In Pursuit Of Purpose?

Since the dawn of civilisation, there is an idea that has been known to us and yet we have never really fully integrated it successfully into any society. That is the idea of living a life of purpose. Since we started recording ideas and philosophies, we have known that purpose is the key to the best life you can live. But right now could be the best possible time in all of history to finally make this idea take hold.

Transcript

Oh,

Kia ora.

Thank you.

So since the dawn of civilization,

There's this idea that's been known to us,

But we've never really fully integrated it into any society.

And that's the idea of living a life of purpose.

So since we've restored it,

Since we started recording ideas and philosophies,

We've known that purpose is the key to the best life that we can live.

So in 350 BC,

Aristotle,

The intersection where your gifts,

Talents and abilities meet a human need,

Therein you'll discover your purpose.

A bit before that,

In about 420 BC,

Socrates,

It's not living that matters,

But living rightly.

And even before that,

This is from around about 1500 BC,

This is the Book of the Dead from Egyptian civilization.

And this is a picture of the weighing of the heart ceremony.

And so the Egyptians believed that all the good and the bad deeds that you did in your life were stored in your heart.

And so after death,

And before attempting to enter the afterlife,

Your heart would be weighed.

So if you lived a good life,

Full of good deeds and good things,

Your heart would be really light,

And it would be lighter than the feather of truth,

Which is what the goddess Mart's wearing on top of her head over here.

And so off you'd go and spend eternity with Isis and Osiris in the afterlife having a great old time.

But if you lived a life of bad deeds and not being doing good things,

Your heart would be heavier than the feather of truth.

And so Amet,

Who's this little multi-animaled creature thing here,

Would eat your heart,

And that would be it.

No afterlife after party for you.

Pretty intense.

But right now,

I think is the best possible time in all of history for us to finally make this connection to purpose and really run with it.

So imagine with me just for a second what a future world could look like.

It's like a future where we can only barely comprehend if we all manage to live a life of purpose.

It's a world where every human gets to thrive in a way that's regenerative to this planet that we all live on.

Pretty audacious dream.

Yeah,

Probably a bit of a dreamer,

But I think we can give it a go.

Because I think if we all choose to make this reality,

If we all choose to go and pursue the purpose,

We can actually make that happen.

So what is purpose though?

There's a lot of,

I guess,

Misinformation around what this purpose thing actually is.

And when you first bump into this idea of purpose,

It's actually quite a tricky topic to grapple with.

It's not a topic that we're kind of taught or grew up with.

And in many ways,

I've always found it's like trying to explain the taste and smell of the number three.

It's like really ethereal,

Really hard to get your head around.

But at a high level,

The best way to think about it is the idea of planting trees that you're not going to see grow.

As the American philosopher William James said,

The best use of life is to spend it for something that outlasts it.

So fundamentally then,

It's about you finding meaning by doing something that's bigger than you for others for shared good.

When you really want to get a true definition though,

The dictionary is a good place to go to.

And that describes purpose as the reason for which something is done or created and something's useful,

Use or usefulness.

So that's the dictionary definition.

So as we try and kind of condense it and it's like this vortex,

You're trying to get your head around what is this thing.

It's about being good fundamentally.

It's about doing things you are good at that does good for you and for others.

It's like you get to be this mini superhero every day.

That's how I think about it.

I also like to think about it as I quite often refer to it as the self-sourcing chocolate cake of goodness.

Because it's like this cake that just keeps oozing chocolate and it's just like amazing and everyone loves it and like why would you not want more of it.

So why is that so vital for us?

And that's purpose not chocolate cake.

I'm not saying chocolate cake is vital to your existence,

Although some people might argue that case.

So specifically purpose guarantees you seven major life benefits.

It gives you focus,

It gives you health,

It gives you hope,

It gives you meaning,

It gives you motivation,

It gives you resilience.

And I think most importantly it'll mean you leave a real cool legacy.

So the research is in.

So it's kind of gone a bit from the woo woo and we're going to go into the science.

So the research is absolutely clear.

Hands up who's keen for an overall doubling in life satisfaction.

Yeah cool.

On average a 31% increase in levels of attraction,

Sexual pleasure and love.

Yeah take that.

42% better memory,

Cognition and executive function.

A 63% increase in income,

Wealth and leadership effectiveness.

A 64% increase in fulfilment.

Four times engagement and five times productivity on tasks.

And I'll even throw in stronger DNA and cells that will give you an extra seven years of this amazing life.

Does that sound like a pretty cool deal?

I think I'll take that for a grey Thursday morning.

But beyond this there also appears increasingly that we have a biological need for purpose,

For contribution,

For service.

There's two recent studies at UCLA are showing that the brain is actually hardwired for this stuff.

And when we do it well we get a dose of what's called the happiness trifecta.

So you get oxytocin which is the bond,

Like the love drug that comes between mothers and child.

We get dopamine which plays a major role in motivation and you get a dose of serotonin which is the mood regulator.

So when you do purpose well you get a big punch and a big hit at that.

So as individuals who are wired to seek purpose and meaning we're also customers,

Employees and investors.

And right now they are demanding this purpose stuff more than ever before.

Particularly the millennial generation.

They really get this stuff.

And that's why we're seeing the increasing rise of B corporations and other socially and environmentally conscious business.

Because people are demanding it.

Like I say customers are increasingly demanding more transparency and accountability from businesses.

They just want you to do more good.

In the recent Colmar Brunton Better Futures survey earlier this year,

90% of Kiwi survey said that they would stop buying from a brand if they considered it had been operating unethically or irresponsibly.

That's a pretty big stat.

On the flip side the fans of purpose driven business are evangelical in their levels of support.

They just want to see them thrive.

In that same Colmar Brunton survey,

86% of employees said it was important for them to work for a brand that they thought was being socially and environmentally responsible.

And yet the global statistics on employee engagement are woeful.

There's a global Gallup survey that's done every year and on average you're looking at 60% disengagement of staff in the Western world.

So 60% of staff are turning up and just going through the motions and lacking meaning in their role.

The one survey that really gets me,

This is a different survey,

40% of those surveyed felt that their role provided no meaning and in fact they thought the world would be better off if their job didn't exist.

How's that for motivation on a Monday morning?

I'm just going to go in,

Destroy the planet,

Yeah well here we are,

We're all here now.

And it's no better though for leaders.

In a World Economic Forum survey 50% of senior leaders and managers surveyed felt that their role provided no meaning to them.

Now at this point you kind of think well you know so what you know you're not supposed to like work.

I've heard that as a comment before like work you just it's a thing you do it's an ordeal you go through.

Yeah but sadly there's a real correlation between life satisfaction and job satisfaction.

If you are unsatisfied in your work there is only a 1% chance of you achieving overall life satisfaction.

So that's something to really ponder on.

But again in purpose-driven businesses employees are happier,

They're more motivated,

They just form better teams and they outperform on every metric.

And lastly when investors like Larry Fink from Blackrock Investments make it very clear that purpose in business is now mattering.

When the guy who controls six trillion dollars of investments starts signaling to the market that if you don't start considering your social and environmental impact.

Then you kind of know that the mega trend of purpose is real.

That's how I see it.

And just in time because I do think we now need purpose more than we've ever needed it in the history of humanity.

We've had the agricultural revolution,

We've had the industrial revolution,

The technological revolutions.

And from those we're now able to do pretty much anything we want.

And just think about it right now in your pocket or on the table in front of you.

You've got a device that you could buy anything you want from anything in the world through Amazon or AliExpress.

You've got a computer so powerful you can get the answer to any question that you have in a matter of seconds.

And through these developments we've made some massive gains I'm not denying that.

But these through these developments we're now also facing some massive environmental and societal challenges.

In fact I'm going to state that we've you know we've got to a point now where we've never had it so good.

And yet collectively felt so bad and made such a mess of the planet.

But with so much on offer why are so few of us living a life of purpose at home or at work.

And if we're not pursuing purpose what is it we are pursuing.

Perhaps it's because you've actually been manipulating believing that a good life can only be found through chasing material success.

Crazy idea.

But how can it be as free smart thinking individuals we've allowed that to happen.

You know life's all about personal choice you're in control of your own destiny.

That's what we all think.

But perhaps we're not as free thinking as we think.

In fact I'll go on to show you how to today potentially you've actually had very little control over your life.

Who you are why you're doing what you're currently doing and how that's stopping you from connecting to your purpose.

And I'll also show you how wider than that at a higher level we've been completely hoodwinked on the wrong idea of what a good life looks like.

So this all starts in your tribalization.

And by this I mean your childhood.

And it's between about the years of zero to seven that this occurs.

And this is during this time that your subconscious brain is formed.

And it's literally a sponge at that time.

So you're walking around as a little kid and you're just sucking in all the information that you need for you to basically be an effective human as an adult.

So your brain is literally just sucking in all this stuff.

Excuse me.

And as an adult about 95% of your decision making is controlled by your subconscious brain.

That's like the operating system.

And that's really really useful for things like opening a door or driving a car.

But it also means that the bigger decisions that you're making in your life about bigger things are being processed by this operating system that was put in there many years ago by other people.

So who's actually in control of your life?

Your parents,

Your upbringing,

Your schooling,

Your society,

Your peers.

All of that have led you to be where you are today and who you are.

Beyond that,

Has anyone heard of the field of epigenetics?

This is where it gets really really freaky.

So epigenetics,

They're now showing that the trauma of life suffered by your grandparents will influence your DNA as a child,

As a baby.

So creating outcomes and beliefs and behaviours in you through the trauma of life suffered two generations ago.

That's really freaky stuff.

Excuse me.

But beyond that,

How many of the ideas and values that we hold to be true today have just been passed down from generation to generation without anyone actually stopping to question,

Well is that the right thing to do?

Be independent,

You know,

Look after yourself first,

Get a good job,

Get married,

Work hard.

That's all seemingly good ideas.

It's best summed up for me though by the idea of what is it that people like you should be doing?

That's where the tribalisation plays its real big part.

At the base level,

Humans are driven by two things,

That's fear or desire.

So a way or towards.

Think about,

You know,

The car you drive,

Where you live,

The style of house you have,

How you vote,

The career path you're on.

Almost all of these choices are driven by your desire to fit into your tribe,

Essentially.

And in particular the tribe of your parents.

And so it all depends on the attachment you have to your tribe,

So whether you like the ideas that they've been teaching you,

Or if you don't like the ideas that they've been teaching you,

At a high level which path you're going to go down.

You're either going to go with the tribe or you're going to react against it at a fundamental level.

And that's because we're also really driven by a need for approval.

That's the one thing that humans really need in bucket loads.

Because you want to be able to fit in with the tribe.

It makes sense,

If you don't fit in with the tribe you get thrown out and you're trying to survive on your own.

So many people,

And I used to be one of them,

Are driven through their life to try and get the approval of parents who will never be satisfied.

You're just never going to get there.

But it gets even worse than this,

Because these base motivations have been co-opted by bigger forces who want to control how you think and feel.

Ooh,

It's true.

So this is a guy called Edward Bernays,

And I wouldn't be surprised if no one in the room has heard of this guy.

He was the nephew of Sigmund Freud,

Everyone knows him,

The psychoanalyst,

So the father of modern psychiatry.

But he was essentially the guy who created the modern consumer driven world that we now live in.

And he was the one who was all about telling us that a good life is about looking good,

Feeling good and having good things.

That we should choose to chase this material wealth in pursuit of happiness.

And he did this by recognising that we're emotionally driven by fear or desire and that we need to fit in with the tribe.

As he said,

If we understand the mechanism and motives of the group mind,

It's now possible to control and regiment the masses according to our will without them knowing it.

I'm not making this stuff up,

This was his book,

1928,

Called Propaganda.

He had a vision for controlling the world,

Him and a group of mates,

We're going to make everyone do what we want them to do.

Really scary stuff.

This is one of his most famous advertising campaigns for the American Tobacco Company in the late 1920s.

So in the late 1920s,

Blokes were smoking cigarettes,

Not a problem.

But women weren't smoking,

So with your market driven capitalist base head on,

Well there's a big opportunity here,

We've got this whole other market we should be selling to.

So obviously he was engaged to create some campaigns to try and help women get onto this smoking idea.

And obviously he did this by espousing the health benefits of smoking.

And in particular the idea of having a cigarette instead of eating.

Because obviously,

You know,

Who wants to eat when you can be skinny?

What a crazy idea.

And so through a mix of these ad campaigns and magazines and papers extolling the virtues of being thin,

He worked with doctors and convinced them to encourage women to smoke rather than to eat.

And he had great success through these campaigns.

But despite that there were still some lingering doubts,

There were still some lingering societal barriers that were stopping women from fully getting into smoking.

And so he created this one amazing campaign around torches of freedom.

So you imagine the 1920s women's enfranchisement was really a pretty new thing.

Good job New Zealand leading the way.

So 1920s,

So he created this idea of torches of freedom.

So women,

Light your cigarette in defiance of the patriarchy.

Prove that you're as worthy as a man by smoking your cigarette.

Genius!

But I know what you're thinking,

Like look,

Okay some of these adverts,

You read some of the text on them,

Like it's pretty,

You know,

This is the 1920s and 30s.

Like we're way smarter than this,

Right?

Yeah.

So these ideals that he began are now at the heart of the 500 billion dollar advertising and marketing industry that's 100% focused on magnifying your fears and desires and getting you to try and fit in with the tribe.

Propaganda,

Which is the name of his book,

Has now become PR.

So this whole industry that is geared to convince you that valuables are more important than values and that the only way to happiness is by consuming more and more.

But so what?

You know,

For many people a life of mindless consumerism is awesome.

Hands up,

Who likes money and buying things?

Yeah?

Feels good,

Doesn't it?

Yeah?

And this is the big challenge I'm facing to try and convince you that that's not the right path,

Because it is awesome.

Yeah?

This is the thing,

Because the tricky thing is it does feel awesome,

But it doesn't work for you in the long term.

Because you end up on this thing called the hedonic treadmill and it's predicated by the whole idea of when I get this,

Then I'll be happy.

If I climb the ladder,

If I get that job,

If I get that car,

If I get that house,

Then life's going to be suddenly miraculously that much better than the one I've,

You know,

Based on what I've currently got.

And so you have to keep up with me,

The Joneses.

That's the whole ethos behind this society.

But you have to realise that you cannot win this game.

It's insatiable.

It just goes on forever and ever and ever.

You do not level up.

You don't beat the big bad boss at the end of the game.

It just keeps going and going and going.

And this continual keeping up with the Joneses is so stressful.

It leads to a thing called status anxiety.

So you've got this continual barrage on your self-worth by the world of advertising.

And then you're continually comparing yourself to the neighbours who are seemingly more materially wealthy than you.

It's just stressful.

It's summed up so well by a guy called Dave Ramsey who said,

We buy things we don't need with the money we don't have to impress people we don't like.

That's the kind of world we're living in.

And then you add on top of that social media and TV.

It's impossible to get away from this comparing yourself to the Joneses and the other people.

And this leads us to feeling that we're competing against each other in this pool of finite resources.

This is from the Black Friday deals in the UK.

But worse still,

We've even started making the basic tools and things we actually do need to survive a competitive arena.

It creates this idea of artificial scarcity for your very existence.

This is stressful stuff happening on you all day.

And indeed,

Mr Bernays,

He knew that scarcity is one of the biggest tools of influence in marketing.

If you tell people there's not enough of them,

They'll want it more.

Yeah?

Interesting stuff.

So is it any wonder then that we're suffering from record levels of systemic diseases?

Globally,

But specifically in New Zealand.

So in 2017,

Chronic diseases,

Chronic conditions such as cardiovascular disease,

Cancer,

Musculoskeletal conditions and diabetes accounted for 87% of the health spend in New Zealand.

That's up from 82% in 1990.

So we're getting more sick.

Meanwhile,

In the same year,

A record number of Kiwis access specialist mental health and addiction services.

Worst of all,

As of June 2018,

We've now had our highest suicide rate over a year ever.

So 685 people took their own lives in the 12 month period compared to a road toll of 377.

It appears to me that we have a lot of people living with heavy hearts.

But it gets worse,

Because at the same time,

Around us our biodiversity is being threatened.

So we're seeing degradation of our soil and water quality at levels we've never seen before.

And New Zealand has one of the highest greenhouse gas emissions of any industrialized country.

So to me,

It seems that this pursuit of happiness through material success,

It's killing you,

It's killing our friends and family and it's killing the planet.

So it's time to think about maybe chasing something else.

And this is how it works.

So instead of ever getting to happiness on that hedonic treadmill,

It keeps you trapped in a fear based mode.

And you can see how this works in Maslow's hierarchy of needs.

So this is Maslow's hierarchy of needs.

So to level up,

All your needs need to be met at the level below.

And the goal is to reach level five,

Self-actualization,

Which is the idea that you're at one with yourself and you're acting at your full potential.

But Bernays and Co,

What they do is they trick you into thinking that you'll get to self-esteem and self-actualization through buying more things.

That's what they're trying to do.

Buy this thing and you'll be better,

You'll be a better human.

So your friends will like you more,

So your self-esteem will go up.

Yeah,

That's how it works.

But instead,

What it does is it keeps you trapped at the bottom of the period in that safety and security.

But actually,

You never even really get to safety and security because you're kept in that constant state of fear.

So raise your hand if you've got a mortgage,

Do you have kids or dependents?

Yeah?

Do you buy stuff that you maybe don't need?

Yeah?

So this is the real challenge and this is the imbalance in life.

There's a small part of you that wants to live more purposely,

That maybe recognizes a little bit of the insanity of what you're doing.

But the rational,

The real side of things is,

Well,

I've got to pay the mortgage,

I've got to get the kids to school,

I've got to buy stuff for them,

I have to buy things.

And this is really,

Really hard,

Particularly when we layer on top,

Like I say,

That world of advertising and marketing.

And what's even worse,

We get to the low point now and then we're going to take you back up,

Don't worry,

We'll be alright.

What's worse is we have this,

What I call this self-imposed Stockholm syndrome.

Everyone knows Stockholm syndrome,

Where you fall in love with the kidnapper?

So we keep ourselves locked in this state of fear because humans are designed for one thing and that's survival.

So you don't want to go against the tribe,

You don't want to go against your tribalization process because in the little subconscious the brain's going,

Oh don't say that,

They'll kick you out of the tribe and then you'll be all alone in the savannah with the wildebeest chasing you down,

Even though that's not going to happen now,

Hopefully.

So we just want to be accepted,

We just want to fit in and so we don't stand up and we don't acknowledge some of these thoughts and feelings that we're having.

So we sabotage our own potential better tomorrow for that perceived safety and security of today.

But the irony is,

Trapping yourself like that,

That's the stuff that's going to kill you mentally,

If not physically,

That's where we're getting to.

And so we suffer this long-term pain of dissatisfaction and disconnection rather than ripping the band-aid off,

Having that short sharp bit of pain to go,

Right I'm going to make some changes here,

Despite knowing deep,

Deep down that if we did make those changes we'd live a better life,

We'd probably make a bit more of a better contribution to the world around us and generally have a much more positively impactful life and existence in this planet.

And so we stay comfortably numb because the only time we change is when we're sick and tired of being sick and tired,

It's really hard to make people change.

But as Rick Warren,

He's got a really great TED talk on purpose,

He says we are products of our past but you don't have to be prisoners of it.

You can choose to organise a jailbreak and that's exactly what I did.

So this is me in a former life,

Obviously the one with the back to the camera there.

So I spent about 10 years selling medical devices and if you're in any doubt as to the tools that Mr Bernays and Anco are deploying in the world,

I spent 10 years learning and crafting to perfection how to influence people,

That's what sales is all about.

But life was great,

I got paid tons of money,

I got given a free car,

A free phone,

Free health insurance for me and my partner,

I'd get to go take my clients to the best restaurants in town,

I got international travel to Davos,

To Southeast Asia,

To ski resorts all along the western coast of North America,

It was amazing.

And to a degree I kind of thought I was living a life of meaning and there was an element of that,

So my job was to go into operating theatres like this and make sure that the surgical team got the best outcome for the patients.

So there's an element of meaning in that,

Like okay that's cool,

I'm making some contribution to society.

But deep down,

Or actually not even that deep down,

Fundamentally I was being driven by me wanting to maximise my financial return,

That was partly why I was in that job because it pays well and you get commission and there's lots more ways to make money.

So that was really what was driving me.

But after a while I got seeing some things in the industry that I just thought,

Okay that's a bit interesting,

That's an interesting way of running things.

So the first one was early on in my career when one of the companies I was working for got into what you could describe a spot of trouble.

So the medical device industry is hyper hyper competitive and companies are always looking for the next big thing that will help them gain market share to basically make more money for their shareholders,

That's really what they're focused on.

And so sometimes this means they will launch products that aren't actually fully ready to be put inside a human being.

And they're willing,

It's like the whole,

Do you remember the Ford back in the day when they knew that one of their cars was faulty but they thought we were willing to risk it because only a certain number of people will probably be killed.

That's really how the medical device industry works.

So they launched this product knowing that it was a little bit borderline,

A little bit risky,

But they were willing to take the risk because they knew that the company down the road had their version coming soon.

So if we don't get ours out first we lose market share and we're behind the eight ball.

So they launched the product and the first eight patients who had that product died on the operating table in a surgery that they should have walked out of.

Now what made it even more worse,

Worse for us,

Was that the people involved with the surgeon,

He was a shareholder in the company.

So he kept going because he knew that if he didn't nail this he would be losing out on his money.

So you'd think maybe after the first patient you'd stop and go let's go back to the drawing board and not do this again.

But eight consecutive patients.

So that was that one.

But at the time you're in the bubble,

You're a part of the tribe,

The internal spin machine kicks in,

Well look,

You know,

It's a medical misadventure,

This is the only way we get to provide and test new products and push the boundaries of medical care is by,

You know,

You can't make an omelette without breaking eggs,

Blah blah blah.

And you're in the bubble and you're being paid well and life's good and you,

Oh it wasn't me,

It was in America,

Yep,

Well move on.

Yeah?

So a few years later there was another little spot of trouble for every medical device company.

So it was round about 2009ish.

Every major medical device company was subpoenaed by the US Department of Justice.

So one of the travel,

So be nice to your travel coordinators,

One of the travel coordinators in one of the big medical device companies that obviously had enough for whatever reason,

And turned whistle blower and she went to the Department of Justice with the books to go,

I can show you here how we're illegally paying surgeons to use our products and here's all the travel manifests of us paying for their wives and kids to go to Paris for a week around the conference.

So it turned out that,

You know,

Pretty much,

Well all the major surgeons around the world,

And there were some in New Zealand,

Were basically being paid by the company to use the product.

And again you're kind of in the system and they go,

Yeah but you know it's no harm no foul,

We're all doing it.

If they're a really good surgeon then they're worth the money,

You know,

Well sure we'll give them a couple of mil,

We'll put a Porsche outside their house because they're worth it,

You know,

It's marketing budget and we're all doing it.

So all the products are approved for use,

It's all good,

There's nothing to see here.

And you're in the bubble,

Stick with the tribe,

I suppose,

Yeah well they are all doing it,

Okay,

Nothing to see.

But then the last one,

Which was a few years after that,

Was when I saw that there was corruption happening within New Zealand.

You know,

New Zealand,

The least corrupt country in the world,

Maybe.

It became pretty apparent from a conversation I had with a large insurance provider in the health system,

That surgeons in New Zealand had the ability to skim money on financial transactions from companies to the insurance company.

And this was around about the same time two Christchurch surgeons were under the spotlight for tax evasion.

And so I kind of was just sitting there going,

You know what,

This stuff just doesn't feel right here.

And this was the beginning for me,

It's like something's not gelling with me internally.

But it was the birth of my daughter in 2012 on the backdrop of the Canterbury earthquakes that really made me sit up and just go like,

What are you doing?

You know,

Would I knowingly walk down the street and kill eight people?

No.

But I'm working for a company that basically did that,

So does that make me complicit?

I don't know.

You can make an argument that it didn't or that it did.

But all these questions were kind of going around my head.

And fundamentally it came down to,

Well,

If I'm working for a,

You know,

In an industry that should be all about saving people,

But actually is happy to kill them just to make more money,

How does that work?

That's not cool.

And so,

And what really got me is some of these companies I'd worked for,

They literally had their values chiseled in stone in their international head offices.

And the number one value is we will look after the patients who our products go into.

And it's like,

It's lies.

You're not doing that.

And so all of this stuff was going around my head.

And I just got to this feeling where I was living against my moral compass,

Like a deeper moral compass to the one that I'd been attuned to before that.

And I just got to think like,

Is this as good as it gets?

Is this all there is to be had in life?

Am I just going to be working for these big companies,

Just helping them earn as much money as they can whilst they're going out there potentially killing people?

And so in 2013,

I thought,

No,

This is it.

I decided to make the leap.

And I clearly remember the moment I was standing in the operating theatre,

The surgeon I was working with was particularly obnoxious that day.

And I just thought,

You know what,

I'm done with this.

So I went home literally at that lunchtime,

Said to my wife,

I'm out,

I can't do this anymore.

So the medical device world,

There was a real bubble,

Like this really weird industry.

You're a rep working for a large company selling to a doctor.

It's like that's not normal business,

You know,

It's not a business to business sale.

So I thought,

Well,

Maybe it's just this medical industry,

This little bubble that I've been in,

Let's go and try some other stuff.

And so at this time,

We'd moved up to Auckland to have our daughter.

And I just thought,

OK,

We want to get back to Christchurch.

I want to get out of medical.

I want to get into a leadership role,

You know,

Boost my CV,

Climb the ladder.

That's the right thing to do.

I'm at that age.

So I applied for about 60 different roles across all sorts of industries just to get a feel for what else was out there.

And ultimately,

I was hired as the general manager for firmware surveyors in town who were starting up post-rebuild.

And again,

You know,

There was meaning in the role I was doing.

I was building a team.

We were contributing to the rebuild of Christchurch.

It's like,

Cool,

This is how I can play a part in the rebuild.

I'm not a builder,

I'm not a handyman,

But I can build a team and contribute in that way.

But pretty soon the cracks started to appear.

So within the company,

It was really,

Really clear that profit maximisation was the overarching thing,

Frequently at the expense of the personnel in the company.

The managing director who hired me,

One of his favourite phrases was,

You must learn to sweat the asset.

And I'm like,

We're not a Victorian mill owner.

They're humans.

They have families.

I'm quite happy that they go home at five o'clock and see their families.

Silly me.

But beyond that,

You know,

Within the rebuild of Christchurch,

It became really apparent that the number one driving factor was how do we put a cheap building up really quickly to maximise our financial return?

Let's not worry about is it a sustainably built building?

Is it earthquake resilient?

Is it going to be built to a better building code so that it's warmer and drier for the people that are working in it?

None of that.

The whole Green Building Council scene was interesting.

And what really saddens me is I was in Wanaka last week at a conference and the Green Building Council having the same conversations with government as they were 10 years ago in the rebuild about how do we increase the building code in the South Island to make warm,

Dry houses.

It's insane.

So I just felt like this is a proper case of out of the frying pan,

Into the fire.

It's like,

OK,

There's this growing misalignment in me now.

It's what I now call the authenticity gap,

Because there were now these two Tims.

There was Work Tim,

Who was having those meetings about utilisation and productivity and how do we sweat the asset.

But then there was Work Tim,

Sorry,

Home Tim,

Who was telling me that my heart was telling me,

You're not on the right path here.

There's something not right here.

So this was really the beginning of my of my proper journey into purpose.

And I did start to really struggle with life.

There was this real dualism.

I couldn't get my head around the fact that this was just going to be my life for the next 40 years,

Just working for big companies,

Pumping money back up to the owners and the shareholders and watching the destruction as we did that.

But I got to the point,

Well,

It must just be me.

It can't be them.

You know,

You have these probing conversations with people and they're like,

No,

You're rubbish mate.

No,

It's all about making money.

It's just me.

No one else is thinking this way.

And I got to this,

I got fairly depressed,

Some levels of anxiety.

And I got to the point where I just want out.

I want out of this system.

It's like,

You guys are all crazy.

Or I'm crazy.

There's a real miss of a line here.

I'm out.

But it was that,

I guess,

That led me to start searching inside myself for some answers.

You know,

How had I ended up there?

How did I end up working for these medical companies?

How have we all ended up here?

Why did I spend so long working for those medical companies?

You know,

Listening to that tribe and thinking that all the stuff they were doing was OK.

But more importantly,

Why couldn't anyone else see what I was now seeing?

It's like I'd had this subconscious awakening.

I could start seeing things for how they really were in my mind.

Has anyone heard of this movie called They Live?

It's like 80s pop culture-tastic.

No?

Go and watch it.

It's quite funny.

It's like proper 80s.

It's cheesy and really poor special effects.

But you can work with that.

So it's called They Live and the protagonist Nader,

He comes into a pair of these sunglasses.

And these sunglasses let him see how the world is actually run by aliens who are concealing their identity and manipulating people to spend money,

Breed and accept the status quo via subliminal messaging in mass media.

Sound familiar?

And,

You know,

Clearly other than the aliens,

We know that the rest is true.

Yeah,

That's what the world is trying to get you to do.

But on reflection for me,

The answer was clear.

It was my tribalisation that had led me to be where I was.

That with a healthy dose of seeking the approval of my mum and dad,

Who never once just sort of said,

Hey,

You know,

We love you,

We're proud of you and you're doing some great things,

You know,

Just you're good as you are.

So having crossed my own journey,

I then started to dig into this wider world,

Like,

Well,

What other options are there in the business world?

OK,

Clearly I might be a bit crazy,

But there can't be,

You know,

There must be other people,

There must be other people struggling with how we're running this show and how just chasing money can't be the answer.

Well,

The good news was I wasn't alone.

So I went down this bit of a Google rabbit hole and I discovered this group called B Corporation in the US.

So this collection of businesses around the world who felt the same way as me.

I thought,

Wait,

Great,

I might be crazy,

But there's two thousand other crazy people out there as well.

So that's good.

That's a good place to be.

And they had this common vision for working to be the best for the world,

Not the best in the world.

And I thought,

OK,

Well,

That's a bit different.

How does that work?

And so it turns out that,

You know,

They are these amazing organisations who have a declared higher purpose,

Which is what they're pushing for,

Rather than a declared higher profit that they're looking for.

But trying to keep the two aligned and work the two in alignment.

I said,

OK,

This is really interesting.

So I did a bit more research and I found out there was actually one in New Zealand.

I was like,

Damn it.

I thought hoping,

You know,

This surveying firm could be the first one in New Zealand.

And it's called Eagle Protect.

And even better,

It was in Christchurch.

And so after a week of umming and ahhing,

I thought,

OK,

What have I got to lose?

So I sent the CEO Steve Ardern an email and said,

Hey,

Look,

I'm just this random guy trying to work out some stuff in the world.

I see you're doing some pretty cool stuff.

Can I come for a cup of tea?

And so we booked a 45 minute meeting and that turned into about a two and a half to three hour extravaganza of my mind just being blown by the amazingness of his company and this idea and this whole framework.

And I left it shell shocked,

But positively shell shocked.

And I just kind of like,

This is what I've been looking for.

I'd found my real tribe.

But then the next question was,

How do I get amongst this?

There's one one B Corp in New Zealand.

How can I how can I join that gang?

And initially I thought,

Well,

If I can get the surveying firm,

If I can try and influence the directors,

Have a chat to them,

How do we how do we differentiate ourselves in a relatively competitive market?

Maybe B Corp?

But they were just like,

How much money does this help us earn?

I don't know.

Right,

Gone.

But at the same time,

I'd also been curious about exploring a career in coaching and training.

And in the world of sales,

You get trained quite heavily.

And I kind of thought I could probably do a better job than most of those people doing that.

So I thought maybe I'll give that a go.

And luckily,

Through some conversations I had with some people who are connected,

I ended up getting a job working as a sales trainer.

I was like,

Cool.

And this company was a small boutique family run company.

And I thought,

You know what,

You know,

Their values align.

They get some of the ideas that underpin this B Corp framework.

You know,

Maybe they could have a look at it.

But they would,

You know,

Small family run business.

They were just like,

Nah.

And they were on a big,

Trying to go on a big growth phase.

And it was like,

Look,

Yeah,

Kind of looks interesting,

But not now.

And so I just kind of felt like I've reached this dead end.

You know,

Maybe there was this hope for a minute.

And I thought,

OK,

Now here we go.

It's just going to be back to working for a company,

Earning money.

But then I started thinking,

Well,

You know,

I keep talking about this B Corp stuff.

I'm trying to tell everyone else that they should be one.

Well,

What if I actually went and just did it myself?

And so in late 2015,

I was offered the perfect opportunity as I and the rest of the team in this small training company were made redundant.

Now,

I guess part of your role as an accountant is to provide advice to your clients.

And if any of them are contemplating making a leap into self-employment,

Here's a few tips on how not to do it.

Don't have a young child.

Don't have a partner who's not earning any money because they're looking after said child.

Don't have a mortgage.

And don't have a father living in the UK who gets diagnosed with stage four cancer.

Because that was how I started my business.

And at the time,

There were compelling reasons and arguments pulling me back.

You know,

My mum,

Like the drum she bangs is get a proper job.

OK,

What is a proper job,

Mum?

I've been there and done that.

Didn't work out so well for me.

But my sense of resolve was massive due to my sense of purpose.

And I knew that I only had one option and I was to go and start my own B Corp.

And 2016 was a year of challenge for sure.

Starting a business in this fledgling industry about purpose,

Which no one else had really heard enough,

Was pretty tough.

But the harder conversations were had with my dad over three month long trips back to the UK as we tried to work out our relationship as he was getting more ill.

You know,

All the while trying to keep a fledgling business up and off the ground and with a small family.

But the more I looked into what I wanted to do,

I think like this is the thing,

Purpose pulls you.

Yeah,

Once you connect to it and align to it,

You can't not do it.

And so my resolve just got stronger and stronger.

Unfortunately,

In November 2016,

My father passed away.

But by the end of 2016,

Like everything had been sorted.

I felt like I was on track.

Grow Good was underway.

I got certified as one of the first 10 B Corps in New Zealand.

And my personal purpose was fully locked in,

Which is to co-create a world of abundance that my daughter could inherit,

Where every human thrives in a manner that's regenerative to each other and the planet we call home.

That's what's pulling me.

That's what that's why I'm here doing this kind of stuff.

And this is what I get to do now.

Thank you to Scott and the team here.

You know,

I get to be up here talking about message,

Talking about purpose and spreading this message of B Corps.

And life is a journey.

You know,

Can you ever get to your true zenith point of purpose?

Maybe not.

But,

You know,

I'm working in the right direction.

And I know that I'm now on that right trajectory.

I'm not on the old trajectory that was set for me by other people.

And I know that I'm making the most positive contribution that I can and trying to lead a movement in New Zealand that includes some amazing global corporations.

So Down & USA,

The world's biggest B corporation.

Allbirds.

Go and get your Allbirds.

Evangelical customers.

Patagonia,

One of the world's first B corporations.

But also local businesses like Social Currency,

The amazing Lisa Mead,

Who's one of your peers locally who runs an amazing social enterprise called Social Currency.

Itik,

One of New Zealand's highest performing B Corps and a global superstar.

And the really,

Really big one for me is Kathmandu.

So if you haven't heard,

They certified as a B Corps about a month ago.

Like this stuff's getting real,

Yeah?

This isn't,

You know,

Four years ago B Corps in New Zealand was small businesses like me who were passionate,

Who were doing it because it was the right thing to do.

Now we're getting the big boys on board.

You know,

If an ASX listed global corporation can do B Corps,

There ain't no stopping anyone.

That's really exciting for me.

So just like me then,

I want you to know that it's okay that you've had no choice.

But I've now implicated you all.

Okay?

You now all know that you do have a choice.

Yeah?

So I'm sorry,

I've now set that little seed in your head.

You now know that you have a choice.

And to live your best life,

You have to take control of your life.

Because if you don't,

It's really likely that it's not going to end very well.

So the number one regret of those close to death,

As a survey,

There was a lady who was a hospice worker and she surveyed people.

What is the thing you wish you'd done?

Number one regret of those close to death.

I wish I'd lived a life true to myself,

Not the one that others had wished for me.

Number one regret of the dying.

I wish I hadn't lived to my tribalisation.

That's basically what they're saying.

But how do you go about unbundling this?

How do you know the choice that you have?

This tribalisation,

The propaganda,

You know,

How do you start connecting to your higher purpose?

We can take you up now.

It's all good.

It'll be alright.

It'll be alright.

Well to be truly free,

Just like me,

You've got to go and start thinking.

You've got to go and start burrowing into that subconscious mind.

Get into that inner recess of your mind.

Because at the end of the day,

We or you are the reason why you're not living that connected life of purpose.

Partly it's not been your fault,

But now like I say,

You're implicated.

You now know.

As Stocker Street said,

The unexamined life isn't worth living.

If you don't go in and do that hard work to go and look at why you are who you are,

And what's really driving you,

It's not going to,

You know,

You're going to have a less fulfilling life.

But this is the hardest thing you'll ever do in your life.

Because we prefer the comfort of not delving into our mind.

Psychologist Carl Jung calls it the shadow.

We don't like to go into the shadow.

We don't like to go into the dark.

And this is proven by a 2014 study at the University of Virginia,

Where they basically,

In this study they said,

You can go into the room,

You need to stay in this room for 30 minutes with nothing but your own thoughts.

If you want to leave the room,

You can self-administer electric shock.

70% of people self-administered an electric shock,

Rather than staying in a room for 30 minutes with nothing but their own thoughts.

That's not even asking them to question their thoughts.

That's just being in the room with your thoughts.

But as Jung said,

One does not become enlightened by imagining images of light,

But by making the darkness conscious.

This is the heavy lifting that you've got to do.

So for those of you,

Maybe after today,

You know,

You kind of feel like you're heroic enough to go and start this journey.

The first thing you need to start thinking about is,

Well,

What is it you're really pursuing?

So on first pass,

Pursuing happiness still seems like a good idea.

Like,

Who wants to be happy?

I mean,

Why would you not want to be happy?

But you've got to be really clear,

There's two types of happiness.

So there's that hedonic pleasure,

Which is the one based on materialism and that hedonic experience that will more than likely lead to that treadmill.

But there's also a second type of happiness called eudynamic pleasure,

Which is sort of deeper seated and it's more about contentment,

Longer lasting contentment.

So where do you find that kind of happiness?

Well,

We know that.

So there's an 80 year longitudinal study that's still going at Harvard University.

It's called the Grant and Glueck study.

And it's been really interesting.

So they're tracking two groups.

One group is a group of,

They're all males,

But I guess this was from 80 years ago.

What do we care about what women are thinking?

You know,

So they followed one group of Harvard graduates,

And that includes some significant global business leaders and one former US president are in that cohort.

And then the other cohort was a group of guys from inner city Boston,

Like the lowest socioeconomic group in Boston that they could find.

And they have shown that more than money or fame or anything material,

The one thing that is more,

That is going to guarantee a life of happiness is the number of close relationships that you have.

So just think about that for a minute.

So the biggest predictor of your happiness in life is basically love and acceptance through meaningful,

Reciprocal connection with another human.

It's not going to be found in the next purchase.

But there's no advert for that.

Can't make money on telling you that.

If I could make money by telling you to go and be friends with some people,

It would be amazing,

Wouldn't it?

But it certainly seemed like a great antidote to this,

The current fear based world that we're inhabiting.

That being said,

Okay,

There's a caveat to this,

I guess,

Like everything.

Money does help to a degree in our current society.

So if you remember that Maslow's hierarchy,

If your genuine basic physiological needs aren't being met,

Then being paid more money will help you.

But its global average is around about $75,

000 of income.

Above that,

Happiness does not increase.

It's been tracked.

So once your basic needs are met,

More money does not help.

I'm also not saying don't go out and have fun.

I'm not being the fun place here.

But you've just got to recognise that.

Have fun,

But have fun based on a foundation of something deeper.

But what if happiness alone isn't what we should be chasing?

So this is Maslow's hierarchy as you probably haven't seen it before.

And he developed this version of it just before he passed away.

And so it was unpublished in clinical papers.

So it turns out,

Just as we knew thousands of years ago,

What he identified was actually above self-actualisation is transcendental purpose.

It's what we've known for thousands of years.

Has anyone heard of a story called the Epic of Gilgamesh?

Has anyone heard of that?

They think it's the first recorded story in humanity.

It's from about 2,

000 plus years BC from Sumeria.

And the story is about man's search for meaning.

So the very first story that we wrote down was about how we should be searching for meaning.

And then right now the science is showing that meaning is the thing you should be chasing.

This is really cool.

And this has been backed up by further recent research that's showing that the happy life and the purposeful life differ.

And the purposeful life is the one you should be choosing.

And that's for three reasons.

So firstly,

Happiness is generally an inside job.

It's internal to you.

Stuff happens,

You react to it,

You feel happy or sad.

And the risk is that internal mechanism of finding contentment could lead you back onto that hedonic treadmill.

So that's a real risk there.

Secondly,

Happiness,

It's such a fleeting temporary feeling.

And you can't always be happy.

There are times when you can't be happy all the time.

So it's hard to actually nail it down.

But lastly,

Pursuing happiness can actually make you more unhappy.

How does that work?

So this happens when your perception of happiness versus the reality of the outcome of seeking that happiness don't match.

So who's been out on a New Year's Eve and thought,

Yeah tonight's going to be amazing,

The music's going to be fantastic,

They'll have a great time.

And then at 10 o'clock you're walking home going like rubbish.

I wish I'd stayed at home.

We've all had those nights,

Yeah.

So that's the real risk if you have this unreal expectation of how the happiness is going to come and how happy you'll be and you don't get it.

Clinically proven you actually become more unhappy than before.

So that's the real risk when chasing happiness.

So,

Pursuit of purpose,

That's where it's at.

Because this purpose provides this more enduring fulfilment.

Because to achieve this state of purpose you have to transcend you.

You've got to be doing something that's bigger than you,

So it's external to you.

And it kind of makes sense because as true tribes are based on service and reciprocity and your use or usefulness to those around you.

If you're not providing use to those around you in the tribe you're going to be thrown out.

So you will make a personal sacrifice today for the rest of the tribe to have a better life tomorrow.

So at a time when we need to do less with less and do more good,

I think this purpose stuff is how we can save ourselves,

Each other and this planet.

But where does it live?

So there are three true ways to connect to purpose.

And the first one is it starts with serve.

So as Gandhi said,

The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.

And this makes sense because you know we look back to the dictionary definition of purpose.

What is your contribution?

What is your useful usefulness?

Your useful usefulness is how much you're serving.

And it's important for a couple of reasons because serving other people is a great way to give you meaning and actually boost your self-esteem and self-worth.

Which is part of that pathway to that transcendental purpose.

But there are levels of contribution.

And so the sweet spot you need to be aiming for is where your service,

What you can offer,

Is fully aligned with the true needs of you,

Your family,

Your community,

Your society and the planet.

So you've got to aim to do the most worthwhile thing that you can do that creates the most good.

You know,

Find a game of sufficient grandeur that makes your life worthwhile living.

Think about what load can you lift that will genuinely make the world a better place for more people.

If you're unsure of what that could be,

A really good thing to do is to think about what is the thing that you see that breaks your heart the most in the world.

Because that's something that clearly there's some attachment to that thing.

So work out how could you maybe start being part of the solution to fixing that problem.

The second thing to look for is flow.

So how do you best serve?

Well the way to do that is doing what you're great at in the service of other people to make that positive contribution.

And flow is how you recognise that.

Does everyone know what I mean by flow?

So it's that kind of state of being in the zone.

It's like when you're doing a task and four hours go by and you're like,

Well I haven't eaten lunch and I was supposed to pick up the kids and I got a little bit focused on what I was doing.

So flow is a really,

Really cool state to be in.

And there's increasing research showing that there's a disassociation from your consciousness while you're in a state of flow.

Like you're detached from you.

It's interesting.

But typically the flow state comes because you're finding deep meaning and contentment in doing something.

So if you can utilise your flow state to serve other people,

You've got a double whammy of purpose and meaning.

And then lastly you're going to need to grow.

So as you begin to serve and you try and lift the heavier load,

You'll want to start doing more good.

Because the flow state,

If you Google it,

There's like a little tunnel of flow that you go into.

So as you get better at doing what you need to do,

You need to do more.

So optimal personal growth will come from you getting better at what you're already good at.

And again within that there is an element of meaning and purpose.

If you're getting better at serving more people,

There's more meaning to be found in that.

And it's this very idea of transcendence and this is the story of the Epic of Gilgamesh.

And you look at every creation myth of pretty much every society and most multi-theistic belief systems.

And even in the Judeo-Christian belief system,

You have dark versus the light.

This is what life is all about.

It's this constant cycle of death and rebirth of you.

Transcendence of you every day so that you become a better human to lift more good for more people.

That again,

There's purpose within doing that,

But all three of them are linked together.

So be the best you.

Self-actualise by doing what you're best at in the service of humanity and the planet.

That is where your purpose will be found.

And you will be doing some of that already.

You just got to try and connect to it and understand what does it look like,

How are you already doing it?

And this is the thing,

I think if we all aim to be doing this,

This is how we're going to create this amazing world.

So as Ralph Waldo Emerson said,

He's a US writer philosopher in the 1800s,

The purpose of life is not to be happy,

It's to be useful,

To be honourable,

To be compassionate,

To have it make some difference that you lived and lived well.

It's like there's all these little tendrils and clues of purpose throughout the history of time.

It's all there for us to see,

It's right in front of us.

So,

But before you can get to that state of purpose,

There's going to be some pre-work you're going to have to do.

So first of all,

I release all of you from having to keep up with me.

I'm Jones,

I have the authority,

You don't have to keep up with me or any of my family.

Because people won't remember what you had,

They'll remember what you did and how you did it.

And I'll prove that to you right now.

So can anyone give me the name of the richest person in the USA in 1963?

No?

Cool.

There are a couple of answers potentially because no one really knows for sure.

But the answer I go with is Robert Wood Johnson,

He was one of the founding brothers of Johnson & Johnson.

Right,

I'll make it easier for you then.

Who was the richest person in the history of the world ever when you adjust the currency and inflation and all that good accounting stuff?

No?

Good.

The rock fella,

The guy who made the libraries,

And the carnaby.

Nope.

So the guy's name was Mansa Musa and he was the Emperor of Mali in about 1280 to 1337.

Right,

Let's try a different tact.

Can anyone give me the name of the person who wrote and delivered a speech in the USA in 1963 about having a dream for a better future for a group of people?

Close.

Martin Luther King.

Cool.

Hopefully I've proved something there.

So stop comparing yourself to others on a material basis.

Compare yourself to how much better you are than you are yesterday and how much good you're doing.

Be a better Martin Luther King.

Don't be a better Mansa Musa because no one's going to remember you.

Secondly,

We've got to stop recycling the dead material.

Yeah,

Just because it's always been done that way is not a good enough reason for us to keep doing it that way.

We've got to evolve.

We've got to create new systems and beliefs and ways of doing things.

You've got to question your tribalisation when you see it.

Next one,

You've got to get your internal ducks in a row.

You've got to get what's called alignment of your head,

Heart and hand.

What you think,

Feel and do.

It's critical that you get that alignment and you do that by working in reverse.

Start with your gut.

Like what does your gut tell you about this thing?

And then connect it to your heart.

Does that feel like it's the right thing to do?

And then put the rational skim over the top of it.

But we're so particularly in the accounting world,

It's such a rational,

It's like spreadsheet based,

This is how it's going to be.

But sometimes you'll be doing something and going,

That doesn't feel right.

That doesn't feel like the right thing to do.

I had a conversation with Lady God.

We were talking earlier on,

You know,

Make the hard right decision over the easy wrong decision.

Yeah,

You know what the right thing to do is.

It might not stack up on the spreadsheet,

But you know deep down what the right thing to do is.

So when you feel that dualism,

When you feel that sense of dis-ease,

Dis-ease leads to disease,

Mental disease.

Yeah,

When you feel that,

When you feel that disconnect,

Just ponder on it.

Why am I feeling that?

Why do I feel conflicted here?

And then the last thing,

What I need you to do is stop competing with each other.

Yeah,

If you're competing against your competitors,

You're never going to get to purpose.

We've got to play,

You know,

At a much bigger game,

Much higher level of a game now.

Has anyone seen the recent adverts from Volvo?

It's a really good example of purpose in action right now.

So what's Volvo famous for?

Safety.

Safety.

So they have now just agreed,

They are releasing all the safety data that they hold from since they started recording it,

And are making it available to every other car manufacturer.

That's purpose.

Like the old school,

It's about prioritising profit,

We'd say no,

No,

No,

That's our IP.

We lock that down,

We own that,

That's how we beat everyone else.

But purpose is not how do we do the right thing to help the most number of people create a better world.

That's giving that data to everyone.

Tesla did the same late last year,

They put all their IP they hold around electric vehicle technology.

It's open source,

Anyone in the world can access to it,

Because they care more about more people getting into electric vehicles than they do about selling more cars.

That is purpose in action.

So think about how could you collaborate with your competitors to create a bigger impact.

Because ultimately,

You know,

We are the only species that can be stewards for this planet and each other.

Like we're the top of the food chain,

There's nothing that we know of that's above us,

And we're made the dolphins are controlling us,

Like was it,

What's that,

Douglas Adams book,

Hitchhiker's Sky to the Galaxy,

Where the dolphins are running the show.

Maybe that's true,

But funnily enough,

We are the only people that can steward this planet.

And so instead of maybe going back to a job,

Not suggesting any of you in this room are doing this,

But there is a company that sells a dog selfie phone attachment.

It's a little attachment that goes on top of your phone so that you can take a better selfie of your dog.

Does the world really need that right now?

Probably not.

So instead of choosing that,

Choose something that is more meaningful,

Choose to pursue this purpose thing.

Because this is the really amazing thing.

We are now living in a time in history where if we choose to do stuff,

We can pretty much do anything.

So this was late 2018 and this is a photo taken from a robot that some Japanese scientists landed on an asteroid in outer space.

Like I don't even know how do you start that conversation.

Hey guys,

I've got an idea.

I was thinking,

Right,

If we put the robot,

I mean,

Like seriously,

We can do that.

Imagine if we all focused our abilities through a lens of purpose.

I don't know why they did it.

It's probably to go and say how we mine asteroids.

Fantastic.

Is that really what we need right now?

Just going to destroy the entire universe rather than just this planet.

If we can do this,

If we focused our abilities through this lens of purpose,

Imagine what we could achieve.

Because this is the super,

Super cool thing is that the future is not linear.

There are as many potential futures as we can collectively imagine.

So why would you not choose to imagine a future that works for you,

Your friends,

Your family,

All the other humans around you and the planet?

It seems really dumb that you wouldn't do that.

Just think for a moment on what your highest potential future based on purpose,

Based on contribution,

Could look and feel like.

And it's important that you do stop and ponder that because your beliefs become your thoughts,

Your thoughts become your words,

Your words become your actions,

Your actions become your habits,

Your habits become your values and your values become your destiny.

So if you don't go and challenge those thoughts that have been put in there by someone else a long time ago,

You're never going to get there.

So I'm finishing up because we've covered a lot.

I want to leave you with four clear next steps to start your purpose journey.

So first up,

Pause.

We're so busy running away from our fears or towards our desires that half the time we don't even know which way is up.

So find some time.

Just take some deep breaths every now and then.

After this event,

Go and take five minutes before you go back and just sit somewhere and just go look at the beautiful hills or the Alps.

But carve time out during your busy schedules just to make time just to sit and reflect and think about some stuff.

Don't electrocute yourself.

Secondly,

Start connecting to that real you.

There will be a little voice that is talking to you every now and then and you just go,

Oh don't do that Tim.

But the other voice goes,

It'll be alright,

It's alright,

We're just doing it this way,

That's how we've always done it,

That's what's expected of me,

Don't want to get thrown out from the tribe.

Connect to that voice and start to connect to your gut and your heart and find that real authentic version of you because it's in there.

And the best way to do that is through meditation and journaling.

Spending time alone with your thoughts and then writing down the thoughts afterwards and analysing them.

Thirdly,

Start reflecting on your life today,

Like how have you ended up where you are?

Are you happy with where you're at?

If you're not,

You can change it.

Yeah,

It is possible.

Where are you making a positive contribution?

But most importantly,

How are you maybe making a negative contribution to the planet?

Because someone is.

Inequality hasn't just turned up,

Poverty hasn't just turned up,

Environmental degradation hasn't just turned up.

Someone's doing something that's making that happen.

Is it you?

It could be,

I don't know.

Pay attention though to those moments of purpose that are there.

Remember,

Serve,

Flow,

Grow.

Look for those moments,

Make a note of them.

When do I get into a state of flow?

When am I serving?

And then lastly,

Adjust.

So take control of your own destiny.

You have to.

If that's the one thing you do,

If that's the one takeover you get from today,

You've got to take control of your own destiny.

And you do that by making one small change.

So think about it.

Is it your physical environment?

Is it the thoughts you're having?

Is it the people you're hanging around with?

Is it the media that you consume?

By undertaking those other three steps,

It will become really apparent what is the thing that you need to change for you to get on the right trajectory.

So,

That's the case for pursuing purpose.

I think we've never needed purpose now more than ever.

And I think that we can be the generation that actually finally takes this and really,

Really runs with it and makes it happen.

And if you choose to do that,

You can help me create this,

Imagine this massive self-sourcing chocolate cake of goodness.

It'd be as big as Christchurch.

By going out today and planting some trees that none of us will see grow.

So that when you come to have your heart weighed at the end of your time on your little stint on this,

We blew a green dot that's floating around in the universe,

You can be fully content in the load that you'd lifted in service of others and living a life in pursuit of purpose.

Thank you.

Reviews

Boy, this is exactly what I needed to hear. I understand and follow these truths, however it spoke volumes in my current situation. So well spoken. Thank you!♡

So good - thank you!

This is great. You need to figure out how to make this sn essential teaching in our schools!

Really really needed to hear all of these. Thank you so so much. ✨

Really inspirational! Thank you. Love and blessings 💙 x

Your talk was awesome. Folks like you give me hope that the world’s people will awake and choose people/love over things and money. Purpose takes courage...something most are sorely lacking. Hope springs eternal so I’ll keep planting seeds.🙏🏾