#58: David E. Marlow - Uncover Your True Essence

What is your reason for getting up each morning?

Why are distraction and FOMO so dangerous to our well-being?

How is the media consciously sabotaging our efforts for success?

These and other highly relevant questions are addressed when David E. Marlow, the Ikigai Guy, joins The Rabbi and the Shrink.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidemarlow/

2:00 What is Ikigai?

Your reason for getting up in the morning

Living in the moment of doing what you are uniquely created to do

Doors open naturally when we are aligned with our true purpose

4:00 Is this different from living according to God’s will?

Living your essence in the best way you can

Disintegration is the opposite of integrity

Finding our balancing point between focus on our higher purpose and focus on our community

9:00 What is MOAI?

Connection to family, friends, and community

11:00 How David found his Ikigai

What came to him in a dream

Looking back, we see how seemingly disconnected events are connected by a common thread

The blessing of Providence and serendipity appear when we pay attention

20:00 What to do if you feel you’re wasting your life

The power of self-reflection and monotasking

Distraction and FOMO destroy productivity

27:00 More views, less news

Set priorities and eliminate noise

Don’t let the media manipulate you and steal your time

Feeling alive vs. true living

We uncover rather than discover our true selves

38:00 The word of the day:  hedonic adaptation

the return to our emotional default settings that follows experiential peaks and valleys

We conflate pleasure with happiness

It’s not moments of elation but the differentiation between states of being

Lottery winners are no happier than paraplegics

45:00 Start small to go big

Invest in yourself and believe that your essence is there waiting for you to uncover it

Begin working to define your purpose

Transcript

Margarita Gurri: 0:03

Welcome to the Rabbi and the Shrink. This is Dr. Margarita Gurri. I happen to be the shrink. And here is my very favorite rabbi.

Yonason Goldson: 0:13

Yonason Goldson.

Margarita Gurri: 0:14

And the good rabbi and I are delighted to have with us David E. Marlow again. Hi.

David Marlow: 0:21

Hello. It's great to see you guys.

Yonason Goldson: 0:22

Welcome David

Margarita Gurri: 0:24

Well, David is known as the geeky guy guy, which is just fun to say. He's going to talk to us about how we can use the principles of the key guy and a few other things that he has in mind. He's not your usual guy. He's a former Marine Sergeant who Ra, a DJ, no less, a certified network engineer. And he's a design thinker, which I don't even know what that is, but Cornell does, because they taught him that and he's got a certificate. One of the things that I love about him is he calls himself a versatile guru. He's got lots to share. He goes way beyond coaching to help us find the meaning in our life. And in our work. Welcome, talk to us help us find meaning where do we start?

David Marlow: 1:12

Good morning. So happy to be here. And yeah, where do we find meeting? Well, Rabbi, they were just talking prior about basketball, the meaning of life. There's a lot of a lot of connections to basketball. Life, but I don't think that's where we want to go today.

Margarita Gurri: 1:32

I think we can always start there. I love basketball.

Yonason Goldson: 1:35

You have to put the ball through the hoop. Yeah, you have to rebound you have to

Margarita Gurri: 1:40

defend the end the thing that never mind. Speaking of meaning, they cut out this very expensive, you know, rope of the what as a as a mother, I'm thinking really the laughter. Speaking of meaning, so I'm not sure the meaning of that.

David Marlow: 1:56

Oh, yeah, that's a keepsake. That's that's for the when they played that high level, they those nets were out fairly quickly. So it's actually not that big a loss. I

Margarita Gurri: 2:05

see. I see. Anyway, so it's symbolic keepsake. I got it.

David Marlow: 2:11

Yeah, it's a coveted. It's a coveted thing to have from a championship. And not that I know I finished, I finished second a couple times in high level basketball, did not get to cut the nets down. So I would have really liked to have wasted a net or two, but did not get to do so.

Margarita Gurri: 2:30

Well, I hope you someday get a chance to have one of your coveted dirty old hoops. That would be great. Yeah, I think about the germs of those things. But anyway, that's separate.

Yonason Goldson: 2:44

Yeah, can you give us a brief definition of

David Marlow: 2:46

IKI? Guy? Yeah. So he guy is your purpose, your reason for getting up in the morning. And it's that unique expression of you in every aspect of your life, your gifts, your passions, your interests, your skills, and your place to impact in the world. And when you're when you're spending your time in your guy doing what only you can uniquely do, that's when you're really becoming the best you that you can be when you're living in that moment and living into that. And the great thing about your eg guy once once it really becomes clear to you, it becomes a core expression of your essence of you, and your your doing and your being. And it's like a guide. It's like a North Star. And it's this incredible opportunity for things to just sort of fall into place. And you're naturally reframe your focus and your energy, and doors begin to open for you that you didn't even know existed. So that's what I love about sharing about guy.

Margarita Gurri: 3:50

Well, the rabbit and I were talking today about the key guy, we asked each other about each other's geeky guy. And the question came to mind is does it have to be specific? Because doing God's will or serving others? Are those specific enough? eKey guys?

David Marlow: 4:10

Yeah, so the great thing about it, that's a that's a thing that, that I know, I struggled with myself. So I grew up in the evangelical church in the 70s. Right. And a lot of emphasis on that was, was finding God's will and don't miss God's will. And if you don't do this, and you do that, you might miss it. And we were many of us were in just like a constant state of panic that we had missed it. And that's what I love about the connection of IKI guy in that the purpose that you have is to live out that essence of you, and why you were brought into this earth and that was to be you in every way in every expression that you can be the various the various aspects or experiences of that expression can be different. So you mentioned in the intro in my life, I have been in my careers, I have been a disc jockey, I have been a sergeant in the Marine Corps, right an engineer and all these different things. And yet every one of and eighth grade girls basketball coach went to nationals that went to national championships and didn't win. And in all of those things, I was able to live out my life, he guys just an expression, those are just expressions of your ikigai. So it's not like you were called to be an accountant. And so if you don't, if you're not an accountant, you're missing it somehow. That's an aspect of, of, of it. And you can live out your ego in that. And so if we want to connect that, and I know I personally do the key guy to God, God's will, it's living my essence in the person that I am in the fullest way that I can connect it to him in the greatest way that I can, and and connecting it tightly to those expressions. So last time, we talked about our authentic selves, and that words got a little watered down, I refer to more of the essence right to the essence of you. And when we're not living that true self, where we're disintegrated, right? It's not, it's an integrity issue in the sense of being integrated into you. So when you're working in a job, that does not allow you to be the real you, and live out your essence, you're disintegrating a bit when you're doing that. And so it doesn't matter so much what the job is, it might be the environment, and the place that you're working, and the types of things that you're doing, or the persona that you must present in order to be accepted and success and successful there. That's the kind of thing that you can do wrong, if you will, it's not wrong, but in the sense of, of not living into your aching guy. So that's the importance there, not so much the tasks or the type of work or that kind of thing. But the the ability to live out your authentic self, and in the fullness of what you feel like is your, your purpose.

Yonason Goldson: 7:15

You remind me that in Judaism, we have three categories of concepts of commandments, or spiritual concepts. between man and God, man, that the sense of human not male, between man and his mayor or his fellow man between man and himself. And this goes back to the model of the patriarchs of which we make a tremendous put a tremendous focus that Abraham was the first Jew, he focused on presets between man and his fellow, his son, Isaac was completely focused on his relationship with God. And Jacob came along, and he developed the concept of between man and himself, meaning finding one's balancing point between those two poles. If I'm fully focused on God, how can I focus on people? If I'm fully focused on people? How can I focus on God? Everyone has created the bookends, and every one of us has some place. Whereas I like the way you said it your essential self resides naturally somewhere on that spectrum. And we're looking, each of us is looking where do I fit? Where where is where does my nature my natural inclination, incline me, so that I can make the most of my natural gifts and successfully implement and fulfill the purpose for which I was created?

David Marlow: 8:54

I love that. Oh, taking notes here.

Yonason Goldson: 8:58

You can listen the recording.

Margarita Gurri: 9:00

Yeah, that was great. Wow. Well, one of the things that that our speaker today talks about is how to do this. And you have a new project that I think will help everyone why don't you have a chance to share this exciting new project that you've created?

David Marlow: 9:20

Oh, sure. Yeah, so in iki guy, there's a concept called mo which which has a number of meanings but the specific aspect of it that I'm looking at his his connection, connection to friends and family culture and support in living out your iki guy.

Yonason Goldson: 9:39

And he's felt that yeah, yes. Yeah.

David Marlow: 9:41

Mo AI. And it's a it's a coincidental enough just like the why of the Easter Island statues, but it's not it doesn't mean the same thing at all. So if you Google it, you might have to specify Aki and Moai. And that's it. That's often credited for like longevity in Okinawan society, for example, that is a very big aspect of Viki guy in Okinawa, and they celebrate the elderly, and celebrate the family and friends and spending time together and community. And what I want to do is build out that community and create a Moai opportunity with daily iki guy. And part of what I have enjoyed with my connection with folks on LinkedIn and things is sharing daily, different ways to live into your guide to express that in those various, various ways that we were talking about earlier. And there's just a limit to that. And so I'm super excited about the opportunity to create a more AI community on daily EQ guy.substack.com, where people can come read, get some daily inspiration, get information and connection to other others and other things about geeky guy, and create that dialogue around sharing and creating community.

Margarita Gurri: 11:06

I can't wait to sign up. You can tell that he's a polished Keynote or huh. published author, Six Sigma leader. When did you discover your iki? Guy? And how do you define your iki? Guy, sir?

David Marlow: 11:19

Sure. Yeah. So the, the essence of human understanding, if you got for me, has almost two points in time. And I'll share the first one because it's more, it's more topical. And it kind of relates to understand it today. About seven years ago, I could see that my career was probably not going to end the way I had originally planned. I was leading a transformation effort at a large fortune 500 company, a very storied company, great company, still a great company. But I could just tell ever changing the company itself was changing, the direction was changing. And you can only be interested in dramatic organizational innovation change for so long is sort of sort of wanes, and I could see that that was happening. So I got on LinkedIn, and started just writing, just writing to express myself to connect with people. Because the last thing you need to do is try and start networking when you're out of work. And so I thought, I'll get ahead of it, and just do that. And what it afforded me was an opportunity to really express myself in ways I had never done before. And so I started asking friends and family, hey, this is this is really me. What would you say my brand was, you know, just put the stuff out there. It wasn't, you know, lean engineer. It wasn't Sergeant Marine Corps. It wasn't anything other than just my heart. And I got some really good feedback. One guy said to me, I don't know about brand, but yo, we're going to eat the guy. And I said, Well, what's that he was on it, just do it. Just Just look at this all the time. So when I dug into it, then I found out that I finally had a name really, for what I had been interested in and had been doing for really almost 30 years. And that was sort of my introduction to the tangible name of IKI guy. My own reflection actually goes back more than 20 years to a dream, interestingly, laugh that I had in the dream. A, it'd be another other sports reference that has nothing to do with sports. But Steve Mariucci was the coach of of the San Francisco 40 Niners that I just despise. I don't like the 40 years. They're not they're like my least favorite team. But he, he came to me in a dream and asked me, What would you do if you were done? And that was it. And then I woke up. And he said, he said it twice, but and, you know, you had lots of dreams and some sticks. And I can still see that in my head that was that impactful of a moment in that dream. And it just stuck with me. And I really began to add it to my to my prayer life to say, what does this mean? What does it mean, when you're done and I began a path of very deep reflection, I've always been somewhat reflective, but but really seeking to understand myself my place I at the time, I was 40 years old, I suppose a rather important demarcation point in life. My kids were heading into high school and my career was really at its zenith. And I was thinking, you know, what does that mean? What would be done with done career done trying to climb back from when what? And that's the question I've been asking myself, you know, for years and years and years. And understanding then, that that was the the journey toward a deeper understanding to be key guy. For me.

Margarita Gurri: 14:56

We're delighted that you had the courage to do that.

Yonason Goldson: 15:00

Your journey your journey is one of and I think we hear this a lot going from one location to another without necessarily any apparent connection from one to the next. And yet, I'm sure that when you look back, you can see how every stopping point along the way contributed to you reaching the point where you where you are now remind me of my my wife, as it was a trained, I guess she is still a trained concert violinist. She played Philharmonic's and symphonies. And then she got She hurt herself. She got tendinitis now to stop. So she went into radio advertising. And then was very successful in that. And then she became religious moved to Israel. When I was offered a job as a teacher, she was offered a job in the same school. And then she took off a couple of years, because we had four children five and under and good for her to stay home for a couple years. And then the, the rabbi and the rabbi, he had a son Down syndrome. And his wife asked my wife, if they would work with him with their son. She had no experience in special ed whatsoever. But she wanted something as part time and flexible. And she wanted to be able to help out this family that were close to. And she started working with their son, on the woman who was supervising them, told my wife that she was doing things intuitively that they teach in graduate school. She just had this natural predisposition to working with kids with disabilities. And now she's almost 20 years into her career as a special ed teacher. And is tremendously successful in a career that she never would have looked into on her own if not for the providential series of events that led her there. So if I, if I sort of apply this to what you're telling us, it was a finding one's eKey guy can be something that really takes takes a lifetime. And that it requires us to be attentive to ourselves and attentive to the circumstances in which we find

David Marlow: 17:49

ourselves. Yes, absolutely. I mean, that's a great, that's a great example of this at work, as well as that, that building of that talent stack, there's no doubt that those experiences she had either supported or maybe even gave her that, that that skill, right, that enabled her to help those folks at the end. And that's the, that's the power of having some level of understanding of it, and then just living into it. Right, because you can't, like so for a number of years, I thought my radio career was a waste of time because it ended, right, it just it ended and it wasn't what I thought I would, would do, ultimately, and I I looked at seven years of wasted that right now, I can't even imagine my overall career without that skill without the ability to speak without the comfort of talking to large audiences of, of being able to convey thought with with sound right to be able to, to say things in a certain way to emphasize things to make videos I people and part of what I'll be sharing on the daily guy are some some very short videos and being able to do that comes from those years of being on mostly radio, I think I share with you guys before I have a face for radio, but I did do some TV. Not very much. I did some TV and it's all those skills, right? I've had a few people ask me well, you know, he guy, how are you? How are you the this or that? That'd be key guy like, I don't know, but I am, I think one of a kind in the person who brings those those versatile guru skills of bringing Kaizen and lean and improvement skills and that kind of element along with engineering understanding along with storytelling and communication and an understanding of, of self reflection and, and then the concept of IKI guy, I present a one of a kind way to to help people live into that. And that only came about through those failed careers that seemed to have no connection. But now make perfect sense and have all, you know, aligned and come together.

Margarita Gurri: 20:06

That's amazing. How about the people that are out there listening that say, Well, somehow he was able to connect all of his skills into a lovely stack and a path? But what if someone says, No, I really am just wasting my talent or my time? What would you say to them?

David Marlow: 20:25

Yeah, I probably only have 10 people a day. Say that to me. So

Margarita Gurri: 20:32

I think now a lot of people rethinking things as the world has changed and the way we work and think about things as changed, what do you say to them?

David Marlow: 20:42

So I share with them some of my my background, because I have been in those those moments, I also share with them, that investing in yourself and getting a better understanding of IKI guy is going to lead you to either being able to, to express it in the in the job you're in, let's say, for example, or to know what you should look for in finding another one. And a lot of folks will reach out to me when they're in career transition, and they want me to help them find the job. That's freaky, guys, what do you know your geeky guy? Yeah. So myself, for example, as I mentioned, my career ended differently than I thought, my department got eliminated. And they came to me with a with a job offer. It was a it was a fine job. And I would have continued in a role, but had nothing to do with what energizes me or would have, if I would have been disintegrating every day that I went into work in that role for five more years. Or I could take an early retirement and do what I'm doing now. And so because I had that strong understanding of my achy guy, I could say yes to the right thing, and no to the wrong thing. And that's what really empowered me because the same thing would have been to say, yes, and let me tell you, six, seven months later, when the pandemic hit, I was thinking, Ooh, did I make the right decision. But I had that, that, that sense that I was in the right spot, and it ultimately played out and has been just a marvelous gift to me, really. But it wouldn't have been available to me had I not invested in understanding my iki guy.

Margarita Gurri: 22:25

Amazing how there's, it's not magic at all. It's really about self reflection and courage. It's interesting, what the whole thing of self reflection, you become quite an expert in not only your own self reflection, but helping others go there. And you've coined the term mono tasking, which I love. Because too many people waste all sorts of effort trying to do more than one thing at a time. And they're proud of it. Tell us about self reflection, and this odious task of mono tasking,

David Marlow: 23:00

right? So, so yeah, so when you think about multitasking, right, that's, that's the thing we can we can, we can be doing this, I can be typing over here. Talking about kids, you can't, you really can't do that. It's actually been proven by by many, many studies now that not only is it not, if you're not doing three things at once, you're losing time in between each switch. So each time you switch from one activity to another, you lose a bit of time your brain has to reset, you have to ramp back up into into interest in your new thing and doing that multiple times. Not to mention, add in the interrupt that we we have with our phones and other things like that, right? We are being highly unproductive. Productivity is our is our goal. being focused on a singular thing allows you to to stay in that moment, there's an element of presence, right? So to being present in the moment, we our brains are flooding so often, that we're just all over the place and we realize wow, three hours is gone. I've got nothing done. As opposed to when you're truly into the present moment focused on what you're doing. That's when I don't I know for myself, I do my best work. That's when I do my best self reflection. That's when I do my best writing. eliminating those distractions and doing one thing Yeah, I call mono tasking the new new thing right? It's the new productivity hack. Just do one thing at a time

Yonason Goldson: 24:34

you talked about this on your on your last visit with us. And it may have been shortly thereafter that I became conscious of how much of an intrusion my phone was on my life. And I'd be working in my office and every few moments is buzzing. And I'm always checking and just pay and I I went and I turned off my notifications On the telephone. And other than that, turn everything off. And, you know, I never missed those buzzing alerts. And I was able to have considerably more focus on the work on doing I mean, are we suffering from collective FOMO? That if we don't have all these alerts, something important might might pass us by. Right. Right. Right. Despite the the experience that tells us that really, there's not very much of important is that we're going to miss?

David Marlow: 25:37

Yeah. Yeah, it's, it's successive, because you I recently got on Twitter actively. And I, and I don't spend a lot of time on there. And I'm using it to share iki guy insights and daily guy. And it, I'd say, maybe every fifth time I look at it, it pops up with a screen over the top. Do you want to set up notifications? It's like, no, no, I do not. I don't. Facebook wants you to set up notifications. This one says, you know, and you're right. On top of it being a problem. It's like, we're inundated with requests to do that, too. And yeah, it's an incredible distraction, and I forget what it is. But the, the amount of time, it's it's many minutes. So if I'm talking to you for 30 seconds, and I break to do something over here, and then come back, it's not like, just the time my it took me to switch over, it's several minutes before I can return to a focus level of attention, even if I'm talking with you. And so you think about that with your phone and, and the buzzing and the interrupts and, and all the things. Yeah, where I have my just my running watch. It has the capability of notifying me of many, many things, and I've had cysts, systematically turn them off. It's like, I want to know the time when I look at this. And I want to know how fast I'm running. That's it. You know, I don't really want anything else from the history. And I know,

Margarita Gurri: 27:04

and learning how to turn those notifications off is is an interesting and empowering event. Well, this whole idea of the collective FOMO. More and more of us, I think don't do self reflection, because we feel first we must be caught up on our email, on reading all our social media, knowing what every little country is doing all of that speak to the issue of in a world with so many delicious distractions. How does one decide their mano, focus?

David Marlow: 27:38

Sure. Yeah. So I have been saying for a number of years now, more muse, less news. I like that. And I wasn't news, man. I mean, I used to read the news and find the news interview. People do things like that. And it took me a while to overcome that thinking, like, what else is important? It's really not important. And I and people will ask me, how do you keep up on things like I somehow seem to know what I need to know, I remember when the pandemic first really kicked in, I thought, you know, maybe I need to, this is pretty big, I better, I better follow or I'm gonna, you know, lose out on something, oh, my gosh, after just a few days of watching the news again. And I'm not picking on any particular venue, you know, an NBC or Fox or all of it. They're all interested in getting you riled up, and paying attention to what they have to say. And staying riled up and paying attention to what they have to say. And shoving that out and eliminating that. I mean, I used to justify it, because of the weather. But now you got an app on your phone, you can check the weather anytime you want to watch the news for the weather. So there's really not a lot of reason to do that. And there's a lot of reason not to. So that's one thing. Then I know I used to find, we were talking earlier about basketball, grew up in Indiana, played basketball, loves love sports, just really, really got into it. And for a while I switched off of like news radio or talk radio and was starting to listen to sports radio. And it became the same thing. Instead of arguing about politics, they were arguing about sports and do I really care if Brett Farve is the greatest quarterback or Aaron Rodgers or Bart Starr, whoever else right? I don't. And I was finding myself involved in things that really were not adding value to my life and that's the key thing. It's like does it really add value to your life? More Muse less news. So reading, I've tried to add a poem a day to my to my habits, so I do that instead of start the morning with news. I start the morning with a phone and we were talking about Robert Frost earlier too, and one of my favorites and it's Just as much that kind of thing especially can can trigger that reflective mindset encourage you to spend a moment pondering something again, besides what Senator so and so said to Senator so and so and so forth, right,

Yonason Goldson: 30:17

is that there's a balance, I mean, we should be informed, we should know what's going on in the world, we should be aware of what's happening with Ukraine and, and even to the point of being somewhat emotionally involved. Because it's, it's, it was horrific, what's happening there. So cutting ourselves off completely, may not be the the correct approach. But, you know, I and many others have observed that, in many ways, we've returned to the ways of the Roman Empire, with the bread and circuses. The bread is the entitlement culture, we're gonna give you what you need, and the circuses and entertainment industry, we're going to know exactly what buttons to push to keep you engaged, so that you won't be thinking about anything else, like ideas that might disrupt the stability of the Empire back then it was gladiatorial fights. Today, it's sports, it's what passes for political debate. It's arguing about any kind of social issue. It's all of those devices that are designed to get our adrenaline pumping, and, and make us feel alive. When in fact, we're not doing anything that intrinsically is contributing to being alive.

David Marlow: 31:39

Yeah, absolutely. And it's a little like, people will tell me they can't read, they don't have time to read. And I had a, I had a manager that I was mentoring one time, and he said, Yeah, I just I know, I need to read these books. And I know it would help me in my career. I just don't have time. Like, really? Okay. Do you ever watch The Big Bang Theory? I knew he did. Right? He's kind of a geeky guy. So you enjoyed it? Because well, yeah, yeah. Did you ever watch the show more than once? Because yeah, all the time. And how long are those shows? Half an hour, I see where you're going. You know, we invest in I agree with you. There's that balance. I really, again, having been a newsman struggled with that. And I find I don't, I literally don't watch the news at all. And yet, I am aware of Ukraine, I am aware of, of the things going on in the world. enough that I'm aware. And if I want to dig deeper, I can dig deeper. I'm not allowing myself to have the turn that you you are going through, I identify there earlier and and involve myself and, and be upset. And in those things. I mean, I want to be I want to be aware enough to to be praying about it to be taking action, if there is some literal action I could do, you know, that kind of thing. And everything else, I just, I want to separate myself, in part, because I want to invest that time. In my own development, self reflection, being present for my family, right? Being there, you're stirred up with all the news of the day. Are you there? Are you listening to your kid, you know, are you are you back processing all this stuff are not really listening to your, your child, or your wife or your friend or whoever. And so that's another reason to drop some of this is to is to really give yourself what we call an IT bandwidth, right capacity for the other investments that you want to make into yourself. And that's even in my coach. So my coaching, that's what I'll I'll do with folks is, especially people that are that are really intuitive, really stirred up and just just turning and unable to get the noise level down. As a as an RF engineer, we're all we're all old enough to remember am radio and when you drive under powerline GT, get all that static and stuff, right? And that's noise. And that noise is so loud, it's drowning out the signal, the intended information you need. And life can be like that there's that intended information we need. And if we let distractions and worry and all the other things, be that noise level, we don't get the signal from from life that we need to have. And so a lot of times that's the first thing I do with with my clients is just get the noise level down in their life enough that they could hear that still small voice that they need to hear. And that's a that's a first thing. And I had one client not not that long ago. I can't believe the difference in my life after just three weeks of trying to get the noise level down because I started to understand a few things like well, how about that? That's amazing, isn't it? that's that that's the other part of this right setting up your life setting up the the, the environment where you can be in a moment of reflection where you can spend some time uncovering that iki guy and I, I emphasize that word uncovering over discover right or, or create, because it's there, right? We're born. With all this, we're fearfully and wonderfully made before you were born, I met you in the womb, right? It's a tradition to tells us. And that essence is there. And then life starts to happen. And even, you know, good friends and parents will kind of pile things on and disappointments and all these things kind of cover that up. And this process is really uncovering, and identifying that essence and allowing it to be understood, as opposed to discovered.

Margarita Gurri: 35:55

Recently, I worked with a high level team that had had something very bad happen because of choices they made that were less than lovely. The CEO whispered to me at a meeting, were supposed to be understanding where they were and delivering this sage advice. And he whispered to me quietly, we don't have time for reflection, could you just tell us what we need to be knowing? And I laughed so hard, I was crying. We just the two of us, and he realized what he was saying. But the truth is, it takes a lot of courage to slow down and to really look at ourselves. Because sometimes in a crisis, we begin to believe a falsehood that we're not enough that we're not good enough. We don't know enough. We haven't done enough. And I think that that's a falsehood, like you said, uncovering the geeky guy, it's there. And taking the time to follow what our guests is talking about our iki guy guy. I think that is the secret of the universe, but so scary.

Yonason Goldson: 37:03

Well, there's a when I was teaching, I always relied heavily on the Socratic method, because I wanted to guide my students to see that they have many of the answers themselves and experience exactly like yours, doctors. This very bright young lady in my high school class, got enormously fesses Why can't you just tell us the answer? And of course, we know, Socrates for the unexamined life is not worth living. But we also know where that got him. He was, he was found guilty of corrupting the youth of acts happens for the high crime of trying to make them think

Margarita Gurri: 37:53

it's not such a popular pastime, it

Yonason Goldson: 37:55

has plenty of modern day parallels.

Margarita Gurri: 37:59

So we're getting to the point where Robert, why don't we have you do the word of the day, then we come back. Why don't we have David E. Marlowe, impart to us some words of wisdom. And then we're going to ask him about his next fun adventure. Rabbi.

Yonason Goldson: 38:17

Word of today is actually the Term of the day. It's one I discovered a while ago, but I just came back to it this week. The term is he done it adaptations?

Margarita Gurri: 38:27

Oh, I love that.

Yonason Goldson: 38:30

So you know, this one, I lived it. I knew you would. What has he done again, optation. It means the return to our emotional default settings that follows experiential peaks and valleys. And I think it's so relevant. We talk often about about happiness on our program and the world of large at large. And we all want to be happy. But we don't necessarily define what that is, or how it happens. And we conflate pleasure with happiness. And so we've been talking about particularly the, the effect of technology on it. And why do we like those buzzing the buzzing on our phone, when we know it's distracting us, because every time it buzzes, we get a little hit of dopamine. And that feels good. And it only lasts a second. But it feels good. And there's another one and another one. And what this does is it It disrupts our natural psychological rhythm of peaks and valleys. We're supposed to have high points. We're supposed to have low points and we're supposed to be constantly moving from one to another. That's what makes us feel alive. What's the natural plateau to which we return when we're not in the peaks or valleys? That defines our state of happiness? It's an it's a continuous state. It's not those moments of excitement, or exhilaration, or or pleasure. That's not real. Because a plateau is always a plateau no matter how high it is, or how low it is. It's the differentiation between states of being that really create within us that sense of having meaningful, fulfilling lives. And so when we, when we seek, you know, and then the, in the above research on this is really compelling. They found that lottery winners a year later, were right back where they were before they won the ladder lottery. And people who were paralyzed, lost the use of their legs a year later, they were right back where they were, before the paralysis. So these external factors that we think have so much to do with our state of mind, really have very little, it's up to us to set that default. And the EEG guy, I think, is a is a wonderful device and tool for us to use, and to discover or to uncover. So that the greater awareness we have that hedonic adaptation, we will return to a state that is exactly where we should be. And where we feel the fullness of our lives. Waiting. That's why make the big bucks.

David Marlow: 41:42

Oh, I love that. I love that. I love the expression at the end. But I love what you just said about about happiness, that that base level is so powerful, because because you're right. events come and go things come and go. successes come and go. A bit that base level is there. One thing I really admire about my granddaughter, I should say my oldest granddaughter, and I have a new granddaughter. My first thank you, thank you, who's who's four. She was she was playing with me. And she, when I say playing with me, she's directing me she should be like a movie directors. Okay, you sit here and you say these three things. I will do this. And that. No, no, no, don't start again. I mean, that's kind of she was talking to one of her her stuffed animals. She was like a few bear. And she said she was going to toss him to me. And I said, Well, I think P bear might be a little phrase because it's a P bear and says, P bear, be happy and brave like me. And that's her. She's just she's happy and bright. And she says that a lot too tall, her stuffed animals that'll be her for admonition. Is that sweet? She's, yeah, be happy and brave like me. So even encouraging them. But that's, that's kind of her baseline, you know, feel and vibe. And certainly she has her moments that she's not happy, or brave. But that's, that's what she sees us as our driver. But I love that because that's and you're right, there's a connection. When you are connected to yourself, to reason that you were placed on this earth, the external aspects of life aren't as important. And that's where again, I try and help people separate from career it's not about career career, can be fun, career can be rewarding career can be meaningful, and, you know, helpful to people in the world. We just can't attach our worth to that or our, our self to that. Another quick example of that in play was again, when when my department got eliminated, the executive VP in charge of that department got eliminated too. And he had been at the company from the time he graduated college to his mid 50s. So a long time. And that was kind of his life. And he really struggled. I mean, he struggled was he asked me, Dave, how is it that you're okay with this? And it's, you know, I understand my achy guy, and this is this is not it. So the fact that this has disappeared is irrelevant to me. I mean, there's tactical relevance, and then certainly acknowledge that but in terms of my self worth, the way I feel about myself, it's really not that big a deal. And for him, it was a big deal. And it was a struggle for him for quite a long while, because that was his identity. As he he was working on it, yes. Yeah, he Yeah, he he a super interesting guy, and he would come to me once in a while, say, I need you to do your Jedi mind tricks on that he was he was working into this at the same time this guy at one point I was asking him some questions. Or he asked me a question, I should say at one point. And he goes, don't ask me a question in response. He just wanted the answer.

Margarita Gurri: 45:12

So that he may find his iki guy, although with a friend like you, I'm sure he has a pretty good chance of finding it.

David Marlow: 45:20

Yeah, he's a super guy. Just a different experience.

Margarita Gurri: 45:24

So you so in terms of final words of wisdom, how would you set our audience off to pondering?

David Marlow: 45:33

Okay, so I always love to give people small things to do, because that's the easiest to do. It's how we start almost anything. I've run marathons. But 1011 years ago, now, I started running by running for a minute, and walking for four minutes, and running for one minute and walking for four. So starting small, embrace the idea that your key goes there, right? embrace that idea. And just accept that it's there. And that your, your job, if you will, in life, is to uncover that. And then to live into it. And then spend some time in investing in it. Invest a small amount in yourself in in time and reflection. One thing that I always like to do is get people to get, I call it the verbs value verse. And I spent time initially on my own iki guy, saying, you know, what am I what am I? What are my verbs? What are the things that activate me and I developed my verse in my verse is, I'm about encouraging, enabling, and empowering people to live into their purpose. And just having that gave me a conversation piece to share with friends to share with like both of you, and you can give me feedback. And I can refine that, and a starting point and understand that your iki guy is going to be very wide at the beginning and narrow over time. And to the rabbi's point earlier, you never really reached that point. Right. But you get better and better and deeper understanding of it. Every day you invest in it.

Margarita Gurri: 47:17

Wow. That was fantastic. And then the Rob and I were talking we want to know what is your next adventure, sir? Something fun.

David Marlow: 47:25

Yeah. So something fun. I'm going to be helping out with my grandson's T ball again, this year, except that it isn't a T ball anymore. Now it's coach's pitch, which is going to be even more interesting. You know, we're out in the yard just just the other day and I was pitching to him. And let me tell you what, thank kick it hit a ball and hit it fast right back at me. So that's a it's a fun adventure. But that and spending time with our grandkids and my youngest daughter and her husband, some things changed in their timing. And so we've ended up now we're taking care of their, their daughter, our youngest granddaughter a couple days a week. So that's a that's a new and exciting adventure and, and fun and tiring, all at the same time.

Margarita Gurri: 48:16

It is.

Yonason Goldson: 48:18

And that's a good point to hone in on that. thinks should be fun and challenging at the same time. And often it's the challenge that creates the fun, isn't it?

David Marlow: 48:31

Absolutely. We need a little bit, right? We need a little, a little bit of challenge or so no fuss someone was I was just going deep on this the other day, and they brought me back to a little bit of reality and made it I think a better analogy of of that in video games, right? If you're playing a video game, the first level is a little hard, right? But not very hard. Because if you if it was so hard, you couldn't overcome it, then you quit. But it's a little hard. And then the next level is a little harder. But now you've been playing for a while to see if you got a skill and so you just keep moving up. And I think our brains are kind of wired for that to that just in life. As a runner, we will say you know the hills are a problem until they are I mean, you know we run in a hill that's tough until you've gotten strong enough. I've got hills around me now that I don't even notice that I ran a hill because I've been running them for years. But when I first started running he was like oh my gosh, I get this hill Yeah, channel you got to have some challenge that right? If everything was super easy, it'd be no fun at all. Like I hate tic tac toe. My youngest grandson wants to play tic tac toe. But it's so boring because I mean, there's only so many things you can do. Right? But for him it's a challenge. So it's fun. There's a

Yonason Goldson: 49:45

classic Twilight Zone episode about this gangster who dies and and apparently has gone to heaven because they give him anything he wants. We can rob banks he can win the casinos. He can go with girls he wants it He's out of ball. And after a while, he just gets incredibly bored. And he finally says to his guardian angel. You know, I think you made a mistake. I don't belong in heaven. You should have sent me to the other place, he says, But sir, you are in the other place. Shirley comes on and he says, a gangster who has everything he ever wanted, and is stuck with it.

David Marlow: 50:29

Oh, that's great. I remember that. That's awesome.

Margarita Gurri: 50:31

I'll have to check that one out again. I love that show. Oh, well, we've come to an end of a lovely episode of the robot in the string. DavidI Marlo, thanks again for joining us you truly give us so much to think about. I urge everyone to check out daily iki guy got substack.com. And I'm going to remember the stack as he talked about skill and experience stacking, which I think is a great phrase. And I'm going to remind everyone, you have your iki guy there. Our guest tells us all we need to do is uncover it. So with with some courage, and a bit of shared faith from all of us and some happiness, I believe you can achieve your iki guy. Until the next episode, we are the rabbi in the shrink. And check us out at the rabbi in the street calm. Thank you and have fun.

Unknown: 51:27

Thank you for listening to the rabbi and the shrink everyday ethics unscripted to book Dr. Red Shoe Dr. Margarita gooery or Rabbi Unison Goldson as speakers for advisors for your organization, contact them at the rabbi and the shrink.com This has been a doctor Red Shoe production