when they need some wisdom, including yours truly.
I just wanted to call myself a celebrity.
See, that's what's up.
You may know him
from his award-winning podcast "On Purpose."
Please welcome my dear friend Jay Shetty!
What up? - Lilly!
- Hello! Welcome, welcome!
- Thank you for having me. - Thank you for being here.
Come on in to my fake crib.
- I love it. It looks beautiful.
- What we're gonna do is we're gonna go in between
all these lights like they're not here,
just like this, and we're gonna sit.
- So cool, I love it. - Um, so--
I love having my friends on the show
because we obviously hang out a lot.
- Yes, yes. - I know you very, very well.
But I've learned that when I'm here on the couch,
we get into conversations that we might otherwise not have.
So I wanna, like, get to know you
in a way I've never got to know you.
- Okay. - Question one.
What is it that I always beat you in Catan?
I'm kidding--no, I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I'm kidding.
I'm done, I'm done, I'm done.
- Because you taught me Catan.
So it means that your coaching was fairly poor,
and therefore you have not created a strong opponent.
Hence, you always destroy your opponent.
- So you actually won the last game.
I'll say it, I'll say it. You won.
- You won, like, seven before that.
- You know, growing up--
obviously, brown dude, brown girl,
parents have certain expectations
of what they want us to do.
You went a very different trajectory.
Not the doctor, not lawyer, still found success.
How did you get to that place?
- I think-- you know what it was?
It was-- yeah, I grew up in a family
where you could be a doctor, a lawyer, or a failure,
and we all chose the third option.
And I feel like society creates these, like, ceilings
in each and every area of life.
And for me, it was actually when I was 14,
and my math teacher in school looked me in the eye.
I was struggling with a question,
and he said to me, "Jay, do you know why
you're struggling with that question?"
And in my head I'm thinking, "'Cause I'm terrible at math."
And he goes, "No, the reason
"you're struggling with that question
"is because instead of thinking about the question,
"you're worried about your parents' opinion.
And you're thinking about your parents' opinion."
- What a therapy session at 14.
- Literally, from a math teacher.
Mr. Kingsley, I will never forget you.
- Shout-out, shout-out. You've terrified Jay.
Look at him now.
- And it was such a moment.
Like, it sounds like such a trivial thing,
but it was so true.
He was literally looking me in the eyes and saying,
"Jay, you care more about your parents' opinion
than you do about dealing with the question."
And so since 14, I started to follow my intuition.
And I think because I started doing that when I was 14,
that voice has got stronger and stronger and stronger.
But for those of us who've been ignoring that voice
since were 14, it's got weaker and weaker and weaker.
So we gotta give it space to get strong again
and give it a moment to go.
- So at 14 you had a voice inside of you?
'Cause I'm trying to think of the voice inside my mind at 14,
and I think it was Sailor Moon. - [laughs]
- So, like, I'm trying to, like, really understand here.
So you believe everyone has that voice inside of you?
- Yes, 100%. - Huh.
That's incredible. - Yeah.
- Let me ask you this.
I'm sure it is a common misconception that people--
you know, are very familiar with you online
and they listen to your podcast and they read your book,
and like, "Jay is probably so full of joy."
They probably feel that way about you.
"Jay is full of joy."
Jay is full of joy--wow. Put that on a T-shirt.
But they probably think that you're very happy and positive,
which you are, but you're human, so--right?
- 100%.
- So how do you stay so positive?
Would you call yourself a positive person?
- I would call myself a--ooh, that's--
I would call myself a realistic person
with an optimistic flair. - Okay.
- So I consider myself to be someone
who's realistic, thoughtful,
I like weighing out the options,
I like being logical.
But overall, I will always try and choose
to see the good in someone or a situation.
But that's been practiced and developed.
There are plenty of days where I wake up, and I am in a mood.
What I've realized is that even on the days
I don't feel like doing my morning routine,
it's on those day that I have to do it even more.
So I go back to the same set of activities
which I don't wanna do that day
because I'm stressed, overworked, no energy--
but I've realized that healthy things,
they feel good after,
and unhealthy things feel good before.
- Yeah, you're so right. - Right?
If you think about that for a second,
like, anything that's healthy for you,
like going to work out.
Before you go to work out, I never want to work out.
But when I finish working out, I always feel phenomenal.
I feel great. - Olympian--I'm Olympian.
- Exactly, there you go.
And the same with food.
If I'm about to eat a healthy meal,
I want the burger and the fries.
But once I eat the healthy meal, the feeling after--
so I've realized to disconnect
from the feeling before an activity,
and focus and reconnect to the feeling after an activity.
- Wow, okay, let's start mentioning your podcast.
I've had the privilege of being on your podcast.
I was, like, the least famous person on your podcast.
- No, you were one of my-- - It was an embarrassment
that I'm on your podcast. I don't know why you asked me.
- Not at all. I actually wanna say this.
I was just getting--we were just getting to know each other
when I launched the podcast two years ago.
You were one of my first three guests,
and you kindly agreed to be on the podcast
when it was brand-new, we had no listeners.
- Right, and, like, since then, we've raised the bar a lot
for the guests we have.
- No, we need to have you back on.
- Who are some of the people that have been on your--
like, amazing, incredible people.
- We've been so lucky. We've had--
- Flex right now, flex. Give me the list.
- We've had everyone from Alicia Keys...
- Okay. - To Dennis Rodman.
Jennifer Lopez came on this year.
- Jennifer Lopez. Just 18 abs.
- Will Smith. 18 abs!
And then, like, phenomenal thinkers like Adam Grant
and Dr. Daniel Amen and scientists that have, you know,
had these massive discoveries.
So we have this beautiful balance between science,
celebrities, thinkers, thought leaders, spiritualists.
- It's insane. So you had really--
first, let's talk about the podcast for a second.
How would you summarize it?
What are you talking about with these people?
- So the podcast is called "On Purpose."
I believe that purpose is the most interesting,
fascinating pursuit of anyone's life.
And I think that the people that we look to
beyond their success and beyond their growth
and fame and wealth, I'm fascinated by the person.
So I try and shift away from their identity of what they do,
and I try and focus on who they are.
And so we're trying to get to the purpose of their being.