Neil Pasricha on How Seeking Approval Can Lead to Failure

Neil Pasricha is the author of five New York Times bestsellers including The Book of Awesome, a catalog of simple pleasures based on his 50-million hit, award-winning blog, and The Happiness Equation, a nine-step guidebook to happiness based on new research. His books have been on bestseller lists for over 200 weeks and sold millions of copies. Neil is also one of the most popular TED speakers with his first TED Talk “The 3 A’s of Awesome” ranked as one of the ten most inspiring of all time. His new podcast, 3 Books, discusses the most formative books of inspiring individuals from all walks of life. His work has been featured in hundreds of outlets including CNN, BBC, The Today Show, The Early Show, The Oprah Winfrey Network, Harvard Business Review, Fast Company, Fortune, and Forbes. In the interview, we discuss the ten years of blogging failures helped launch Neil’s viral blog, 1000 Awesome Things; the 2-minute practice that Neil uses every morning to build more gratitude into his life; why focusing on external validation leaves us unhappy and what we can do about it; and what Neil learned from launching his new podcast, 3 books. You can subscribe to Neil’s podcast at this link. - Get your FREE copy of my e-book. Text OZAN to 345345 or navigate to weeklycontrarian.com to download a free copy of my e-book, The Contrarian Handbook: 8 Principles for Innovating Your Thinking. Along with your free e-book, you’ll get the Weekly Contrarian — a newsletter that challenges conventional wisdom and changes the way we look at the world (plus access to exclusive content for subscribers only). Don’t want to miss future episodes? Be sure to subscribe to the podcast and leave a review on iTunes or Google Play. As always, thanks for listening.