#93 Gad Saad - The Saad Truth of Happiness

0 (0s): There is a whole constellation of knowledge. I know 1000000th of what I could potentially know. And that not only inspires me oftentimes when I'm about to leave on vacation, I argue that one of the most difficult decisions I have to make is deciding which book or two books to bring on vacation. 2 (23s): Hello everybody. You are listening or watching Chatting with Candace. If you wanna Support the show, please check out some of the affiliates and the sponsors below. You can also go to Chatting with candace.com where you can click that link. This says, buy me a coffee or the Patreon account, or get early access to episodes. I couldn't do this without you. All of the proceeds go directly back into the show. If you have not hit like and subscribe, please do so. It takes two seconds. Most of you that are listening and watching are not subscribed, so you don't wanna miss a single episode because you'll miss out on guests like we have today. This one is a, oh my gosh, it's such a treat. I have been waiting to get this guest scheduled for a while. He's a repeat, repeat guest. We had to get our timing right. 2 (1m 3s): He has a new book coming out, Dr. Gad Saad, he wrote The Parasitic Mind bestselling book. This new one, which I'm sure will be bestselling as well, is the Sad Truth about Happiness eight Secrets for Leading a Good Life. It is incredible. It talks about mindset, pleasure, Happiness, how to pick the right Mate, how to pick the right job. It's, it's truly incredible. I think it's gonna help everyone be that much happier. Maybe it's the secret sauce that you have been missing. And if you feel like you could be 1% happier, 10% happier or more, please check out this book. You can get it. It's linked below Amazon, anywhere that you get books. 2 (1m 44s): And before we jump into the episode, I wanted to read a quote by my teacher, Dr. Carlos Waters. And it's funny 'cause he just had this really long conversation that he is was doing and it was unhappiness. So I felt like it was relevant to the show and a lot of it overlapped with Dr. Gad Saad work. And I just thought you talk about serendipity in, in the podcast, and this is just a moment of serendipity that I wanted to on, to honor. Understanding our true self is a crucial aspect of experiencing genuine Happiness. Our sense of identity is often shaped by the external influences such as social expectations, cultural conditioning, and the roles we play in our relationships. 2 (2m 25s): However, true Happiness lies in connecting with our Authentic self. The essence of who we are beyond the external constructs. It involves exploring our values, passions, strengths, and deepest desires. When we align our lives with our Authentic self, we experience a profound sense of purpose, meaning, and fulfillment. This journey of self-discovery requires self-reflection, introspection, and willingness to let go of societal masks and conditioning. And I think that was amazing, and you'll see how it's relevant, especially after you check out Gads book. So please enjoy the conversation with Dr. Gad Saad, you're back again. 2 (3m 5s): I'm so excited. I've been eagerly waiting to have you on for round two, and I know my people were pitching you, so we had to wait for the timing of this new book, which congratulations on the launch. 0 (3m 15s): Thank you so much. I'm equally excited to be with you, Kad and I, I'm sorry that I wasn't able to do it. You were gracious enough to invite me to come and do it in person. Hopefully maybe round two, round three we can do that. But for now, we'll have to settle for remotely. 2 (3m 31s): I'd love to, you know, what they're actually saying is Wilmington is supposed to be the new Austin, so I'm just, I'm, I'm ahead of the game here. It's beautiful. It's not as hot. We have beaches, so maybe next time that you're going on Rogan, you can make a pit stop on the East coast. 0 (3m 46s): Well, I'm going in exactly a week, so it'll have to be probably the next time after that, but yes. Yeah, 2 (3m 51s): The next time. Yeah. Wonderful. Yeah, you're a serial guest on there, which I, 0 (3m 55s): I'm, I'm fortunate enough to be, so yes, thank you. 2 (3m 58s): What's, what's interesting, I was thinking of the last time we talked and we were talking about what is a honey badger? And in my mind it was honey badger to this Happiness project, which I think is so amazing. What inspired you to show like this softer side or this Lighter side and going into Happiness instead of like this more, I don't know, this, the honey badger side, 0 (4m 24s): Right? The more sort of, more combative issues, right? You have to, by, by the very nature of my last book, you're taking on ideas, you're taking on people's belief systems. And so by its very nature it's going to be, you know, a bit darker. But that's a great question, thank you. And I actually discussed it briefly in the first chapter of, of the forthcoming book. So I received tons of feedback from, you know, from my platform, from the people who follow me saying, Hey, how do you, how do you always seem to have a twinkle in your eye? You're always smiling, you're always joking, yet you take on all these serious issues. What's your secret professor? So that was the first thing that compelled me to write this book. And secondly, I noticed that oftentimes I don't really operate too much in prescriptive world. 0 (5m 9s): What I mean by that is here are the seven steps to lose weight. Here are the three steps to make your spouse happy. That that's never been, you know, the ecosystem that I've inhabited. Because as a professor, I'm much more in descriptive world. I wanna, I want to describe why people do the things that they do, but often I found that when I put out some advice, some unsolicited advice, that would be the stuff that would receive the greatest amount of feedback from people. So for example, to, to the earlier point that we mentioned about Joe Rogan, of all the times I've been on Joe Rogan, probably the singular snippet that received the most attention is when Joe asked me, so what was your secret to becoming trim again to, you know, I lost a lot of weight. 0 (5m 55s): And so then that got me thinking, you know, maybe I couldn't have the audacity to actually put together a book where I, I, I can't guarantee you that reading my book will assure you to be happy, but I can hopefully increase your probability of being happy by adopting certain mindsets and so on. And so I said, you know what? I'm gonna throw my ring into it. I wrote a book that was about negative mindsets. The last book, let's now complete the circle by talking about positive mindsets. 2 (6m 24s): I love that. And I think a lot of people, probably friends within our ecosystem could use this because you have a huge social following and you engage a lot. But there difference that I see between you and some other people that we may know is like, you do have this lightheartedness about you, and you are like, you are very, you are happy. You can objectively see that. And then other people you see that it's draining them. So how do you not take things personally because people will block you, people will say nasty things. How do you protect your space? 0 (6m 56s): So I do think an element of that is just your personhood. It's just the unique genes that you have that make up who you are. And, and at the start of the book, I basically argue that, well, I cite research that says that about 50% of our Happiness stems from our gene genes. But of course the good news, that means there's still 50% up for grab. So what are some things that we can do that can ha wherever we are on the Happiness set score we can improve on? And so for me, from an environmental perspective, I think having grown up through some of the horrors of my childhood, the Lebanese civil war and so on, I'm always able to contextualize anything that I'm going through that I'm feeling anguish about in light of what could have been given what I went through in the Lebanese civil war. 0 (7m 44s): So I'll give you a a a minor example that highlights this. So as I was about to embark on, you know, the, the media tour to, to promote my book, you know, you wake up, you're, you're anxious, oh, I have to travel here, I have to travel there, I've got a million shows to do. And so you can easily allow that stress to take over. And then right away I kind of thought to myself, are you really complaining and whining to yourself that you're going to be speaking to all kinds of interesting people who actually have given you their forum to speak and you're, because you're going to promote a book that hopefully is going to do, well snap out of it. And so I think by always contextualizing whatever is upsetting you in light of the bigger picture, it can hopefully ground you back to reality. 2 (8m 29s): So I would assume that's a muscle that you have to work because it's not gonna be reflexive initially. So some people tend to be stuck on this lower, like if you see like these arcs kind of like a graph where it's sneaking up and down, if you're at this high point, it's very easy to have gratitude and appreciate everything that's going well for you. But if you're stuck in this rutt, then all you see is the negative. So it's really hard to kind of have that upward spiral moment or to train your, your brain to do it. Do you have steps for that or is it just awareness and interjecting? 0 (8m 58s): Well, certainly awareness, but I also think if you, if you view whatever thing that you're trying to achieve at its end point, then oftentimes it could be become daunting. But if you, you simply atomize it to let me win today. So what do I mean by that? Let's take for example, the weight loss thing, right? If I had started, which I have done in the past and say, you know, I'm, you know, I probably could afford to lose 50, 60, 70 pounds, I'm never gonna get there. Well, I'm, I've already lost. I'm, I'm at the bottom of the curve as you said. But if I say every single day there are three possibilities that could happen as relating to my weight, my weight can stay the same. 0 (9m 40s): It can go down that day or it can go up that day. How about I just make sure that on every single day, however little amount, it's always that I weigh less today, even if I, even if the scale can't pick it up, right? Well, guess what? I win today. I win tomorrow, I win the next day, I win for six months and suddenly I get on the scale. Holy moly, I haven't been that weight since, you know, 2001. And so I think that there are ways by which we can, you know, contextualize what the ultimate summit is in smaller steps to at least make it more digestible. And if you do that, I think you're more likely to succeed. 2 (10m 19s): So I guess we should also go back and define Happiness. So what does Happiness mean to you? Because I think especially in the West that there is a lot of confusion as to what Happiness is. 0 (10m 29s): Yeah, sure. That's a great question. So of course in the academic literature, there are all kinds of debates about the difference between Happiness and contentment and wellbeing. And some people of course also confuse sort of short-term dopamine hits, you know, pleasure stuff. You know, eating a juicy burger makes me happy. Watching a spicy movie might tickle your sexual appetite, whatever. That's not what I mean. I'm talking really, if we're going to use sort of an endocrinological framework, I'm talking about the serotonin system, I'm talking about contentment, I'm talking about existential Happiness. Do I wake up on any given day and say I'm really great, I I have a great life. 0 (11m 12s): Of course there are all kinds of things that piss me off and, and, and, you know, stress me, but am I at a place that makes that I'm happy? And so it's in that sort of grand existential sense. Do I wake up in the morning and rub my hands for all of the opportunity? Yeah, I'm gonna get to speak to Candace today and I've got this, and then I'm speaking to a graduate student about some interesting project. So it's in that existential sense that, I mean, Happiness 2 (11m 36s): So more internal and external. 'cause I think that's a lot too, is we, we conflate pleasure with Happiness. So it's these things that you're seeking that give you like a rush and you're like, that's Happiness. If I'm not constantly feeling those fireworks with my partner, then I'm no longer in love. So you feel all of these external things and that's how you're measuring it instead of just being whole on the inside. So it's this constant chase and then you're never going to be satisfied. It's like that old Japanese, like the hungry ghosts, right? Where they have like the big bellies and the long necks and it's just like never, never, never enough. So where, how do you go about, I guess, like feeling that wholeness in this world where we're constantly almost being forced to wear a mask, to go along, to get along where you feel like you might not be able to share who you authentically are or you're not experience alignment. 2 (12m 25s): It's like if you don't know who you are to start with, how do you experience that Happiness? 0 (12m 31s): So there are several threads that I can take there. Let me start with the last thing that you mentioned where you talked about authenticity and knowing who you are. So I talk in the book about the Delphi maxim that the ancient Greeks had, were very aware of, which is know thyself, right? And I specifically talk about authenticity and realist, and I don't just mean realness in the sense of, you know, in, in, in, in a one-on-one dynamic, are you someone who's real, who's Authentic? Although I do mean that, but I mean in a grander sense, existential authenticity. So example, if, you know, one of the things I talk about in the book is that at the end of your life, if you can look back at your life and have as few Regrets as possible, then all other things equal, you're, you're likely going to be in a happy state right? 0 (13m 15s): Now, let's link that to existential authenticity. If I decided to become a pediatrician, because my dad is a pediatrician and his dad was a pediatrician, and I know that that's a safe, respectable career, I might go ahead and become a pediatrician, but I've always wanted to be a ceramic artist. And so when I'm sitting at 80 and I say, you know, I, yes, I've been very successful and I've now closed my medical practice and people respect me. But that's not existential authenticity because really what I wanted to do was something completely different. I wanted to instantiate my artistic side. I was very interested in the arts, but I never did it because whatever people didn't respect it, my parents didn't appreciate it and so on. So I think it's very, very difficult to be truly in a meaningful way happy if you're not existentially Authentic. 0 (14m 2s): Now that of course I'm Authentic to a fault in that I'm oftentimes unable to modulate my interventions on social media because I just can't put up with bullshit, right? So I recently had a tiff with a, a guy on social media who, who has a very big platform. People had said to me, oh, you should look into this guy, you should get on his show. Then I looked at his stuff, I didn't really know who he was, and then I found that some of the, the full bullshit that he was peddling was really annoying. So I, at that point, I could have done one of two things. I could say, I've got a book coming out that pragmatically speaking, let me not go after the sky because I can benefit from getting on this platform. 0 (14m 46s): But then that would make me feel in, in the internal voice of my head inauthentic. And so I said, I'm going for it. I'm going to cri criticize him. Now, I didn't do it in any mean way. I wasn't trying to insult him, but I wasn't able to modulate what I thought would be appropriate in terms of defending the truth. And so, like most things in life, and I, that's actually a topic of one of my chapters in the book. I talk about, you know, everything in moderation, which the ancient Greeks were already well aware of. So I call this the inverted you too little of something is not good. Too much of something is not good and much of the optimal place that we need to be is in the middle sweet spot. 0 (15m 28s): The, the Buddha called it the middle way. Aristotle called it the golden mean. And so like most things in life, if you're perhaps too Authentic and that you never hold your tongue, that's not good. If you never speak your mind, that's not good. And the truth lays or the optimal thing lays somewhere in the middle. 2 (15m 47s): So how do you calibrate that sweet spot? Especially when it comes to the truth. How, Much, Truth is Too, Much Truth. Because I find myself in a very similar predicament often, especially in real exchanges, where someone will do or say something that I think is just nonsense. And I just, without, there's almost no like Paris no stop. It's just thought and out. And because it's just so out, something will be so outrageous, especially if it's around like parenting or kids, and I just see bad behavior, I'm like, shut that down immediately. Right? And I did it to a really, really old friend and it didn't land well and it still is kind of a little bit thorny. So is there such thing as too much truth? 0 (16m 27s): So the way that I would answer that is to draw on two distinct ethical systems, which actually I, I don't spend much time discussing in this book, but I certainly do in the, in the, in my last book, the Parasitic Mind where I talk about deontological ethics versus consequentialist ethics. So consequentialist ethics would be where you might massage the truth because the consequences of telling the truth are not necessarily worth it. So I always give the example, 'cause it's a humorous but true one. If you want to have a long lasting marriage and you hear the question, do I look fat in those jeans? Please put on the consequentialist hat because it may be worthwhile to, you know, asage the feelings of your partner and say, no, you, you look, you look beautiful On the other hand, when it comes to the pursuit of science, the pursuit and defense of, you know, first principles that define a society, well then there is no I believe in free speech. 0 (17m 27s): But if you use the qualifier, but then you are violating a deontological principle, the deontological means an absolute truth, right? So presumption of innocence within the judicial system is a deontological principle. So once someone says, yes, yes, I believe in presumption of innocence, but not for Brett Kavanaugh 'cause he's a serial gang rapist, well then you are violating a deontological principle. So to your question, I would say the, the way that I'm able to know whether I should modulate my tongue or not is whether it's deontological or consequentialist is if it's consequentialist is i'll modulate my tongue. If it's deontological fasten your seat belts. 2 (18m 8s): Mm, okay, yeah, that's really helpful. Is it the same with, I guess we kind of talked about it with Authentic Expression because obviously you don't wanna have unbridled rage, you can't just go express yourself and punch somebody. So you do have to modulate that. So I guess tying it back to the guy that wanted to work with pottery, it's, you, you have all this programming and some of it's not, it's not like meant to mess you up as like, we're we always mess up as parents, no one's gonna be a perfect parent. So sometimes you put programming in there that you don't even know you're doing, like you're not gonna make any money with making stupid pots, right? Go be a pediatrician. Right? And that, that can do a lot of harm because when you have this other person that's really living out of alignment and then they might seek a life partner that's out of alignment and then they get married and then they're in a horrible marriage and it just kind of starts to just build and build and build into this mountain of, of sadness and like being like a counterfeit life essentially, right? 2 (19m 6s): So like how do you, how do you pragmatically go throughout the day? Like, yes, I have responsibilities, I have bills, I do operate in this three D world, but I also have passions. So is it that you, you do your day job and then focus on your passions at night? Like how do you not kill your spirit? 0 (19m 23s): Yeah, that, that's, that's another great question. So let, let me tie it to, in, in one of the early chapters, I talk about the two fundamental decisions that are likely to impart upon you the greatest amount of misery or greatest amount of Happiness as a function of whether you make the right choices or not. And decision one, which eventually, if you want, we can drill down on is Choosing the right spouse? And then of relevance to your question, Choosing the right profession. And what I argue in the book is that all other things equal Choosing, a profession that allows you to instantiate your creative impulse is probably the best way to find a profession that grants you purpose and meaning. 0 (20m 4s): It's not the only way, but it's certainly one that's almost by definition like it do. So now I can create, in many ways, I create, by creating online content as a podcaster, I can do it by being a chef. I, I literally create culinary art that allows people to share an experience that didn't exist before I created that dish. I can be an architect and create, I could be a standup comic and create material that jokes that no one's heard before. I could be an author, I could be a professor. So there are many ways by which I can, you know, engage my creative impulse. Now. So to your point though, as you know, do I wait till after hours to pursue those things? 0 (20m 45s): It might be that pragmatically I've always wanted to be an artist, but for whatever reason I haven't been able to instantiate that and I've become an insurance adjuster. And I think without being a denigrating insurance adjusters, we need them. It's probably not a job that allows my creative impulse to be instantiated. It's probably not the job that gives me purpose and meaning. But what about at night when instead of watching, you know, four hours of television, I sign up at the local adult learning center to take the pottery courses that I've always wanted to take. So, so yes, in an ideal world, if my day-to-day job is one that allows you, allows me to immerse myself in play and in creativity and so on, that's great. 0 (21m 25s): But if I can't do that for whatever pragmatic reasons and obstacles that have come my way, then there are certainly a slew of decisions that I can make that would allow me to go after that, those those needs without it being my profession. 2 (21m 41s): So it, I wanna circle back to Choosing, the Right Mate. Do you know who Paul Dolan is? 0 (21m 47s): It rings a bell. Tell me more about him. 2 (21m 49s): So Paul Dolan was looking at some marital studies and he interpreted them in a way, and I don't know if it was intentional or not because I'm not Paul Dolan, but he interpreted in such a way that marriage makes women miserable and it's beneficial for men only. And this idea of having kids actually makes women more miserable. So childless women are happier. But I guess the way that the data was presented, it was like, is your husband out or has your husband left? And it wasn't identified like, did he leave the kitchen? Are you alone or did he physically leave the house and you are separated? So kind of a big thing to decipher between he did not, so literally the women he was talking to were estranged from their spouse. 2 (22m 34s): So of course they're going to report dissatisfaction and raised levels of unhappiness. But he took it as like this feminist movement, be independent, you don't need kids and you don't need a man. And when it comes to the child studies or like childless stu studies, I'm sure you know, that like they are particularly looking at like in the throes of the newborn baby stage, and they're like, of course, you know, these parents are unhappy, don't have kids, well go scale out to when they're, the adults are, you know, in their forties and fifties, and actually they surpass the people that don't have kids. So it almost seems like the sneaky way that people are purposefully misinterpreting data to maybe suit some kind of agenda, some kind of feminist agenda, some kind of childless agenda. 2 (23m 19s): I'm not really sure. 0 (23m 20s): So I'm, I'm, I'm not sure that I can speak specifically to the Paul Dolan studies that you referenced, but maybe I can put the ge more general question in an evolutionary framework. And I think last time that I was on your show, we probably covered some evolutionary themes. So you, you know, humans are in a conundrum in that we both have the deep desire to engage in long-term coupling because we are a bi parental species. I mean, by definition, biologically men, human males are some of the best dads in the animal kingdom. In that we, we certainly do stick around and invest a lot more than just copulation. And so we are a bi parental species, so it makes perfect evolutionary sense for us to develop the emotional bonding system of romantic love and that we, we, because we need to stick together for long enough to see our children get to sexual maturity. 0 (24m 12s): But of course, as you also know very well Candace, we have evolved a desire for variety seeking. And actually I have a whole chapter in my forthcoming book on variety seeking as a pathway to Happiness. Now I talk about many different forms of variety seeking food, variety seeking exercise variety, seeking sexual variety, seeking intellectual variety seeking. And so humans are, are, are really in a Darwinian conundrum because from this side of my brain or mouth, I completely want to bond to this one woman and be faithful to her. But I also from this side of my mouth or brain see all sorts of beautiful women that I really would love to have an intimate encounter with. 0 (24m 56s): Now there is no sort of absolute prescriptive, you know, remedy to that. We also have evolved a moral compass that allows us to asage many of our Darwinian instincts. If I have made a commitment to someone for a monogamous union, and I feel that if I were to violate that, that would be a betrayal of our trust. Then withstanding the fact that I would look at tons of women and say, oh my goodness, I, she's so gorgeous. That's the price that I have to pay to be true to my mono monogamous union. So all other things equal though I would say that the research shows that marriage does correlate with Happiness. 0 (25m 37s): It, it's not a massive effect, but it certainly does correlate. So all other things equal, certainly having a good partner is very important. That's why to our earlier question when I said that there are two important decisions, Choosing the right spouse Choosing the right profession. Again, there is no singular recipe for how to know who's going to be your optimal spouse, but there are certain general guidelines that we can use to decide that. So for example, there are two conflicting maxims when it comes to may choice. One is birds of a feather flock together. The other one is opposites attract. It may or may not surprise you, Candace, to know that the, the research overwhelmingly supports birds of a feather flock together, at least for long-term success of a marriage. 0 (26m 26s): So I'm not talking so for a short-term ions, opposites attract might actually be optimal. I may be sexually shy and introverted. You may be sexually adventurous and extroverted and therefore you bring me out of my shell. And that actually might permit me to have a much better experience. But for long-term Happiness in a relationship, assortative mating. But, and now you might say, well, birds of a feather flock together on which feathers here we're talking about shared belief systems, shared life mindsets, shared attitudes towards important values. It's much more to someone who's similar to you 2 (27m 7s): In those regards. Right? So could it possibly that the opposites attract is more your temperament, so introvert versus out extrovert and then also like maybe risk seeking behavior or I don't know, like maybe just like more inconsequential things when it comes down to virtues and like what you would build a family upon. Like those things need to be in alignment. Exactly. But the other things can 0 (27m 29s): Be different, although just not to get too much into the trees, but if you said, let's say risk taking, that could overlap with some general life goals. So for example, I want to be very much risk aversive and safe for our future. You are very much of a risk seeker. You live for the day, that might cause some problems in our relationship. But if you just mean risk seeking in that you wanna go bungee jumping, whereas I'm incredibly safe in everything I do, then I think that might be a complimentary. So it depends what you mean by risk. 2 (28m 5s): Yes, that's definitely my dynamic. So my husband was just at Abundance 360, it's like this Peter Diand like conference and he won one of those zero gravity plane rides and he's doing it and he's like, do you wanna go with me? And I immediately have a panic attack. We're laying in bed while he asks me and I just get quiet and he feels my whole body contracting and I'm getting nauseous and I'm like, I do not wanna go, but he invited me, what do I do? And he goes, I just meant to Florida. And then like, I'll go up and then we will hang out. And I was like, thank God I have zero interest in that. I don't even wanna watch you. Just make sure that they take a video and record it. And I hope that you have fun because we are so different in that regard. 2 (28m 47s): I'm like, I wanna keep my feet on the ground and he wants to go to outer space. So I'm not, 0 (28m 51s): I I share your, your tepidness because while I may be an intellectual risk taker in that I, I speak my mind, I publish papers that many other academics wouldn't dare do and so on when it comes to some of that physicality, so example heights stuff, you know, yeah, I'm with you. I get vertigo and I turned into a, a little girl, 2 (29m 14s): They act, I don't know what I was listening to, but they actually said that kind of risk taking, whether it's moral or like societal, cultural risk taking, like intellectual risk taking is actually the rarest form of bravery. Like doing like the real typically bravado stuff like, you know, the people that are doing the skyscraper or bungee whatever, like what you would think of as risk taking, that's actually more common, but it's a lot more rare to like say the truth or stand up or risk social isolation or what have have you from being honest. So 0 (29m 43s): Well take, I'll take that as a compliment, take 2 (29m 45s): That as a compliment. I 0 (29m 46s): Won't feel so bad about not having jumped off some of the 40 foot cliffs that I saw others jumping when I, we were just on vacation. My family and I in Portugal, we were in the Algarve, which is in southern Europe, which is very known for having these really majestic cliffs that you could jump into this glorious water. Now I jumped off two levels of cliffs, which I thought was pretty impressive. But then I would see these other guys typically much younger jumping off these insane, I mean, I, I couldn't even stand there. And they're jumping off as if it's like they're eating broccoli. And so it makes me feel better to know that that mat, that's very frequent form of risk taking. That's good. 2 (30m 24s): Yes, yes. No, that trip sounded amazing. I loved your story that you shared on your podcast about being open and, and serendipity. I was listening, it was so cool. I felt like I was there with you. I was just finished up. And this is like a, to speak on serendipity. I just finished up a podcast with R F K and he was talking about serendipity and he said his interpretation of it, it's God tapping you on the shoulder and saying like, I'm here and then you tell your story about serendipity, which is like the next podcast I listened to. Wow. And how I know, right? I was like, this is serendipity happening. And you talk about this story about just like being open and, and then that's when like these really cool moments happen for you and you had this man approach you and ask you like, what is the secret to Happiness as you have this book on Happiness coming out, you are like, you can't write this stuff. 2 (31m 13s): Like you really can't. And I think that there is something saying like, when you're just like vibrating at a specific level, when you're truly happy, you become a magnet, people are gravitated towards you and they want to know more about you and they find you curious and interesting versus people that are just like so emotionally closed off. You just feel that. So I thought that was really cool, 0 (31m 32s): Thank you that thank you for mentioning that just before coming on your lovely show. So I had finished, I had done a show myself on, on my channel, and then I had about 45 minutes I said, so I asked my wife, do you wanna go for a walk? And so we ran into a, a neighbor who's an older gentleman. He, he has some health issues, he's, he's, he's walking with a walker. So we stopped for a few minutes to chat with him. And you know, he just said, he goes, you know, I love running into you guys. You, you, you both always seem so happy. And so you're exactly right. I mean, you really either exude that or not. And now I'm starting, even though I'm supposed to be scientifically minded as I say these things, I, I feel like I need to touch wood. 0 (32m 18s): I certainly, I suddenly turn into a superstitious person because you know, in Lebanese culture there's this idea of the evil eye, right? When you say some, when you say something like, oh, I'm so happy now watch when someone looks at you and you know, jinx you. So even someone who's supposedly scientifically trained can't help but look for the wood to touch as I tell these stories. Well, 2 (32m 39s): You can have both, right? I think, what do they say? It's the Ego and like critical thinking makes a great, what is, I just listened to it basically. It makes a terrible master. It's, it's very useful. Don't throw it out with the bath water, but also to not like disconnect from like your heart space or from like seeking spirituality or God or whatever it is. So like to have both of them where the people that are all the way on the other side in the spiritual wor world kind of cast out being an intellectual or being articulate or, or critical thing. They're like, no, that's just of this world and that's useless and it's figuring out like, again, that golden ratio or that happy middle for, for both of it. 0 (33m 20s): Yeah, that makes perfect sense. And to, to tie what you just said to the, the story that you were kind enough to share about the gentleman that I ran into in Portugal, that interaction for me was a, a an instantiation of divinity, right? Because again, it depends what, you know, how you conceptualize what, what the divine is, right? The fact that there could be such a magical moment that was unexpected, that's divine, right? And so, and and I I talk about this very briefly in the book when I'm discussing various correlates to Happiness in one of the early chapters. And that at one point I talk about the, the link between religiosity and Happiness. 0 (34m 0s): And I then explained that the research shows that there is a moderate correlation between being religious and happy. But then I didn't want people who were not religious to walk away saying, well, there's a strike against me. I'm not religious. Because if you define that sense of grandeur as something more than simply couched within a religious narrative, then you can find these divine moments in all sorts of things. When I look at, I mean, they've passed away, now we're thinking of getting the next generation of Belgian shepherds. But when I would interact with my Belgian Shepherds, I don't think that God or the cosmos can create, in my view, a more perfect creature, right? 0 (34m 42s): They're loyal, they're protective, they're playful, they're, I mean, they, they they exude every they or they exhibit every one of the noble qualities that most of us could never hope to acquire. And so, so I can find divinity in all sorts of things without necessarily couching it within a supernatural framework. 2 (35m 0s): Have you seen those most recent pictures from the James Webb Telescope where it shows all of the different galaxies? 0 (35m 8s): I mean, just a few snippets of them on Twitter, but not systematically, but I, go ahead, 2 (35m 13s): Tell me, oh my gosh, I was looking at this picture, and again, my husband shows me or like, like presents all of this stuff to me as I'm about to go to bed and then I just can't sleep. And he thinks it's hysterical, but he shows me this picture and it just, all of these different galaxies, like so many that it looks like the night sky, like what you would look and see all of these stars, like they're just galaxies. So you see that and you're like, how do you look at that, that and know that you are one in infinite infinity when it comes to that and you think you know anything or you feel like you've got it figured out or you think you are as big as it gets? How do you possibly think that? And like, so to people that don't have any spiritual inkling, I'm like, I feel like we're just wired for that. 2 (35m 55s): Like we're wired to know that there's something bigger and whatever that however you transmute that or translate that into, you know, whatever that looks like for you is another thing. But just like this inner knowing that there is something bigger, right? And I think that purpose that ties into purpose. 0 (36m 10s): Absolutely. And I, I can even take that example that you said, and rather than explore at the cosmological level, which for most brains is difficult to comprehend, ju let's bring it down to the study that I'm in right now. As you're taping you, you can't see it in the shot, but I have this huge collection within my personal library of books that I've yet to read. And it's that, that allows me to be quite epistemologically humble, even though I may know quite a lot as the fact that I'm a professor who spent my whole life and navigating ideas. The fact that I'm knowledgeable allows me to know how little that I know because there's so much so to, to use your cosmological analogy, there is a whole constellation of knowledge. 0 (36m 57s): I know 1000000th of what I could potentially know. And that not only inspires me, oftentimes when I'm about to leave on vacation, I argue that one of the most difficult decisions I have to make is deciding which book or two books to bring on vacation. And usually my wife will tell me, start that decision process early because I go through this whole choice paralysis where I'm just standing like a zombie in front of all the books that I've yet to read and I can't make my my mind up. And oh, by the way, I'm supposed to be an expert in the psychology of decision making and I'm completely on the choice paralysis. So, so yes, it's always nice and humbling to, to realize that you're a very, very small spec in this greater universe. 2 (37m 42s): So is that kind of what you mean by like your pushback on the Spice of life is variety is like too much can be overwhelming? 0 (37m 51s): I mean certainly that it, there, what I'm arguing actually is that depending on the domain, the pursuit of variety might be a good thing or a bad thing. So in, in a sense, a lot of the stuff in my book can be frustrating to people. But though I'm honest, in other words, many quote self-help books are read my book and I guarantee you a Ferrari and your wife having 20,000 orgasms every time you look at her. Those are false promissory stuff. Well, I'm a lot more honest and humble in what I'm saying, which is if you read my book, I could simply offer you some statistical likelihood that you're more likely to be happy. 0 (38m 31s): So to the point about variety, there is no rule that says across every possible domain and every setting more variety is better. To, to our earlier point about sexual variety seeking, if you're in a committed monogamous union, not withstanding your desire to engage in multiple matings, you may want to, you know, reel that in. But for example, intellectual variety seeking, since that's probably the thing that's closest to my professional heart, I argue that it's a very, very poor way to live life by always being a stay in your lane person. So let's take an academia and academia, the reward systems are set up for you to be a hyper specialist because you know, there are only seven other people that know about anything that you're talking about. 0 (39m 23s): And so by be becoming a greater hyper specialist, that's where you can make a contribution. And of course there's some value to that if you're going to contribute to a particular scientific literature, you have to be an expert in it. But the biggest breakthroughs in science come usually at the intersections of disciplines. So the mapping of the human genome require people in many distinct disciplines to put their collective IQ together to be able to crack some of the, in this case, the code of our existence, right? And so I argue that life is too short to only navigate through the same intellectual journey every day. And yet most of my academic colleagues are completely stay in your lane professors and now they're staying your lane professors. 0 (40m 10s): In many ways, they only publish on a single topic. So I am, you know, a emotions researcher, so I only do that. I only publish in these four psychology journals. I only write peer review journals because that's what's rewarded in academia. Now look at my career, it's been the exact opposite. I have published countless academic papers and top journals, but I also wrote books when it was frowned upon to wr to write books, you should only publish peer reviewed papers. I also, I wrote academic books and trade books, meaning for the general public, well that was viewed as a, as selling out. 0 (40m 52s): I started a show and a podcast when very few people in general had shows, let alone professors that was viewed as not serious, right? I go on Joe Rogan from a very long time ago. As I discussed in my previous book, when I was invited to Stanford in 2017, my host looked at my connection with Joe Rogan, with great derision. You know, we don't do that at Stanford, right? So to me, I have been enriched in, in incalculable number of ways by having pursued variety seeking within my profession, within my intellectual pursuits. And it's a real shame to always go to the same, you know, one trick pony life is too short for that. 2 (41m 37s): That's so interesting now because I feel, I don't know, maybe it's different, you can tell me from your experience, but do you feel like it's more widely accepted now to be able to be a whole person and express yourself fully? Like be an author, go on podcasts 0 (41m 50s): As an academic, you're saying? Yes. 2 (41m 52s): Yeah. 0 (41m 54s): So you know, as you probably know when you talk about diffusion of innovations, there are the, the innovators, then the early adopters, then the late adopters, then the laggard, right? Who, who's the last person to get a a cell, an iPhone? Who's the last person to have purchased a, you know, a microwave, right? Well, regrettably, academia are very much at the laggard end of things in that it takes them a long time to accept radical new ways of being. Right? And, and, and so to your question, I used to get a lot of the derision from, oh, you know, you're a sellout by speaking to the great unwashed to the rubes, right? 0 (42m 37s): Why aren't you only talking to fancy professors at Harvard? Well now the same schools that used to look at my stuff with derision, when I go visit them and give a talk, they say, tell me how, how did you become so popular? Now they see it as a, as a positive thing. Whereas 10 years ago it was viewed as a sellout. So I think to your point, you know, they are changing, but it's a very, very slow change. And it requires someone who has a, I don't give an f attitude to serve as the agent of innovation, right? I didn't care whether they appreciated it or respected it or not. I just had to be Authentic. And so going on the Joe Rogan show and speaking for three hours and having 20 million people listen to, to my ideas seemed like a really good idea because I have the business of creating knowledge and spreading knowledge. 0 (43m 30s): What better way to spread knowledge than on the number one show in the world? Are you really going to pull the elitist card on me and say, I should only publish in a journal That's if I'm lucky, I don't know if you know this guys, but you know, the average academic paper will be cited zero times zero right? Now if your paper is cited a hundred times in 10 years from now, that's considered a highly successful, impactful academic paper. Well, how long? I'm sure that within the first minute of our chat here, we're gonna get a lot more than a hundred people listening to it. And again, I'm not comparing it, I know it's, there're different things. Publishing in a peer review journal is different than going on a popular podcast show, but there is room for all of these things. 0 (44m 15s): It's not an exclusive either. Or I could be a serious academic and a peer on all sorts of popular shows. 2 (44m 22s): So how do you see education changing, especially with everything becoming more democratized and open source? And I feel like a lot of people are doing either continuing continued education or like a lot of what they're learning or experiencing novelty is through books or podcasts or YouTube shows, things like that sub stack. Like a lot of people aren't spending crazy amounts of money to go to school anymore, right? 0 (44m 46s): Look, I don't think, look, I wrote parasitic mind to describe how universities served as the, you know, spawners of all of these dreadful ideas. So I, I have a lot of critical positions regarding the university ecosystem, but I'm also, I think wise enough to know that, you know, universities are not going to go away. There are many forms of research that require the infrastructure of a university to be able to pull it off. So I don't think universities are going to go away, but to your point, I think now we do have a democratization of knowledge, right? I, I could go on YouTube if I want to find out who is the, the world leader when it comes to Epictetus. 0 (45m 30s): I could sit down and consume 10 hours from their lecture. Well, certainly when I was a student and probably when you were a student, that didn't seem like it would be possible. So I could now put together a, a survey of buffet of leading thinkers in any field that I might be interested in e from the most esoteric to the most popular, and I will have access to that. So I say, look, it's, again, it's not an either or I think universities are here to stay. Although I do think that they truly have been taken over by these dreadful ideas. Hopefully we can fix them. And boy, it's great to live in a world where I can go and listen to great thinkers at, whereas 20 years ago, I would've had to pay a lot of money to be able to go to a lecture. 0 (46m 17s): Both, both are viable ways of learning. 2 (46m 19s): I wanted, 'cause I, I know you are a very busy man, I definitely wanted to get into regret 'cause that was sent over. And then I also think it's such an interesting topic. 'cause it, it leaves people very charged. Well, do you personally have any Regrets? Do you feel like everyone has something that they regret? And then how do you go about moving past it? Right? 0 (46m 39s): Thank you for that. Great question. So I have a whole chapter on regret. And the way that I started the chapter is by citing, you know, as sort of the organizing framework, the work of one of my former psychology professors in my PhD. His name is Thomas Gilovich. And he pioneered the psychology of regret by looking at the two fundamental sources of regret, regret due to action and regret due to inaction. So regret due to action would be, I regret that I cheated on my wife. And that brought, brought the end of our family and our marriage regret due to inaction. I regret that I never pursued my artistic interest and I became a pediatrician. 0 (47m 23s): Well, it turns out, Candace, that over the long run, the greatest looming regret that people have are typically those of inaction, right? And so, you know, I wish I would've done this. So the load the road that was not traveled right? Now, if I'm 85 and I'm looking back and I say I, I wish that I had, you know, become a A N B A player. Well there's nothing that I can do to fix that regret 'cause I'm too old and too short to have ever been an N B A player. But the what I, but as a, as an optimistic bent on this, you know, difficult issue, there are many forms of regret that even late in life we can do something about. 0 (48m 9s): And I give several such examples, which I'll share with you now, and then I'll give, I'll answer your question about my own personal Regrets. So I give two examples in the book of Regrets that were alleviated very, very late in life by, by two separate individuals. So story one, this gentleman who graduated with a PhD at my university where I'm currently a professor, so this was in the mid nineties, whether he finished his PhD, but he was a someone, he was a a an individual who left Germany prior to the start of World War ii as a young person moved to Canada and just life circumstances did not allow him to pursue his education. 0 (48m 55s): He'd always wanted to go to university and so on. Fast forward several decades, he's now retired, he's in his sixties and he says, look, I'm young enough at this point still young enough, I still have vigor. Why don't I now go back and get my undergraduate? He's in his sixties, right? The average student is 20. And so he goes to, to my university, gets an undergraduate degree, finishes, I don't remember the exact age, but in his seventies, she says, well, hey, look, I'm still, I still got vigor. I'm I, I'm still, you know, ready to go pursues a master's. Completes his master's. Now he's in his eighties. 0 (49m 35s): And then I remember, I think it was in 1996 and the university newspaper, the, the, the, the cover on the cover of the newspaper was finally a doctor at 91, I think it was nine two. And at the time, I think he was maybe the oldest recipient of a PhD in Canada or or something to that effect. Within a year, he passes away. Now talk about purity. That person did not pursue his PhD because he was going to go on the academic job market. He did it for the most of pure reasons, which is just the sheer love of knowledge, right? Sophia love of knowledge. So that's story one. 0 (50m 16s): Story two, I actually had this gentleman on my show last year, Manfred Steiner, he got his MD medical degree in 1955. I think he had gone into medicine because his parents had said, no, you have to do something practical, something respectable. He wanted his love was physics, but physics, well that's not, that's not a practical thing. And so he became a physician then he specialized in hematology, picked up along the way in 1967, a PhD in biochemistry, had a full career as a medical specialist. 0 (51m 1s): And then in his eighties decided that he wanted to instantiate the pursuit of his original love in physics. Started getting a degree in physics, finished with a PhD in physics at Brown University at the age of 89. So now imagine these two stories I just told you, Candace. When a student comes into my office during office hours and they're 28 years old, and they tell me, well, I feel though I'm too old professor to do my M B A and then I say, sit down, I'm going to tell you a story. And then you can see the power of that story because I say, so do you still think you're too old? And so I think that for many Regrets unfortunately, time has passed us by the opportunity has passed us, us, but so many Regrets we can still do something about them. 0 (51m 50s): Now, as far as my personal Regrets, I really have a singular one that haunts me. It's the, so I was always talented in two things in life. I was a very good soccer player and I was very studious guy. I, I loved books, I loved learning, which is very strange makes in that usually your brawny or your brainy. I happened to have been fortunate enough to have both. And so I always thought that I would be a professional soccer player and then I would go on and, you know, develop, you know, become an academic. And at the age of 17, I had a very serious injury in Canadian championships that put an end to my soccer career. 0 (52m 31s): But e I think that even if that injury had not happened, I did not grow up in an environment that would've been conducive to, to increasing my chances of becoming a soccer player, number one, because my family did not support that at all. You have a brain, why would you waste time picking a ball? But I grew up in Canada where, you know, in the early eighties it wasn't very, very common for Canadians to be scouted the top European teams, although I was on the path to having that happen. And so whenever a, the World Cup comes around and I see the, the majesty of that tournament, I'm always filled a lot of regret at the fact that I wasn't able to instantiate my soccer career. 0 (53m 12s): So that's probably the only regret I have now, to her credit, Megan Kelly, I shared that regret with her once on her show, and I actually mentioned this in the book and she's like, kind of snap out of it. You shouldn't regret that. You've had a lot more influence in your life by having become an academic. You've, you've made a difference. So enough. Don't regret that. So that's it. 2 (53m 34s): Yeah, it sounds like no matter what you are destined to have an audience. 0 (53m 38s): I guess so, right? Yeah, 2 (53m 40s): Yeah. I 0 (53m 42s): Guess I'm a performer, whether it be on the soccer pitch or as an orator. And, and you're right that maybe that's what has allowed me to, to have an audience, which is that I think I'm approachable. I I delivered a message in a way that hopefully people appreciate. And so, you're right, I am a performer. 2 (54m 0s): Oh my gosh, this was amazing. I could talk to you forever. So I would definitely love to have you back on whenever you start to slow down with this, with this launch. But before we head out, can you tell the listeners where they can pick up your book projects you're working on? I know you have some live appearances that you're doing, like shamelessly plug away. 0 (54m 19s): Oh, you're very kind and and I, I too can talk to you forever. So thank you for giving me an opportunity. The book will be out in exactly one week next Tuesday. You can certainly pre-order it now on Amazon. It'll be available though as of July 25th. I do have several upcoming events in terms of live events. The next sort of super big one is the Commonwealth Club, which is this very she she platform in San Francisco. So assuming that I don't get gang rape by homeless people on crystal meth, it, it'll happen on August 8th. 0 (55m 0s): Sorry, noble homeless people because homeless people are noble by the very nature of them being homeless. And if you think otherwise, then you are marginalizing homelessness. So that will be August 8th in San Francisco, also appearing at another venue in early September in New Jersey. A whole bunch of other smaller things. But in terms of shows, the whole slew, starting with Candace, Megan Kelly's upcoming, Greg Gutfeld, Joe Rogan is next the day of the launch, I'll be on Joe Rogan. So many exciting things. I'm all over social media. You can catch me there. I've got a website, gaza.com. 0 (55m 41s): So connect with me in any way that you can. And thank you so much for the opportunity. 2 (55m 45s): Oh my gosh, of course. And my father-in-law's gonna be so excited to see you on Gutfeld. That's his favorite show of all times. So yeah, I'll tell him. I'll tell him to keep an eye out for you again. You great. Thanks. Thank you so much. 0 (55m 57s): Thank you. Cheers. 2 (55m 58s): And that's it for this week's episode of Chatting with Candace. Before we go, if you wanna support our guest or the show, we have everything linked below where you can buy the book or you can Support the show. If you have not left a five star review in or it has be wild, please do so. That helps us with the all algorithm. We wanna stay in the charts. People, it's been amazing there. I don't wanna go back, I wanna stay here at, at the top or the middle or whenever I am in the the top 100. So please do that. I couldn't do it without you. And if you like, if you know anyone that would like this episode, you enjoyed the content, please share it. That is the best way to grow a podcast is word of mouth. And I, again, thank you from the bottom of my heart and I'll see you next week. 2 (56m 39s): Bye everybody.