The #1 Habit BILLIONAIRES Run Daily To 100x PRODUCTIVITY For Success! | Robin Sharma
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In this episode of Impact Theory, host Tom Bilyeu interviews international best-selling author and leadership expert Robin Sharma to explore how billionaires cultivate extraordinary productivity and success. The conversation centers on a critical shift from time management to energy management as the primary driver for high achievers like Picasso, Basquiat, and Usain Bolt. Sharma introduces his "20/20/20 formula," a morning routine designed to activate a brain's pharmacy of mastery before distractions arise. This method consists of three distinct pockets: moving from 5:00 AM to 5:20 AM through sweaty exercise to release dopamine, serotonin, and BDNF while reducing cortisol; reflecting from 5:20 AM to 5:40 AM by journaling, meditating, or visualizing a blueprint for the day; and growing from 5:40 AM to 6:00 AM with deep inner work. Sharma argues that these early morning hours offer the luxury of tranquility necessary to build intimacy with one's mission before engaging with the world's noise. Sharma delves into his concept of "four interior empires"—mindset, heartset, healthset, and soulset—which he believes are essential for legendary longevity and impact. He explains that while mindset addresses psychology (25% of personal mastery), true greatness requires purifying one's heart to release past trauma and sadness, optimizing physical health through biohacking like fasting and sleep recovery, and cultivating a "soul set" focused on character, nobility, and authenticity rather than religion. A key component of this framework is the willingness to be brave by embracing suffering as the price of greatness; Sharma cites Nelson Mandela's experience in Robben Island prison as an example where enduring humiliation allowed him to transcend his circumstances upon release. He encourages listeners to face their fears directly, noting that discomfort is simply growth wearing a wolf's clothing, and advises against repressing pain or seeking constant pleasure, which often leads to distraction and the death of creative production. The discussion also addresses how leaders can maintain focus in an era dominated by algorithms designed for addiction to distraction. Sharma advocates creating a "tight bubble of total focus," inspired by Thomas Edison's Menlo Park laboratory, where individuals disconnect from devices like smartphones to enter flow states characterized by transient hypofrontality—a temporary shutdown of the neocortex that allows access to deep insights and creativity. Furthermore, he redefines patience not as passivity but as being "ridiculously impatient" regarding one's mighty mission while remaining patient with human beings who are learning or struggling. This distinction ensures that leaders drive execution without compromising their humanity, emphasizing that great leadership is less about talk and more about doing, requiring a monomaniacal focus on the few priorities that truly matter rather than being busy for the sake of busyness. Ultimately, Sharma identifies three core traits for effective leaders: knowing oneself through self-identity and values, executing with ferocious action to keep promises made to oneself, and having the courage to be "weird" or a misfit who refuses to follow societal norms just to gain approval. His deeply cherished personal values include service above all else, family, an appreciation for beauty (aesthete), vitality through biohacking aimed at living until 177 years old, and curating a lifestyle filled only with people and pursuits that bring joy. The interview concludes with Sharma's mission to remind ordinary people of their potential by thinking differently, feeling differently, and doing different things, proving that legendary status is accessible to anyone willing to go all in on personal development and serve humanity without judgment or limitation based on others' fears.
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I think what's happened on the planet
right now is there's been a great
seduction and a great brainwashing. When
we are kids, we want we want to be
astronauts. We want to be billionaires.
We want to be history makers.
We want to do all our dreams.
And then and and we stand in awe and
wonder and we're full of curiosity and
we're loving. And we're passionate and
we're strong. We're not afraid to be
ourselves.
But as we leave the perfection of
childhood, the hypnosis and the
brainwashing begins. Our
well-intentioned parents say, "Oh, you
want to be an astronaut? You want to
start a business when you grow up? You
want to paint like
Jean-Michel Basquiat?
Be reasonable."
And George Bernard Shaw said it better
than I ever could. He said, "The
reasonable man adapts himself to the
world.
The unreasonable one persists in
adapting the world to himself.
Therefore, all progress depends on the
unreasonable man."
Welcome to Impact Theory. Our goal with
this show and company is to introduce
you to the people and ideas that will
help you actually execute on your
dreams. All right, today's guest is an
international best-selling author whose
books have sold over 15 million copies
across 62 countries in 75 languages.
He's penned over 20 books, several of
which have set sales records across the
globe. His book, The Leader With No
Title, was a number one best-seller on
Amazon and his mega-hit, The Monk Who
Sold His Ferrari, smashed it in the US,
was a blockbuster in too many countries
to count, has been in the best-seller
list in India for more than 2 years, and
is the fifth best-selling book of all
time in Israel. His success is not due
to fancy marketing, but rather an
obsessive focus on ensuring that what he
teaches delivers an insane amount of
usable information. And as such, he is
widely considered one of the world's top
leadership experts, and his staggering
roster of clients include some of the
biggest names on the planet, including
Microsoft, FedEx, Nike, GE, NASA, and
IBM. He is also one of the most
sought-after speakers in the world, and
he's appeared on over 1,000 TV and radio
shows. Additionally, his social media
posts reach a staggering plus people a
year. And he was ranked as one of the
top five leadership
experts in the world in a massive
independent study of more than 22,000
business professionals. So please, help
me in welcoming the founder of the Robin
Sharma Foundation for Children, the
best-selling author of The 5 AM Club,
Robin Sharma.
Welcome to the show, man.
Ah, what a great introduction. Thank you
so much.
easy with what you're after and what
you've accomplished in the time that
you've been doing this, which is already
pretty extraordinary. And I, having seen
you in action now, can say that you'll
be doing this for a very long time. It's
it's really pretty extraordinary.
And one thing that I want to talk about
is that level of energy and enthusiasm,
and you talk about that being something
that's common among high achievers. How
do we cultivate that?
Well, um first of all, congratulations
on all your success with the show and
all the people that you're influencing.
So, one of the lines from right out of
The 5 AM Club is
one of the DNAs of legendary is
longevity. So, if you look at the
Picassos, the Jean-Michel Basquiats, you
look at the great sports champions, you
look at the great history makers.
They were much better at energy
management than time management.
And so, we're in a war against
distraction right now, and what we
really have to do is optimize our
energy. How do I do it? Well, I mean, I
get to the morning routine, which which
the whole book is based on, but it's
really quite powerful because if you
start your day with sweaty exercise,
you're actually going to activate a
pharmacy of mastery that exists in every
human brain. I know you love the
neuroscience. You're going to release
BDNF, which is brain-derived
neurotrophic factor. That's going to
actually accelerate your processing.
It's actually going to repair brain
cells that have been damaged by stress.
You're going to release the
neurotransmitter dopamine, which is the
the fire neurotransmitter, which we all
need as entrepreneurs and business
builders and and servants of humanity.
Um
cortisol, the fear hormone, is highest
in the morning, so exercising first
thing in the morning is going to reduce
that. I'm getting into my 20/20/20
formula, but I mention it because it is
a way to maximize your energy.
So, talk to us about the 20/20/20. I
mean, you sort of um started it there
with the the sweaty exercise, but what's
the rest of that formula, which is
pretty powerful?
Sure. So, the new book is all about
rising at 5:00 a.m., and that's because
if you look at the great creatives and
the great saints and the great
humanitarians and the great titans of
industry, many of them got up at 5:00
a.m. Even right now, you've got Tim
Cook, and you've got Howard Schultz, and
it goes on and on.
Before the sun rises is the time of
least distraction. Before the sun rises
where you can build intimacy and fluency
with what you want to stand for in your
day. Before the sun rises, the luxury
and tranquility of the early morning
hours,
you can do that deep inner work that
will allow you to go out in the world
and and play at your best. So, what the
20/20/20 formula is is simply this.
There's
three pockets. The first pocket is move,
5:00 to 5:20.
And you get into the sweaty exercise
because like I mentioned, it releases
neurotransmitters,
it reduces the cortisol, increases your
metabolic rate, which gives you more
energy. So now, and sort serotonin as
well, which gives you joy.
So now it's 5:20. Fundamentally, you
feel different. You have energy. Your
state is strong. You've got a fire in
your belly, and you've accelerated your
focus.
5:20 to 5:40 is the second pocket of the
20/20/20 formula, which is reflect. We
live in a world where a lot of people
are busy being busy, but what's the
point of being busy around climbing the
wrong Mount Everest? And so clarity is
one of the DNAs of mastery. You know
this. If you talk to the titans of
industry, and you talk to the people
really getting traction around their
ambition,
these are people who have a monomaniacal
focus on the few things that matter.
They have an obsession bordering on a
possession around the few priorities
they want to build their life around.
And so 5:20 to to 5:40, the second
pocket, you're writing in a journal.
You meditate.
You visualize.
You do what I call in the book A
Blueprint for a Beautiful Day.
Um or you just sit in solitude, and you
think, and you ponder, and you reflect.
And then the final pocket is 5:40 to
6:00, and this is the victory hour.
The final pocket is grow. But if you
look at the greatest billionaires, I've
coached many billionaires over the past
20 years. If you look at the greatest
producers on the planet, these people
have one thing in common. They are
ridiculously curious.
And no matter how much money they make,
and no matter how much impact they have,
they maintain a white belt mentality.
One of the keys to epic performance is a
relentless commitment to daily growth.
So, that's the 20/20/20 formula that the
5 a.m. method is built around. And
the premise is basically this, as you
begin your day, so you handcraft the
rest of your day.
And if you have consistently great days,
you're going to have consistently great
weeks, quarters, year, and a lifetime.
So, your days are life in miniature, and
you got to get those mornings calibrated
if you really want to win.
When you were talking about the
the obsession that borders on
possession, which I like a lot and I
think it's the thing that's missing from
a lot of people's lives. In fact, I'll
say that I don't think people know how
to want, and I don't think they know how
to turn a want into a crushing need. And
so, there's people have this vague sense
that they want something, but they don't
know how to to really cultivate that.
How do you help people with that? How do
you help them light themselves on fire
and really commit to something?
Tom, I actually believe we are built to
want.
The very nature of being a human being
is we are built to progress. We know
that the human brain craves novelty.
And we are most alive, we have the most
energy, we are most intimate with our
best selves when we're progressing
towards our mighty mission. So, I think
we all want. I think what's happened on
the planet right now is there's been a
great seduction and a great
brainwashing. When we are kids, we want.
We want to be astronauts. We want to be
billionaires. We want to be history
makers.
We want to do all our dreams.
And then and and we stand in awe and
wonder, and we're full of curiosity, and
we're loving.
And we're passionate, we're strong,
we're not afraid to be ourselves.
But as we leave the perfection of
childhood, the hypnosis and the
brainwashing begins. Our
well-intentioned parents say, "Oh, you
want to be an astronaut? You want to
start a business that you when you grow
up? You want to paint like
Jean-Michel Basquiat?
Be reasonable.
And George Bernard Shaw said it better
than I ever could. He said, "The
reasonable man adapts himself to the
world.
The unreasonable one persists in
adapting the world to himself.
Therefore, all progress depends on the
unreasonable man."
So, that's our nature, but our parents
give us limitation based on their
limited psychology and their emotional
patterns that they learned from their
parents. Then we go to school and we're
taught to live in a box, think in a box,
dress like everyone else. Don't sing too
loudly. Don't dream too big. Don't be
too passionate. And then our peers
do the same thing to us. And then
society says, "Oh, genius is the realm
of genetics, not everyday people." which
has been dismissed by some very good
science. You know, I mean, the 10,000
hour rule that we all know from Florida
State University Professor Anders
Ericsson, it just confirms so much. So,
I do think we all want I think what's
happened is we've
as we've left who we truly are, we've
contracted. And now it's all about
staying safe in the world versus going
out there and letting our brilliant our
primal genius shine. And a lot of people
just have stuffed that pain of
disappointment and their doubt really
deep inside. And they just um
are addicted to distraction and escapes
because they don't want to deal with
their potential that they've denied.
Take us back. So, you um start out as an
attorney. You're a litigator.
And you write your first book. You
self-publish it. Print it at Kinko's,
which I thought was pretty interesting.
Um
How do you then take that leap? Like
obviously, you were beginning to
cultivate that um the the traits of the
unreasonable man or maybe it was a
process of unlearning. Um but how did
you do that? How did you buck all of
that and do something new?
Uh
self-growth.
You know, we live in a world that
suggests the doorway to success is
swings outward.
If you build the business, if you get
the jet, if you get the money, if you
get the cars, if you get the beautiful
spouse, then you're going to be happy.
What I believe and there's a model in
the 5 a.m. club that I think is a very
disruptive model, but it it's a
transformational model. And it's called
the four interior empires. And it's not
just mindset, it's mindset, heartset,
healthset, and soulset. And we can talk
about it if you like. But I worked on
those four interior empires when I was a
very unhappy litigation lawyer. Like,
I'd made money. I was successful. I had
two law degrees. And yet I'd wake up
every morning, Tom, and I'd go into the
bathroom mirror and I'd look at myself
and I was a completely empty person.
And nothing
is more expensive than losing your joy
and your peace of mind.
And so what I did was I started working
on myself. You know, I worked on my
mindset and I read all the books and I
went to the courses, but that's only
your psychology and I think that's one
of the missing links in our field, which
is everyone's talking about mindset, but
mindset is just your belief system. It's
just your psychology. It's very
important, but that's 25% of the
personal mastery equation.
I believe the second piece is your
heartset. I worked on that. Purifying
your heart. That's your emotionality,
not just your psychology. You're never
going to make history, dominate your
domain, and handcraft a world-class life
if you've got a great psychology, but
you're carrying the pain and sadness,
disappointment, and trauma of the past.
So I worked on my heartset, but that's
only the second interior empire. The
third interior empire, your healthset.
Don't die. If you want to change the
world, like dead people don't change the
world.
So, health set.
Biohacking. There's a whole chapter on
recovery and the essentialness of sleep.
So, really getting your health set
right, but
there's a fourth interior empire that I
worked on
that allowed me to go out in the world
and and pursue my my magic.
And it's a little dangerous for me to
share because I know how many business
people,
you know, follow you and how many
entrepreneurs, but I'm going to share
because
it's my truth. So, it's not just mindset
and it's not just heart set and it's not
just health set set, it's soul set.
And soul set has nothing to do with
religion. Soul set is about working on
your character.
So, you re-access your nobility and your
bravery and your authenticity
and your decency.
And you find a cause that's larger than
your life.
So, when you go out in the world every
single morning,
people might ridicule you because every
genius is ridiculed before they're
revered. People might throw stones at
you, but you use them to build monuments
of mastery. People might not mis-
understand you because any disruptor is
going to be misunderstood. And even you
if you're an army of one, a Galileo or a
Steve Jobs or a how Phil Knight,
you continue at all costs. So, those
four interior empires that I go into
detail in in the book give you a fiery
inner core of warriorship and leadership
that allow you to go out in the world
and do amazing things, but it all starts
with who you are because you'll never
rise any higher than what's going on
within you. I I we really have to talk
about the the soul set and the heart
set. I think those are going to be the
ones that are least familiar to people.
So, um in the soul set, let's just dive
into the the most maybe controversial
one, but I I actually think people are
going to resonate with this.
Um
the thing that you talked about in the
book that that really hit me is this
notion of being braver, of finding ways
to get braver. And I don't know, it was
one of those where you're kind of like
trying to guess what the person is going
to say, and I was so struck by that one.
Um how do we practice getting braver?
What does it mean to be braver? And then
how does that end up being useful for
us? What What terrifies you most, go
directly there.
Because discomfort is simply
growth in wolf's clothing.
Um Well, yeah, I mean, in the last
chapter is uh I don't want to give it
too much away, but it's it's um an
experience I lived. You know, it's a
it's Nelson Mandela's prison cell. Mhm.
Have you been to Robben Island?
I haven't, but I am beyond obsessed with
Nelson Mandela, so I know the story very
well.
You know, I I I'd encourage you to go.
Because standing in that in that cell,
feeling the sensations
will transform you at a soul level as
well as heart-set level. So, how do we
become more brave? Well,
I went over to um Nelson Mandela's
prison cell, and I stood there, and I
was shocked. He didn't even have a bed.
He was in there for 18 years.
Then I went over to the limestone
quarry,
and I saw where Nelson Mandela spent 10
years chipping away at stone to break
his spirit because they threw the stones
away.
And then I saw the showers where this
elderly statesman would shower while the
young guards would laugh at him.
And then in the book I talk about a true
fact where
he was asked on Robben Island to dig a
grave, and he he would he
got in the grave
thinking he was going to die, and the
prison guards urinated on him.
And my point is simply this, when Nelson
Mandela was released from prison after
27 years of total incarceration,
the he invited the prosecutor who was
seeking the death penalty to dinner.
And he invited the prison guard who kept
him in prison for 18 years on Robben
Island
to his inauguration as president of
South Africa.
And he was asked,
"Why would you do that?" And he said,
"Because
if I didn't, I'd still be in prison."
And my point is to lead and to become a
great hero
or an everyday hero.
The doorway is through embracing our
suffering and doing difficult things. I
think pleasure has been promoted too
much in our society. Like no great
Titan of industry, no legendary cellist,
no
great athlete, you know, the great ones
all understand that suffering is the
price
of greatness. So, how do we become
braver? You You do the difficult things
that you don't feel like doing, but you
know have the payoff.
Yeah, the hard set, that's uh that's
really interesting. And what I liked
about it was the way that you talk
about, you know, we all have this
accumulation of trauma, often times from
when we're younger. How do you help
people process through that? Like how
You've worked with some really high
performers. How have you helped them tap
into that? And then, more importantly,
how do you help them process through
that? Is it about reframing the event?
What does that look like?
Mhm.
Journaling is profound.
I have journaled. To say that I do
journal would be a lie.
You're going to love journaling. Like I
I do it almost every day before I I had
um I had a show this morning. And then I
had to set my intentions for you and all
your global followers or or viewers.
And so, I went back to my hotel room. I
took a cold shower.
You know, I've been fasting a lot. So,
we can get into fasting cuz I fasted as
I wrote the
5 a.m. club and that helped massively.
And then I pulled out my journal and I
sat on my terrace
and I literally started writing about my
intentions for Impact Theory.
And so, how do you how do you move
through pain? You journal.
Um if you're going through heartbreak, I
mean we've all experienced heartbreak.
What we do is often we repress it
because we're not given the tools to
process through it. You lose a business,
people repress it.
Someone has a divorce or an illness,
oh, mindset, reframe it, psychology.
You're swallowing pain, you're
swallowing sadness, you're swallowing
anger. We're built to feel.
Right? So,
writing in a journal, just getting it
out. There's actually something in the 5
a.m. club called the journaling
deconstruction because it's not just
processing through pain, but to answer
your question, that trauma of heart set,
you write in a journal, you get it out
of your system, guess what? You don't
bring passive-aggressive into the
workplace. You don't bring sadness or
low vibe into the workplace. You you're
you're full of your true self in terms
of your heart set, which is gratitude,
love, appreciation. You know what that
does for a business? You know what that
does for a human life? So, if you're
going through a painful time, write that
out. Um almost every day I write
gratitude, but I love great restaurants.
And so, I'll take the business card and
the next morning I pull out my little
glue stick and I glue the business card
into my journal and I relive the
experience. Oh, I had dinner with
so-and-so. Here's what I learned. I
deconstructed with better awareness.
We'll make better choices.
Better daily choices, better daily
results. Imagine journaling like this
every single day. You're going to have
such a cute awareness about when you're
at your best, what the great ones do,
how to live a life, what you want to
stand for, what your core values are.
You walk out in the world and you're
just radiating possibility in a world
where people are addicted to distraction
and numbed out. Mhm. You've brought up
distraction before and I know you talk a
lot about it in the book.
How do we
in this world where it's algorithms are
literally being constructed to make sure
that they get our attention with as much
frequency as possible, how do you talk
to people about eliminating that? How do
you do it in your own life? How do you
create that space? How much time do you
allocate to that that real isolation?
Mhm.
Yeah, the brain tattoo in the book is an
addiction to distraction is the death of
your creative production. Mhm.
Your people's phones are costing them
their fortune.
So, how do I do it? One of the rituals
in the book is the tight bubble of total
focus. It's It's based on Edison's Menlo
Park.
Um there's a great documentary on what
he did, but essentially him and his band
of co-geniuses
would leave the world, go up to this
hill to Menlo Park where they could get
into flow state. To give credit where
it's due, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi of
University of Chicago came up with that
term, flow, when we're at our absolute
best doing magical things in our
performance.
But that only comes when we get away
from the world. So, you can play with
your phone
or you can be monomaniacally focused on
being a history maker and legendary. You
don't get to do both. And so,
building periods of time in that tight
bubble of total focus where you leave
your phone in another room,
where you train your team or if you
don't have a team, you just don't have
any distractions, and you ask yourself,
what is the one thing I could do that
would allow me
to go out in the world and
and bring my magic to the world. The
human brain
has a phenomenon called transient
hypofrontality. The neocortex, as you
know, it's the the seat of thinking.
It's our monkey mind. It's all the
chattering. It's the stuff that says,
"Tom, you can't do it. Robin, you can't
do it. What would they think? What if I
fail? What if I get laughed at?" That's
all the neocortex. It's the crown jewel
of brain development. Not our primitive
brain, crown jewel.
But there's no genius in there. And
here's what I mean.
When we get away from distraction
and we find our Menlo Park or we go work
in a quiet place
and we get lost
the neocortex actually shuts down.
That's why it's called transient
hypofrontality. For a short period of
time, our thinking shuts down. The whole
model is in the book.
And we actually go from brain waves at
beta
down to alpha
down to theta and maybe even delta.
And we stop thinking and we go into
flow.
In other words, the advanced minds of
the world, the great geniuses, Galileo,
Da Vinci
Steve Jobs
they weren't in the neocortex. They got
away from the world for bursts of time
which allowed them to access the human
capability we all have to get in the
flow state and access insights that they
went out in the world and then executed
on with a world-class team which totally
changed the game.
It's interesting. Talk to me about
impatience. So, this is something that I
bump against a lot of people on. I I'm
not a patient person. I don't invest in
patience. I don't think it's useful.
Doesn't mean that I don't play the long
game. It doesn't mean that I um do
things that are dishonest just to get
ahead or because it would be faster. I
wouldn't. But I definitely cultivate
impatience. What are your thoughts
around patience and what do you mean by
being impatient?
I'm ridiculously impatient around my
mighty mission.
I'm ridiculously impatient, Tom, about
serving people and bringing value to
people. I am very patient
with my children.
I'm very patient with my team.
You got to love the people around you.
I'm very patient with the barista in a
coffee shop who maybe is overwhelmed or
it's her first or his first day on the
job. I'm very patient with the taxi
driver who maybe gets lost, but you
know, that's how they're making their
livelihood. So, with human beings, I've
worked very hard, and I'm a work in
progress, but I'm very patient with
human beings.
Going back to leadership for a second,
what would you say are the three If
somebody wants to be a truly effective
leader, what are three traits that they
should cultivate in themselves?
Know yourself. I mean, Jack Welch of
General Electric said it really well.
Don't um
don't lose yourself on the way to the
top. Warren Buffett said, um there'll
never be a better you than you.
So, great leaders, again, it's those
four interior empires, working on
yourself, knowing what what you want to
stand for, knowing what you want said
about you on the last hour of your last
day, knowing your core values, your top
five core values, knowing those, knowing
your weaknesses, knowing your strengths.
I mean, a lot of leadership talk isn't
about that, but starting with your
character and your self-identity,
that is really important for a leader.
I'd say the second thing for a leader
would be
well,
getting big things done. You know, you
mentioned it in the introduction. It's
like
ferocious, like a warrior when it comes
to execution. Like, great leadership is
less talk and more do.
You know, I mean I It doesn't really
matter what the chatter. I mean, it's
all about execution, implementation, and
and application. So, they get things
done. And we live in a world where
you know, we pull out the phone. People,
"Oh, I'm going to get this done, and I'm
going to get that done." We say to
people, "Oh, I'll send you a book." It
doesn't get done. Even worse,
it's we lose self-respect from the
promises we make to ourselves that we
break. That's where it all starts.
Like it's so You know this. It's so
important. Your your income, your
impact, your relationship with
creativity, productivity, and the world.
It all comes down to your relationship
with yourself.
So, that would be the second thing about
leadership. It's like execution, and
don't break promises.
And the third thing I'd say, um you
know, be crazy. The great leaders are
insane. And I say that they're insane to
the majority. The great ones are all
misfits, and they're all
weird.
I mean,
the very nature of being a disruptor and
a leader means you're not a follower.
And if you're not a follower, then
you're not buying the Kool-Aid that
society sells you.
If you're not a follower, you're not
like this all the time looking for
likes.
If if if you're not a follower, you
dress the way you want to dress. If
people criticize you, yeah, they
criticize all the great ones.
Critics are nothing more than dreamers
who got scared and never got off their
chairs and got back in the game. So,
you've got to be willing to be to 5:00
a.m.
Weird. Who does that? Why not sleep?
Leaders have to be willing not to be
followers.
Well said.
What drives you so hard to keep doing
this after you've had the kind of
success you've had to keep coming back
to this and keep pushing and the touring
and just like going after it.
Tom, because we live on a
tiny planet in a galaxy with trillions
of other planets.
So, on our little planet, we're actually
it's a core philosophy of mine. We're
we're brothers and sisters on a little
planet.
That person
that homeless person was someone's
dreams at a time.
The
person in the restaurant or the hotel
who it's very easy if we're numbed out
and not awake.
I mean, that's someone's father or
mother.
And when I look at most people on the
planet, it's no judgement. I just I see
people who are they're in scarcity
versus generosity. I see so many people
saying, "You know, when I was a kid, I
had all this creativity. I don't know
where it happened." You see you see it
every day. You know, you have all these
people, "I want to build a business. Oh,
I I Oh, I guess I can't It's psychology
of can't versus mentality of
possibility. I see people in pain. I see
people playing victim. I mean, wouldn't
you agree most people on the planet at
some form or form or another, whether
it's with their creativity or their
stuck in victimhood?
And
I know I know mindsets. I know rituals
and routines. I have systems. And it's
not just go out there and live your
dream and be happy happy happy. I mean,
the book shares
most of my a lot of my methodology, the
twin cycles of elite performance, the
90-90- one rule, the second wind
workout, the two massage protocol, the
20-20- Like these have worked for my
clients for years.
So, I have the information to serve.
You have the information to serve.
How can we see people
stuck
when they have such glory and nobility
and decency inside of them? How can we
allow that to happen? We have a
responsibility. We all have a
responsibility. You said that
everybody should have core values. What
is What are some of your most deeply
cherished core values?
Service above self.
In other words, contribution, impact,
service.
Number two,
family.
I mean,
if I could be a tenth of the human being
my two children are, I'd be a
I'd be a I'd be a amazing.
Family, you know.
I I've worked very hard, but I've
really
worked hard on my family, too. Even
trying to be a great son, a great
brother, all those things. Because we
all know to get to the last day of your
last of your life and say, "I made a lot
of money and I got a lot of likes and I
sold a lot of books and I impacted a lot
of people
and your own family never got to know
you, that's heartbreak.
Third value. I'm I'm an aesthete, the
French word, lover of beauty.
You know, that's why, you know, that's
why I love Los Angeles. Like we were
coming over here and it's like
there's flowers, you know, it's whatever
time of the year is the flowers
everywhere, you know.
Um so I love beauty and art and food and
people and sunsets and that's why I love
Rome so much. Now, that fourth value
would be um vitality.
You know, I I really do believe that
the the one of the keys to legendary is
longevity. I mean, I want to live till
177. I want to you know, I don't
Right? I mean, I'm biohacking and I'm
resting and I'm doing the two massage
protocol and everything possible so I
can be rocking my craft and serving as
many people as possible when I'm into,
you know, I I one of the things I'd say
is you never want to let an old person
anywhere near the inside of your body,
right? Because and we could get into
epigenetics and the fact that we have a
chronological age and a biological age,
but vitality is important. And then I
think the final core value is lifestyle.
You know, we can serve the world and
that's very important, I know to both of
us.
But I want it's life is ultimately a
really short ride.
And so I want to really be around only
people. I mean, I am focused. I only
want people in my orbit that bring me
joy or feel my joy.
I only want to do the pursuits in my
business and career and life that bring
me joy.
And I only go to places where I feel
joy.
That all makes a lot of sense. So,
you've brought up a couple of times now
the biohacking part. So, going into the
health set, let's talk about that. What
are you doing?
Um you've got fasting, you've got the
obviously the exercise, you've got
sounds like the massage, two massage
protocol. Um
walk us through what you do to care for
yourself to make sure that you hit that
177 number, which I like. It's It's very
far and it's very specific, so.
Um so, yeah, fasting. A lot of writing
the book I was in fasted state. And for
me it the way it looks like
intermittent fasting? Yes.
Uh but I want to get to 36 hours and
then I want to go beyond that. Because a
lot of the great creatives and mystics
So, for me it's um
my last meal might be at 9:00, but I
won't eat until 4:00, let's say, the
next day. When I was writing, a lot of
the book was written in Rome, I would
get up and have two cups of coffee
because coffee is a health drink.
Awesome antioxidant, magnificent
cognitive enhancer. Mhm. And plus I'm in
Italy, you know, drink coffee. Um and
then I just, you know, I'm at a hotel
that allowed me to have a tight bubble
of total focus, so zero distraction. And
then I go into that flow state, and I
would just work on the manuscript in
fasted state, and I saved a lot on
grocery and food bills. Just imagine it.
You know how much time How much time we
spend even eating? Yep. And I'd actually
So, and then it'll be like 3:00 or 4:00.
I'd be in flow. I didn't even know where
the time went. And then I'd ask, you
know, and call the hotel front desk,
"Can you clean my room?" I'd go out to
the streets, and I'd reground and have
something to eat. So,
basically, it would be at least 18 hours
without food, and then I'd have the the
window of eating
where I, you know, eat healthily. I'm on
a Mediterranean ketogenic diet, and
that's how I do the fasting and
nutrition.
I just I know by my energy level and by
my mental focus when I'm in ketosis.
Um rest
There Like I said, there's a whole
chapter in the book on the essentialness
of sleep.
And And
the the key piece is this.
A lot of business builders, a lot of
creative performers, a lot of great
a lot of athletes think that it's work
harder to achieve more. Well, that's
been debunked by science.
We all know that we are at our best
creatively, productively, and in terms
of our performance when we experience
intense bursts of elite performance.
And then we make the time to recover. I
had a person at one of my events
recently. He worked with Usain Bolt, and
he said, "Usain Bolt told him, 'I sleep
50%
of the time
Wow. to allow the training to take
effect.'"
So,
I I run these cycles of intense
creativity and productivity, and I've
learned to really rest. I take naps.
I've done it since I was 18.
And recovery is very important in terms
of meditation, visualization, or
whatever. All right, I could keep going
with you, but we have to get you out of
here. So, before I ask my last question
though, tell these guys where they can
find you online. Sure. Um well, anyone
who's interested in the 5:00 a.m. Club
book, it's on in the bookstores, Amazon,
uh it's on Audible. Anyone who also uh
can find it, it's at the 5amclub.com.
And I think it's important to say a lot
of books um
they don't have a support system.
And I really wanted to serve people and
really help. So, at the end of the book,
there's actually a 66-day because that's
the amount of time according to
University College of London to install
a new habit. There's a 66-day online
digital course for free where I mentor
people via videos to lock in the 5:00
a.m. Club habit. It's also important
every very important to me because every
uh the royalties from the book um a
percentage goes to helping me fight
leprosy. Wow.
Um yeah, a lot of people don't know
about leprosy and I'm I'm
ferociously committed to helping reduce
it um
as well. And then I'm on Instagram at
robinsharma.com,
YouTube uh
robinsharma.com, yeah. So. Perfect. All
right, my last question. What's the
impact that you want to have on the
world?
I want to remind people of who they
truly are. And when they see Nelson
Mandela or Oprah Winfrey,
they say, "Hmm, they did it."
But legendary is simply a testimony to
ordinary people
who thought differently, felt
differently, and did different things.
And thereby
became who they were. And if they can do
it,
I can do it if I go all in. I want to
get that that message out even more. I
love that.
Guys, if you want to go all in, let me
tell you, dive into this man's world.
Like I said, he's written 20-plus books.
It is absolutely extraordinary the way
that he's able to weave information into
narrative.
He's been at this a very long time
touching high achievers, figuring out
how to make them even better, and he's
able to distill that information,
package it up, and make it usable to
everybody else. I think that he's really
one of the most incredible minds in this
space. You will not regret diving in and
seeing how much of that information you
can extract and put to use in your own
life.
It will change you if you let it. All
right, if you haven't already, be sure
to subscribe, and until next time, my
friends, be legendary. Take care.
Robin, thank you so much, man.
This is what we want in our lives. This
is who we are. And that's not a
judgment, it's just right in terms of
our level of personal development. And
then I my epiphany was if I dedicate
time every day to personal development,
I will gradually become a level three,
and then a level four, and then a level
seven. Eventually, if I become a level
10 person,