I jumped for JOY when I spotted this epic interview. THE Tony Robbins, meets THE Michael A. Singer for an enlightening, feel good interview. Presupposing you are into self-development, conscious living and like to ponder about living your life to your fullest potential, read on, this blog post is for you.
You know, I follow these two for quite a while now. So who are these people? Tony Robbins is a motivational strategist, global speaker, influencer, 40 years of transforming millions of people. Watch him also on Netflix, in a 2014 docu 'I am not your guru!'. Michael A. Singer is a best-selling author of the books "The Untethered soul" and "The Surrender Experiment". Picture this: Mr. Robbins is a force of nature and loud, Mr. Singer is calm and relaxes in his beige socks, Perfectly poised and positioned in the middle of the interview frame is Tony Robbins' beautiful wife Sage, sitting zen-like crossed-legged for the duration of the approx. 90min interview. This is extra-ordinary, because we can witness their joined quest to unravel, understand and acknowledge the power of the MIND. As these protagonists are masters in their field this is a true highlight and below here in this post you find the main take aways. If you want to dig deeper watch the interview here. Otherwise read on and you find the highlights including approx. timestamps.
sidenote:
Michael Singer online course: For the over-achievers who read this, I suggest signing up (click underlined for links): a) for the FREE 3 part video teaching module on "the untethered soul" (teaser for the full version) b) full online version including 9 hour video course .
Golden nuggets of the interview Tony and Sage Robbins with Michael A. Singer Part 1 (click for video link) 1. The outside world will never make you happy long-term.
2. What really makes us happy is: Who we become. What we experience. What we give/contribute to the world. Part 1, min2.20
3. the mind gets in the way, even when we feel great! Mind can be a party-pooper or a wonderful gift.
Part 2 (click for video link) 4. With our will, we are determined to take control over our mind to avoid struggle, unwanted stuff, instead of allowing the experience to simply take place.
5. min 3 People want to change something on the outside (Partner, situation, etc) which makes them feel disturbed! How to deal with the triggers? It is only the one big moment which makes you boil over....we have got to relax about the very small stuff along the way to avoid accumulation!! Super important: Relax and release!
6. min7: Tony: Faith and fear are both made up. If we fear something, let go/surrender and have faith that something greater will turn up. Michael S: Yes agree, but it is more grounded for me. What is it that is getting in the way of being happy. Sage: With awareness was I able to step away slightly to gain a bit of distance to observe and identify
7. Decision: Do you really want to be happy? min1 It is a loosing battle if you check for all the great times, when the world delivered you the beauty, the good side of life, because then people start to expect this from 'life'. This ideal model of the world seems to be build upon avoiding stuff which makes us feel lousy. The mess inside is still there. Like a house which is build up with filth, starts to smell and rotten. Solution: You got to clean up the garbage/mess inside. Happiness is an inside job! How?
Work with the every day moment-by-moment stuff, deal with it. Do not compensate or suppress.
8. 3.30 min Three ways how to cultivate HAPPINESS (release: not carrying garbage around) a) Affirmations (positive thinking) (eg Who am i do decide how fast the driver in front of me MUST drive...Surrender) = Honour and respect reality
b) to train your mind, create a positive habit: repeatedly say something to yourself during the day. eg 'I can handle this!'.
c) Relax instead of resist! min6 like Judo (attack is coming...let it go) Surrender: let go of the resistance Emotional Fitness: Build the inner strength to handle the discomfort
Sage: Chapter 17 of 'The untethered soul' is on the subject DEATH, this changed my life experience profoundly. (MIND YOU personal note: this chapter has also been a transformative experience for me and many friends.) Tony's best takeaways from Singer's online course: min 9 Awareness of the present moment to find happiness inside.
slowing down to find own happiness and monitoring distractions like dopamine/adrenaline rush from phone use. min 1 Singer 'Whoever you are, you are in there!' (Inner voice) Course content: What is the mind? What is the outside world? what is your heart? What is your experience? What is your relationship with the your heart? What can be the relationship be with the heart? What is the world? Question yourself: Did you make anything about the situation you are in? Did you make the furniture? did you make the people there? Leading to questions like: Why is it the way it is? And where does all this come from? Okay: We got to go back to the Big Bang, and we come from this Cosmic soup. All these atoms got created? Did you create those? NO. NoBODY did it. The laws of Quantum Physics happened, and over time it made the molecule called DNA. And DNA created all these animals and human beings. 13.8 billion years creating happened like this. Today, we see the end result! min 4 If your ancestors would not have met, you would not be here. And this is true for everything. So now we drop in with our consciousness and think about what we compare ourselves of what are made up. We compare it to our past experience of like and dislike, and we either get mad at it or we run after it. KEY: Appreciate what we have got. Question: Would you rather be on Mars or Outer Space and have nothing going on? Realise: You are given the gift of the moment in front of you! Appreciate it as it is given to you, with all the learnings, etc. In sport, the other team is not making it easy or the way you want it to be. It is what it is. Be in the moment, be in the zone! You struggle, if you are only happy, when life is THIS way, your way. 10 trillion cells in a human body are communicating, working together, doing their job for you to live. And you want your job to be a certain way? Really? When was the last time you thanked your liver? Your pancreas? Your lungs? If they went wrong, you would not have a business to worry. Awareness about the voice inside and the appreciation about the inside, liberates and sets you free to seek happiness and what matters to you in a transformed way. 8.40min: Advantages of being a happy person: better Health, better relationships, better sleep, higher income,... What is keeping the average person from being happy? Answer: People believe in the constricted, conditioned form of
life to have to fit into a mould in order to experience happiness. Solution: Appreciate how life is happening and use your given gifts and skills to shape whatever you are capable of shaping.
Thoughts on The Surrender Experiment: Life-long learning of letting go. Successful Business people have to realise that they did not do most of the stuff. The universe presented a situation as an opportunity. Even if you are smart. Who gave you that smartness? What if the brain stopped? You would not know what to do!.....Humbling process.
Singer found passion in writing a software which 25% of US independent physicians used in 1982, which made him highly successful. Singer: Learning to surrender means, I don't have to do this. Instead be open, be ready, just be in the zone, and participate what is unfolding in front of me.
My experience then is higher than if I mentally decide what it all should be like. Outcome: Inspiration comes, life is a miracle Company went public, 23000 employees. BUT one day changed everything. Investigations against theft, 6 years later...and a lot to GO THROUGH. Meanwhile: Singer's life's mission: Letting go of the garbage his mind is coming up with. Mantra: I can and I will handle this. Miracle: One day the case just got dropped. Singer: I want to sit on this planet, whilst I spin through space and enjoy the journey. Build your spiritual muscle: Practice to surrender.
Tony Robbins promotes Singers online course:
The course is for you if you want sustainable Happiness!!
Sage: Once having the awareness that this could be the last day on earth, sitting behind every emotion even pain to be part of the experience whilst on earth, brought a whole new level of consciousness. Getting behind the sensation and realizing the thoughts leads to a deeper living experience. How to relax about tough feelings: lean away from the inner noise of that creeping emotion like anger. Achievers like to think that anger or fear are main drivers of their success, when in fact this can not be a healthy long-term solution.
LOVE is a greater driver than any other.
You actually can run a business with LOVE. Inspiration does not happen when you give in to the lower parts of your being like (fear, anger).
Let the higher emotional levels come up and motivate you. Love does not burn-out, does not even get tired. Willpower gets us a certain distance but is not lasting. It is a pusher. LOVE has the pull factor.
min 6 There is an energy inside everyone of us, when we take away the walls, this energy feeds us from inside. The energy of your being gives you energy. When there are blockages, move them, and you wake up in giggle, excited to find out what is happening that day.
You become an inspired being. You are turned on. and that is infectious. You get turned on by someone who is turned on. How to relax: Meditation. 15 min in the morning. 15 min in the evening to tuning in on the question: What is my mind doing? This way you witness consciousness. Outcome: You become established in the seat of self.
Sage: 'When I am feeling charged up negatively: I learned to step away, step into the thought: This is me experiencing my life!' Higher emotions are the currency of love.
min 2 Own the moment, the emotion. 'I was blind, I was angry. I am sorry. Can we please reset!'
Singer has worked with inmates in prisons and would speak the exact same words than in a temple or in this interview. interestingly they understand too. Surrender is - breaking the habit of being guided by ego.
- willingness to open your own blinds, which are limiting you and your view. Blinds are the ego, self-concept, fears like: I am not enough, So much of our stress is just made up in our mind. part 8 (click for video link)
Singers main gateway to inquiry is the question: Who are you?
Metaphor: At night when we sleep. the body sleeps, so who dreams? When we wake up, we say: I had a dream, I saw a dream. So who dreamt? Answer: Consciousness dreamt. Who is the awareness of being, who watches the dream.
Inner voice phenomena: You are the one who is hearing what is said. When you understand that, you awaken!
When you watch TV, do gaming, you are not in the room you projected your consciousness in the object of consciousness. Then something in the room might happen and you are back, seeing the room, the furniture... This is what is happening with your mind. We are listening to the I-channel, We get observed by that channel....You don't have to...you can come back to the couch where the seat of SELF is.
3.50min
Mirror: You look into the mirror and over the years you see something different, but it is still you seeing it.
Emotions:
The emotions that you have are constantly changing. well, It is not the emotions, you are the witness of the emotions...if you forget, and you think YOU ARE the EMOTIONS than you feel the pain of that.
LOVE does not come from the heart, it comes from somewhere greater than us. Love comes through the heart, if the person lets it or does not. Everyone has this immense source of LOVE from GOD (Or whatever you believe in, higher consciousness...). 5.50min Tony Robbins asks: A lot of people are taught that god is love, and god is also judgement? How do people understand that god is purely love and that we are pure joy and love.
Singer: answers are in the whole of the interview and the course.
When people realise by sitting back that they are 'divine by nature'. I am watching the human. That what is watching, is spirit. Robbins Q: What pulls you out to serve? what is your legacy?
It is the service which is there because of the moments which unfold in front of me. I respect and accept those moments. The course is my legacy. Singer sees his legacy to be the course which was recorded by soundstrue! If people want to learn what he has learned, there it is. 10min: Singer shares his lifestory. "the worst battle you can have is the battle between your right arm and your left arm....don't arm them..!' if you fight with yourself...you loose!
He had to answer for himself: Am I ready, willing and able to let go of all parts that are resisting what is unfolding.
There is only one way to live your life and that is life, not mind.
Interview end.
Send your comments with thoughts, feelings, experiences of reading this blog post or listening to the interview. I case you apply to the online course to sustainable Happiness, please get back to me. I am curious! Subscribe to my monthly newsletter via the webpage www.mindyou.today and follow on instagram and facebook for updates. As always, please share generously in your social circles, I want to reach as many people as possible, who are keen on living a bright and fulfilled life with all its joyful rides.
Julia Seibold, Mind You
Michael A. Singer
has been a spiritual teacher for more than four decades and has written two books:
the #1 New York Times bestseller The Untethered Soul and the New York Times bestseller The Surrender Experiment. He is also the creator of a leading-edge software package that transformed the medical practice management industry, and founding CEO of a billion-dollar public company whose achievements are archived in the Smithsonian Institution. While working on his doctorate in economics in 1971, Michael experienced a deep inner awakening and went into seclusion, focusing on yoga and meditation. In 1975, he founded the yoga and meditation center known as Temple of the Universe, where people have come together to practice and study ever since. In addition to his work as a spiritual teacher, Michael has made major contributions in the areas of business, education, health care, and environmental protection.