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Are you living a life that truly reflects your highest values and aspirations?

What are the habits that differentiate those who achieve their dreams from those who don’t? 

And what do seriously wealthy people know about money that the rest of us don’t?

Back for his third appearance on the show, the incomparable Dr John Demartini is here to dive into these life-changing questions and so much more. 

From living on the streets to becoming a bestselling author, world-class chiropractor, renowned speaker, and an international thought leader, John’s journey is nothing short of extraordinary. (And if you don’t know his incredible story, be sure to check out Episode #3 and Episode #434 as well.)

This latest conversation is a goldmine of insights. Press play to learn: the mindset secrets of multi-millionaires and billionaires, the surprising value of negative thoughts (yep, you read that right!), the sneaky differences between those who don’t achieve their goals versus those who do, the hidden psychology of vitality, how to unlock your full potential, and what it’s really like to live on a giant ship.

Whether you’re seeking personal mastery, craving financial freedom, or looking for transformative life strategies, press play now… this massively inspiring episode is for you.

About John Demartini

Dr. John Demartini is a world-leading human behavior specialist, researcher, best-selling author, educator, and founder of the Demartini Method — a revolutionary tool in modern psychology. He has authored 40 books that have been translated into 39 different languages and presented his insights alongside some of the world’s most influential people, including Sir Richard Branson and Deepak Chopra. Dr Demartini’s cutting-edge methods are the culmination of almost five decades of research across disciplines including physics, philosophy, theology, metaphysics, psychology, astronomy, mathematics, neurology, and physiology. He has synthesized these teachings and incorporated them into his work on human values.

In this episode we chat about:

• The inspiring projects he’s been working on since we last spoke (4:05)
• The surprising story of how The 7 Secret Treasures book came to life (6:09)
• Using the ‘7 treasures’ framework to achieve personal mastery (9:20)
• Why negative thoughts aren’t as damaging as we’ve been led to believe (15:53)
• How to not get derailed by the polarity of life (22:18)
• Unlocking your full potential as a parent (27:28)
• Is it essential for couples to have the same core values? (31:58)
• The habits and behaviors that differentiate high achievers. (Borrow these now!) (35:40)
• The truth about why depression and anxiety are so widespread (37:35)
• Crucial mental health tips for parents who are struggling (42:25)
• The wealth creation secrets of millionaires and billionaires (54:46)

Episode resources:

• Dr John Demartini’s 7 Free Masterclass (get them here)
• SheLaunch (join here)
• Mastering Your Mean Girl by Melissa Ambrosini (book)
• Open Wide by Melissa Ambrosini (book)
• Comparisonitis by Melissa Ambrosini (book)
• Time Magic by Melissa Ambrosini and Nick Broadhurst (book)
• How To Solve All Your Problems with Dr John Demartini (podcast)
• The Truth About Vaccine Mandates, Understanding Polarity & Seeing Both Sides with Dr John Demartini (podcast)
• Dr John Demartini (website)
• Free Online Training Classes (website)
• Dr. John Demartini’s Ultimate Wealth Mastery Library: Key Strategies for Financial Mastery by Dr. John Demartini (book)
• The Values Factor: The Secret to Creating an Inspired and Fulfilling Life by Dr. John DeMartini (book)
• The Resilient Mind: Conquer Your Fears, Channel Your Anxiety and Bounce Back Stronger by Dr. John DeMartini (book)
• Essentials of Emotional Intelligence by Dr. John DeMartini (book)
• The Productivity Factor: How to Accomplish Twice as Much in Half the Time by Dr. John DeMartini (book)
• The 7 Secret Treasures: A Transformational Blueprint for a Well-Lived Life by Dr. John DeMartini (book)
• Bounce Back: Dr. John DeMartini Master Course to Deal with Tough Times by Dr. John DeMartini (audiobook)
• The Gratitude Effect by Dr. John DeMartini (book)
• Pursuit of the Magnificent: The Divine Order of Love by Dr. John DeMartini and Deepak Chopra (audiobook)
• The Great Ideas: A Syntopicon 1: Angel To Love Vol. 2 by Mortimer J. Alder and William Gorman (book)

Prefer To Read?

The following transcript has been automatically generated and not checked for accuracy.

Melissa: [00:00:00] In episode 549 with Dr. John Demartini, we are talking all about the seven secret treasures and how they can help you live an extraordinary life, plus so much more. Welcome to the Melissa Ambrosini Show. I’m your host, Melissa, bestselling author of Mastering Your Mean Girl, Open Wide, Comparisonitis. And time magic.

And I’m here to remind you that love is sexy, healthy is liberating, and wealthy isn’t a dirty word. Each week I’ll be getting up close and personal with thought leaders from around, as well as your weekly dose of motivation so that you can create epic change in your own life and become the best version of yourself possible.

Are you ready? Beautiful. Beautiful. Hey, beautiful and welcome back to the show. I am so excited about this episode because Dr. John Demartini is one of my [00:01:00] favorite humans on this earth. And this will be his third time on the show. He was episode three and episode four, three, four. So if you haven’t had a chance to listen to those episodes, I highly recommend them.

They are incredible. And we share in those episodes, his incredible story of how he went from living on the streets to becoming a best selling author. World class chiropractor, renowned speaker, and international thought leader. And he is one of my favorite thought leaders. And for those of you that have never heard of him, he is a world renowned human behavior specialist, researcher, best selling author, educator, and founder of the Demartini Method, a revolutionary tool in modern psychology.

He has authored 40 books. that have been translated into 39 different languages. And he has presented his insights alongside some of the world’s most influential people, including Sir Richard Branson and Deepak Chopra. Now his [00:02:00] cutting edge methods are the accumulation of almost five decades of research across disciplines, including physics, psychology, theology, metaphysics, psychology, astronomy, mathematics, numerology.

And physiology. And he has synthesized these teachings and incorporated them into his work on human values, which is just such incredible work. Now, I have done the Demartini breakthrough method in person, and it was a game changer for me. So he shares his life, business, financial relationship, and leadership empowerment strategies with people all over the globe, enabling them to transform their lives according to their highest values, which is so important.

So for everything that we mentioned in today’s episode, you can check out in the show notes and that’s over at melissarambrosini. com forward slash five, four, nine. And now without further ado, let’s bring on the incredible Dr. John Demartini.[00:03:00] 

John, welcome back to the show for the third time. I am so excited to have you here. But before we dive in, can you tell us what you had for breakfast this morning? 

John: What I had for breakfast this morning, I had Greek yogurt that’s made here on the ship and I had some multi grain rolls that I love and some fresh berries and grapes.

Now, let’s 

Melissa: just go back here. You mentioned something. You’re on a ship. Now, before we started recording, you showed me that you are in Antarctica. I got to look outside your window. It is incredible where you are. Now, tell us, you’re still on the ship. You live on the world. That’s what it’s called, isn’t it?

John: Yes. I’ve been here over 22 years now. Oh my 

Melissa: gosh. It’s just incredible. And you just travel around the world, on the world. 

John: That’s the basic idea. I 

Melissa: love it. I love it. Well, you’ve got to come down to Australia. We’d love to [00:04:00] see you. 

John: We’re coming in the fall. Well, you’re spring. 

Melissa: Oh, this is brilliant. Now I have known you for a very long time.

You’ve been on the show three times. And I’ve actually done your breakthrough experience in Sydney in person, which was life changing. And you have an incredible story of how you went from living on the streets to becoming a bestselling author, a world class chiropractor, a renowned speaker, an international thought leader.

Now, we’ve shared a lot of your story in these past episodes that we’ve done together, episode three and episode four, three, four. Now to get us started this time, I’d love to know what the last few years have held for you. Like, tell us a little bit about what you’ve been up to. I know you’ve got your new book out, but tell us what you have been up to and what’s shifted.

John: Well, for the last four years, since COVID, almost four years, I have done a lot online, obviously, like many other people. [00:05:00] And we converted from live internationals, traveling and speaking and things to now international traveling and speaking by Zim and by other modalities besides Zim. And I’ve been on back on the ship more full time because beforehand I was off and on because I was traveling, flying, going to live presentations and then coming back to the ship.

Now I’ve been able to be on the ship and do live presentations anywhere in the world. So that’s been a blessing. And as far as books, gosh, I’ve done eight books in the last couple of years, some more movies and more products. We just signed another deal with Nine Gale Conant. They’re doing another 12 products.

That’ll be 15 with them. And I’m just researching, writing, traveling, and teaching, which is what I love doing. I constantly do that. We have a new movie coming out ourselves that will be out, it’s hitting the film festivals probably in about two weeks. And then starting at the beginning of the year. [00:06:00] And in May, but we’ll launch the movie in May.

So it’s called The Breakthrough. It’s called Breakthrough Movie, basically. 

Melissa: Mm. Incredible. I cannot wait to see that. How many books have you got out in total? I want to talk about The Seven Secret Treasures, which is your latest book, but how many in total? 

John: I think 45 paperbacks and, but some of them are retired now and they’re, they’re, they’re wanting to reactivate them.

They’re putting them on audio programs, but what about that many? And then manuals and textbooks, you know, there’s 200 and something. So those are things I just, a thousand page book on the brain just recently. And I’m doing another one on morality and I did one on cosmology. I do whatever I’m inspired to do.

I write big textbooks on it so I can absorb the information more effectively and teach better. You are 

Melissa: amazing. I actually just remembered, I had a flashback to an interview that I did with you in Sydney one time. I went to your hotel. And I was interviewing [00:07:00] you and when I walked in, you were sitting at your desk writing and you had this massive textbook, like the size of a brick.

And that was your gratitude journal. And you said, I just wrote about you in my gratitude journal that I’m grateful for this interview. Are you still doing your gratitude practice 

John: every day? If I showed you, I don’t know if I do it now, I’m used to Zoom. You just got typed in there before I got it. So yes, exact same thing, I’m, I’m, it’s 9, 000 pages of gratitudes and objectives.

So I keep records of everything. 

Melissa: That is so beautiful. And do you do it more digitally now and not so much in your handwritten books? 

John: Well, the book, it was a printout. of digital typing, but I used to print them out. Now there’s 35 volumes. It’s just too much to print. So I just keep it on my thing. You’re in volume 34 right now because there’s some other things at the end that’s relating to 35, but you’re in volume 34 [00:08:00] and let’s see exactly what I said.

I, I put on here, I had the opportunity to be interviewed again by Melissa Ambrosini from Australia on her Melissa Ambrosini show podcast, but it used to, we also had another one. You had a comparisonitis, I think at one time too. 

Melissa: Yes, you were part of the comparisonitis, one of the bonuses. You’ve been in my orbit for such a long time and I’m so grateful for your work and truly the breakthrough experience that I did in person.

Was absolutely life changing for me. I went to that with a very challenging situation that I was going through. I just stepped into the role of being a step parent. And that comes with so many beauties, but it also comes with a lot of challenges and you’re dealing with co parenting with another family who may not be aligned and things like that.

And that was really a big thing for me to step into. And I walked out of the breakthrough experience feeling nothing but love and gratitude for the whole situation [00:09:00] and everyone involved. So I am so grateful for that incredible experience and all of your work. Your books are incredible. Every time I’ve had the pleasure of interviewing you and your work, it’s like, it’s the Bible.

It’s stuff that is just life changing for people and if, if people have not read any of your books, I would highly recommend it. But I want to talk about the seven secret treasures. I want to know what these seven secret treasures are and how they can help us live a better life. Can you share these seven secret treasures?

John: Sure. I’ve actually got three more books out. I’ve got the fourth one coming out since then. So that, that’s, that since we posted it. The Seven Secret Treasures is practical, high priority, inspiring methodologies, principles and actions that you can do to empower each of the seven areas of life and the seven areas of life and which are the treasures when they’re empowered.

Is your spiritual quest being inspired? [00:10:00] I consider any area of your life. You don’t empower other people overpower you. So if you don’t empower yourself intellectually, you’ll be told what to think. If you don’t empower yourself in business, you’ll be told what to do. If you don’t empower yourself financially, be told what you’re worth.

If you don’t empower yourself in relationship, you’ll be do honey, do things around the house. You may not want to do. If you don’t empower yourself socially, be told what propaganda and misinformation to follow. If you don’t empower yourself. Uh, physically, you’ll be told what drugs to take and what organs to, if you don’t empower so spiritually, you may be taught some geocentric, anthropomorphic, Aristotelian derived theology that may be outdated.

So the book is about how to empower and live an inspired life, how to empower each of those areas and the highest priority actions that I’ve found, because I’ve been doing this since I was 18. I’m 69. So I’ve been doing it for 51 years, researching and teaching this field. So [00:11:00] anything that would allow an individual to help them empower and master the seven areas of life is what the book’s about.

And it’s the highest priority actions that I’ve found distilling it down to how to do that and how to wake up the treasure that each of those powers has. So your inspired mission is your spiritual path. Whatever that is, because, you know, some people climb mountains for their spiritual quest, some people have children for their spiritual quest, some people have businesses.

Whatever is deeply meaningful to you, what’s truly highest in priority to your life. What inspires you is what I’m going to call the spiritual quest. It may be religious or it may not be. Your mental quest is waking up your genius and innovation and creativity and contributing some original ideas for the planet, and how to do that, and how to maximize your learning potential.

Your, your business one is how to create a business that’s serving ever greater numbers of people. So that can be a global business or a local business, but most likely global with [00:12:00] ways, the way the internet is today. But how to maximize your effect and see an efficiency. Engagement in the hiring, inspiring, and leading, and management, and sales, and negotiation, how to maximize all those components to grow businesses, because people would like to be able to do what they love and be able to have their business managing itself.

You know, I, I teach research, write, travel, and the rest of it’s all delegated. And I travel on the ship doing what I love doing. And then the mastery of that, how that’s done. Then financially, how to rearrange the value structure so you can filter your reality and perceive, decide, and act in a way that’s prosperous and leads to a financial independence.

So you’re a master of money instead of a slave. And then their relationship is how to communicate with respect in dialogue with equanimity between you and the individuals that you love so you can maximize the fulfillment in the relationship dynamics that you’re engaged in. And under social, it’s about how to wake up [00:13:00] living by priority and living by a real vision, a real inspiration to lead.

We all have a leader inside us, but many times we don’t allow it to emerge and don’t. You know, let it become its natural expression. I was speaking in one time in Melbourne and there were about 1, 400 people there. And I said, how many of you came here because you want to wake up your leader and be a leader?

All the hands went up. So I came down off the stage with a microphone. I said, then if that’s the case, then you know what you’re going to lead. If you don’t, then you’re kind of living in a fantasy. So what are you going to lead? And everyone, people went blank. What do you want to be greatest at and leader at?

So it’s about getting clarification of what it is you’re going to do and the strategy on how you’re going to do it. And how to live congruently spontaneously exemplifies leadership skills and the manifestation of it. And then physically, how to, how to maximize your autonomic regulation to maximize your epigenetics, to maximize your physiology, to allow yourself to have the vitality, the wellness, and the magnetic [00:14:00] attractiveness to be able to fulfill what it is you dream of.

And how also to live an inspired life. And be inspired and grateful for your life. If you’re, you’re, your spirituality is an expression of how much gratitude and love you have for your life. So it’s basically how to empower all those areas, practical, very simple, practical things that you can do that you can implement immediately to enhance and empowerment of those areas.

Any area of your life, you don’t empower people over power. You’re not a victim of their own empowerment. You’re just not empowered. So it’s, how do you do that? So you’re appreciate people instead of feel that they’re running your life. 

Melissa: Mm hmm. So beautiful. The thing is, like, everything I’m hearing is like, we have the power to step into our power to feel empowered in all of those different areas.

We have to take responsibility to do that. And that’s often the hardest part for a lot of people is taking that responsibility. 

John: Exactly. Well, I was 18 years old when I decided to divide life into those seven areas are spiritual, [00:15:00] intellectual, or business, mental, business, finance, family, social, and physical.

I laid that out. And then I said, I’m going to. I want to master those areas. I’m going to keep my eyes open for any bit of information that can help people master that area. So for 51 years, I’ve been doing that. And you see a lot out there, and some of it is fluffy. Some of it is, you know, unstable. Let’s put it that way.

But I want to take and distill out And stand on the shoulders of great giants, studying philosophers and thinkers and leaders and people that have done extraordinary things. What is it that they’ve done and how they’ve excelled in those areas and summarize and distill it down to the essence behind how do we expand our existence in those areas.

So yeah, I’m, I’m inspired by that. I’ve been doing that 51 years. 

Melissa: Let’s talk about negative thoughts, because you say negative thoughts have a value. Does that mean [00:16:00] that we don’t need to panic if we are finding it hard to be in a positive mindset or positive about something in our lives? Let’s just talk about that because I know for a lot of people, if they have negative thoughts, they think, Oh my gosh, you know, I’m going to manifest it and they freak out.

But let’s talk about how negative thoughts have a value. 

John: Exists and doesn’t go, anything that’s a value in our evolution continues. If not, it goes extinct. So we still have positive negative thoughts. They must serve a purpose. So I found out when you set an objective, an objective is a neutral objective, by the way, you have a subjective bias, you have a neutral objective truth in philosophy, whenever you’re pursuing something that has both sides, it’s obtainable.

Whenever you’re pursuing a one sided magnet, let’s say you’re looking for a magnet, I want the positive pole of the magnet, I don’t want the negative pole of the magnet. [00:17:00] Well, if you cut the magnet in half and try to get the positive pole, you end up with a positive negative and a positive negative, two little magnets.

So the pursuit of that which is unobtainable and the, the pursuit, try to avoid that which is unavoidable is a source of human suffering. So anytime you set a fantasy, A one sided objective, you’re automatically going to get the other side. And that other side is your intuition, bringing in the other side to balance it out, to make sure you set a real objective, a real objective has both sides that we found out that when we pursue challenges that inspire us and we mitigate the risks and we go after something that’s deeply meaningful, we achieve way more than if we strive for fantasies and try to avoid the challenges and then the challenges, when they come, which are inevitable, they come with the two sides.

Then automatically it’s now distress instead of eustress, which is illness promoting instead of wellness promoting. If I was to go into a, get into a relationship, let’s think of a logic of this, I’m going to go [00:18:00] into a relationship with some female and pardon me for being. I still like females. I mean, some people have a whole spectrum out there now that I still like, my girlfriend’s a girl and let’s say I’m going that relationship, but I have a fantasy expectation that she’s supposed to be positive, never negative, kind, never cruel, generous, never stingy.

Peaceful, never wrathful, considerate, never inconsiderate, giving, never taking, positive, peaceful, never wrathful, one sided. What’s likely to occur? How am I going to feel when I go into a relationship when it’s got two sides? If I have a fantasy, I’m going to end up with anger and aggression. I’ll want to blame her and feel betrayed.

I’ll want to criticize her and challenge her. I’ll feel despaired and depressed. I’ll want to exit and escape. I’ll feel frustrated and futility. I’ll feel grouchy and grief and hatred and hurt. Irritability and irrationality. And I’ll be jaded and I’ll act like a jerk when I have a false expectation of her to be one sided.

Because if I ask people, and say to them, You’re always nice, you’re never mean. They go, Uh, not exactly. Or [00:19:00] I say, You’re always mean, you’re never nice. They go, Uh, not exactly. But if I say to them, Sometimes you’re nice, sometimes you’re mean, sometimes you’re kind, sometimes you’re cruel. They say, Yep, that’s me.

So if I have an expectation that’s one sided, I’m going to accentuate the negativities. To let me know that I’m pursuing only a one sided positivity. If I set an objective and I embrace both sides, that’s obtainable. And when you’re obtainable, your expectations are met. When you don’t meet your expectations, you get angry.

So unmet expectations occur when you set up fantasies, confused as objectives. They’re fantasies, not real goals and objectives. So negativity is a feedback mechanism to let you know that the goals that you’re striving for and the expectations you have are not quite balanced. And that are skewed in a fantasy direction based on the survival based portion of the brain called the amygdala.

The amygdala wants to avoid a pain and seek a pleasure, avoid challenge, seek ease, avoid and [00:20:00] support, avoid predator, seek prey. So anytime we’re not in our executive function setting real objectives, we’re in our amygdala trying to avoid a pain, seek a pleasure. The more we strive for the fantasy, the pleasure, the more the pain hurts because we’re comparing it to the fantasy.

So, I’m not a positive thinker unless somebody’s down. If they’re really depressed and down, I, I find the upsides to things. But if they’re now in fantasies and infatuated, I find the downsides. I’m trying to bring people back into a balanced state where they have sustainability, where they have fair exchange, because the second you put somebody on a pedestal and they occupy space and time in your mind and minimize yourself, that’s not the authentic you.

And whenever you look down on somebody and resent somebody, you’re conscious of the downsides, not the upsides, and puff yourself up. That’s not you. But when you look across and see both sides of them and you at the same time, you get to be authentic and you get to see them authentically and objectively.

And now you have a loving, sustainable, and fair exchange relationship with them. So I’m [00:21:00] not a positive thinker unless there’s a down. I’m not a negative thinker unless there’s an up. Because they’re fantasizing. I’m a balanced thinker trying to help people become stable. I love 

Melissa: that so much. I remember you really honed in the, there’s always both sides to everything and there’s always equal amounts of support and challenge is something else that I remember in the breakthrough experience we really dug deep into and you got people to see who had been through incredibly challenging situations.

Like deaths in the family, suicides, things like that. You got them to see how at that same time, there was also support. And when you first started this exercise, I was like, how is this going to work out? I was like, how is he going to do this? And you did, and these people left feeling in a peak. And grateful and [00:22:00] contentment.

And it was, I remember there was a young girl whose boyfriend at the time had just taken his own life. And I remember just sitting there like jaw open going, how is this going to work out? And she felt nothing but love, grateful, gratitude, like just everything. So can you talk a little bit more about the equal amounts of support and challenge and what that means and how we can look for it?

Because it’s very easy when we’re in a challenging time. To just think that the world is against us, that nothing is flowing, I may as well give up, you know, those sorts of negative thought patterns. How can we flip it to make sure that we see that there’s also 

John: support? Well, negative thoughts are there designed to break our addiction to positive thoughts.

That scares people at first. It was the Nobel Prize winner, Paul Dirac, who said that it’s not that we don’t know so much, we know so much that in so, we’re [00:23:00] taught moral hypocrisies. You know, your grandmother says, now be nice, don’t be mean, be kind, don’t be cruel, be positive, don’t be negative. And then she beats the hell out of grandpa and yells at him and damps money from him and stuff, right?

So, moral hypocrisies trap us. They’re opiums of the masses, and they’re sold to the people who can’t control themselves in order to govern them. And to also sell an institution, usually religious or political. So what happens is it’s, this opium is sold to people, and people think they’re supposed to be one sided, and life’s supposed to be one sided, but that’s not the truth about life.

It’s got two sides. And so if we look very carefully, if we were to go in and go and have prey, which is, you know, let’s say we’re in an ecosystem and we’re an animal and we’ve got prey and predator. And if we were to go get prey without predator, we’d be gluttonous, we’d gain weight, we’d lose our fitness.

If we had predator without prey, we may shade and starve and lose our fitness. But if we put prey and predator together, [00:24:00] support and challenge, Together, we maximize our fitness. Maximum fitness, maximum growth and development, maximum involvement occurs in the food chain at the border of support and challenge.

And so the more we strive for one without the other, the more the other becomes painful and wakes us up. If we get nothing but the thing that supports us, we stay juvenilely dependent, and we become dependent on it. If we get nothing but challenges, we become precocious, independent, independent from it. If we put the two together, we get a balance of dependency and independence is what’s necessary for a healthy dynamic and relationship and well being.

That’s why we have the parasympathetic nervous system and the sympathetic nervous system. One for support, anabolic, one for challenge, catabolic. And we need both build and destroy in our body. We have mitosis, apoptosis, reduction, oxidation, alkalinity, acidity. We need both for maintaining homeostasis. And our brain is a homeostatic mechanism filled with homeostatic feedback systems to help make sure we [00:25:00] get a balance of support and challenge.

So maximum involvement occurs with the poor or support channel. It’s called order and chaos in chaos theory. Maximum involvement of all living species occur at the border of support and challenge, order and chaos, positive and negative, plight of use and pains. What’s interesting is, the more you’re addicted to one, the more the other one becomes the opposite.

So if you’re addicted to protection, you attract an aggressor. If you’re addicted to innocence, you attract a perpetrator. All the things that you think you’re trying to avoid seeking this one side draws it in with increasing probability. I’ve worked with thousands of people to demonstrate that when they see that they go, Oh my God, I’m creating that in my life because they’re, they’re striving for that which is unobtainable and keep trying to avoid that which is unavoidable.

And when it comes to grief, we’ve talked about grief. We only have two forms of grief, the perception of loss of that which we seek and the perception of gain of that which we try to avoid. As long as we’re running with our amygdala and we’re trying to avoid the challenge and seek [00:26:00] the ease and support.

We’re going to be living in grief because we’re going to fear the loss of that which we seek and we’re going to fear the gain of that which we try to avoid. But when we finally embrace both sides and we’re at neutral and we’re, then we have resilience and adaptability. Stress is the inability to adapt to a changing environment.

When we have a completely balanced view, we don’t have this, this stress response because we’re not fearing the loss of something because we’re not infatuated. We’re not fearing the gain of it because we’re not resentful. And when we do, we activate our executive center, the forebrain, and start to live with foresight and strategic planning, which differentiates fantasy from real objectives, and we have the greatest achievement.

Elon Musk would not go to Mars on fantasies of positive thinking. He hires the best engineers. And thinks of everything that can go wrong, like the old Stoics and, you know, Marcus Aurelius. I want to know everything that can go wrong. I want to make sure we have got a plan 1, 2, for each thing to go. I want us to [00:27:00] anticipate that, prepare for it, strategically plan things, mitigate the risk so we get to Mars.

He’s not a positive thinker. He’s a balanced thinker. He’s going for a dream. He hears all the exhilarations and all the challenges. He makes sure he puts both of them in his awareness, plans for each one, strategizes for each one, prepares for each one, and therefore he acts, not reacts. When you’re not prepared for the one side, you react.

When you are, you pro act. 

Melissa: Mm. So talk to me about parents who, as I was sharing with you before we started recording, Bambi is over two and a half now. And I remember in the early stages, you know, you’re just so in love, like you’re just in awe of this gorgeous little bundle. And I had these thoughts, like terrible thoughts of something bad happening to her.

And I know that that was out of balance. Infatuation. Yes. Infatuation. Now talk to me about that because [00:28:00] I know a lot of parents feel like that. Yeah. 

John: Well, anytime, the people that have the pre partum reds get the post partum blues because they have a fantasy. And then when it doesn’t match the fantasy, oh my God, it’s not matching my fantasy.

Anytime you infatuate with a child, you’re going to fear its loss. But when they’re teenagers, sometimes you go play in the traffic, go get hurt. You’re driving me crazy when they’re teenagers sometimes. So Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You don’t have the fear of them being lost so much from their teenager. I’m, I’m teasing a bit, but not much because I’ve talked to a lot of parents that are in that parent phase.

So when you resent something, you don’t fear its loss. You fear its gain. When you infatuate with something, you fear its loss. You have a fantasy about its gain. You have a fear of its loss. When you have a, you resent, you have a phobia of its gain and a fantasy of its loss. So as long as you have failures and phobias, you have an imbalanced mind and you’re now unstable and you’re going to have.

The pleasures and pains that come with it The more polarized you are, the more unstable you [00:29:00] are. The more centered and balanced you are, the more you know that with this baby comes pleasures and pains. And you have a realistic expectation. You know that you’re going to have smiles and frowns. You’re going to have giggles and crying.

You’re going to have happy moments and sad moments. There’s going to be peace and there’s going to be war. There’s going to be times of giving the freedom to the child and other times you’re going to put constraints. All pairs of opposites are there to teach you what love really is. And love is a synthesis and synchronist of all pairs of opposites that will ever be perceived.

And so you’re going to love the child by realizing both. And if you know the child’s got both, you’re more prepared to manage the child. If you have a fantasy about the child, you’re, you’re blinded, and then you get broadsided by unexpected things that drive you nuts. 

Melissa: So interesting. So interesting. It’s fascinating because my father in law has always said that to me in the very early stages when I was like, I’m having these like visions of like.

Something bad happening or these dreams. And he’s like, it’s just the [00:30:00] opposite. He’s like, you need to balance your mind. He would say to me, you need to come back to balance. It’s like you are just fearing the opposite and it’s not balanced. And I just found that so fascinating. 

John: When people have a high infatuation with a relationship, let’s say a girl meets a guy and she’s infatuated with him and she starts taking babies and thick and thins and marriage and my soulmates and everything else.

And if she’s the underdog and she’s entirely infatuated, right, she’s afraid to say anything negative to him because she’s afraid he’ll leave, right? So in that process, when all of a sudden they get together, as the days go on, all of the repression of your own values, because when you infatuate somebody, you inject their values, you try to live in their values.

And then you end up resenting that because you start, you repress part of your own nature. And you do that for the child too, you repress what’s important to you and to be sacrificing for the child. And then you resent the child eventually, because I can’t get away. I can’t see my friends. I can’t keep working out.

I can’t do this. So then what [00:31:00] happens is you eventually build up enough resentment to get your life back and to level the playing field to take them off the infatuation list back into equilibrium. Once they’re in equilibrium, you now have a balance between yourself and them and you need a balance to them.

Otherwise you get on a sustainable dynamic. So while you’re infatuated, you’re going to fear it’s lost. You’re afraid to say anything negative and you’re, you’re walking on eggshells all the time. And then you have anxieties and phobias at night about what could happen to the child and what happens if this happens and you start anxiety.

Once you balance that and you get your life back, then you have a more balanced view and you’re able to manage and sustain a relationship kind of much easier. When the guy turns into a schmuck, over time the guy turns into a schmuck, then she’s not worried about him disappearing. She hopes he leaves. I hope she, I hope he finds another girl, you know, maybe let her have this now for a while.

And then she celebrates with her friends when, when he goes out and has the fling and goes, thank you. She celebrates and goes to a party. 

Melissa: So talk to me about couples [00:32:00] because A lot of people feel like they have to have all of the exact same core values in a relationship in order for it to work. Is that the 

John: case?

That won’t happen. Nature has too much wisdom to fall for that fantasy. Is it about respect? You won’t respect somebody. If I, if I come up to you and I say, whatever you want to do, I just want to, I want to do it. I just want to please you. I just want to be, I want to make you happy. I just want to do whatever you want me to do.

Just tell me what to do. Where do you want to go to eat? Like, what do you want to do? You’ll say, get some testosterone. Stand up to me. You know, get some hospa or whatever. Because you go, be a man. You got no testosterone. Stand up to me. Challenge me a bit. Put me in my place occasionally. So praise plus reprimand makes respect.

That’s what bantering is about. If you’re in a relationship and they can’t say anything but positive things, it’s boring. Doesn’t, that doesn’t work. If they can say positive and negative things and they can support and challenging, they give you ease and difficulties. Now you have a stable system. It keeps you in check [00:33:00] because you now have.

The juvenile dependence and the independence oscillating. And that’s a much more stable place. And that won’t occur if two people are exactly the same values. If any two people are exactly the same ones, not necessary. You’ll grow by, by having a balance of similars and differences. The ancient Greeks said, if you see more similarities than differences in relationship, you have an infatuation, you’re blind to the downsides and they will bite you in the, in time.

If you see more differences than similarities. You have differences, you have resentment, and you’re going to find out they have other sides that you actually admire once you try to get rid of them. Then you’re going to miss parts that you’re now unaware of. But if you have a balance of similarities and differences, things you like and dislike, now you have love.

Love is the synthesis of the pairs of opposites in the law of similarities and differences. So you don’t want somebody that’s exactly the same as you. That’ll bore you. You don’t want somebody completely different. That will burn you out. You want somebody that’s a balance of those two. And that’s the one that we keep making.

In fact, even if you get in a relationship and you start out similar, [00:34:00] they’ll flip and turn into something different to bring out the other side, to make sure it’s, to make sure it’s stabilized, they’ll come in. I had a guy from Coca Cola company, the head of Coca Cola company, he was married and had five children and, and he was just wanted out of that relationship.

He was bored of that. He meets this girl. That’s a business woman in Coca Cola, right? This real business driven female, right? He goes, Oh, now she can relate to me like he thought, I’m going to get this woman. That’s just like me. Now it’s wants to talk about business and wants to have ambition. They want to go take on the world.

Well, she was 39 years old and the second he got with her and she felt stable for his financial stability, she started thinking, well, I want to have kids now. So he’s back with three more kids. Oh my goodness. She stopped going to work much because now he’s playing that role. So nature forced him. All relationships are striving for androgyny, the masculine and feminine forces of nature.

Even if they’re [00:35:00] homosexual relationships or transgender, it doesn’t matter, there’s still going to be a balance of androgyny in a basic relationship. So it’s going to make sure that you’ve got reproduction and production. You know, you’re going to have the pair of opposites. There’s going to be spiritual, spiritually common according to their values, but you’re going to have business and finance and intellectual, and you’re going to have family and social and physical areas.

So they’re going to keep balancing each other. And if you’re androgynous and you have a nice balance, you’re going to get somebody that’s balanced. If you’re really polarized, you’re going to get the other side. So the 72 year old bald headed buzzer billionaire is probably going to get the 27 year old big breast of beauty.

Melissa: Wow. I love this so much. I want to sidestep for a second and talk about success because, you know, a lot of people want to be successful and everyone’s definition of success is different, but what habits and behaviors create the conditions for success? 

John: Well, I don’t use the word success. I think that that’s.

And as [00:36:00] Keogh from Coca Cola company actually said, if you’re thinking you’re successful and you’re proud of your success, you’re on your way down, you’ve de purposed yourself. And if you’ve actually feel like you’re a failure, you’re on your way up, you’re repurposing yourself. I’m a man on a mission. I don’t focus on success or failure.

I think those are. Imbalanced awareness is when you’re successful, you think of the positives without the negatives and you’re blind, you’re failure. You’re thinking of the negatives without the positives. You’re blind. If you see both of them, you’re a man on a mission or a woman on a mission. So I’m more interested in, uh, towards, I don’t focus on success.

I focus on an inspired mission and know that those are transient, fluctuating feelings, labeled success and failure. Robert De Niro does a great job on an interview. If you look for him on success, it’s a great one. If you can find it. He says, I’m leery about people that think they’re successful. They’re usually on their way down.

He understood that says, don’t get too puffed up. Don’t get proud, pride before the fall. Just be grateful for the opportunity to be of service, to focus and prioritize your life. Don’t [00:37:00] compare yourself to other people. Compare your daily actions to what’s highest on your values and stick to the highest priorities and keep doing what’s highest in priority, most productive, most meaningful, most inspiring, most fulfilling things that make a difference in the world.

And if you do, other people will throw the word success at you, but you’ll be grateful and unperturbed by those terms and just say, I’m just a, oh, human being on a mission. Because people throw those terms all the time. You’re, oh, you’re successful. I go, if you say so, I just like to be a man on a mission because I don’t, I don’t want the term success running my life.

It’s a distraction. What 

Melissa: about for people who feel depressed, depression, anxiety, a lot of these things that are very common these days. I think it was Arnold Schwarzenegger in his recent Netflix series. I didn’t watch it. I haven’t watched it yet, but my husband watched it. And apparently Arnold says, like, if you’re depressed, if you’re anxious, you’re not on a mission.

You’re not being purposeful. Go [00:38:00] out and be purposeful and do something with your life. Talk to us about depression, anxiety, purpose, mission. I want to get your take on this. Absolutely. 

John: Well, he’s accurate. When you live by your highest priority, everybody has a set of priorities, a set of values, things that are most or least important in life.

Whenever they prioritize their life and live by the highest priority, their self worth goes up. Anytime they go to lower priority, their self worth goes down. When their self worth goes down, they split apart and have vacillating self esteem fluctuations. And that’s because the amygdala is trying to get one, trying to divide life up into looking for pleasure and avoiding pain.

The executive center embraces pleasure and pain equally in the pursuit of a mission. So when you focus on a mission, you’re not striving for fantasies. You’re going after objectives. And when you do, you’re less bipolar and you’re less trying to get a one sided world. And then the other side smacking you.

So depression is a comparison of your current reality to a fantasy you keep addicting to. And there’s about 15 most common depressive sources. [00:39:00] Unrealistic expectation on others to live one sided. You’re expecting people out there to be nice, never mean, positive, never negative, peaceful, never wrathful, delusional.

Not going to happen. Then you expect others to live in your values. Not going to happen. They can’t live in your values. They live in their own values. So don’t project your values so frantically onto them, thinking they’re supposed to live in your values. They’re not going to. They make decisions on their values.

The third one is the combination of the two. The fourth one is an unrealistic expectation on yourself to be one side. I need to be positive all the time. I need to be kind all the time. Not going to happen. Nobody’s going to, you don’t need to get rid of any part of yourself to love yourself and trying to get rid of part of yourself will be futile.

And the next one is unrealistic expectation on you to live in somebody else’s values. And that’s what happens when you’re infatuated with people. You expect to live in their values. You can’t sustain it. It’s non sustainable. You’ll eventually resent yourself and them. And then what happens is the odd combination of those two.

Then you have an unrealistic expectation on all of those. [00:40:00] So all seven of those, then you have an unrealistic expectation on collective society, but all the people in society, they’re always going to be one sided. World peace. Well, the Global Peace Index shows that peace and war have been balanced throughout history.

But for some reason, people live in a fantasy of one sidedness. Or they expect the world to live in your values. The whole world needs to match my values. I spoke at the United Nations in UNESCO in France, training center. And I was amazed at how many delusions some of the diplomats had about if we could just everybody live in my values, we’d have world peace.

Delusion. And then you have an unrealistic expectation on that, the two together. Then we have an unrealistic expectation on mechanical objects to live in our values. And most people get angry at machines and telephones and computers because they’re expecting them to be always nice, never mean, always doing what you want and never challenging you.

And then you expect them to live in your values and read your mind. And, and all these are delusions. [00:41:00] Add up to what we call depression. Depression is a comparison of your current reality to a whole bunch of delusions and unrealistic expectations mostly positive thinking Or one sided thinking that leaves the other side and the other side is not an illness It’s the depression is a feedback system to guide you to set realistic expectations that are congruent with what you value And let other people do the same in life when you do that.

You have a realistic expectation life. Life’s amazing That you’re grateful for life And anxiety is some event that occurred in your life that you chose to not see the upsides to that you’ve stored in your subconscious mind that has more pain and pleasure, more loss than gain, more negative than positive, more disadvantage than advantage, and you’re wounded by it.

And now in the process of doing it, you’re now being reminded of that by stimuli that are associated with that original event. And you’re compounding and promoting new associations that make it more expanded. So almost anything stimulates the remembrance of that event. If you go back to that [00:42:00] event and find the blessings in it, the upsides to it, the cascading anxieties go away.

I mean, I, I, I work with that. Almost every week in the Breakthrough Experience and show people how to dissolve these anxieties and it’s really doesn’t take that long and people go, yeah, but I’ve been going to my therapist for 10 years for my anxieties. That’s because they didn’t know what they’re doing.

They know what they’re doing. That’s a three hour thing or less. Most case, just all. Hmm. 

Melissa: I know for me, John, that. If I don’t feel like in my career, like I’m being purposeful, if I’m moving forward, if I’m being helpful, if I don’t feel like I’m moving forward, I feel depressed at times. And I know as well, like when I first had Bambi, I had a beautiful year long maternity leave and I wasn’t working and I was just in mom mode and I loved it so much.

But toward the end of it, I did start to feel like, Oh. I want to get back into being purposeful in my [00:43:00] work. I love my work. I love helping people. I love coaching people. I love supporting people and writing books and speaking and doing my podcast. So you’re saying that that was the opposite. Like I was creating the 

John: opposite.

No, no, probably in that case, you had a high value in making contributions. With intellectual property with knowledge and, and insights and help people empower their lives. That’s my observation of it. And so you love that. That’s fine. Your values and you also want to have a baby. So you have the baby, you had a high value on the baby.

But that other set of values is just temporarily sitting there waiting for somehow in your mind, you probably thought, well, I will breastfeed for a certain period of time. I’ll do that. And then when they get a certain age now, I want to start developing my career again. So you had that in your mind already.

And so it’s surfaced again at that time. And then you started thinking, well, I want to get back to making some sort of contribution because I’m not making the difference I’d like to [00:44:00] make with people. And if you ask people, when’s the most fulfilling moments in their life? Most people will say when they’ve made some sort of contribution to other people’s lives, they’ve said, thank you for something that they love doing.

That’s, that’s pretty common. So you have fulfillment raising your child and watching the milestones of the development of the child, but you also had to make a desire to go beyond that and make a difference in the community, city, state, nation, and world. So you probably gave yourself that year and you probably then allowed yourself to go back and to do it.

And now you’re finding that balance between those two, which is healthy. You’re eventually going to make it where the kids are going to start schooling. And then you’ll get more into your career possibly. And unless you’ve had more kids and some people, their highest value is their children. I know people that’s their highest value.

I know a woman that’s got 15 kids. She can’t think of anything but kids. That’s her life. And she loves it. I met a woman that had 27 kids, 27 frigging kids. And it’s like, Whoa, but they’re a whole focus. This kid, they don’t want to do a business. They don’t want to do that. They [00:45:00] want to take care of beautiful families.

But you had a desire for doing something and. And it’s been sitting kind of on the back burner. It’s not, it was, you did it intentionally because you want to have a baby. But as the baby starts maturing, you start thinking, okay, I’m now ready to get back into my career and, and have my life and the baby’s life.

Cause you now know you can, you can totally do it and delegate things and help people help you and serve the child. I always ask if, if you’re having challenging qualms about, do I go back into work or do I stay with a child or whatever? Just ask, how is going to work, serving the child? How is spending time with the child, helping work and link those.

Anytime two values are linked together, they enhance each other. Anytime they’re not linked, they tend to hinder each other. So if you go and find out how he’s doing what you love doing, helping the child because you’re inspired, you want to bring your inspiration to the child and the knowledge to the child, and, and, and there’s lots of benefits from that.

And at two and a half, they’re really soaking up information. But if you link those together, then there’s no, there’s a transition back into the workforce [00:46:00] and back into the contribution on a grander scale again. Also, in the meantime, while you’re having your child, you can ask. What is the impact of this child’s having of the global, because you, you, in the meantime, you focused on the child for a year.

And the thing is that’s impacted you, which is impacting others. So you gave you knowledge that you now can make a difference in other people’s lives. It probably had a lot of mothers calling in when you started back because of it. 

Melissa: Absolutely. And now with our latest company that Nick and I have launched, which is called SheLaunch, it’s helping females.

So, you know, we’re so dedicated to helping females get to six and seven figures. So they are doing what they love and making the income that they want to make so that they can be the best mamas, the best partners that they can be. So they feel empowered in their career and in their parenting. So that’s now what we’re doing.

John: Perfect. Well, that’s the perfect blend. That’s why you link those together. When people don’t link them together, they feel torn. I feel guilty if they’re working, I feel guilty if [00:47:00] they’re not working and they’re, and that’s because they haven’t linked them. Yours spontaneously were linked. So now you can realize that you can.

Actually make a career out of doing something you love with the children. I had a woman that said she had this beautiful little blonde daughter and she was, I mean, everybody wanted to take pictures of this beautiful girl. And then she thought, you know, she’s a model, a basic model. So she started charging for the, for the modeling, everything else.

Her mom, her daughter is a model and actress. And that started when she was two, because she allowed her to build a business. She built a business around them because she was also an actress. She built a business and they grew together and did things together. And they were, they were dressed light. They were going places.

They were your mom and daughter and everybody wanted to take pictures. And she built her career out of it so it can be done. But guilt is an assumption. Whatever you’ve done with your actions somehow has caused more drawbacks and benefits [00:48:00] to somebody. And it’s not true because there’s always a benefit side to it.

Just because they don’t see it doesn’t mean you can’t see it. And if you go and find out the benefit of it and find out how it serves people, you don’t have to carry the burden of guilt around over something that’s not necessary. I help people dissolve guilt every weekend in the Breakthrough Experience.

They come in with guilt every weekend, or some shame, or guilt, or some fear. And all those are nothing but imbalance ratios of perception. If you balance them out and bring them back to the center, they’re gone. They dissolve away. It doesn’t take that long. I’ve seen people dissolve things they’ve been carrying around guilt for for decades.

And 15, 20 minutes, it’s gone. I’ve seen it over and over again. 

Melissa: Wow. That’s amazing. I’d never experienced this thing called mom guilt, which so many people talk about. And I had never heard so many people talk about it until I became a mom. And it’s this thing, it’s like, Oh, mom guilt, mom guilt. It’s just like so common.

People talk about it. They feel guilty if they’re working and they’re not with their child 24 7. And like [00:49:00] I said to one of my clients, I was like, well, you kind of got to think about it this way. Like, would I want Nick to be by my side 24 7? Like do I want him next to me all day, every day, like coming to the toilet with me?

Do I want him showering with me? No, I want some time to myself. Or with other people as well. And when like I said that to her, she was like, Oh yeah, like that actually makes a lot of sense. And I was like, let other people love your children. Let grandparents love them. Let aunts, uncles. 

John: If you ask the question, because I’ve seen that God knows how many times, working thousands of times.

Men do it too. Men have the idea, well, I should be home with the kid, but I can’t. I gotta, gotta run this new business I’m starting, you know? And you just write down how specifically is dedicating my energies to my business, helping my child and stack up 30, 40, 50 benefits. Until you get a tear and how is spending time with my child helping me grow my business and don’t stop [00:50:00] till you get a tear I guarantee you that changes the game and it takes all that away And also when you’re not there who’s playing your role and when you are when you’re at work Who’s playing your child’s role?

It’s a real interesting thing, you know side c of the demartini method in the break to expand When somebody thinks they’ve lost something I go. Okay, so When somebody disappeared, died or left or whatever, and you think you lost these traits who emerged in your life to demonstrate those traits in your life.

And I show them that it’s there and I make them accountable for it. And they go, Oh my God, I can’t believe I didn’t see this. And then what’s the benefit of them doing that? And what would be the drawback if it was. In this old form, and we clear that, balance those out, and all of a sudden they’re resilient and adaptable.

They allow themselves to be with their children, be at work, without all the guilt associations. And if they do, sometimes you’ll find that your children are more independent, because they got to figure things out for themselves. They develop more social skills, they interact with friends. Other people become [00:51:00] father figures and mother figures at school, and the teacher plays a role, and the best friend’s father gets to play, participate in it.

And you get it diversified and that gives them more resilience and adaptability to a changing environment than it is if it’s just a pen on one brush. Hmm. 

Melissa: So interesting. And I love playing that special role for my friend’s children, like that special and fun auntie role. Like I love playing that. And so seeing my daughter have that with other people, it’s so beautiful.

I love watching their relationships. I love seeing how much my daughter loves these other people. It’s really, really beautiful to watch. 

John: That’s a healthy dynamic. That’s why, you know, I like to think of it this way. I was joking one time at a, in my break through and experience. And I, I said, this woman was so attached to her kid, like, so really like frightened of walking away.

I mean, it’s really ridiculous. And it was over overkill. And it was like, the kid’s like smothered, right? And the kid’s manipulating the mom with it. [00:52:00] Whenever it wants, it does this. And then the mom comes running and it’s just, it’s a manipulation game. So I said, I said, when, imagine if your baby’s born and the baby turned to you and said, what are your credentials?

And you go, I don’t know what the hell I’m doing. So I’m, I’m new at this. And they go, okay, you know, I had a, I had it right here on the ship many years ago. I’ve been living here for 22 years. And when I first got here, I, I met a woman who was 16 years old and her parents were very wealthy and they hired or they bought two apartments on the ship and the girl, 16 years old, lived in it.

So it was an independent girl living on the ship. The parents used the other apartment for Nobel prize winners. And they, they found the top professional leading experts in different fields, and they created a curriculum of education for, from 16 on, that was unbelievably, I mean, just [00:53:00] unbelievably exceptional.

I used to come and join them for their classes sometimes just to learn from these highly intelligent people, right, these leaders. And they got the opportunity to sail around the world in this luxury kind of place. They were taken advantage of it. They were paid well, and the, the, the children do it. She ended up with five companies by the time she was 22, financially independent by 22, I mean, she was a, and socially involved in social political involvement.

She was a philanthropic, I mean, it was a mind blowing. So the parents, you could say, well, they weren’t there for the child, or maybe they were in another way. So sometimes we have to ask, are we the most highest quality? If we go to the lowest socioeconomic, people usually follow in the footsteps of a parent and they do the same trade.

They go to higher socioeconomics, people go into specialties and excel in things. And the question is, is what’s the greatest thing for the child? Probably a balance. Probably a little bit from the [00:54:00] parents, probably a little bit from experts. But give the children the ability to have self and other. Self and other, and don’t go to one extreme or the other.

That’s, and I saw this child do extraordinary things, amazing things because she had, and then the parents would come and visit her and then they’d, they’d get a place. They rent out another apartment and come and visit her for a period of time and they joined together. And, but they were talking to her every, almost every day they had conversations, but they gave her an autonomy and believed that she was autonomous and gave her a capacity to do that.

I was at 14. I was 13. I left home at 14. I was, I was living on my own at 14. That used to be not uncommon back, you know, years ago, but I was doing that at young age. I’m grateful that I was on entrepreneur at a young age. 

Melissa: Wow. Wow. Oh my gosh. Let’s talk about wealth creation for a moment because you talk a lot about saving money now.

What are some of the things that we need to think about in order to set ourselves up and [00:55:00] to not have money slipping through our fingers? I want your take on wealth 

John: creation. Well, money circulates through the economy from those who value it least to those who value it most. And if you don’t have a value on wealth building, it’s not going to occur.

I’ve done enough interviews on people that are, I’ve met over 150 billionaires, and I’ve, I know a lot of people that are impoverished too. I’ve met both extremes. And the people that have wealth have a high value on building their fortunes and the people that don’t, don’t. And if you have a higher value on buying consumables that depreciate value with immediate gratification than you do deferred gratification buying assets, you’re not going to be financially independent.

It’s not going to happen. It’s a value structure that determines that and your hierarchy of values dictate your financial destiny. So I first do a value determination of where is money on the value list. If it’s not in the top four, financial independent isn’t going to occur. Proven that, but doing value determinations for 45 years, I’ve met enough people that know that’s true.

If you don’t [00:56:00] have a value on it, it’s going to slip through your hands because money is going to keep going to what you value. If you value travel, it’s going to go there. If you value food, it’s going to go there. If you value education, it’s going to go there. If you value kids, it’s going to go there. If you don’t value asset accumulation, where it’s passively working for you and buying assets, you’re not going to have financial impediment.

And people don’t realize that if they were allowed them to do that, Eventually their money crescendos, and then they increase in their opportunities and the life that they want. So I’m a firm believer in empowering all areas. I believe you can do them all. And so I realized that, and so I figured out a way of becoming financially independent.

I made it to financial independence multiple times over. And in the process of doing that, it gives me the freedom to do what I love doing. Not because I have to, but because I love to. To me, that’s what the purpose of financial independence is. Relax and be debaucherous and drink yourself to death or whatever.

I believe that it’s there to give you an [00:57:00] opportunity to do what you really love to do, not because you have to, but because you love to. And then think philanthropically, what do you want to make the contribution and decide, because if you give money into taxes and to the governments, they may not put it where you would like it to go.

Why don’t you decide where do you think it can serve the greatest number of people in the most efficient manner? That’s fulfilling to make a difference in people’s lives with the resources you’ve been able to develop in your life. 

Melissa: So interesting. I love it. And then, yeah, like you said, the work that you get to do is because you actually want to do it, not because you have to do it.

That’s it. Beautiful. Okay. John, I would love to hear now, if you could put one book in the school curriculum of every high school around the world, I’m going to actually give you two books. One can be one of yours for high school students and one not of your books. What two books would you choose? 17 year old male and female.

John: I would put in [00:58:00] the school curriculum, my values factor book for mine. And I would put Syntopic in volumes one and two by Mortimer Adler as a class that would be worthy of pursuing for high school. Beautiful. 

Melissa: Beautiful. And I’ll link to those in the show notes, as well as all of your incredible work.

John: William Radley’s Significant Volumes 1 and 2 is a synthesis of the greatest ideas by the greatest minds in the Western culture over the last 2, 700 years. It’s a really nice piece. 

Melissa: Wow. I’m definitely going to check that out. Thank you for sharing that. Now I want to hear about, uh, your days and how you set yourself up for the day.

Like what are your little rituals and routines? I know it’s different probably all the time, especially being on the boat. Can you talk us through a quote unquote, typical day in your life? 

John: Well, I, I learned many times, many years ago when I was 27. So this is quite a few years back. [00:59:00] Don’t waste your time on low priority things.

Ask yourself, what do you want to feed your mind? Knowledge wise, prioritize. What do you want to feed your body? Gain knowledge on it. Prioritize it. Who do you want to associate with, feed your social life? Prioritize it. Prioritize the actions in your business. Prioritize what inspires you. You want to prioritize your life because if you’re not living in top priorities, you’re going to devalue yourself.

It’s over the world. The world will reflect it. So anytime you don’t fill your day with the highest priority actions, it fills up with lowest priority distractions. So I have already determined what my highest priorities are. Teach, research, write, travel. That’s it. Everything else is delegated. I have specialists taking care of everything else.

So I haven’t cooked since I was 24. I haven’t driven a car in 32 years. I have people that take care of cleaning. I have people that take care of cooking. I have people to take care of. You know, concierge service. I I’ve hired people to take [01:00:00] care of everything that needs to be done. That is distracting or requires any form of motivation to me to do.

And I only do the things that I spontaneously love doing and inspired to do, teach, research, ride, and travel. So that’s my day. And when I, when I do that, I, it varies because I’m in different countries when I’m on the ship, I’m in different countries, I’m in four country time zones a year, I mean, a week sometimes, so I’m moving around all the time, a little bit strange on hours.

But I eat high priority foods and I, and I associate with amazing people. I try to prioritize that cause I learned if you do, you will build incremental momentum towards a more fulfilling and more meaningful and inspiring life. So I’m, I simplified my life. I’m very much a minimalist. I don’t need a lot.

I’m simple, but I surrounded myself with people who are experts doing what I want to delegate so I can do what I love. 

Melissa: I love that so much. So inspiring. Now, I’d love to head into a little rapid fire round. [01:01:00] I’ve got three rapid fire questions for you. Are you ready? Okay. What is one thing that we can do today for our health?

John: Number one on health. Is find a career that you absolutely love to do. So you’re not putting unnecessary distress into your life. Because if you tap dance to work, as Buffett says, you’re more likely to have less health issues. That has been proven by cytokine studies, inflammatory responses. You can work 18 hours a day, which I’ve done for many, many years, 18 to 20 hours a day.

No problem. If you’re doing something you love doing, there’s no distress from it. Most people don’t think I’m 69, but I still have more energy than most people. Now, drinking water is also the most universal solvent. I’m not against having vegetable juices, but I don’t do stimulants that cause fluctuation.

I don’t do high glycemic foods and drinks and things like that to hide. I eat [01:02:00] to perform. I don’t live to eat. So eat to perform. Ask what is the highest priority fuel that allows you to maximize your potential on a daily basis and find out what that is and prioritize. Do the same thing in activities. I do my, I did my exercise this morning.

I do exercise. I don’t do it all the time. I don’t do it every day. I do about once a week, but I do a routine that is satisfying to make sure that I’m keep myself in tone. I drink a lot of water. I eat wisely, as I said, and I do what I love every day and walk, get out there and walk, walk, and use probably the greatest exercises there is.

I would say there’s six exercises, walking, walking up incline planes. Swimming, yoga, lovemaking, and, and, and, and breathing deeply, right? Yogic breathing type things. These all are wise exercises that don’t cause injuries that help you keep core fit and have a purpose. People that have a purpose and [01:03:00] something deeply meaningful in life tend to live longer than people that don’t.

And if you’re living by priority, you’re going to live longer because you’re. You’re opening up the forebrain, which has foresight, which sees things and has bigger, broader things. You measure an individual by their most distant ends, as Seneca said, and the magnitude of space and time in your innermost dominant thought will determine the level of conscious evolution you’ve attained.

Give yourself permission to go after something that’s so That will keep you busy for your life. So you have a long life because it’s going to, you’re going to be working on it for your life. 

Melissa: Yeah. I love that. So beautiful. So many great points and helpful things there. Now what about wealth? What’s one thing that we can do for our wealth today?

Take a 

John: portion of whatever you earn, regardless if you think you can do it and start buying assets with it. Start buying the S& P 500 in America or whatever country, find a suburb and just buy it. Or buy it, buy assets, either by quality companies or quality real estate, but start buying assets and don’t wait for extra to [01:04:00] come in.

It won’t occur. The wealthy always paid themselves first. The poverty always paid themselves last because entropy will take over. If you don’t put money into something, that’s an asset and automatically be wiped out by a liability. Focus on buying assets. Don’t say I can’t afford it. Just go and pay it.

The more you manage money wise, you get more money to manage. Start buying assets. I don’t care of how small it is. I opened up an account for somebody that only had 200. We opened up an account for 200. He put 50 away. He’s now at 7, 000 a month. Over a three year period, he went from 50 to 7, 000. He just kept, because you manage money wisely, you start getting more money.

You start managing, you start saving more. And every time you save and invest and buy assets, you manage money. Money comes to people who manage it wisely. I love that. What 

Melissa: are your thoughts on 

John: crypto? I’m not a crypto buyer. That’s a speculation. Investments is different than speculation. Speculation is based on the idea of what you think is going to [01:05:00] happen instead of what it has a track record.

And so I don’t, I’ve never touched the crypto world. I keep it to quality companies that serve ever greater numbers of people. I look at a company, I bought a company 41 years ago, a peanut butter company. I ate peanut butter as a child and I died. That company will still be selling peanut butter. And I, and it’s going to give me about an, about a double digit return for the last 41 years.

So I buy companies certain that will be serving people over long periods of time. I don’t speculate on what that’s going to be. I look for ones that have a track record, that has been quality managed, that has governance. I don’t speculate with my money cause fools part with their money. 

Melissa: Yeah, absolutely.

Okay. Last one out of these three rapid fire. What is one thing that we can do for more love in our life? 

John: Realize that everything that’s going on is part of it. So if you perceive something you think is challenging, look for its opposite, the support, and the balance of support and challenge makes up love.

Love’s the synthesis of synchronicity of all pairs of opposites. In [01:06:00] every perception we have, there’s a pair of opposites. For every memory, there’s an anti memory. For everything that supports, there’s a challenge. Heraclitus, 500 BC, wrote all about this, and it hasn’t been improved upon since. He called it the unity of opposites.

Train your mind, no matter what you see, to look for its opposite, to counterbalance it, to keep it steady. And you will stabilize yourself, and you will maximize your potential in life. But if you allow lopsided perceptions to throw you off with impulses and instincts, think about the time you were really infatuated with somebody you couldn’t sleep at night, or really resentful of somebody you can’t sleep at night because you’re highly polarized.

But if you’re stable and centralized and see both sides simultaneously, Wilhelm Wundt, the father of experimental psychology in 1895 said, Simultaneous contrasts stabilize and imbalanced contrasts volatilize. One is the amygdala, the volatile, and one is the executive center. So if you want to be an executive and govern your life and become master of destiny, not victim of history, look for the other side of whatever’s happening and [01:07:00] balance it, just like in the contrarian view of economics, when the market goes down, that’s a time to buy.

When the market goes up, that may be a time to hold. So balance things out in your mind and watch what happens. You stabilize your life. 

Melissa: Yeah, absolutely. This has been so amazing. Before we go, is there anything else that you want to share with us? Any last parting words of wisdom? 

John: Just know that no matter what you’ve done or not done, you’re worthy of love.

Stop judging yourself. Stop comparing yourself to other people. If you put people in pedestals, you’ll minimize yourself. If you put people in pits, you’ll exaggerate yourself. And you won’t love yourself as long as you’re in posture with exaggeration and minimization of self. Start looking. Whatever you see in others, look for where you have it inside.

If you admire it, look for where you have the trait you admire. If you despise it, look for where you have the trait you despise. Know that whatever you perceive in others, you have. When you own it, stabilize yourself and have reflective awareness. You maximize your authenticity and the magnificence of your authentic self is more powerful than any fantasies you [01:08:00] impose on yourself.

Melissa: I love that so much. So beautiful. Thank you so much for ending on that. Now John, you are helping so many people. You are serving so many people. The work you are doing is incredible. So I want to know how I and the listeners can give back and serve you today. 

John: You’re doing it right now. I’m getting to talk to people I don’t get to talk to every day.

So thank you. Bless you. That’s the reward of being 

Melissa: with you. Thank you so much, John. This has been such a pleasure. I always love chatting with you. And you’re always welcome on the show. Thank you just so much for everything that you have done for me in my life and Nick. And I’m just so grateful to know you and to share you and your work again with my audience.

So thank you so much. 

John: Thank you. Appreciate this time.

Melissa: My friends, I highly recommend diving into all of his books, any of his programs, if you have access [01:09:00] to them in your town, do them, go. They are life changing. I hope you loved this conversation, got a lot out of it. Please go and listen to the other two episodes with Dr. John Demartini. He is amazing. And if you loved it, please leave me a review on Apple Podcasts because that means that we can inspire and educate even more people together.

And also means that all of my episodes will just pop up in your feed so that you never have to go searching for a new episode. Now, come and tell me on Instagram at Melissa Ambrosini what you got from this episode. I love connecting with you and hearing from you, so jump on over there. Now, before I go, I just wanted to say thank you so much for being here, for wanting to be the best, the healthiest, and the happiest version of yourself, and for showing up today for you.

You rock. Now, if there’s someone in your life that you can think of that would really benefit from this episode, Please share it with them right now. You can take a screenshot, share it on your social media, email it to them, text it to them, do whatever you’ve got to do to get this in their ears. And [01:10:00] until next time, don’t forget that love is sexy, healthy is liberating, and wealthy isn’t a dirty word.

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