Everybody has narcissistic tendencies, and we're all self-absorbed, but nobody wants to admit it. It's always somebody else, it's always Donald Trump, it's always Elon Musk, but everyone has a manipulative side. There are no saints in this world. But can you use it productively?
Yes, most definitely. There's deep narcissists who are very problematic, and there's healthy narcissists, and no one's a distinction between the two. We'll help save you years of misery. We're from dealing with a narcissist.
I want you to do the following. I want you to... Robert Greene is one of the most influential writers in history, unraveling the secrets of power, strategy, and human psychology are essential purpose, resilience, and success. What is that about human nature that we just don't want to admit?
One is that envy is deeply ingrained in all of us. In fact, always wanting to be better and superior to others is the most motivating factor of 90% of human behavior. But if you don't admit it to yourself that ugly emotion is like a nuclear bomb to all aspects of life, it will seize you by the throat and make you miserable. But there's also understanding things like we all judge on appearances, because everyone has a dark side, and that we are all actors.
And I will get into the beauty of all of them, because it's really about how powerful people use those traits for their success. People are lonelier than ever, and when you look at the impact that's having, it's equal to smoking 15 secrets a day. What is the antidote for this? I empathize with it very much so, because when I was younger, I was losing in the game of life.
I was very depressed, and even suicidal, but what lifted me out was... I find it incredibly fascinating that when we look at the back end of Spotify and Apple and our audio channels, the majority of people that watch this podcast haven't yet hit the follow button, or the subscribe button, wherever you're listening to this. I would like to make a deal with you. If you could do me a huge favor and hit that subscribe button, I will work tirelessly from now until forever to make the show better and better and better and better.
I can't tell you how much it helps when you hit that subscribe button. The show gets bigger, which means we can expand production, bringing all the guests you want to see, and continue to do this thing we love. If you could do me that small favor and hit the follow button, wherever you're listening to this, that would mean the world to me. That is the only favor I will ever ask you.
Thank you so much for your time. Robert, at this moment in time, what do you believe your followers, your fans, the people that love your books, what do you believe that they're struggling with the most? I'm asking this question because I imagine you get thousands of DMs and messages from these people. What are the common themes?
Well, the most common question I get, particularly from people in their 20s, is they don't really know where they're headed. They don't know what their career is. What I call a mastery, their life's task. And I talk a lot about it in interviews in the book, Mastery.
And I make the point that it's the most important decision in your life, figuring out what you were destined for, why you were born, what you were created for, what makes you unique. And I say that everything from that realization and understanding kind of stems from that. Your sense of fulfillment, your happiness, everything will come from that one realization. And a lot of young people are very confused right now.
I don't blame them. These are very, very confusing times that they're going through, much more confusing than anything I had to deal with, particularly, I think, the influence of technology and social media. And what I mean by that is to know who you are, to know what you were meant to do in life, why you were born, what makes you unique, requires a lot of reflection on yourself, self-awareness, self-knowledge. You have to go inward.
And when your attention is always focused so much on what other people are doing, what other people are saying, you know, what they think is hot, what they think is cool, you become kind of a stranger to yourself, right? So when I talk about that concept to them, it's like, it sounds interesting, Robert, but I have no idea what that is. It's quite high, but it's not all of them, but it is a trend I've noticed with young people who are going through, I think, very, very confusing times. And I'm very empathetic to it because I was actually someone who was quite lost in my 20s, and I know the pain that that can cause.
Not feeling like your life has any meaning. You know, I think that's something that really is tormenting a lot of young people. What does life mean? What will give me a sense of meaning, right, to what I'm doing, to where I'm headed, to my daily experiences?
And not having that is deeply disturbing. I've been through that myself. I think I'm getting a lot of that kind of feedback and a lot of those emails among others. Is there a strategy that young people, or really anybody that feels lost or aimless in their life, should and is able to deploy to find their purpose, to find the direction, the thing they should be aiming at?
Well, you know, you have to get out of this way of thinking that so many people have, which everything has to be simple and linear, and I'm kind of in this direction, there's got to be a solution, like I'm hacking my way to the truth. Life doesn't work that way. Life is very complex. So I can't give you a single track answer to finding your life purpose, you as an individual.
But I can give you kind of clues. I can kind of direct you towards certain paths that have worked for me and that have worked for hundreds of thousands of other people who have become masters or very successful in their field. And the first thing is you have to go inward. So you have to resist the pull that our culture gives you.
You have to also really want this. That's probably what it really comes down to. Are you unhappy? Are you frustrated?
Are you getting kind of rock bottom? Is this a turning point in your life where you realize if I keep going this way in five years, it's going to be really serious? It has to be important to you, and you have to have a sense of urgency. And with that sense of urgency, you have to make some decisions.
And one of the decisions that's absolutely essential is to pay less attention to what other people are doing, to pay less attention to what other people are saying, to pay less attention to what people are telling you you should be doing.