On Purpose with Jay Shetty - 12 Hard Lessons I Learned In The Last 12 Months - Birthday Special

Episode Date: September 6, 2024

What lessons have you learned from your past 12 months? How have your goals evolved over the past months? Today, Jay reflects on the 12 key lessons he has learned over the past year. He begins by discussing the idea that the seeds we plant—our actions and intentions—manifest as either flowers or weeds, the importance of pursuing meaningful actions for personal fulfillment rather than external validation, and how to distinguish between setting goals and choosing growth, underscoring that genuine progress requires a commitment to personal development rather than simply aiming for outcomes. The episode highlights the importance of protecting one's purpose from external distractions and maintaining a clear focus on one's path, the challenges we face as opportunities to grow into who we're meant to be, and the concept of defining experiences proactively to shape our own narratives rather than letting circumstances dictate our identities. In this episode, you'll learn: How to handle envy with love How to act for fulfillment, not praise How to focus on growth, not just goals How to guard your purpose from distractions How to use challenges to evolve How to stay open to unexpected help Stay open to the unexpected, protect your passions, and choose growth over comfort. By doing so, you not only transform your own life but also inspire those around you to do the same. With Love and Gratitude, Jay Shetty What We Discuss: 00:00 Intro 02:29 Lessons Learned in the Past 12 Months 03:50 #1: The seeds you planted in the past will grow into flowers or weeds today. 07:08 #2: Envy will erode your life. 10:27 #3: People forget things quickly, do the right thing and what's meaningful to you. 13:06 #4: Everyone sets goals, not everyone chooses growth. 15:00 #5: Don't let anyone deter you from your purpose. 16:45 #6: Your challenge is designed for you to become who you're meant to become. 18:37 #7: You'll let things define you if you don't define them first. 19:35 #8: Help can come from unlikely sources in unlikely ways. 21:34 #9: Try to see things as an invitation, not an impediment.  24:07 #10: Sometimes to get to your dreams, you have to take the stairs, the elevator, or come through the roof. 25:17 #11: The people you leave behind will feel left behind no matter what you do. 26:35 #12 Love is not enough.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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The number one health and wellness podcast. Jay Shetty. Jay Shetty. The one, the only J Shetty. Hey everyone, welcome back to a very special episode of On Purpose. Today is my birthday and so I wanted to do a very special reflection birthday episode where I get super deep super vulnerable and open up to you about the lessons I've learned, insights I've gained, purification I've had to go through and challenges I have overcome in the last 12 months. Now I'm really

excited to dive into this episode but before I do that I want to thank each and every one of you for choosing On Purpose this year. It has made a huge difference to our community, it's made a huge difference to me, and I hope that you will subscribe, leave a review, and share this episode with a friend. I am so grateful for your ongoing support, and I couldn't do this without you. Now, as I sat down to think about this episode and introspect, I realized that there were 12 key lessons that I've learned in the last 12 months. And I think it's important.

I challenged myself to think of 12 lessons because I believe that every month has something for me to learn. Every month of the year has something for me to have to encapsulate into a line of wisdom, a quote, a thought, a reflection that I can carry on into the next. The reason why we make the same mistakes again and again is because we don't learn the lesson we need to learn again and again.

We miss the signs, we miss the opportunity, we miss the chance to learn and grow, and so we fall, fail, and make the same mistake again. The reason why I do this episode, we fall, fail and make the same mistake again. The reason why I do this episode and I recommend you do it around your birthday as well is because it gives you the opportunity to make sure that you're carrying the wisdom of your last year into the next. And for those of you who are wondering, yes, I'm a Virgo in case you hadn't figured it

out just yet. And I'm just so happy that I get to share these lessons with you. Here's lesson number one. The seeds you planted in the past will grow into flowers or weeds today. What you experience is what you planted a long time ago. This is how karma works.

Don't be mad at what grows, focus on planting good seeds. How many times have you had it where something happens and you're thinking to yourself, I've been doing everything right. I've been doing good, I've been working hard, I've been acting appropriately, I've been really focused on service and making a difference. And all of a sudden, some surprise comes in your way,

something that you weren't expecting, something that feels like you don't deserve it and you probably don't. But what you realize when you recognize the power of karma is that there was a weed you planted years ago and today that weed has grown and is now affecting your life and sometimes the most beautiful things happen to us we meet someone amazing we get an amazing opportunity in our careers someone someone spots our talent, something phenomenal happens for us. And again, we didn't do anything different now.

It was a seed that we planted many months, many years ago. So our life is like a garden. And the seeds and weeds that we planted months and years ago are growing today into either flowers or weeds. And then we're experiencing either the beautiful scent of that flower or we're experiencing the tightness of that weed around us. In that moment, it's so easy to get bitter. In that moment, it's so easy to be bitter. In that moment, it's so easy to

be angry. And all of those feelings are valid. They're okay. But the behavior we want to see is the acceptance. The Vedas talk about this idea of one who can accept something as a reaction of their karma, as of a seed that they planted a long time ago, to that person they experienced liberation and peace. It's the acceptance that maybe there's somewhere in my journey that I acted in a certain way. Maybe there's some conversation that I said something. Maybe there was one period where I did something

and now there's a reaction to that action that I took and instead of focusing on that I'm going to start planting even better seeds and I'm going to uproot this weed by figuring out how it was planted in the first place if you've ever tracked a weed through a garden, you start pulling it out and you can actually follow it and trace it to its root place. Remember, the seeds you planted in the past will grow into flowers or weeds today. Not everything is about what you did in the last 30 days. We think of things as quite short term. We think of things as quite instant. And right now, a lot of what we're experiencing is from a long time ago. Lesson number two. For some people in your life, envy is uncontrollable compared to their

character. Make sure yours is the other way around. Envy will erode your life. It's a really interesting characteristic envy because it's that feeling of I wish I had that. I deserve that. They don't deserve that. They don't. They shouldn't get that. Why did that happen to them? Why not me? And by the way we all go through this. I don't want you to sit there and shame yourself or make yourself feel guilty or make yourself feel bad for this. We all experience envy in different ways. No matter how successful or how at the beginning of your journey you are, it's something that everyone experiences. Two of the questions I ask my clients when I'm first meeting them, the first is who do you envy?

I always ask that because to me it shows so much about what a person values. It shows so much about what they think is good. What they think is better than what they have their level of gratitude, their level of character. And the second question I ask is, who or what is your God? What do you idolize? What do you obsess over? And it's not just what we think in our minds, it's what we show by our actions. What I found is that for most of us, we're able to calm our envy.

We're able to not act on it. We're able to coach ourselves, talk ourselves out of acting on that feeling and emotion. But for some people, it's uncontrollable. Their envy has reached such a height that they're prepared to do anything in order to express their envy. Now, if you're on the receiving end of this, it can be really difficult and challenging. Can be really hard to go through that. And if you have been, I know some of you have said to me in the comments before, Jay, I had a friend of mine tell me that they were envious of me and I struggle to be friends with them now. Some people are bold enough to admit it to you.

And some of you know, some of you know that there's someone in your life who's envious of your relationship, someone who's envious of your promotion, someone who's envious of your recent vacation, envious of your wedding. And it can be a really uncomfortable feeling. What we have to recognize is that we don't want to meet envy with bitterness. We want to meet it with love. We want to meet it with the recognition that envy is eroding that person's life.

And we don't want to partake in increasing our envy or increasing our ego. If we take joy or satisfaction in the fact that someone envies us, our ego grows. And if we get really uncomfortable, then our bitterness grows. Instead we meet it with love. We remind ourselves, I'm really grateful for what I have. I'm really fortunate for what I have. I'm really thankful and blessed for what I have. Please never let me be envious of others and please let me not be the cause of envy for

others. Let them be purified just as I wish to be purified. Let me also move towards love in this moment. Lesson number three, people forget things quick, do the right thing and what's meaningful to you. Sometimes when you're doing good things, I'm sure you've felt this before. You're hoping that your friends, your family, they celebrate it. You're hoping that the people around you recognize it, that they notice it, that they're able to partake

in your achievements and where you've got to. People forget things quick. You may have done the most amazing thing and someone will forget in the next 24 hours. People forget in the next seven days. I often think about the great music artists of the last 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70 years and how quickly people are forgotten. People forget things quick, both good and bad.

Do the right thing and what's meaningful, what's truly meaningful and do it for that reason. Sometimes it's the opposite. Sometimes we're dealing with negativity Sometimes we're dealing with negativity. We're dealing with other people's judgments. We're dealing with other people's assumptions and it doesn't feel great and we just wish that they could see the truth. But guess what?

People forget things quick. Do the right thing and what's truly meaningful and do it for that reason. I've often found that that's the test. If you're doing good things for validation or if you're dealing with negativity, hoping to change people's perception, then you can fail on both accounts because you may never ever shift what someone thinks of you. You can't change what someone thinks of you. You can't change how much someone thinks about you.

You can't change their perception of who you are. All you can do is do the right thing and what's truly meaningful. And when you do it because it's the right thing and because it's meaningful, you get to feel that validation yourself. You get to experience it deep within your heart. People forget things quick. Stop giving them so much importance. People will forget the best thing you did in a moment. People will forget the biggest thing you did in a moment. People will forget the most amazing thing you did in a moment. And if you're hoping that they'll validate you, they'll recognize you, they'll believe in you because of it, you'll always be running out and you'll always have to keep filling up.

People forget things quick. Don't place your value in how much they value what you're doing. Because if you do, you'll always feel devalued. Lesson number four. Everyone sets goals, not everyone chooses growth. I've realized as I've been coaching people, as I've seen people grow and seen people achieve their dreams, I've had the fortune

of seeing some amazing comebacks to industries, I've seen some amazing moments of brilliance of people in their field. And I've noticed that the people who do get to where they want are not the people who have goals, they're the people who choose growth. See, a lot of people have goals. We know that the studies show that 80% of people

don't meet their New Year's resolutions. Setting a goal doesn't make you amazing. Setting a goal doesn't ensure anything. It's those who choose growth that experience the success of a goal. And I've seen over the last 12 months, people that have mentored, people that have coached, that those who chose the discomfort, people that have mentored, people that have coached, that those who chose the discomfort, those who chose the uncomfortable path, those who chose growth achieved their goals. So I'm always asking myself, not what's my goal,

but what's required of me from the perspective of growth? What growth have I not yet made, which is why my goal feels so far away. Your goal will feel further and further away until your growth is constantly expanding. Right. Your goals will feel closer when your growth grows faster. So I'm always asking myself, the thing that's blocking me from my goal is my growth. So let me figure out how I need to grow.

What skill is it? What habit is it? What mindset is it that I don't yet have that is holding me back? This one has been a big lesson for me of late. Don't let anyone deter you from your purpose. There's a beautiful verse in the Vedic literatures that says, when you protect your purpose, your purpose protects you.

And I love this statement because we often think of our purpose as something we have to find. We think of our purpose as something we have to find. We think of our purpose as something we have to build. We think of purpose as something we have to create. Our purpose is something we have to protect. You already have it, you know it, but you've been veering away from it because of other people's expectations, other people's judgment, other people's criticism, other people's negativity. And you've gone so far away from it that you

feel like you have to find it again, but you don't have to find it again. It's already there. It exists and we have to learn to protect it. So I want to ask you, what is something that you haven't protected for a while? What is a part of you that you haven't protected, that you haven't shielded, that you haven't created boundaries around? Because when you protect your purpose, your purpose protects you. I found that everything in life is trying to get you to stop living your purpose, because it's the only way the game wins.

It's the only way the material world wins is by distracting you from your purpose. The material world wins when it takes you away from that which you were meant to do, that which you're born to do, that which you are made for. And for so many of us, I find that it's okay to get distracted, but we have to find our way back. Find our way back to protect it. Lesson number six. Your challenge is designed for you to become who you're meant to become. Don't ask how do I get over this or through this. Ask who is this asking me to become and why am I avoiding the call. Whenever you meet a challenge, when you're ready,

after you've experienced the emotions, experienced the pain, experienced the stress, ask yourself, who is this asking me to become? Who is this calling me to become? And whenever I avoided this in the past, chances are we only get a really strong alarm sound when we've resisted the call before, right? Your alarm gets louder and louder and louder and louder in the morning when you ignore it. What's the call you've been ignoring that just got loud? Who are you being asked to rise to become? Who are you being asked and challenged to become? Who are you required to become and why are you avoiding the call? Whatever challenge you're going through,

know that you are designed for it and it is designed for you. And when you approach it in that way, you get the strength that you need because you recognize you are built for this. You're made for this. You're designed for this. You're created for this. The resistance makes us feel weak. This is not for me. I're designed for this, you're created for this. The resistance makes us feel weak. This is not for me, I'm not for it, I can't do this. It's not possible. It makes you weak in the fight.

You can strengthen in the fight, you can build in the fight. You can grow in the fight. I've seen my friends this year fight some incredible things, truly fight some incredible things, really difficult, challenging moments. And it's because they chose to become what that situation was asking them to be. Not who they wanted to be, not what they wanted in the moment, but what was required of them in that moment. And that leads nicely on to lesson number seven. You will let things define you if you don't define them first.

So we let things define us when we just go with the flow and we think, okay, that happened to me. It defined me. No, let me define it. Let me decide and define how I want this to change my life. Let me decide and define how I want to speak about this. And this is a really important point. I think a lot of us don't use these as opportunities to expand our emotional vocabulary, to expand how we perceive this moment. How can you learn to define and make a decision

about how you're going to let something affect you, right? I can either use a life-changing moment to actually change my life or to continue living life the same way after a few days. It's my choice. It's your choice. Lesson number eight. Help can come from unlikely sources in unlikely ways. This year I had a lot of random sources of help. And one thing I've really learned is to remember the in-betweeners. Now the in-betweeners was a TV show in the UK, maybe you watched it, maybe you didn't.

It was about a bunch of awkward people at high school. But to me, the in-betweeners are the people that introduce you to someone that you're now best friends with. The in-betweeners are the people that introduce you to someone that you're now best friends with. The in-betweeners are the people who helped you get that job, even though it didn't benefit them. The in-betweeners are the person that maybe even introduced you to the love of your life and you're no longer friends with them.

Who's an in-betweener in your life? Help can come from unlikely sources and unlikely ways. And I promise you, you have someone important in your life today or something important in your life today. And you have it because of an in-betweener, someone you've forgotten about, someone you no longer know or stay in touch with, or someone that you don't ever really show that gratitude to.

This is a reminder to express your gratitude to the person you forgot about, to the person who introduced you to an amazing friend, to the person who helped you with your last job, to the person who maybe introduced you to the love of your life, but somewhere along the way you fell out, you forgot about them, they forgot about you, you disconnected. But that in-betweener is one of, they forgot about you, you disconnected. But that in-betweener is one of the most important people you'll ever meet. And help can come from those in-betweeners sometimes when we least expect it. Help can come from unlikely

sources in unlikely ways. We have to be receptive to it. Sometimes we go to the same sources for help. We have to be open to the fact that there are other people out there with wisdom, with insight, with so many things that can help us if we simply open ourselves up to it. Lesson number nine, try to see things as an invitation, not an impediment. I was speaking to my friend, Alok, who actually said this to me. How can every impediment be seen as an invitation? What does that mean? An invitation is letting you in. An impediment often feels like it's keeping you out. Right? We often think as blocks as rejections, keeping us out, we didn't make it in.

So an invitation, when you look at it as an invitation, what is it inviting you into? May not be inviting you into the room you wanna be in, it may not be inviting you into the career you wanna be in, it may not be inviting you into the relationship you wanna be in, what is it inviting you to? Read in between the lines. What is this impediment inviting me to be a part of?

It may not be inviting me to be a part of the thing I want to be a part of, but there is something else. I've seen this over the years in my work and life. I remember when I first came to LA, I had been reached out to by a production company. This is seven years ago that wanted to make a TV show with me. And I'd come to LA and we pitched this TV show, which I thought was pretty cool. And no one wanted it. And everyone got rejected.

I got rejected over town, but I became really good friends with a lot of the people I met people at streamers and production companies. And it was really interesting to me because I realized that because I didn't get the opportunity to do the TV show I wanted, I had time and energy to build the podcast that I really wanted to do. I had time and energy to create content that I really believed in. I had time and energy to write the books I cared about. And it's funny because I think if seven years ago I was given that show, maybe I would never have done all of this. And today I'm so grateful because it was an invitation to say, be independent,

be entrepreneurial, be creative. And I think about all this amazing stuff I've been able to do and the connection I've been able to build up with you was because of an impediment. It was because something didn't work out. Most things that work out are because other things didn't work out. Most things are created because other things were blocked. Think about in your life where you're chasing the same thing and waiting for permission when actually you could let go of the desire for permission and focus

on making progress in the things that you see as potential. Lesson number 10. Sometimes to get to your dreams, you have to take the stairs. Sometimes you get to take the elevator and sometimes you have to come through the roof mission impossible style. And I think a lot of us want the elevator. We might take the stairs and we don't really want to have to jump through the roof. In that scenario, I want you to ask

yourself, have you been waiting for that elevator for too long? Have you been waiting on that floor for that elevator to stop for way too long and it keeps missing it? You keep missing it. How many of you have been resistant to take the stairs because of the climb, the steep climb, but now it's the time to go through that fire exit and take the stairs even though it's 24 floors that you've got to climb? And how many of you realize that now it's time to just go through the roof, right? To really take that leap, take that risk. And so I want you to ask yourself, what have you been resisting? Have you been waiting for too long?

Have you not been waiting long enough? It's been a big lesson for me this year. Lesson number 11, the people you leave behind will feel left behind no matter what you do. You can try to please them. You can try to make them feel included. You can try to make them feel involved in everything you're doing.

But if they wanna feel left behind, they will find a reason to feel left behind. And there's nothing you can do about it. You have to accept it and move on. I've had the fortune of seeing people stay connected with me even when I was hard to connect with, and I've seen others that I've tried to stay connected with who've disconnected despite my efforts.

People you leave behind will feel left behind no matter what you do. You can't stop growing because of that. You can't stop growing because of that. You can't stop going because of that. But the thing you promise to yourself you won't do is be bitter towards them, be upset towards them, be disappointed by them. Because what that does is it pollutes your journey.

It pollutes your path. It pollutes the purity of your intention, the purity of your intention, the purity of your purpose when you fall prey to the idea that they should have come. They must do what I wish they would do. And lesson number 12, love is not enough. Build skills, qualities, and characteristics. Don't over rely on love. I've seen this with people I've worked with, people I've coached, mentored. Love will get you only so far because people's capacity to love is limited by their capacity for hate.

People's capacity for love is limited by their capacity for a lack of trust. We are only love. We're made of love. But because we've increased our capacity to be all these other things, we have decreased our capacity for love. And therefore the skills, the mindsets, the habits make up for what we lack in love, only to ultimately lead to love. I want to thank you for listening to my special birthday episode. I hope these lessons gave you something to think about, something to reflect upon. I hope you'll continue to be a part of this community and share the messages you're learning here. I look forward to reconnecting with you soon. Don't miss out on episodes, new ones, every Monday and Friday.

We've got like 500 episodes for you to catch up on if you're new here. Thanks for listening. Remember, I'm forever in your corner and always rooting for you. Thank you so much for listening to this conversation. If you enjoyed it, you'll love my chat with Adam Grant on why discomfort is the key to growth and the strategies for unlocking your hidden potential. If you know you want to be more and achieve more this year, go check it out right now. You set a goal today, you achieve it in six months,

and then by the time it happens, it's almost a relief. There's no sense of meaning and purpose. You sort of expected it and you would have been disappointed if it didn't happen.