high vibration, non-physical to physical. It's just, that's just part of creation right there.
**Unknown:** That's it. My comment is that- You have a, you have a, you have a, you have a more padding on your butt than you do on your shoulders. I think that's because you need to get your butt in gear. I don't know what that has to do with anything.
**Unknown:** I was... Knowing you, John, knowing you, John, I was a little nervous you were gonna say something else. No, but you, you, you need a g- you need a good, you need a good wallop in the butt sometimes to get your butt in gear. A pat on the shoulders d- you don't need but a little bit of patting on the shoulders.
**Unknown:** You need a little patting on the butt sometimes. But I f- I find that people that are really inspired by what they do, they put the hours in. I have a gentleman now that I've known for almost 12 years now. When I met him, he was a...
**Unknown:** You know, he's involved in music per- performance and stuff. He's got three Grammys now. He's been a student for 12 years. Three Grammys, and the guy is busy.
**Unknown:** I mean, he is out there doing it, and that's why he's achieved what he has. He's putting in the hours. And I... The same thing for a martial artist I know and sports people I know.
**Unknown:** They put in the hours. So I, I don't wanna promote the idea. I'm not against the idea of visualizing and affirming and focusing. I'm all for that.
**Unknown:** But you wanna put the hours in, and that's where the, the work comes in. That's why I spend as many hours as I do teaching, researching, writing, and traveling. I think the, the story about the pianist, your own story is everything. It, it's the perfect wrap-up for this podcast, and the reason being is because you're able to give that much effort, time, and energy because you want to, because it's in alignment with your values, and that is what is going to lead you to leave that legacy.
**Unknown:** Somebody asked me one time, "You know, you don't have to work. You're financially well off and everything else." I said, "I know, but I, I, I don't care." I didn't, I didn't wanna have financial independence to, to sit in luxury and just do nothing. I had a desire to do financial independence so I could do what I love because I can do it, not because I have to. I do it because I love to.
**Unknown:** There's a difference.And so, uh, they go, "Well, why do you put so many hours into it?" I said, "Because I'm so inspired that somebody'll listen." I think that's a great, uh, story though, because so many people are looking to acquire, you know, money, financial abundance, but they have no idea what they're gonna do with it. Or they're gonna use- Well, if you- ... it on material things ... if you don't know what you're gonna do with wealth, you know, why...
**Unknown:** I, I just... I'm working on a book right now, Nine Steps to Financial Freedom right now, and, uh, one of the subchapters, just yesterday editing, was that. If you don't know what you're gonna do with it, why would you expect the world to bring it to you? You know, what are you gonna do with your, with...
**Unknown:** What, what exactly is wealth, and what are you gonna do, and how are you gonna... You know, it's like getting in an Uber. Uh, I don't know where I am- ... I don't know where I'm going, but take me there.
**Unknown:** It's a great point. I know, those little examples, you're just like, "Ah, yeah, that makes sense." Well, this was amazing. Life is com- comp- contextually simple. I, I think this was huge.
**Unknown:** Our audience is going to gain so many pearls of wisdom from this. And guys, if you, uh, didn't get it yet, you need to know your values. It's the foundation of everything. And especially if you are a growth-focused individual that is looking to leave a legacy in any area of your life, it starts with knowing who you are as a person.
**Unknown:** So true. All right, thank you guys for being here, and we are excited to have Dee Martini on again. We thank you so much for being an avid listener of Integrative U Radio, formerly known as Integrative Wellness Radio. We appreciate all of your support.
**Unknown:** We love your comments. Please visit us on social media, as well as our website, to see all of the fun things happening behind the scenes, and the new amazing content and courses that is being rolled out on a monthly basis. We hope to see you there.
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About Integrative You Radio
Integrative You Radio is a root cause medicine and integrative medicine podcast hosted by Dr. Nicole Rivera and Dr. Nick Carruthers — two integrative doctors who build personalized wellness protocols from your DNA, minerals, hormones, gut, and nervous system rather than from a population template. Looking for an integrative doctor who reads your labs together instead of in isolation? This is the show.
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