Dhru: [00:00:02] Hey, everybody. This is Dr. Dhru, and I’m here to welcome you to my podcast, Ikigai Leadership. We’re going to be talking to leaders in all different industries from all different backgrounds and demographics from all over the world. And we’ll be discussing topics like leadership development, culture, DEI content creation and marketing and all things business and entrepreneurship. Hey, everybody. Welcome back to another edition of Ikigai Leadership. And my name is Dhru Beeharilal. I’m here with Dr. Stefan Zavalin. So one thing I love about Stefan, he also loves Purple, which is my favorite color as well, which is cool, makes him automatically close to my heart. On top of that, he’s also a fellow nerd and fellow business owner, so we have a lot in common. And you’re actually also legally blind, right? So which is amazing. You couldn’t tell because again, just you operate. So I don’t want to say normally, but you operate so ably, I should say. What’s the politically right way to say that? I don’t know. But either way, you’d never be able to tell Stefan. You know, you call yourself the unicorn. I’ll start with that. Where did that come from? What does that what does that mean to you?

Stefan: [00:01:08] You know, it actually it came about because I was being called a unicorn a lot of times. And then I just started sort of wearing it. It came about so I was originally born in Russia and then moved when we were seven and grew up in Nashville, Tennessee. And I think that many people don’t know about Nashville, Tennessee nowadays is that if you grew up in Nashville and you’re still in Nashville, you’re a unicorn, that’s what you’re referred to as because it’s so rare, most people move away. And so that kind of unicorn thing came out from being called there. And then I always loved to do things differently. I always just stand out and just do random stuff all the time and make it theatrical. I was never in theater, but I was one of those kids where you’re like, That’s a theater kid. I didn’t get exposed to what theater even was until I got to undergrad when I joined a rock band. And all of them were theater kids, and I was like, Oh, I’m just a musician. I don’t know what this is all about. So the unicorn thing was kind of always there. And I went to school. I went to grad school for physical therapy. I got my doctorate in physical therapy. I also got a parasite in grad school. That’s not something that they advertise on the university brochure.

Stefan: [00:02:09] But it wasn’t even there. It sounds so bad now. I wasn’t born blind. I became blind, as all of that. And I was in the clinic. I was doing just the usual clinic stuff and documentation got so much, and I wanted to start my own business. And I swear this relates to unicorns. It’s coming. And when I started my first business, and I was still in this shell of being like, no, I have to be very professional. I have to do things this way. This is how we do it. In the clinics, they always made us wear ties even though we did exercises. I was like, Man, why? What is this? Come on. And so then finally when I really pushed out, and I was like, No, I want to be the me that everybody says, like, be yourself, do the thing that you’re supposed to do and that you love doing. And I went, well, unicorns are pretty cool, and that would be the unicorn thing to do. And nobody would ever expect a unicorn kind of a business thing like this. So that’s what I’m going to do. And then the tagline to that finally was, I was like, Oh, but then people won’t think I’m professional. How do I overcome that limiting belief? Call the company The Professional Unicorn. Nobody can argue with you there. And that is the full circle.

Dhru: [00:03:12] There you go. I mean, those are the kind of the most fun stories, though, the ones that kind of evolve organically. Like you said, it was always there, but you never really called it out until it kind of came out. Right. Everything we do, it’s kind of like that. I appreciate the think about Nashville, too, by the way, because DC is kind of the opposite. I consider myself some of the unicorn in DC as well because of the fact that I’m actually from DC and 98% of people are from somewhere else and moved here. So it’s kind of like the opposite of Nashville where everyone moves away, everyone moves to DC, and I’m actually, I was already here, which is interesting. So when you started that business, you said, you know, you went through the process of going to school and getting your doctorate and everything. What was the first business you started, and what made you start it?

Stefan: [00:03:51] There was kind of a combination of I was basically being pushed out of the clinic because of the whole blindness thing. And then we were trying to get accommodations and they were giving me… It was a nightmare, and I finally said, I don’t even, I don’t want to deal with this. So I was already in my mind. I was thinking, I want to start a side hustle. I want to do something. I had already kind of purchased the website, and I was going to talk to people about the dangers of sitting and how we can help remedy that. So I dived in. That was the first business. It was a consulting business around the whole idea that we should reduce how much we sit. And so it resulted in a book called “Sit Less”, a Ted Talk called “Move More, Sit Less”, and a show called “Scared Shitless”, because that’s a hilarious title. But, the goal was to kind of public speaking and educating that it’s not just go do exercises, and there is a very valuable lesson that I think I’m still holding true even to the new business, The Professional Unicorn. The thought behind it was the idea that you’re given a problem, and a lot of us go, Oh, okay, I need to do more of the good thing that will solve this problem. And I was saying, But what if instead of doing more of the good thing, we do less of the bad thing? And this could be translation into diet? What if instead of eating, you know, more salad, you eat less pizza, and naturally that can be a vacuum, so better things fill in slowly, and you make that transition. At work instead of being more productive, how do you be less ineffective? And if you view it from that perspective? So yeah, that was the first business.

Dhru: [00:05:15] Yeah, now you’re talking crazy. Because that just makes too much sense, right? I mean, why not? It’s like the it’s the helmet idea, right? Like, why not stop doing the thing that makes us need a helmet and just get us a helmet. Right? It’s like it’s the Jerry Seinfeld thing, which always cracked me up because it’s like a funny joke. But in reality, it’s. It’s a legitimate thought, right? It’s like, hey, we decided that we were going to create something to allow us to continue doing this dangerous thing, which eventually is now having TBI and things. We’re all recovering now, concussions and whatnot. Right. But we made this helmet to allow us to do more of the things that are inherently going to kill us. We, as a society. It’s a funny case study. I’m like, I’m curious, you’re a clinical guy as well, right? If you’re looking at an experiment and consider the human race like an experiment and the way that it works, the way that it functions or doesn’t at times, I wonder where we are in the spectrum in terms of successful or non-successful experiment outcome-wise.

Stefan: [00:06:15] With that premise of the experimentation you’re setting up, that there is an answer of success versus failure.

Dhru: [00:06:21] It’s all relative.

Stefan: [00:06:21] And then that’s a huge question. It’s like we don’t what is success versus what is failure, right?

Dhru: [00:06:25] What are we trying to do? If we’re, again, going back to another comedian, George Carlin Right. There’s the whole point of us being here was to create plastic. Then we’ve succeeded, right? Because maybe the earth needs plastic long term. But if the whole thing of creating us or us existing was to, I don’t know, have a productive society that people are people are happy, I think we’re pretty much in the failure category at this point. Yeah.

Stefan: [00:06:47] Yeah, maybe. All right, I’m gonna spin around. Let’s get a tiny amount of deep and hear more about our host in your perception of the small because realistically, maybe you know thousands of people, that is a tiny fraction of humanity. What do you think our, not our purpose on earth is, that’s that’s way deep. But what to you would be success versus failure? What would be an interesting metric to go by, do you think? Not that there’s only one I’m not gonna like. I’m just curious.

Dhru: [00:07:09] You mean like humanity wise? Human race?

Stefan: [00:07:12] Yeah, human race.

Dhru: [00:07:13] I’d say creating a society where people felt safe, felt largely happy, and I mean happy, not in, like, the immediate, like, momentary happiness, like, I just got a birthday cake happy. But, like, a content feeling like I’m. I’m secure, I’m happy. I can. I have a good life with my family or whatever and I can continue to move up and do what I need to do. I think we’re better off than we were a thousand years ago in some of that. But in some ways but I think in some ways we’re not right. Like mental health wise. We’re not. I think in terms of money, just sheer numbers of money, we are. But at the end of the day, also because of inflation, we don’t know if that’s actually a real thing. So I think we’ve moved away from from happiness in some ways by creating the 9 to 5, by creating these these things, these artificial constructs we’ve created in society to make us function a certain way. And I think in some ways we move towards it as well, because we’re saying we’re, you know, we’re going to focus on things like mental health and like taking care of people who need to be taken care of and creating accommodations for folks who need them, you know, Whereas, you know, 2000 years ago, they might have just stoned you if you were blind, you know, just like shunned you. It’s like that guy’s blind. He’s cursed by God. He should not be part of society versus like, Hey, this guy had a parasite that needs to be treated. And we did the best we can, but it sucks, but let’s see what we can do to make sure he can do what he needs to do in society still, you know?

Stefan: [00:08:29] Yeah. Tiny aside, blind guy story. So as one of the many surgeries that had to get, I had to get cataract surgery, which is now hilarious, when I get to talk to like old people and they’re like, “you’ve never gotten a cataract,” and I’m like, yeah. So I’m laying there. they’re about to they’re administering anesthesia, I’m about to go into the op room and the nurse is like, Do you know why they call it like, you know what cataract means? And I’m like, Don’t know. No idea. It means waterfall. And I’m like, Oh, why does it mean waterfall? She’s like, Well, in ancient Egypt, they didn’t have surgery, so they waited so long that the lens and it’s the lens of the eye kind of becomes opaque and hardens. They would take a hammer, hit you on the head and it would crumble. And because it was just so opaque and you couldn’t see through, it would let people see again, it wasn’t great sight, but it was much better than it was. That’s it. That’s why it’s called a waterfall. It’s like the waterfall, the shattered lenses falling like a waterfall. And I was like, So you’re telling me that right before I go to surgery for this? Awesome, smart.

Dhru: [00:09:20] That’s a great pre-surgery story. It’s like the one where. Like, it’s like, hey, by the way, you know, I know you’re about to get leg surgery, but this is really cool, funny story where this guy, they cut off the wrong leg. Isn’t that isn’t that hilarious? It’s like, yes, that is hilarious. Right before I’m about to go in for leg surgery. That’s great.

Stefan: [00:09:35] Yeah, absolutely. But to you, to your point about this whole idea of kind of the peace, the happiness side of it, yeah, I was really thinking about the fact that technology just amplifies what we are. So it amplifies the good as well as the bad and money. Money is technically technology, if you want to think about it that way. It doesn’t. It’s not a thing as much as cash is a thing. It’s an idea. It’s an idea that represents something else. It’s technically a technology to communicate some kind of a value. Great. That’s all that it really is. And yeah, it does amplify nowadays, sometimes the bad, especially with… We can get into the whole social media side of things and how much that is amplifying the good and the bad of people.

Dhru: [00:10:15] Yeah, no, I mean, you touched a couple of things, right? I mean, one is that the money idea? I don’t think we talked about crypto when we talked about the first time, but that brings up for me, it brings up the idea of crypto, right? People keep saying. Cryptocurrency is not real. It’s fake, it’s fake, it’s fake. And I’m like, Money’s fake. Money is the same as cryptocurrency in that sense. Anytime you get people together and they decide something has value. Then it has value. But then that community, it’s just a lot of that money happens to be largely accepted as having value. If you were to take the US dollar, for example, and go to Mars, it has zero value now. Right. It doesn’t mean anything on Mars or to Martians or to aliens or whatever, right? Because it doesn’t have anything at all. There’s a story of this guy, this explorer or whatever was going traveling to some South American country. And he found natives there. And he was he was like, I want this. I forgot what he’s trying to buy from them, but he wanted something from them and he wanted to trade them jewels. For what? Or gold for what they had. And they’re like, What is this crap? You know, they have, they don’t consider jewels or gold to have the same value that we consider it to have, right? That society considered it to have. And so it didn’t mean anything to them. And so the exchange was was not possible because he had nothing of value to them. Right. So value is relative. And I’m curious what your thought about that is.

Stefan: [00:11:32] Was it cocoa beans? Cocoa beans?

Dhru: [00:11:35] Yeas, I think it was Cocoa beans.

Stefan: [00:11:36] That was, That was a whole thing, like for the Mayans and others just because of the health benefits and. Yeah. And they they literally used it as currency as well. And so it was like, this is a bean. What do you mean? Nothing. I was interviewing actually a crypto guy and I love him, when people say, well, it’s digital money, it’s not real. And he just goes, okay, but. Where’s all your money? In a bank. So, like, you take out, like, gold and cash? Oh, no, no, no. It’s on my credit card. That’s digital money. What I was thinking through all this is that size, in a way, gives a lot of authority. So, for example, the dollar vastly used across the entire world gives authority to it as a currency. It’s the same way that, technically speaking, every single person is an influencer. They interact with some other people and they somehow influence them. But the vast majority of people we would not call influencers. Even if we just look at only the people on social media. Like you’re not actually an influencer. Why? Well, you don’t have a million followers.

Stefan: [00:12:29] You don’t have the credibility of having high volume and thus the authority of whatever that might be, but that doesn’t actually not make them an influencer. So I think it’s it’s that combined part. I think what makes people kind of get worried about crypto is that it seems quote unquote fake because anybody could create one. You and I could decide that we can create a cryptocurrency and then it’s like, okay, you guys just printed monopoly money. That’s that’s the equivalent in people’s minds. And so then all of a sudden, it means it has no value. But if we create a circle of friends where we’re going, we’re only giving them this kind of stuff. And you can only buy these products with these specific bucks that we decided to make. Now you’re generating that, but it’s really hard to communicate that to people, especially older people that are kind of set in their ways and like, why? Why is it necessarily changing? But we’re all human. We’re all we all have a hard time with change.

Dhru: [00:13:20] Yeah. No, absolutely. And again, people from the like, you know, even the boomer generation. Right. The world has changed so much since. I mean, I’m thinking about how much the world has changed just since I’ve been alive. Right. And I’m a later millennial, right? So, I was born in ’84. And so just from ’84 to now, the world is completely different than it was, you know, like completely different. I mean, we don’t have dial-up, have like circular phones anymore. Like the whole circle dialing thing is gone. We don’t have dial tones. People have no idea what a dial tone is. I was talking to somebody the other day. My friend and I were making the joke about the the dial-up sound like the (makes dial-up internet sound) that thing. No one knows what that is anymore. No one has any clue what that is. And this I was with a bunch of Gen Z people and they were like, what are you doing? What does that sound? And I’m like, Wow, I’m old as fuck, dude. Like this is.

Stefan: [00:14:12] Have you seen, it’s a legitimate thing, is just asking a person to mime that they’re talking on the phone. And so older generations, they’ll do the hand with the thumb and everything and others will just do their palm because that’s how they’re used to doing it. And holding cell phones.

Dhru: [00:14:27] Yeah, I remember. I saw that. I think that was on, was it Instagram or something? One of those things. Yeah, it was. It was just.

Stefan: [00:14:32] Yeah, it’s, it’s interesting. It’s wild to think about some of those things.

Dhru: [00:14:36] Yeah. It’s a culture shift.

Stefan: [00:14:37] Like CDs, like burning CDs. What, what, what did you use to do?

Dhru: [00:14:41] Yeah. Burn CDs and cartridges. Like video game cartridges.

Stefan: [00:14:46] So blowing on the cartridge. What are you guys doing?

Dhru: [00:14:50] I was on a call earlier today, and this guy was talking about a VCR, and I was like, I love you because you said VCR. That’s why I love you right now, because you said VCR. And I know what that is. And 80% of people on this call have no idea what you just said. Oh, actually, funny story along the same lines. Actually, I was playing Taboo over the weekend with with a group of friends. Right. And compact disc came up. Right. That was the clue. And so I was like, okay, this is the precursor to DVDs. And they’re like, someone’s like CDs? And like, okay, what does that stand for? They’re like, uh, disc, something disc. I’m like, Do you not know compact disc? Like, that’s what it came from. And they were guessing everything. They were guessing like, you know, I forgot what, what other guesses they had, but they, they, they didn’t get to, they never got the compact disc. And we didn’t get, we didn’t get the point. But I was like, are you kidding me right now? Like, and these are my fiance’s friends. So they’re younger, they’re significantly younger, like eight years younger than me. But. I was just like. I don’t want to live in a world where no one knows what compact disc is.

Stefan: [00:15:52] I will give them a tiny amount of credit. They at least knew what a CD was. That’s true. So I give small credits for abbreviations sometimes, especially when abbreviations mean the same thing, like it’s the same abbreviation, but for for different industries, it’s different stuff. So sometimes I just I’m like, Am I about to make an ass of myself?

Dhru: [00:16:11] I mean, I did all the time, so. Yeah. That’s awesome, man. So when you’re talking about working with clients, and let’s shift it a little bit to, to the kind of business side of things a little bit when you’re working with, with your clients, right? What are the things that you see that they do that you’re like, I’ve seen this a thousand times. I see this with almost every client I see. Like, what are the most common things you deal with with with folks like that?

Stefan: [00:16:32] All right, I’m gonna mention a really tiny one just because of everything we were just talking about. And it’s wild. I think it’s called the Millennial Pause now. So because I do video recordings with people. But it’s the pause that when people press the record button and they pause for a second for it to catch up, to start recording. And nowadays, technology is so fast where you don’t have to do that. You should start talking as soon as you press the button. And it’s so counterintuitive because like, we didn’t grow up with it. We like, give it a second. Oh, I see the button. Okay. It’s saying it’s recording. I’m gonna go. That’s always a really hilarious little step for me to see how well a person’s versed in those kind of recordings and if they know or don’t know. But working with people of getting them on camera, because my whole premise is I believe that everybody has the potential to be special, but not everybody is special. And a lot of times that’s where business owners kind of struggle because they’re going, I don’t know why anybody would want to hear about what I have to talk about. I don’t look good on camera. I can’t really talk to people. And I’m like, But you’re like a business coach.

Stefan: [00:17:29] What do you mean you don’t know how to talk to people? You’ve been zooming for the last 2 to 3 years, so you’re fine on camera. Like none of these are legitimate excuses whatsoever, but it’s the barriers that we put there. And so it’s making it as close to what reality is. So the kind of work that I do is where I get on and have a conversation with them, and all of a sudden it’s like, Oh, this is a little closer to reality. We focus on them as a human being, which fun fact? Anybody listening, business owner or not, you’ve been a human being longer than a business owner. Mind blown. I know. Craziness. So if we connect to you as a human and talk to you as a human, now all of a sudden you’re going, Oh, I know this. I know Stefan as a human, I think, I hope maybe. So, building that connection allows us to then actually showcase them and somebody that people feel like, Oh, I can connect to this person as opposed to the salesperson most people see. So I don’t think scripts work very well. I think we can all tell scripts when people do videos. It’s just showcasing their humanity and obviously they’re their unicorn.

Dhru: [00:18:26] Yeah, I love that dude. We talked about this last time. I’m not a script person. I kind of shy away from them whenever possible because I just want to think that they’re confining. Right? I think think doesn’t allow you to be in the moment as much and to I think a lot of people, they use them as a crutch. And so they get caught reading the script as opposed to saying the words. Right. But I love what you said. I’m going to go back to what you said in the beginning, which is that you believe that everybody has a potential to be special, but not everybody is special. I think that’s huge to highlight because I think everyone, not everyone, but you hear a lot nowadays about people saying, oh, everyone’s special, everyone’s special. Everyone can be a leader, Everyone can be a leader. Well, if everyone’s special. Then no one special. Right. But I like the idea that everyone has a potential to be special because then you have to try. You have to actually do something to be special. Same thing with being a leader, right? There’s no such thing as everybody’s being a leader because then who do you follow, right? Who’s going to be… there’s some, there’s a lot of people out there who just don’t want to waste the time or spend the energy to be a leader. Right. And they’re just fine following and they want to follow. They don’t want to expend the energy because it takes a lot of energy and effort to be a leader. Right. And so I love that that distinction between everyone is special versus everyone can be special. And so when you’re working with somebody who doesn’t believe that they’re special, right, you worked with it. You talk to a little bit of that process just now. But what do you do when someone’s, like resistant? Like just like I don’t I’ve never been special in my life or I don’t I don’t have anything that I really believe is special about me.

Stefan: [00:19:51] So I have a, whenever, I call it the Endless Content Machine, and it’s technically two questions, but then a third question gets answered no matter what. And the idea is that we connect. I take who they are, a piece of who they are, something about them connecting to what it is that they do for work. And inevitably, when you have to, or you’re forced to connect those two pieces of why they do what they do and why it’s interesting to them. You get a why answer of this is the why. This is not Simon Sinek’s “My One Why.” But you can do this over and over and over for various different pieces of your humanity. You can do like an accountant who loves going fishing. So he is a human who loves going fishing. He also loves thinking about taxes. And so that’s why he loves it, because when he’s out on his boat fishing, he’s just like in his head just going over taxes stuff. And it’s super relaxing for him. I’ve never heard an accountant say that, and I’ve been talking about this example for a long time. That’s pretty unique and different and special. And so how many other ways, how many other combinations can you have that are going to highlight you as a human and why it’s different in business? So that’s basically what I do.

Stefan: [00:20:51] I show them the connection piece and all of a sudden they go, Oh, yeah, that’s true. Oh yeah, I do like that. I’ll give you another example of a guy that I just talked to. He’s a spreadsheets guy for all intents and purposes, super boring, right? That’s not fun at all. And he has he had a guitar in the background and I was like, Do you play? He’s like, not really. He’s like, I’m terrible at it. I’m like, Here’s a video idea for you. Sit down, strum the guitar, and when it sounds terrible, go well, at least I’m good at spreadsheets and walk away. That’s it. That’s your whole clip. I’m like, just. Just. He loved it. Yeah. And the funny part is he loved it so much. He performed the clip for various people on Zoom calls before he filmed it. So it’s it’s wonderful. I’m like, That’s great. And he keeps on talking about it. And there’s a, there’s a series. I was like, start a series of that. What are you bad at? And then just do that and then go “Well at these I’m good at spreadsheets.” Perfect. Now we’re talking. There’s something there. You’re being human and admitting you’re not great at everything. So that’s kind of the process.

Dhru: [00:21:51] I love that dude. That’s and again, it’s such a unique and simple thing, but it’s also something people don’t think about as much because again, it makes them relatable, right? When people think you’re too perfect or too whatever, they’re not going to relate to you. They’re not going to want to talk to you about anything. You’re not going to. They’re like, Oh, fuck that guy. You know, he’s just he’s just like, I’ll give you a perfect example, actually. So. Gary Vaynerchuk, right, solid guy. We can say he’s successful, right? And so following him for a while on social media, this whole thing about kindness, about authenticity, about stuff, it’s like at a certain it’s like, okay, this is buzzwords at this point, right? Like, it’s just he’s full of shit, right? He’s just he’s got this. He’s, he’s of course he’s going to say that he’s got millions of dollars. Right? And then you meet him in person and he’s actually that same way in person. Like he’s actually relatable down to earth person in real life. And it’s just it’s a different experience than what you what you what you would expect. I mean, even if you know him and like I’ve seen his stuff online, some people might expect that. But I mean me, I’m a cynic in some ways and I can be cynical, I shouldn’t say, I’m not purely cynic, but I’m like, Oh, that guy’s probably an asshole in real life. Not not an asshole, really nice guy, you know? And so I think that online persona thing can almost work. I mean, like you said, in an authentic kind of thing of like, that guy with the guitar, like, Oh, at least I’m good at spreadsheets. Like, that’s hilarious. I love that.

Stefan: [00:23:11] So I want to I want to point something out as well here. So you’re absolutely right. Authenticity is a buzzword. And I, I understand why it is used. I also use it sometimes because it’s language. You have to be able to communicate in the way people are going to understand you just because you don’t like what a word means anyway, but have a whole thing of where I go, authenticity versus humanity. And I’ll give you the example of authenticity versus because I push for humanity versus authenticity. So authenticity. I use Taylor Swift because my wife loves Taylor Swift. And so if you if you’re a fan of Taylor Swift and her tickets are expensive, you bought a ticket, you went to the show, Taylor comes out on stage and goes. Hum. You know, I wasn’t. I haven’t been having a great day. My boyfriend said something really mean to me. My throat kind of hurts. Um, I’m just really not feeling this. I’m not going to do a show. Thank you. And she walks away. You’re pissed. You’re like, What? What the fuck, Taylor? I’m being a Swiftie. I’m dressed up. What is all this? Now, if she comes on and goes, I’ve been really having a bad day. My boyfriend says something really mean to me. My throat hurts a little bit, and I’m going to push through all of that to give you the best show I possibly can. It may not have been the best show ever that Taylor Swift has done, but for you, that’s going to be an amazing show because Taylor Swift just became human. She just became relatable and she became a little bit vulnerable. And that, to me, is that difference between true authenticity, because sometimes we’re like, I don’t want to be here. I just want to be on the couch watching Netflix. That’s my authentic version. But then there’s the human side, and I think we should strive to be at the extreme more human than necessarily utterly authentic.

Dhru: [00:24:45] I love that it’s something that you don’t really hear people talk about as much because I’ve always used the word authenticity. But I think the way I’ve used it connotation wise is more towards what you define as humanity, more so than the authentic side. Because I agree with you, there’s a distinction in those two things. I’ve never made that connection before because that’s a really powerful distinction because like you said, if you’re feeling authentic, I feel like shit, it’s going to go relax and go to sleep for like three days. That’s authentic, right? But what’s the human what’s the humane thing to do? What’s the humanity? I have an obligation. I’m going to fulfill that obligation to best of my ability. But I’m going to be honest, like, hey, I’m not feeling great today, but I’m doing this for you. I’m doing this for us so we can so we can keep this going, whatever. You know what I mean? Like that. That’s also a powerful, powerful factor in getting people to understand that you are a human. You’re not this larger than life thing. You’re still a human at the end of the day.

Stefan: [00:25:37] Yeah, that’s. And I love that you said all those things because then it’s The pushing through because that’s what business is in the end it’s that we, we do expect that amount of it. But yeah, when people are a little bit more vulnerable with us and that is the other one of vulnerability. And people immediately, they, authenticity seems okay. Vulnerability. People immediately jump to, Oh, I should tell them my sob stories. No, that’s not what that means at all. Because vulnerability can go the other way. You’re in a board meeting. You’re like, I am legitimately excited. My niece just had an amazing recital and she got a scholarship for, like, great. That’s also vulnerability of being excited about your family. Vulnerability doesn’t only have to be, yeah, it just sucks. It’s terrible. It’s all awful.

Dhru: [00:26:19] Yeah. Vulnerability is letting the wall down sometimes. They use them as excuses, I think. Which is also what bothers me too, is like, I’m just being vulnerable. I’m just doing. I’m doing this. I’m doing this like it’s a veil of vulnerability, right? You’re using that as an excuse or authenticity or whatever, because they use it on the other side of things too. It’s like I’m being my authentic self. I’m just being like, No, you’re being an asshole. Like you’re being mean to people. Like, that’s a difference. There’s a huge difference, right? It’s like I’m just being me. No, you’re being an asshole. You’re not being you because you’re not an asshole. You’re a human. An asshole is part of you. That’s the part you’re being right now, right? It’s like it’s not something people ever really take time to, actually. Because it’s easy to hide behind that veil. Right. And I think people don’t take time to do that and distinguish those things. And you mentioned Simon Sinek earlier, the one “why” and versus the multiple “whys.” And I actually have always aligned more with the multiple “whys” anyway, because I think the one “why” is great for like the fictional character because they’re one-dimensional right there, or maybe two-dimensional. If you’re a really good writer, maybe three-dimensional. But that’s it, right? Reality. We’re like infinite dimensions of humans, right? Humans have infinite dimensions. There are different parts of us that get expressed in different situations. You even add one new person to that, to that interaction of five people. And now the new dimension if you came out right. So when you’re talking to people about the distinction between the multiple “why”s and the singular “why”, what kind of things what kind of conversations do you have around that?

Stefan: [00:27:43] We always talk about like the different facets of things. So like when business owners say things along the lines of my biggest driver in business is my family, I’m like, okay, if a CEO of a huge company says that, wouldn’t the biggest driving thing if it was his family and providing for his family, sell the whole company, take the money and now you support your family. That makes the most sense if truly family is the biggest driver in your life. So, yeah, that’s a very interesting part of it. I think that the big “why” there is probably a priority “why.” And that is like the one why is like what is the biggest driving thing that you can see. And then there’s smaller ones all throughout and it’s hard for people to identify the big one right away. So sometimes I go, let’s start with something a little bit a little bit smaller, but an exercise I always love doing is it’s I forget who said it. It’s Seven Layers Deep is what they called it. I called it the child’s question where you just repeatedly ask why to a person it is annoying as all get out, but it’s like, oh, I need to go to work. Why? Because I need to make money. Why? Because I need to provide for my family. Why? Because I love my family. Why? And at that point, you’re like, What do you mean why? Why do I love my family? How dare you ask me that? It’s like, okay, but why do why do you love your family? Well, they make me feel complete. They make me feel the happiness that is not just a birthday cake. They make me have that feeling. Okay. Why do you want to have that feeling? What is the purpose? Because. I want to feel loved. I want to feel complete because it makes me feel free to do whatever else because I’m not confined. Okay, so now we kind of got down to the core is you want to be free to be you. You want to be loved. And usually it comes down to one of those few things of that is the core thing. And then you can potentially build out your bigger why from that of going, okay, because then that is what fuels each one of those things of: I need to make money because I want to feel loved and feel free. And then because that’s why I go to my job, because I want freedom and love realistically. But we don’t necessarily think of it that way because most of us hate our jobs. So, we’re like, What? I’m doing this because I love myself. That makes no sense.

Dhru: [00:29:56] Yeah. And that is a jump, right? If you think about just the two things without connecting them between, it’s a huge jump, right? I think of it like the converting fractions thing, you know, that whole thing. I don’t know if that makes sense to anyone else other than me because I’m crazy thing when I think of that thing sometimes, but I’m thinking about it in terms of like just converting things back and forth. And if you just jump make the jump. And I had a professor in college, this guy was brilliant, like genius-level intellect, and we were in calculus three, which I did not stay in that class very long. Calculus three Engineering school. First year of college. And I’m sitting here like, and he is this guy. His name is Kyriakopoulos. He was a Greek guy, really brilliant guy sitting at the board, small in stature, white hair, looked like Einstein with shorter hair. And he’s writing on the board. He’s like, Just write this complicated equation right on the board. It’s like, just, multiple lines and stuff, whatever. And then I’m like, okay, cool. And he’s like, and this is by inspection is two. I’m like, inspection, dude. There’s like 40 different things on there. What the hell are you mean inspection? Can you explain? Can you show your work to us? Like, what the how’d you get from there? And everyone in the class is like, I have no except for the Russian guy. The one Russian guy is like, Oh, yeah, that makes sense. Everyone else is like, What the hell is happening right now? And that’s the way I think. There’s some people who can make that connection and make it very easy for themselves. But a lot of people who, like you said, need to go through that “why” exercise that’s seven layers deep or the child like child question exercise because it does take them on that road and gets them out of their kind of their normal way of thinking about things, which wouldn’t really get them to that answer.

Stefan: [00:31:30] Well, and I think the other reason is because so when you get to the answer of, say, let’s say like the freedom and the love for yourself or that you want to feel loved, you very quickly realize that the place you’re in, what you’re doing for money, what you’re doing for all those things, they are not making you feel loved. They are draining you away from that. And so what you’re really doing is then going outside of that afterwards and distracting yourself from the fact that your why is not actually being fulfilled and that what you’re doing is not there. And so you’re in this in this consistent cycle. And it’s tough. It’s not I’m not saying like, oh, find your why and everything becomes easy. No, it’s a lot of work.

Dhru: [00:32:09] It’s the beginning.

Stefan: [00:32:10] Yeah. It’s just the it’s just the beginning. And then you get a trajectory and then you go. It’s. That’s just putting in the directions into Google Maps.

Dhru: [00:32:19] Yeah. There’s a similar exercise in coaching that we call competing commitments. I don’t know if you’ve heard of that one before, but it’s a, it’s a similar exercise. It’s basically but it’s kind of on a micro scale more so. So it’s like, okay, you want to accomplish something, Let’s say I think the easy one is losing weight, right? You want to lose weight? Well, you know what you need to do to lose weight. You got to eat, eat healthy, and you got to work out. Right. Those are the two things you got to do. You’re not doing those things. What are you doing? Instead of those things and you kind of walk through the process of why you’re doing something else and what you’re doing and what does it mean to you if you do this thing you need to do and not do these other things you’re supposed to do? And I know when I did this exercise, it was interesting. It’s fascinating because I came upon the I’ll just say my mind was losing weight and the whole thing. And I refused to eat healthy. I work out like crazy, but I just eat like trash because I just you know, I said I liked food, which I do like food. But the reality was I didn’t want to be my brother because my brother eats just purely for nutrition, nothing else. He can just eat cardboard because it’s healthy and then work out and he’s in great shape. But I refuse to do that because I don’t want to be like him. I don’t want to. I want to actually enjoy my food. I want to I don’t want to be that person. And as you say that, like you said, when you when you come across that kind of that, “why” that like that micro why you’re like this doesn’t make sense right. I know I’m never going to be him so why would I even have that thing. Let me go back and look at this thing and see where I can make a difference and change and start doing things differently and understand, like you said, the beginning of the process is identifying, hey, I have this rule in my head about but what I want or what I really what really drives me and what I’m doing is really not actually doing that, even though I tell myself that it is.

Stefan: [00:33:56] I’m going to push you a little bit because I’m curious. We get to learn all stuff about Dhru today, guys and gals and everybody. It’s going to be great. Younger or older brother. Older brother. Were you compared to that brother? Frequently as you were growing up?

Dhru: [00:34:09] Absolutely not. Never. Never in my life. I would never compare to my brother or anyone else for that matter. I was always just me.

Stefan: [00:34:15] And you were perfect. Exactly as you were. Nothing ever had to change about how you were.

Dhru: [00:34:19] My parents always told me they love me. They always told me they are proud of me. All that stuff. My mom just texted me on my watch that I’m not wearing to tell me that she is happy and proud of me. Yeah, there you go.

Stefan: [00:34:27] So it’s obviously not at all related to any of that.

Dhru: [00:34:29] Clearly not. Yeah.

Stefan: [00:34:30] Yeah, never mind. Um, but yeah, it’s. I literally got called out yesterday in the morning of how much I compare everything I do in my business to trying to be as successful or more successful than my siblings. So, I should say sibling really only have one. I have a cousin who is like almost like a brother. But yeah, and it’s funny because realistically, I don’t know if we’re going to get way into this. My parents do this thing, we’re all over the place, where when they speak to you, like to us as a son, they will never tell you they’re necessarily proud of you. And they do the same thing to my brother. But when they speak to other people, they’re like, He’s amazing. He’s the best. He’s great.

Dhru: [00:35:11] Oh, about you? Or about, about someone else?

Stefan: [00:35:14] No, no, about. About me.

Dhru: [00:35:16] Okay.

Stefan: [00:35:16] So sometimes, like, I’ve literally, like, come at parties and. And they’re like, this accomplishment, this, like, I know what I did. I know those are my accomplishments. I come up and I’m like, who are you talking about? And they’re like, We’re talking about you. And I’m like, since when? Since when these nice things about me? And so, yeah, and that builds in the thing of they obviously talk to you about your brother in a nice I’m talking about literally about me. I don’t know what your experience was where they’re like, your brother did this and this isn’t that great. I mean sometimes they’ll be like, how can we help him? But they never tell you that you did great. So now in my head, I’m like, yeah, he’s the great. I’m the black sheep of the family that went and started with the music major, still got a doctorate, though.

Dhru: [00:35:55] Yeah, No, so my parents do the first part. They definitely don’t tell me ever that they’re that they’re proud of me or whatever, that kind of stuff. Um, they don’t talk well about me to me, but they don’t do it to anyone else either. They do for my brother, though. They’ll speak positively of my brother. And I joke about this because I called out my dad about this like 20 years ago when this happened. We were at our temple, our Monday, right. And my dad’s talking to introducing my brother and I to, to one of his friends who came to visit. And he’s like, oh, this is my son Jason. He’s a doctor. And this is, this is before I went to law school and everything, right? And this is my son, Dhru. This is my other son, Dhru. End of sentence. And it’s like. That’s my life in a nutshell, essentially. Right? Which is it’s funny because it’s like it’s that’s generally I made the joke like I’m the other son, which is the general joke going on going forward. But to your point, like they don’t. Maybe they have said they’re proud of me once in the last like ten years or so. But that took a very long, long time. And I will say they changed after my nephew was born because they both my mom was always relatively cool. My dad definitely softened up big time when my nephew was born. That changed him in a very big way. Being, I guess being a grandparent, I don’t know. But he’s definitely softened up. He still hasn’t told me he’s proud of me, but this doesn’t matter.

Stefan: [00:37:11] Yeah, for me it has. And maybe this is the same way for you. It’s now devolved to where I realize that I had to be the one that detached from needing that as that part. And I think that’s going to be true for if people are dealing with their parents, with their significant others spouses, bosses, friends, that if you know that you’re doing good work regardless of what kind of confirmation, affirmation, validation that they’re going to give you, that’s the most important thing. And it’s not as if I’m perfect and it doesn’t sneak back all the time. I literally we’re going for a month this Saturday. We’re going for day after tomorrow. We’re going to stay with my mom for a month. I know my mindset is in danger. I know that I’m going to start doubting myself. And I’ve already put things in place of where I have a couple coaches that I’m like, I’m going to need a session with you about my mindset like two times throughout that month because it’s going to wreck me.

Dhru: [00:38:00] Yeah. And you know, I tell people all the time, like, that’s going to happen inevitably, whenever you put your own validation on an external situation, anything with this person, place, job, whatever, anytime that that validation has to come from somewhere external, you always run that risk, right? You’ve got to try to as much as possible and no one’s perfect, right? So no one’s going to have 100% validation internal. No one’s everyone says, I don’t care what people think, but at some level you do, right? But as much as you can work to bring that validation internal because as long as you have that, it becomes you become more and more unshakable, right? So the whole stoic idea, the whole stoic mentality, which I absolutely subscribe to, I love that kind of that kind of stuff. So I’m glad you have people who reach out to you because you’re definitely going to need that.

Stefan: [00:38:41] Yeah, and I would just add the only thing to that, as well as hand select the people that you know, you can trust for validation when it is necessary. I am very grateful and lucky to have a spouse that can do that for me because I will frequently go to her and be like, I’m not a complete shit, right? Like, I don’t suck. I’m terrible. I don’t deserve to take all this money from people. Right? I’m off. And she’s like, what are you talking about? Literally every single person that works with you goes, “Whoa, this is what you do? This is amazing.” Why are you thinking this way? I’m like, I don’t know. I watched a social media post and now I just feel like garbage. Yeah.

Dhru: [00:39:14] That’ll do it. That’ll definitely do it. I mean, and going back to that, that comment about social media, because we talked about it earlier briefly. Right. I mean, that’s a construct that, you know, as much as I do social media consulting as well and, you know, the whole thing. But it’s just as much as I see I see the value in it, like any like any tool, right? When it’s used for good, it can do amazing things when it’s used for evil or just stupidly, right? Like, irresponsibly. It can do a lot of harm, right? I mean, I know a lot of people who spend a lot of money to try to pay people for social media and they don’t know what the hell they’re doing. Neither one of them knows what they’re doing, frankly, the person paying or the person being paid. And I don’t know if I told you this before, but maybe it was. But it was like anyone with a Facebook account claims that their social media consultant nowadays. Right. Or Instagram account or whatever. And I say that’s similar to someone who says I have a heart so now I’m a cardiologist. Right? It’s not the same thing, right? You just having one doesn’t mean you know how to use it properly. It doesn’t mean, you know, the ways of writing stuff and creating content effectively and creating content that’s going to benefit that person to meet their goals because not everyone has the same goals, right? And so when you’re talking about your posting and you’re facing your like your social media presence because I mean, as a business owner, I’m sure you have one that you curate on a regular basis. Right? So what is consistent considerations you have when you go out there and say, I want to put my human self, not the authentic self, but your human self out there.

Stefan: [00:40:38] First of all, I will always say, and I hate that this is true, but it is. And every single person who has posted on social media for any amount of time will know this. The post that you’re like, This is game changing and the whole world will like thank me, nobody cares. And the thing that you’re like, Why am I even posting this blows up and you’re just like, So that also to then to the point when you have people that are going, here’s how you game the algorithm. This is how I got this many views, this is how you’re going to blow up and make $20,000 a month. It’s bullshit. It’s bullshit, it’s bullshit. They’re really repeatedly through business, there’s never been a get rich, quick, easy scheme that has actually consistently worked. I’m not saying they didn’t get lucky and that didn’t happen. It did. It’s just that most likely that’s not going to be there. I forgot who it was that shared. They were like, okay, do you think if it was so easy and could make that much money, they would tell it to you? Realistically, like they would just give it to you for free? You really think that that is the case? So when it comes to me putting out my authentic self, a lot of times I have no problem doing it. So I’ll talk about my blindness, I’ll talk about being a dad, I’ll talk about all sorts of different things because now I have an 11 month old, so that’s always fun. But some people go, yeah, but I don’t want to talk about necessarily my personal life. That’s fine. But how do you present yourself as a business owner or whatever person that works with your clients that’s going to be different. What makes you actually you instead of reading the pitch and whatever it is that does come back to the whole thing we talked about before, the who that is matches with the what and then tells you kind of the why it’s those pieces. But I think the biggest thing is don’t make it a gimmick. It’s not meant to be a gimmick. It’s meant to be fun. So, if you have fun doing it and showcasing it, you’re probably on the right track. That would be the biggest litmus test for me is if it’s fun for you, it’s going to be fun for the people watching your content. If it’s boring and dull for you. Same thing.

Dhru: [00:42:32] Yeah, I like that rule. I think that makes a lot of sense and I think more people need to follow that, to be honest with you. But when you talk to business owners, right, and you’re working with them on the messaging and on being who they are and how they can be special, how often do you or do you ever run into business owners who are like, this guy should not be a business owner. This guy probably shouldn’t run his own business. He’s not equipped or whatever.

Stefan: [00:42:57] I feel like more than I admit. I was going to mention this earlier and I steal this from Tom Bilyeu, the host of Impact Theory. He has an exercise that he likes to do with his wife, which is: No bullshit. What would it take? And the exercise is basically, you have a goal, no bullshit. What would it take? You put on everything. We’re going to murder somebody. We’re going to steal this. No. Then afterwards, it’s not saying do that stuff afterwards. Go. Are we morally willing to do this? Is this like, okay, not put in a bunch of excuses of why you couldn’t do it, but realistically go, okay, truly, realistically, could we not do this? And the reason I bring that up is I think I meet a lot of business owners that kind of go, yeah, I guess, I don’t know, like my business isn’t going great. I should probably do something about it. Yeah, you probably shouldn’t be a business owner because you should know you should do something about it and you should be doing something about it, not thinking whether or not you should. And I think that happens a lot, and that happens more so with the people that say they’re a business owner, but they’re probably running like a side hustle. And I love finding that out every single time It seems that I get that energy from somebody where I’m like, You’re not really serious about your business, are you? And then I come to find out. They’re usually working on the side doing something else. I’m like, okay, so you’re not making any money, you’re not really a business owner. You’re just saying you’re a business owner, right?

Dhru: [00:44:14] You have a hobby that you want to get paid for.

Stefan: [00:44:17] Right, exactly. I’m not saying that it’s not legitimate. I’m just saying put the same effort in. You know, if you were to completely put all of the eggs into the basket of the business and put all that energy into it, it’s a whole different way people show up.

Dhru: [00:44:29] Yeah, I agree with you. Along the same lines, when you think about people who have that mentality, right? And have that like, oh well I guess it’ll, it’ll be fine. It’ll work out. You know, I’m just, I’m just going to keep doing what I’m doing and just not worry about anything and just, you know, keep that going. How long does it take for you to be like, I’m cutting the cord with this person because it’s not worth my time or them spending the money? Or do you kind of just keep on trying as long as they’re willing to keep trying?

Stefan: [00:44:57] Yeah, for me it is. It goes back to literally what we talked about, the potential of special versus actually being special. If I see that there’s no work or energy being put towards developing the potential and there’s nothing there, I’m not seeing a spark light in their eyes. And many times I’ll even in the initial interview, I’ll go like, Yeah, I don’t know if I could help you because you don’t you don’t want it. So why would I take money from you if you don’t necessarily want it? And it’s interesting. Most of the people, they end up kind of filtering themselves out. After a while, they’re like, yeah, they pull the cord and cut the cord. I don’t because they’re kind of like, Yeah, I don’t know. I just don’t know if this is right for me, if I’m in it, whatever it might be, because I get passionately excited about pretty much everybody because I can see the potential. I know that it’s there. If they keep extinguishing that flame, that I keep on trying to light inside of them with all their limiting beliefs, preconceptions about stuff. Eventually they’re just going to walk away.

Dhru: [00:45:53] I like that. I think that makes sense. I’ve had to fire people personally, fire clients just because it’s not worth my time. One, but two, it’s not. I don’t want them spending their money and then turn around and be like, oh, it’s your fault because that’s what’s going to happen, right? They’re not going to be like, those kind of the people who have that mentality. They’re not going to blame themselves. They’re going to blame. They’re like, Oh, I hired this coach. Coaching doesn’t work. I hired this person. That that person doesn’t work. It’s like, no, they didn’t work for you because you didn’t work for yourself. And there’s a difference, right? If I go back to I forgot who said this now, but I know Gary Vaynerchuk says something similar, but the idea is like the radical accountability thing, right? It’s like you have the ultimate responsibility for your business if you’re not willing to work for it. Why do you think someone else is going to work for it for you? Right?

Stefan: [00:46:37] Absolutely. My mom, since we were talking about parents, my mom hired me as a coach, which isn’t necessarily what I do, but she was like, you seem to be all around this. Can I hire you as a coach for a hundred bucks an hour? And I was like, Yeah, because you’re not going to find anybody else willing to do it for that much. And it was like, it was nice. Like, you know, we would go out for coffee, we’d get to talk about a little more about her life and like, big of her, to take advice from her youngest son. Like, there’s a lot of growth there, too, to be fair. And it was funny because after a few meetings she goes, Yeah, you already told me that. Yeah, you already said that. And I was like, but did you do anything about it? She’s like, no, but you already told me that. I was going. Well, then I think we’re done. If you’re not going to do the things I can’t tell you the next thing because you haven’t done this thing. So what’s the point?

Dhru: [00:47:22] Yeah. I generally make it a rule not to coach friends and family for that reason, because typically they’re not going to listen anyway. And if a regular client didn’t listen, which again, the same kind of people who don’t who should not be running businesses, they don’t listen either. If they’re not going to listen, then that’s at least they’re paying me a lot of money to do that. And then I’m not personally invested in their future in that sense, right? Like, it’s not my family. It’s not my close friend. If a family member does it, then they don’t listen to me. I’m going to be really annoyed if a client does listen to me. I’m like, they’re a client. They’re not Listen to me. Then I’m just going to eventually, if they keep if they keep this up, I’m just going to fire them. You can’t fire friends and family. That’s what sucks.

Stefan: [00:47:56] Well you could, but it’s a it’s a hard process.

Dhru: [00:47:59] Yeah, it’s a little complicated.

Stefan: [00:48:01] We so I grew up in Nashville. We’re now in Los Angeles. Part of the reason that we moved was because we were trying to get away from family, because we knew that they kept on having us in this mindset of limitation of You can only do this. The only way to make money is to get a doctorate and then that’s it. You get a degree, you get a steady job, and that’s all you do. My dad had a business that he started and it literally just only took in money. It never made money. So, my mom’s belief about starting your own business is you’re just going to waste your money.

Dhru: [00:48:29] Yeah. I mean, at least see what your dad tried, though, You know, that’s kudos to him. My parents never even tried this. They worked full time for other people, Complained about everything all the time, then complained about how the bosses are never going to respect you. They’re never going because they never got respected themselves. Right. And so they’re like, Are you boss? Just keep your head down, do your work, and just, you know, it’ll be fine. Like that worked out so well for you guys. You guys are so happy as a result of that.

Stefan: [00:48:49] Yeah, I will say he did the hobby thing. He really did because he was a professor at two universities, like full-time professor at two universities. He wasn’t really running the business. It was more of just like I made an LLC and sometimes on the weekends I do stuff within the LLC and create things.

Dhru: [00:49:04] Well, that’s fair.

Stefan: [00:49:05] Yeah. So, it was like, no wonder it didn’t make money.

Dhru: [00:49:10] Yeah, well, again, like I said, at least he at least he put put it out there and tried. I think it was a lot harder to do that back then than it was now too. Right. So that took a lot more like starting an LLC today. I can do one while we’re on the call right now, literally. Right. Whereas back then you had to actually go through the process of like, get the papers, fill them out physically deliver them or mail them in or whatever, and with the check and stuff like that. And it’s just, you know, it involved some effort. So there’s some kind of I think that’s another thing that I wonder. I don’t know necessarily that I have an opinion, good or bad. I think there’s positives on both sides, positive negatives. But how easy things have become as we’ve become, like you said, technology enables us to be more of who we are, right? I think technology has enabled us to be more of the people that are in the movie Wall-E at the end of that movie. I dunno if you’ve seen that, but you know, the fat, lazy people who just like have machines even feeding them at some point because they just don’t do anything. And I think we’re getting closer and close to that because it gets so much easier to do stuff that we don’t even do easy stuff anymore. Right? We’re like, oh, how can I outsource this? How can I just, you know, get someone on TaskRabbit to go do this thing for me? Like, how do I call Uber Eats for the store across the street so I can go and on the way home they can pick up 7-Eleven ice cream, you know? So like.

Stefan: [00:50:20] Yeah, I had somebody. So with like ChatGPT coming out now and content creation with ChatGPT, I had somebody who was like, so yeah, but I thought you were like anti ChatGPT and that you were creating a group that’s all anti ChatGPT for content creation. I was like, no, no, no, ChatGPT is great and wonderful. I use the the spreadsheet guy with the guitar. I’m like, ChatGPT could not come up with that idea because ChatGPT doesn’t know how well he plays guitar, doesn’t know his style of humor. Right. Doesn’t. It might give you some general idea, but there’s, there’s still that element of humanity. And I think a lot of times I’m hearing more and more now people go, oh yeah, I’m just going to get my ideas from ChatGPT. And it’s kind of shortcutting. I’m not against it. If people want to create, by the way, I’m going to give everybody a quick little hack for content creation with ChatGPT that actually involves some creativity from your end as well, is you do a paragraph about your ideal client, you do a paragraph, this is all the prompt about what it is that you actually do. And then you say, What are the 10-15 questions that client will ask about my product? It gives you the answer. The questions and the answers do not use those answers. You have a brain. You have the questions. Now answer the questions the way that you normally would. So that’s a great way of like, okay, what should I be thinking about now? Let me find a fun way to help showcase that.

Dhru: [00:51:35] I like that. And I think it’s also a distinction to make between ChatGPT and AI in general. Ai doesn’t really do creation. It does generation because you always have to have some kind of a prompt for it to do that. It’s not going to be like, Oh, by the way, I know you gave you a prompt on this earlier. Here’s an idea I had based on that prompt we did just two seconds ago. It’s never going to do that, right? It’s not going to be like, let me create this new this new piece of music or whatever that makes sense to you. I know that they have AI that’s generating music, generating these kind of things. They’re still generating things from prompts. They’re still generating things based on other things. So they can always, you know, append or supplement additional ideas or generate things based on other things. But they always have to have that other thing. before it, right? That’s the difference between, I think, between humans and AI. And anyone who says AI is going to replace humans doesn’t understand creativity. Right? Because creativity is something we can, but that AI cannot replace. That’s why it’s still artificial intelligence. It’s not real intelligence. Maybe one day they’ll get there. But right now, in the next ten years, it’s not going to happen.

Stefan: [00:52:32] Absolutely. That’s when people ask me what really I’m in the I’m in the business of creativity. That’s what it comes down to. Because the ideas that I have for people’s content and all that, it’s not as if I create ideas for them. They have the ideas, they have the knowledge. I can’t be an expert in all the things that my clients are experts in, but I can help pull it out of them.

Dhru: [00:52:50] Right? Exactly. Oh, man, that’s great, dude. Look, we talk this forever, but we got to wrap up soon here. Maybe we’ll do a part two at some point, because this is actually a good time. And I hope you’re having fun with the fun, too. And hope listeners and visitors and viewers are having fun, too. But I’m going to closing out here. I got a couple of questions or one question really that I ask everybody, which I prepared you for inspiration-wise, right. Because that’s something I wanted. People always understand what or who were the biggest inspirations in your life to get you where you are right now?

Stefan: [00:53:21] I’m going to go through several I for a while there, absolutely adored the movie Iron Man. That’s Iron Man. Robert Downey Jr did an amazing job and I just love Robert Downey Jr in general. The reason I like Iron Man of all of them is I love the movies where they go, I’m going to figure this thing out, I’m going to build it. It’s the building process of the, literally the creativity side of it all. So that that part was relatively inspirational to me. Just constantly I’ve just, yeah, rewatch that movie far too many times. Then Tim Minchin, who is an Australian musician, he’s an incredible pianist, but he’s and also very intellectual and yet a comedian as well. It really it just showcases both of those people to me, showcase that when you’re good, it’s undeniable. Like it doesn’t it doesn’t matter where you start, as long as you’re persistent and you’re really that good, it doesn’t matter. And maybe he’s not the best pianist in the world, right? Maybe he’s not the best comedian in the world because most people in the States haven’t even heard of him. But he’s still good. He’s very good. And that kind of really helped kind of push that along for me because I when I went blind, one of the ways that I went through all that trauma is I wrote a bunch of comedy songs and other stuff on guitar and piano. That was my way because I was like, Well, if I lose my vision completely, I’m not going to be a physical therapist. I’m going to be a musician, and that’s going to be fine. Um, turns out I could still be a physical therapist. It was just the documentation that entirely did me in. Yeah, those are the two big ones. And then randomly, since I named a movie and music, I’m also just going to do an author because this guy comes up for me all the time, which is Douglas Adams Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Just the way that it is written. I love the things that make you do it like a double back of where you go like, ooh, a double take. That’s what it is. Not a double back Stefan, come on where you’re just like, What? What did that say? There is one specific line that always stood out to me, which was? Which is the yellow spaceship hung in the air very much like a brick doesn’t. And it’s like to me, I’m like, that’s that’s what I love that line because it’s just it’s so unexpected. It’s so something you wouldn’t compare it to. All of those combined have really fostered that that kind of that creativity and that going, hey, if you’re really good at what you do, just keep doing that and eventually it works out.

Dhru: [00:55:43] I love that. I don’t want to say anything else after that because I think that’s a great way to end. Stefan, thank you so much for taking time today, man. It’s awesome conversation. Love chatting with you all the time. And yeah, folks who want to reach out to Stefan, his information will be in the description below. And for those of you listening on the podcast, we’ll have his information also in the show notes. So thanks again. I appreciate it, man. Hope you had a good time. We’ll do this again because this was a blast. And yeah, if you’re down to come back, we’d love to have you back.

Stefan: [00:56:10] Hell yea, pleasure.

Dhru: [00:56:11] Awesome, man. Thanks a lot, everybody. Take care. Stay safe. Hit, Subscribe. Thank you all so much for listening to the Ikigai Leadership podcast today. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe and leave a five-star review with comments to let me know what you thought. It really helps me keep on delivering valuable and relevant content to you all, and if you want to connect with me directly, please feel free to do so on my socials. That’s at @DhruBee on Twitter, at @DhruvaBee on Instagram and LinkedIn, it’s linkedin.com/in/dhrubee. Thank you all so much. Take care. Stay safe. Talk to you soon.