Why You Need to Stop Saying What People Want to Hear | Kyle Cease on Impact Theory

I really believe that no person has ever broken your heart, but they broke your expectations. And by breaking your expectations, they get you closer to your heart. And it's also the fact that it's temporary that also adds to it, right? That all of this is temporary and we move as if we have forever and it's crazy. Everybody, 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 actor, comedian, best-selling author, and transformational expert. He started performing stand-up comedy at the age of 12 and was headlining by the time he was 18, making him one of the youngest headlining acts in the country. From there, he poured himself into his craft and continued to excel. He took first place in Comedy Central's Laugh Riots competition, earned a number one ranking on Comedy Central's Stand-Up Showdown, had two number one specials on Comedy Central, and made more than 100 appearances in film and television, including 10 Things I Hate About You, Not Another Teen Movie, Jimmy Kimmel Live, and Chelsea Lately. But then, at the height of his success, he began to realize that he wanted to do something entirely different. And even though it meant facing a tremendous amount of ridicule, he transitioned from being a comic to being someone who uses comedy to help himself and others transform. Since making the change, he's been just as successful and today he can be found leading his transformational event Evolving Out Loud to sold-out crowds and appearing on stage with such luminaries as Tony Robbins, Eckhart Tolle, Jim Carrey, and Deepak Chopra. He's also been a guest speaker at thousands of colleges, summits, and Fortune 500 conferences, including Agape International, the Sun Valley Wellness Festival, and the Longevity Now Conference. So please, help me in welcoming the New York Times, USA Today, and Wall Street Journal best-selling author of I Hope I screw this up, Kyle Cease. WOW. THAT'S ALL RIGHT, BUDDY. WOW. WELCOME TO THE SHOW, MAN. We got your whole like That's crazy. fan base in the house today. Yeah, after that intro, I'm excited to hear what I have to Well, what I love about you is you you don't plan ahead. So, we we ought to be right in the pocket today. Um I feel like if I planned ahead, you wouldn't be hearing me. You'd be hearing something I prepared. Mhm. And if I was doing something that I prepared, it would be because I want to get something from someone. You know, we say, "Am I doing this right? Am I doing this wrong?" That question implies there is a right or wrong way. And how do you measure that? Like did it sell something? Did people like it? Did I get approval from the audience? So, I also feel that in the moment we're always feeling something. Like if you just say what you're feeling, then you actually create a space where the person across from you or the audience goes, "Oh, I know what that feels like and I can connect with you." But in trying to prepare something, often we block what we're feeling and then bring something that we prepared earlier in the day and people miss out on the real you. Mhm. And one thing I was thinking about at one point a while ago and just now when it came up again is that and it was 3 years ago when I first thought of it, but then I thought of it again many times since then and just now it came up. So, one thing I just realized again is that It's a good thing I've seen your comedy. Yeah. It It Well, the this is the thing is we live in a world where we don't say what we're thinking. We say what we think people want to hear. So, if you get into an elevator and there's someone that you're attracted to that gets on the elevator and you're trying to think of the right thing to say, what would happen if you looked at the person and said, "I'm trying to think of something to say to you." Like that's actually true. Right. And how attractive would that be if a person is like, "I'm trying to think of the right thing to say to you." Like there's vulnerability in that. There's possibility. They get co-create with you. But most people don't say that. They instead say what they think the person wants to hear, right? So we instead look at this person and go, "There sure is weather outside." And they're like, "Yes, and there was weather yesterday, too." And now you're two phony people, and this is who you're going to marry. That's the world we live in, right? I'm going to marry this person after starting the entire thing off inauthentically. So for me, not preparing is so much easier and so much more true, and there's so many amazing moments from that. Right? And people go, "I don't know how you do that." And I remind people, "Well, when you go to a restaurant, you don't have a set list. You don't sit there and think, 'First I'll ask him if they have pets and if they like ice cream.' You'll actually just say what you feel. And in that space, you have a 2-hour off-the-cuff conversation. So that's all we're doing." It's really interesting because looking at your career and seeing how successful you've been, and even now like post getting into a much more mindful space, I know that you differentiate between goals and intentions, but you definitely have intentions. So walk us through like what the difference is between a goal and an intention and how you continue to be somebody who strives um with that what you were just talking about, which is not overplanning and falling into falsehood. Right. Well, I believe a goal is something you can actually see the outcome of, right? Like I'm going to make a million dollars. So if you say, "I'm going to go make a million dollars," then you might actually see your bank account change, but that might not necessarily mean that you change, right? So if you have an intention, that's an inner, in-the-moment goal, right? And life can mirror what your intention is. So let's say you're feeling off. If your intention is, "I'm here to grow," then feeling off might be okay, right? So if you say, "My inner intention is to learn. My inner intention is to free myself. My inner intention is to whatever," that's what you are right now. It's a word that you can bring to you. It's something that's different. Many people don't realize they all have intentions, but they haven't created it themselves intentionally. So, they might say you know, I'm worried right now, and their inner intention might be to not have conflict. So, then they're against that worry, and they're actually scared. Right? So, an intention is what I like to bring with me. My intention, like I actually have the word patience on my shirt. I love the word patience. Like if I'm doing, for instance, sometimes I'll do a juice fast, right? And I was 3 days into a juice fast, and I actually stepped on the scale and gained weight. And if my intention was results, I'd be really pissed because I didn't get any. But because my intention is patience, I stay with it and say, "Okay, I'm not supposed to just get results in 3 days. I'm supposed to stay with it." And then bigger results usually show up as a byproduct of you being that intention, being that space. So, to me an intention's way bigger because you don't know what the results are going to be. But you change with an intention. You become a different person. You see the world differently after a while. So, I don't like goals that much because goals are often created from you in that egoic state. Do you get what I mean? Like in the state you're in. Like everything you're thinking right now, the biggest goal you can see for yourself still brings in your past story. So, your past story might think I'm someone, for instance, just to give a measurable thing. Let's say you're someone who makes $20,000 a year, and you want to create a goal for next year. So, the biggest you're going to see is like, "I'll make 30,000 next year." Yeah, but you're just this moment. What you and I and Oprah and Trump and anyone you can think of, we're all the same thing. Infinite possibilities. Just heart, lungs, potential in this moment right now. And if you undo yourself from the old story, Then you can change really fast. When you say that we're just the moment, um are you talking about that we have the opportunity to push that potential in any direction that we want? What does that mean exactly? Okay, so what I believe is all you are is this moment right now. I'm just not sure like how to internalize that. Yeah, so check this out. Everything that you perceive about yourself from your past, it doesn't exist right now. You're just sitting here, right? So if you take a deep breath, you might have these little images of what your past story is, like things that happened to you, things that you feel reactions to, whatever. But if I actually realize that everything that I think I am from past accomplishments or future accomplishments or that I I have as goals or whatever, are not me, that I'm just this space that those ideas show up in, then often they might leave, right? Let's say you have a thought, "No one likes me because no one liked me at that one thing in the past." Okay, who's saying that? It's just a thought, it's not you. It's a thought that comes from evidence of one thing in the past, but that doesn't mean that's you, right? So that thought shows up and you just let it be there. One thing I love to do with people is when they say I'm nervous or I'm scared or anything that feels like a negative thing, I have them say, "And I love that" afterwards. So if I said right now, "I have no idea how this is an interview is going to go, and I love that." All of a sudden I'm free, right? If I think, "I have no idea how this interview is going to go, and that scares me." then I'm going to be entangled, right? And the problem isn't the thought, it's your resistance to the thought. So where are these thoughts coming from? They're just thoughts that we have, these things that we think, and usually we think that those thoughts are bigger than us, and then we resist them. So I don't know if that answers your question, but what I realize is that all those things that we think we are that feel limited, you know, I'm not enough, I'm not worthy, I'm scared, all those things that we think we are are the only thing we have as evidence of that is our past. Right? I'm not enough because that one time. Everything that comes in and hears me say that you're just infinite, that you're amazing, when you hear a voice go, he doesn't know my story though. My story. My past. It's not what you are. Um talk to me about that time you're making the transition out of stand-up comedy. Uh the people that you've been performing with side by side now begin to come at you pretty aggressively. Um their viral videos are going viral about them sort of coming after you. Yes. And it sucked. Yeah. And how did you work your way through that? My friend Diego said this once that became something that I live by is whenever you let go of something scary, you're only scared because your mind can measure what you will lose, but it can't see what you'll gain. So, if you're sad because you're going through a breakup, you're focused on the loss of one person versus the gain of 7.5 billion people if you're bisexual and willing to date everybody. So, so your mind just remembers one person, but it can't see what's on the other side of it. And that's no different to me than getting on an elevator. When you get on an elevator, it's a dark closed room. Just like when you meditate sometimes, your visions of what you were disappear and you feel darkness, but that doesn't mean because these doors are closed that there isn't a whole new world on the other side about to open up. So, when you feel lost, you're really in a problem of you're just addicted to seeing the old story. I want to go back to what you said about the stories and the stories we tell ourselves, which really feels to me very foundational in your entire philosophy. And I've seen you on stage working with people to help them release their stories, which is really, really special and neat to to see you do. And you want to talk about something that would give me heart palpitations. It's uh it's really neat. How do you help people break out of those stories? Like what is the process? Well, this might sound ignorant, but I believe all of our challenges that we have that we get triggered by are an illusion. I don't mean that like so don't pay attention to them because that's ignoring them. They still need to be felt and released. But almost everything that every person says they can get to an energy where they're stuck in something and I can see the lie. I can feel the lie. So, if someone says um whatever, I'm going through a massive stage fright right now. The first thing I have them do often is say and I love that. And right away it loosens up. Right? They they release it. Is that because you're shifting their perspective on it? Yes, not only am I in my opinion shifting their perspective, but I'm taking them to what's true. In other words, most people think the things that are temporary are the permanent things. Right? The temporary passing. I'm going through a breakup. You don't understand that in a month you're going to be okay. You think when you're in a blow, when you're feeling bad, you think that thing you're feeling is how you're going to feel forever, which is what makes it feel worse. You know what I mean? When you're in a low, you're like, "This is my life now. This is it." Or when you're in a high, you also get extra high cuz you think, "This is my life now. I've fallen in love with this person. So, we're together forever and I'm always going to feel like this. They're the one." Then a month later, you're like, "Is this my life forever?" Are you And then and then it goes back and forth and you don't get that all of your emotions are temporary. They're passing things. But there is this thing in this moment right now that I feel is permanent. This thing that you can feel, just this the space. I've had so many things that have shown up and left that I once thought were my reality, that it feels like parts of me continue to die, and I allow them to die, right? So, most of our pain comes from believing, I believe, that we should keep holding on to these things that are really heavy in our lives. Even in physical examples, like just there's a lot of us that have an attic full of things, right? A lot of those things are things that your past thinks you should have, but they're not necessarily what your heart would want right now. Right? Like this is something I inherited, or I should keep this and one day show my kids, right? So, to give you an example for me, I had a top Comedy Central special in 2006. I was cleaning a couple years ago and I found this huge poster from that, and it was something I'm so proud of, and I was like, "Should I keep this?" And I was like, my mind comes up with a justification for why I should keep that. And I believe when your mind comes up with a justification, that means you don't want it. I don't justify with to anybody why I do this for a living. I don't justify who my family is. I don't justify who my best friends are to anybody. But there are some of us that have situations like, "Well, I do not like that person, but they were nice to me that one day." "I don't like Yeah, that that job sucks, but I will get medical in 6 months." Right? You're allowing yourself to lower yourself to your mind understanding why you're ignoring your body. Because the Define for people that the the mind-body distinction, which you talked very eloquently about. So, I believe there's two voices that we all have. There's a first voice that tells you the next step, and it can only tell you the next step, right? So, those are those quick inspired moments that show up that say things like, "What if we left this company?" You can't see what'll happen, right? It's that first voice. You It's before you realize you might go broke. It's that first one. "What if we leave this company?" Or "What if we ask that person out?" Or that inspired moment that goes, "What if I just flew to Italy right now? Or started that book or that band or took piano lessons for a year and just locked them down now, whatever it is. It's an inspired thing. You know what I mean? I believe that feeling is a preview. But it can't tell you why you should do that because you've never done that. So this first voice, that voice that we hear in our body, especially when you're silent or you're in a really good mood, you're laughing and you say something like, we should whatever, say something kind of crazy. That's amazing. The book that I wrote is called I hope I screw this up. How free would you be if you were just like, yeah, we might screw this up, but awesome. I love that, right? What will I also become if I'm willing to make a mess, but also it's my calling. It's something in me that says, I need to do this. So that's the first voice. But we've trained ourselves to ignore this voice and listen to the second voice that I believe is a collection of the average society. You know, it's what we learned. It's the practical voice, the voice that says I need to be responsible and it's the should voice. Whenever you say I should do, where are you getting that from? What society says, but we forget society's kind of crazy. There's a lot of unhappy people there, a lot of addictions, a lot of stuckness, right? A lot of murderers, a lot of like, why are we using them as the the bellwether that we should get our advice from, right? So this first voice goes, I think we should do this and we go right to this voice that says why we shouldn't. Oh, and I went off on a tangent. What I was going to say was with the poster, I thought I had a justification for why I should keep it. I I one day might want to show a kid, if I have a child, like I might want to show them this poster. Which by the way, what day will that be? Like, it's time for me to show you my accomplishment in 2006, honey. There isn't really a excitement for that day. Like we're holding things that we don't realize that day will never actually happen. So I took this poster to the garbage because it wasn't a 10 in my body. It's a story of who I was, not who I am now. And I said, "I'm just going to release this." And it was scary as hell. And I feel I feel the more scary it is, the more change you're going to feel. So, I dropped it in the dumpster, and I turned around, and I had this freedom release. I unhooked myself from thinking I was that comedian. And I realized if I have a child one day, which I do now have, if I have a child one day, they'd much rather have my presence. My presence as many moments as possible, than me bragging about some accomplishment I made 20 years ago. Totally. So, if stories are that bedrock, that foundational, um how do you get people to begin to build a story that's going to be empowering? And I guess I'm giving you that word. I don't know if that's a word you would use, but Sure. um what are the building blocks of a a healthy uh story? So, what I like to do, actually, is help people to get okay with where they are. Like what I really believe is that if you're if you're really only able to look at yourself in this moment, right? If you're really only able to see you, you have to actually take in the idea that you're enough first, because otherwise you're going to always be moving from a place of lack and fixing, right? Tell me what you mean when you say that to really accept that you are enough. Right. As in Okay, so for instance, there's many people that feel guilty about something, right? Okay. If you actually go to your heart, you can understand at a true level why you could have done something like that. Everyone can. But what our pain what what causes our pain is trying to get society to understand why we did something. But the collective society isn't at a consciousness where they've forgiven themselves for anything. So, there's a a of judgment you'll look at in yourself if you look at yourself through society's eyes. One of the most amazing stories that you have and that was your mother passing away just 6 weeks before your daughter was born and it was I think the time that I really clicked into place with your philosophy of understanding one you were really real about what you were going through and then two it was like I really understood um that you have to take a real look at what's going on because I for me certainly when I first started hearing people that talk about you know creating space stepping into space that kind of stuff I didn't know how to to get my hooks in it to really understand it like a visceral level what's happening. Yes. Um but your example there really helped me understand in a concrete way where you're coming from. Walk us through that walk us through the the lesson that you learned I think it's really powerful. So for like starting when I was probably 20 no matter what I did as an achievement in my comedy career my mom wanted to be a grandma like that was one thing that I heard all the time it didn't matter who I was dating it was when am I going to be a grandma like I felt this vibration from her always wanting to have a grandchild. Um my fiance Christie and I found out that we were pregnant the same minute Trump won by the way which was really weird because when people had many different reactions all over the world we were just glowing especially Christie she was just fine. It was weird to hear the news and CNN projects Trump and she's just and I'm just like what is happening in the world right now and like this moment we're pregnant and this is happening like no matter what you feel about Trump it was just such a crazy switch in energy worldwide and in my life personally right? So we tell my mom and she's also having opinions about Trump winning and freaking out and everything like that. And I tell her that, she's like, "Yeah, right." You know, and I'm like, "No, we really are. We're pregnant." So, she gets so excited. And she's just calling me all the time and asking about the baby. And my mom was really one of my best friends. Like, we're very close and I told her everything. She'd be one of the first calls on any accomplishment. So, I was so excited to tell her about the baby. And then while we were in the middle of the pregnancy, my mom got delirium and just started going crazy and living in a hospital for 3 months and just she was gone all of a sudden. And I'd tell her about the baby and she'd half remember it and half forget and not remember that we're pregnant and it was crazy. And one of the things that I say in my talks that I had to live is that I really believe that no person has ever broken your heart, but they broke your expectations. And by breaking your expectations, they get you closer to your heart. So, so many people go, "That person broke my heart." No, they didn't. You had a belief that you were supposed to be with that person forever and really there was kind of an ownership aspect to that. You know, if you really just take in that we only have this moment, you'll really I really sincerely appreciate this moment that I'm on the show with you, that I'm hanging out with you. And it's also the fact that it's temporary that also adds to it, right? That all of this is temporary and we move as if we have forever and it's crazy. And so, we get very spoiled by the relationships and the friendships that we're in and we don't just appreciate them in the moment. So, we create these expectations and in that expectation, you better be like you were before and you can't be you. I have an expectation we're here forever. You can't like someone else. You can't feel anything else. You need to be mine. And we have these ex you know, expectations. And we forget to live. And we forget to enjoy that we get this moment. And no one's ever broken your heart because I've never had it where an expectation wasn't broken then I didn't cry something out and feel closer to myself, right? So 6 weeks before my daughter is born my mom dies. May 31st, she died May 31st, 2017. And I had known enough to just let this hit me. Don't go eat a bunch, don't go get distracted, don't like talk through it in a way that's denying it. Just let it hit me. My best friend just died. My mom. And I sat there and I really cried and I did it on camera. There's a video on YouTube called Mourning My Mom with me and I just I'm talking to the camera the next day about what I'm feeling. And it was very helpful. It was very therapeutic for me to talk about that. And then 6 weeks later we had this perfect baby. My mom was also worried cuz of some false test that there'd be something wrong with the baby. So my mom died worried that the baby might not make it and stuff or that she might not be healthy. And then it turned out we had the greatest baby in the world. This baby is an angel. She's the most amazing thing ever. And I thought about later as I cried things out more and more and felt this massive shift in the last year in my life in both areas. I thought about how you know when you watch a movie you've seen before with somebody you're really in the middle of it like why am I watching this again? Just to show this new date this movie. Why do we do that? Because we like to enjoy something with someone else, right? And I think that I was set up to enjoy this baby through my mom. Meaning like if my mom had stayed alive I would have been like look what she's doing now. Now do you like me? Look what she Look at Look at how we're connecting on how great the baby is. But she got out of the way for me to become a direct father of this child. She left and I had to grow up because when she died, also the part of me that was seeking her approval died, too. The story of who I was with my mom also died. And I cried it out and I felt and then a more of a man showed up. And I can be so much more of a protector for this little girl. If my mom had stayed alive, I might have been trying to get her approval and maybe even brought that to my daughter. Are you proud of me? Are you proud of me? I'm holding my entire past here. Is everyone proud of me? Here's Here's this accomplishment. Mom, are you Don't you love me? She's walking now. But because she died and I released that by letting myself release it, I would much rather my mom be here, but it made me stronger. It made me better. It made me more connected and more focused and more protective and stronger. And I lost probably 50 lb since my mom died, too. I was like, I want to become the most energetic, most powerful man I can be for this little girl. And it's making my content better because I have even more of a reason to make the world better because she's in it. I have a 1-year-old little girl and she is a underlying She's an underlying driving reason for this because I believe every person on this planet is capable of changing the world by changing themselves. And I want to make the world better for my daughter. I love that answer. Yeah. Before I ask my last question, tell these guys where they can find you online. Well, um I do a lot of events and we have a lot of videos and there's all kinds of different things. So, kylecease.com is my website. It's spelled k y l e c e a s e or I'm assuming it's under here. It's right here. It's also evolvingoutloud.com. In 2019, I have another book coming out uh with Hay House, and it's called The Illusion of Money, Why Chasing Money Is Stopping You From Receiving It. And it's not It's about money, but it's not. It's about you and the infinite creative being that you are that we usually sacrifice because we're chasing nothing things. And I'm going to live the rest of my life holding space for everyone watching and everyone on the planet to see that they're infinite until I die cuz that's what I'm here to do. And that's what I'm That's my dharma, and that's what I love doing. Well, you may have just answered my last question, which is what's the impact you want to have on the world? I I would say I'm going to let the impact on the world be a byproduct of me living in my highest truth because the biggest impact I can see from here is probably nothing compared to what we're capable of. So, I'm just going to keep being surprised and following the highest me and let it tell me what it's supposed to be. I love that. Yeah. Thank you so much for coming on the show. I love your show, by the All right. Guys, this this is a world that you're going to want to dive into. The way that he's able to bring the comedy into the transformation is absolutely astonishing and gives people just the right amount of a hook to draw you in and give you something that is profoundly transformational and help you really begin to tell a different story. And that part of his message, I think, is so incredibly powerful, understanding that you are carrying your past with you a lot of the times and making decisions that you think are here and in the now, but they're really based on how you view yourself and your fear of losing that um and not being open to something new and creating something new and to show up with spontaneity. He doesn't have a script. You can see he's working with people that don't have a script and it's really, really phenomenal to watch him go through that process. I think you're going to see yourself in a lot of what he does. So, be sure to check it out. His book is phenomenal. You have to love the title, I hope I screw this up. Uh it's really, really fantastic. All right, guys, if you haven't already, be sure to subscribe and until next time, my friends, be legendary. Take care. Uh thank you, my friend. Wonderful. That was fun. Hey everybody, thank you so much for watching and being a part of this community. If you haven't already, be sure to subscribe. You're going to get weekly videos on building a growth mindset, cultivating grit, and unlocking your full potential.