Some people relate to trauma. Some to grief. But everyone will admit to disappointment, even if you’re a chronic minimizer like me. We’re not here to exaggerate and inflate anything, and nobody wants to give attention to disappointment so it limits them. That however is my concern. Are we healthfully dealing with disappointments or are we repressing unresolved feelings that are in fact, limiting us? You may be CEO of your company and clearing a million per year, and have unresolved disappointments, from your childhood or last year, limiting you. Maybe they are limiting your performance. Your income. Your relationships. Your fulfillment despite your achievements. This was my focus as I entered into the following discussion with acclaimed grief educator and multiple best selling author, Christina Rasmussen. Christina studied to become a therapist and crisis intervention counselor - even doing her master's thesis on the stages of bereavement, and thought she understood grief. Then, with daughters nine months and two-and-a-half years old, her 31 year old husband was diagnosed with Stage 4 colon cancer and passed away. It was then she truly grasped the depths of sorrow and pain that accompany loss. Four years after Christina’s husband died she created the Life Reentry process, which launched her on a mission to bring compassion, grace, and validation to thousands, while simultaneously establishing an exit from what she termed the Waiting Room. She wrote the book, Second Firsts that became a bestseller. Then, Where Did You Go? Her new book and our muse here is Invisible Loss: Recognizing and Healing the Unacknowledged Heartbreak of Everyday Grief. She’s taken her experience and research from severe and tragic loss and brought the same, profound process of healing into our everyday grief and disappointments. She found that it’s not the size of the big trauma or little disappointment that matters, but the resolution, and she has a process to help us work through it.

In this episode I'm unveiling a very common motivator for your drive that I'd not adequately conceptualized before. We all realize that negative feelings can often be a powerful motivator for us. The desire to prove ourselves to the world. But my guest took it a step further and it was an "Ah ha!" Moment for me. Self-development leader Joel Brown cited that even among the top performers he's hired to coach, he finds that many not only have negative motivators driving them, but they are actually afraid to lose them, as they feel, even subconsciously, that it's their superpower. Boom. I think this is huge. We may be holding on to negative motivators because we've attached out identity to them. Joel Brown is a renowned self-development leader who has inspired 372 million people worldwide with his #1 personal development website, Addicted2Success. Over the last 14 years he's directly impacted over 12,500 lives through hands on training, conferences and retreats. Joel hosts the highly successful Addicted2Success podcast, with over 6.2 Million Plays & Downloads over the past 4 years + over 9 Million plays on his Youtube channel featuring thought leaders such as Tony Robbins, Matthew McConaughey, Simon Sinek, Les Brown and more. Joel stands apart to me because of his holistic blend of cutting-edge psychological strategies and deep spiritual insights, delving beyond the surface to target the subconscious patterns that often derail us from our path. Joel is also a Jedi of understanding procrastination. He actually has a quick quiz you can take to understand your procrastination type. There are six procrastination types and it really helpful to discover mine and how to better mitigate my propensities. Go to doquiz.com. doquiz.com. But you'll hear us talk about it in this coming conversation.

In this episode we’re delivering steps for you to stand out and be remarkable. So you don’t get lost in the shuffle of noise out there. To get much of anywhere today, we must be remarkable. But what does that mean? My guest defines it not as being famous or rich, having tons of followers or being a genius, but as making a difference. Making the world a better place. His podcast is actually called Remarkable People, and after having 200 amazing guests he’s curated tremendous wisdom in his new book, Think Remarkable: 9 Paths To Transform Your LIfe and Make a Difference. And he, is Guy Kawasaki. Guy is a Silicon Valley legend. If you look him up in Wikipedia it says: Guy Kawasaki is an American marketing specialist, author, and Silicon Valley venture capitalist. He was one of the Apple employees originally responsible for marketing their Macintosh computer line in 1984. He popularized the word evangelist in marketing the Macintosh as an "Apple evangelist" and the concepts of evangelism marketing and technology evangelism/platform evangelism in general. The Wikipedia source is interesting as Guy actually sat on the Wikimedia Foundation board of trustees for a time, which is the non-profit operating entity of Wikipedia. Guy has written 15 books and this is the third time I’ve had him on my show. Guy is a truly inspirational and wise guy. I dubbed this book, “Life’s Little Instruction Book For Aspiring People,” which you’ll hear Guy say he is going to steal and use. I’m honored. This conversation goes by quickly, it includes a lot of laughter, and an immense amount of wisdom from a truly, wise Guy. Next up…Guy Kawasaki and a guide to being remarkable.

In this episode we give focus to our drive, in our work. Our work is a primary, if not the primary focus of our lives, at least from a daily time and energy devotion. The message here is in relation to the interviewing process, but as you’ll hear, so much of it relates to our lives overall. In any relationship and opportunity there is an aspect of selling yourself and often a struggle between being yourself and feeling you are performing. I was recently introduced to Anna Papalia who is one of our leading authorities on the new science of interviewing. Now, I’ve been a lifetime entrepreneur who has never technically interviewed for a traditional job, but as I read Anna’s research I was made acutely aware that as an entrepreneur I spend a lot of my time interviewing for opportunities. Selling myself. And to that degree, we all are. Which is why I wanted to bring this conversation to you. Anna’s research is now culminated in her new book, “Interviewology” where it categorizes all of us in four interview styles - The Charmer, the Challenger, the Examiner, and the Harmonizer. The three keys we discuss are, 1) understand your own style, 2) understand how to fully embrace your style in interviews and be completely authentic when you’re selling yourself, and 3) understand the other styles so you can tap into them when you are being interviewed, or you are interviewing, so you can better connect with the other person and vastly increase your chances of success. And success may mean helping you realize the job or person is a completely bad fit, which is vital to know! The book again is Interviewology and you can go to interviewology.com to find out what your style is. By the end of this conversation however, you’ll have clarity on what your style is and how to fully utilize it.

I've forever had my paradigm shifted with a new category of attributes. What are attributes? They are inherent qualities you possess. We all do. And they inform everything we do. Here is the story. Rich Diviney spent 20 years as a Navy SEAL, completing more than a dozen overseas deployments, eleven in Iraq and Afghanistan. He went on to be intimately involved in a specialized SEAL selection process to look for elite performers amongst the already elite SEAL members. He found himself often surprised by which candidates washed out and which succeeded. So often someone with all the right skills would fail, while others he might have initially dismissed would turn out to be the best performers. This led Rich to research and discover hidden drivers of performance. Attributes which will often predict how we will perform, especially under pressure. I read through Rich's book, The Attributes: 25 Hidden Drivers of Optimal Performance. Then I took his Attributes quiz. We started off with what drove him to pursue being a Navy SEAL. Then discussed how attributes differ from skills, and in truth, eclipse them. Then we walked through all 25 attributes and I'm confident you'll hear brand new perspectives on attributes like courage, situational awareness, task switching, cunning and even narcissism which he says has a place in top performance. Again, I feel I have a whole new toolbox for understanding, predicting, and growing my own performance. I'd highly encourage you to go to hub.theattributes.com, create and account and use code MILLER15 to get 15% off your own assessment.

I’ve continued to be skeptical of the whole “manifesting” concept, until now. As I’ve finally shown and convinced that I have been and always am manifesting most of my life. I don’t believe I’m all powerful or that I am God. But I do find that I generally reap what I sow. What my mind dwells on seems to come to pass, and my mind…our minds…naturally tend toward negative thoughts. If I keep thinking I don’t want to get sick, I don’t want to get sick, my subconscious just comprehends a constant focus on sickness. And goes to work towards it. What I need to do is focus on being well. Being well. Being well. And let my subconscious work on that. Let it bolster my immune system and let it steer me toward feeling positive and optimistic and increasing my awareness of making better health choices and avoiding things that weaken me. To expound on this topic from a scientific perspective, I bring you James R. Doty. James is a brain surgeon. His playground is the brain. And he has studied the concept of manifesting from a neurological standpoint and leaves the woo-woo out of the conversation. Dr Doty has been on the faculty of the Stanford University School of Medicine since 1997 in the Neurosurgery Department as a professor and more recently as an adjunct professor. He is also the founder and director of the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education (CCARE) at Stanford, of which His Holiness the Dalai Lama is the founding benefactor. James’ new book is Mind Magic: The Neuroscience of Manifestation And How It Changes Everything. I admittedly brought up faith and God and I feel they can and do coexist. But you can listen in and decide for yourself. But James bring us to consider neurological issues like “value tagging” and our “selective attention system” and a concept I feel is really tangible called “target fixation” which often gets brought up in regards to motorcycle accidents, where when a rider becomes so fixated on an unwanted target ahead that causes them to unconsciously steer into the direction of their gaze. Focus on where you want to go, not on where you don’t want to go. That concept alone covers a lot of ground on what the neuroscience of manifesting reveals for us. This is more than hopeful. I feel it’s revelatory.

We are driven by our values. Sometimes however, our values change, or we find ourselves in a place where it’s hard to live out our values. So we think about change. Which requires decisions. And boom. A crossroads. The comfort and security of where we are and what is known, and the fear of the unknown. It’s a big deal. However, I’ve got really hopeful news for you. A resource if you will. How would you like a manual for how to make it as easy and secure as possible? Emily P. Freeman is the Wall Street Journal bestselling author of five books, including The Next Right Thing: A Simple Soulful Practice for Making Life Decisions. This book became so popular that Emily now has a nationally ranked podcast of the same name, The Next Right Thing, which already has more than 24 million downloads. Emily regularly offers perspective and clarity for more than 120K followers on Instagram. After doing the research to masterfully address decision making, Emily has turned her focus to making change. Her new book is How to Walk into a Room: The Art of Knowing When to Stay and When to Walk Away. We went really, really deep into the real and perceived risks of change. Then we spent nearly half our time together walking through 10 questions Emily has masterfully outlined to help us discern if a change is truly wise and fitting. We even hit on personality styles and talk about those who change is easier for, but that those who struggle more with change often actually do it more successfully. As you’ll hear, I’m the former, for the record. I’ve never experienced a more clear and concise plan for taking so much of the fear and risk out of big decisions and changes and I won’t address it again the same way. So next up, Emily P Freeman and a deep discussion to help us all with big decision and change to help equip us to drive more authentically and efficiently through the ups, downs, lefts and rights of life.

Here is a business story, that is really a humanitarian story, but overall is an incredible story of drive I believe you’ll be inspired and equipped by. The story would make a great movie, and since my guest actually roomed with Matt Damon in college, it just might become one. James Rhee’s parents migrated to America from Korea. James was driven to excel and please his parents, so he got into Harvard. But he really wanted to teach, so he then taught high school for a couple years. Some of his most rewarding years he says. But then he went back to Harvard and graduated from law school. But he realized he didn’t want to be a lawyer so he became an investment banker. He did well, but realized he didn’t want to do that either. So he worked in private equity. He did well. Very well. He appreciated helping businesses, but didn’t like how disconnected he was from everything. So he quit and didn’t know what to do. Then he ends up in an unlikely place - as CEO of Ashley Stewart, a fashion retailer that served plus-size, predominantly middle- and lower-income Black women. And the company was at its end. The death knell had sounded. James came in for what was supposed to be six months because he felt an obligation to help. He ended up there for seven years with a miracle turnaround story that he’s now described in a book called Red Helicopter: Lead Change With Kindness. You'll hear a very personal story of James' drive, from healthy to unhealthy. You'll hear about how Ashley Stewart went from death to stardom because it became a place and brand of belonging, not fashion. You'll hear how success came, not from communication, but connection. And most of all you'll hear how goodwill is the bridge to not only wild success, but abiding joy. Today James Rhee teaches at Howard University, MIT Sloan School of Management, and Duke Law School. His TED Talk and Dare to Lead interview with Brené Brown have reached millions. It was an honor to spend a couple hours with him and as you’ll hear at the end of the show we’re planning a t-shirt campaign together to advocate for the “analog life!”

In our quest for health and wellness and looking at the food we eat, how we exercise and sleep and addressing our mental health, we often miss two primary areas of consumption; what we are breathing and drinking. I just want to trust that overall what I breathe and drink is ok and my body can handle it. It can, but it’s not optimal. My body can exist on cheetos and coke as well, but it won’t be optimal. I want my physical body at it’s best to support my overall drive. To dig into these subjects I brought in an expert, Peter Spiegel. Peter worked on an organic farm. He taught meditation. He learned Chinese medicine and taught it to doctors in London. He started and sold a natural foods company. From all this he ultimately devoted himself to clean air and water and I wanted to know why. You’re about to get a master class in the air we breathe and the water we drink, in all forms, and why you’ll best serve your drive to clean them both. We spend most of our time talking about air and water, but you’ll also hear us mention his products to address both. Peter founded a company called Ideal Living which provides the AirDoctor for cleaning your air and AquaTru which cleans your water. If you’re interested you can head to idealliving.com/DRIVE to receive up to 40% off air purifiers and 20% off water purifiers! Exclusive to podcast listeners, you will also receive a free 3 year extended warranty on any AirDoctor, which is an additional $84 value. Get the special offer by going to I-D-E-A-L-L-I-V-I-N-G dot com slash D-R-I-V-E. Up next, Peter and I dive into the truth about the air you breathe and water you drink!