Episode 072: Jay Shetty - Making Wisdom Go Viral, Storyteller & Speaker

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This is the Rise of the Young podcast, bringing you insights from the most innovative entrepreneurs and influencers of this era. Hosted by entrepreneur, author, public speaker and branding expert, Casey Adams. Now let's get right into the show.

What's going on, everyone? Casey Adams here. Welcome to the Build you'd Empire podcast. Today on episode four, actually, for the Build you'd Empire podcast, we have Mr. Jay Shetty with us today. It's a pleasure to have you on the show, man.

Thanks for having me on, Casey.

Absolutely. Yeah. So for everyone that may not know, jay, you're at 15 million followers on Facebook. Your videos have been seen by billions of people. I saw that you have over a billion views put together.

Two now.

Yeah, two billion views. When it comes to making wisdom go viral and to kind of catch people up to speed, I want to just first off, tell people, where are you from? Because obviously you're. We're in LA right now. We're living this beautiful view. But where are you just from. Where did everything start for you?

Yeah, so I'm from London, born and raised, grew up in north of London. So if anyone knows soccer or football, well, I've adapted to using soccer instead of football, but Tottenham, not so far from Tottenham. And yeah, shout out to everyone who's watching from London or listening from London.

Totally.

Yeah. London's home for me, man.

That's beautiful, man. It's funny because I actually. We were planning a European tour, about to go to London maybe early next year or something. I do have a lot of people in London, so shout out to London.

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I was in London my whole life.

Okay. How long lived?

Yeah, I was in London from all the way up until 22.

Oh, wow.

So I lived in London until I was 22 years old when that's when I decided to become a monk. So I lived in India on and off for three years. There's India and Europe for three years. And then in the last two years, I was living in New York and I just moved to LA four weeks ago. Wow, we caught him at the right time in la.

I love it, I love it. We'll make sure to put that check in the box. So I want to talk about something before we get into the business. Social media. Just the first time I found you on social media, it was just the energy that I got from your videos was different. It was the most unique, just, I would say, fulfillment from watching your videos. A lot of the ones on Facebook. And I think for the people watching that may have seen those videos or may not. Just you always talk about you were a monk, right? And I know we were just talking about that. That obviously instilled in you a lot of core beliefs and just things that opened up your perspective. But for the people that may not know just what goes into becoming a monk, what was that journey like?

Yeah, good question. So I'll give a prefix. This is in other places, you can find it elsewhere. And then I'll talk about your question, which I really like, by the way. So I became a monk because when I was 18, when I was chasing the rags to riches, stories like, that's what inspired me. When I was 18 years old, I loved hearing about people who had nothing and ended up with everything. And every week at my business school, I was trained. I was at business school learning behavioral science. And I was going to go off and become an investment banker or a strategy consultant. And that was my path. And then I met a monk at business school. So I was forced to go to this event every week we'd have entrepreneurs, CEOs, celebrities, speaking at my business school. And I was forced by my friend to go along to hear a monk. And I had no interest in hearing this guy, hearing him speak. Yeah, I was like, who wants to hear a monk speak, right? Like, who goes to that kind of event? You think about events we all go to today, no one goes to hear a monk anyway. So I got forced to go along. I said, I'm only going if we go out afterwards. Like if we hit a bar after I'm in. So we end up going to hear this monk speak. And I'm blown away. I'm just like, this guy is incredible. So I spend the rest of my summer holidays from 18 to 22 every summer I would spend them, half of them in Suits, steakhouses, bars, working as an investment banker and then spending the rest of it living as a monk.

Wow.

And so what I learned about living as a monk was you sleep early, you wake up early. So you wake up at 4am every single day. And most nights you get about six hours sleep. Right. That's, that's your amount of sleep. The other thing is you meditate for about eight hours a day. So a lot of your day is focused on silence and self awareness. You sleep on the floor, so you don't have a bed. That's a big part of it. All my positions fit into a gym locker, so I could fit everything I owned into a gym locker. Whether that was clothes, we only. Oh yeah, you only get two sets of robes. So you wear one, you wash one.

Okay.

That's, that's the training. And it's a lifestyle where you're dedicating your life to half of silence and self awareness and half to service making a difference in the life of other people. So it's like, how do you grow and how do you help other people grow? Like that's your only mission in life. So that's what kind of goes into being a monk.

That's amazing, man. So when you say it was like the best of both worlds, right? You're in the suit, you're at the bars, but then you're half the summer you said you were a monk, and that was 18 to 24. So I'm 18 now. So you're in. I would say at my time in my life, you were just in the best of both worlds mentality. And so when it comes to leading up to that investment, Baker, was that high school, college or what, what time a part of that was your life meaning? Was that the part like you graduated high school, then you decided to go to university or how did that.

Yeah, so we finished high school at 18.

Okay.

And then go to university. So that's when I started university at 18. I was fascinated by behavioral science and the mind. That's always been my fascination. So I was studying that.

Okay.

But that didn't seem like a career option. Like I didn't have a role model who had gone on to be successful. In my opinion, from what I saw, successes then, that was using behavioral science to be successful. So what we were speaking about earlier when you came in, which I loved, I always say, you can't be what you can't see. If you've never seen an entrepreneur who's doing what you love, you'll never think of it. It's hard to think of it. It takes a lot more to think of it. And so 99% of people won't have that. So that's what it was for me. I started university and business school at 18, and that's what I studied. And then at 22, that's when I chose to become a monk out of the two tests that I did. So I always call it my split test.

Okay, Right.

I was testing the extremes. Yeah. I've always been an experimenter. I've always been a tester.

I love that.

And for me, it's like I wouldn't know which one I loved more unless I did them to the extreme, to the edge, like, pushed.

That's beautiful, man. And I think that gives me a perspective. And I think coming back to when I first found you watching your videos, it's like, I think you can just tell when people have seen the best of both worlds, of having nothing and having something and the bridging the gap. I think you do that very profoundly in all your content. But I want to touch on now, and I'd like to jump around in the podcast and really just touch on different subjects. So currently. Right. It's like talking about being a monk, having nothing, fitting everything in a locker, to now having 15 million people following you on Facebook, providing content and value to billions of people. Honestly, it's like, it's just such a different ballpark. And it's really interesting to me to kind of see, like, what it does to an individual internally, from my perspective. And so when it comes to just the process of, from being a monk to now, having this audience, to providing value and impacting the world, what would you say was the starting of that transition of going from someone that isn't looking at everyone else, seeing how you can add value to them. But it was just like you said, meditation for eight hours a day. It's just. It's very interesting to me to just see the complete black and white differences of both worlds. So what was the start of the transition that led into everything you're doing now?

The big one was my teacher, after three years of living as a monk, actually said to me, he said, I think you should leave to share what you've learned.

Beautiful.

And when you hear that from a mentor, no matter how much you love that mentor, it still feels like you failed. That was the closest I ever got to depression. That's the closest I ever felt, like everything had just fallen apart. Remember, I've just given up jobs, relationships, money, my whole background, everything to be a monk. And then all of a sudden, it's kind of like, yeah, all called off.

Yeah.

And you got to reprocess and reprogram and think, how do I figure out my life again? And I'm 26 years old at the time, and I'm like, do I really want to go back into that world I left? Do I really want to get a normal job again? Like, how do I factor that all in? But one thing I was convinced about was I'd found so many parallels in timeless wisdom in modern science, and I was just like, I need to share this with people. And the most amazing thing happened when I would move back into London with my parents, all my friends who now worked at some of the biggest companies in the world. They were like, to me, jay, we're stressed out, we're burnt out. You need to come teach us what you learned. And that was so interesting to me because I thought that they'd now all be happy and be okay and whatever. But it wasn't like they had been working in these places for five years, three to five years, and they weren't happy. They were making good money. They had holidays, they had all the rest of it, but they were. There was something in them. And so they were like, come and speak to us. So I almost by default, ended up launching a corporate coaching company where I was helping corporations and people in corporations with their personal challenges. So execs, CEOs. And I was just starting to see, like, this is like, 2013, 2014. And the most incredible thing about that time is that's when, like, mindfulness, meditation, wellness, like, that's when those themes were just. Now we talk about them a lot more. They become buzzwords now. But at that time, they weren't a buzzword. They weren't a trend yet. And it was almost like I came back in perfect timing. That's how it all kicked off. It was just. It came from demand. It didn't come from me going, oh, I think I found something that's gonna solve everyone's problem. I'm gonna share it. It came from people saying to me, we think you have something. Can you share it?

Yeah. That's beautiful. So when it comes to the shareability of everything you have, was your first thought, like, social media or what was in the 2013 timeframe, where now it's like, social media is the place to be. Everyone's building brands on there. But a couple years ago, five years ago, it wasn't that case. Right. So what was that sort of like standpoint during that time was social media.

So I was speaking at lots of companies and I was sharing these messages in corporate, like conference rooms and all of this stuff. Thousands of people. I remember doing a huge thing for like 5,000 people and event in London. It was insane. I was teaching meditation and it was fulfilling. But I've always had a part of me that's fascinated by scale. Like, I love scale.

Yeah.

Because I'm just like, if this is that powerful, it belongs to everyone. It's like when you just walked out of watching the best movie of all time, you want to tell everyone and it's like listening to your favorite song and you want to tell everyone. When you have good news, you want to tell everyone. So I felt like I had something that I wanted to tell everyone about. And the only way I felt that was possible was social media. And my vision was to create a video that someone could send their friend and say, we're not alone. Like, that was the vision behind every video, that someone could simply send it to their friend and go, look, this is what we were talking about, that we're not the only ones who think like this. We're not the only ones who feel like this. And I didn't feel like anyone at that time in social media was using it to share deeper, meaningful, purposeful messages, which I think conversations people are having. No one's putting into the video.

Totally.

So I'm True story. I did not have a social media account till 2016.

No way.

Right. Like, true story. And I had a LinkedIn account because I went to business school. You have to have a LinkedIn account. So I had LinkedIn since I was 18, but I did not have a social media account. I did not have a public figure page, I did not have a YouTube page. Any of that.

Two years.

It's only been two years.

Wow.

So I launched my YouTube channel in 2016 and I chose social media because I was just like, I want to spread wisdom at the pace we want entertainment. How do I condense like a one hour sermon and lecture into three minutes and still get people to watch it? Because I wanted to add value to people's lives quickly. So anyway, I took to social media simply for the whole. But before that, I literally pitched my video series idea to around 30 media companies. This is before I ever made a video. And every single one of them rejected me before interview because they said, you have no filmmaking background, you have no social media background, you have no media background and you have no video making background. Like, you should not be making videos.

Okay.

So I went through 30 rejections from media companies when I was trying to leave the corporate world and switch over into this at 2016.

Okay.

So, yeah.

So throughout that journey, were you in New York during that time?

No, this is London.

So you're in London.

I chose social media because I couldn't make it in the traditional route. I kind of saw social media as a last resort.

Okay.

It wasn't even my first choice. It was like I was hoping one of these companies would see the value of me and pick it up, but they didn't. And so I was like, I exhausted all options apart from social media.

Okay. And then you saw that as like. Like an independence sort of round.

I just felt like, you know what? Let's give it a go.

Right.

I had nothing else to. I had nothing else going for me in this space.

Okay.

So it's the only option I had.

So when you were pitching this video series idea, was that, like you said, you didn't have the videos itself? It was just like an idea at the point?

Yeah. And this is my big lesson in pitching. Do not pitch ideas. If we want to get into entrepreneurship, do not pitch ideas. Like, I'm glad everyone rejected me.

Yeah.

Because I deserve to be rejected. I deserve to be rejected because I had not made the product for anyone to buy into. And so if you've not made a minimum viable product, if you've not made the minimum simplified version of whatever it is that you want to give out to the world, whether it's a video, wisdom, fitness, health, wellness, mind, whatever it is, you need to build something. And I think we still live in this world that's, like, excited by ideas. And I think everyone will say to you that it's about having a physical objects that people can look at, touch, feel, listen to, that's gonna help them believe in you. And so I'm glad I got rejected because if I didn't, I would still be making videos as a trainee video journalist for, like, some company.

That's amazing, man. So throughout that rejection. Rejection. 30 of them total. You're still in London. When was the transition to come to New York and why?

Yeah, I was really fortunate. So after three months of being on YouTube, Arianna Huffington's team saw my videos.

That's amazing.

Which was insane. So some sort of my videos at Davos.

Yep.

She loved the videos, and she sent someone who's a really good friend of mine now. His name's Danny Hsieh. Dan Katz and Danny Hsieh, who are her right and left hand men. She sent them both to London. They were passing through for HuffPost in London and they said they could meet me. So I went and meet these guys and I was just like, look, I love this. Like, this is like my passion, it's my vision. This is like what I live and breathe. What can we do here? And they were like, look, we're going to share your videos on the HuffPost Facebook page and we'll see how they do. There was no money involved. There was no, there was no deal. It was just, we'll see how it goes. So I produced four videos for HuffPost and I had to bug Danny, and he knows this. I had to bug Danny. I sent him an email every day for 30 days straight for him to respond after the amazing meeting we had in London. So we had this epic meeting in London, which I thought they loved me. And then it took 30 days of an email every day saying, danny, when are we going to do this? When are you going to share my videos? Then it took us another month to process the videos and then they shared four videos. The first video did a million views in a week. The second video did a million views in 24 hours and did 40 million views in total.

That's 2016.

That's 2016. This is like summer 2016. Then the third video did something like 30 million views and the fourth video overall, those four videos now have done 100 million views.

On Facebook.

On Facebook. And so Facebook was half post platform of choice at the time. And so I. So literally overnight I was getting invited to speak at conferences, I was being offered book deals, and it just changed. Like, everything shifted rapidly. It literally was like that. And everyone's like, oh, overnight success. And the funny thing is, my first video that I ever made far post was called there's no Such Thing as an Overnight Success. And. And I still hold that. Like, for me, it's like this has been. I talked about, I've. I've spoken about these. Like, some of the videos you see today, I wrote the scripts for them as my notes as a month. Like, they weren't scripts, they weren't videos, they were reflections, they were introspections. They were my thoughts, they were like my journal. And so the fact that those thoughts I wrote down eight years ago are still important and relevant today, that's what's fascinating about it.

Yeah, that's beautiful. I love the. When I read your Instagram bio, it's like making wisdom go viral. And it's like, that's the Thing that stuck out to me is like the messages. I remember it was, I think it was Thanksgiving or something where I showed my grandpa like all of your videos and he's like 70 something years old and like it resonated with him so much. I'm talking about like, yeah, I'm not going to go to college, I'm going to move out west. And he was like, oh, I don't know about that. I show him all your videos about like school and that entire thing. It's like it resonates from anyone because it's just the core beliefs.

See, true wisdom is timeless. True wisdom is timeless. It's ageless and it's universal.

Yeah.

And I only want to make content that is timeless, ageless and universal. But because I want someone to be able to claim my video in five years, 10 years, 15 years. And if I have to have the same impact, actually more because I try to layer each video so every time you watch it, you get something new. And for me that's really important because it's not. Wisdom isn't a trend, it isn't a fad, isn't just a moment. So for me, all the content has to be seen from that perspective.

No, that's beautiful and it's Super Interesting because 2016, I would say that's when I sort of got on social media. And to see what you've done within two years is just incredible. And I think a lot of people watching would agree because some people that I know, it's like they've been building brands for years, three, five, six years trying to build on social media. And what you've done is just phenomenal when it comes to billions of views. So to kind of touch on that when it comes to creating the content, obviously it's like you have this niche making wisdom go viral. That's the specific category. In a sense. What have you seen has been the biggest sort of, sort of pivot on social. Obviously, boom. You start your social media accounts, you have these videos going up and in post. When was the transition of saying, alright, I'm going to take this seriously, this can come like book deals, speaking on stages. How did that open your mind to see what's possibly potentially possible?

So I was with HuffPost for around six months and then last March I went fully independent. So I had a huge contract there and it was awesome. And I love that HuffPost and they gave me my break into the US and then last March I went totally independent and so I actually launched my. I actually started posting natively to Facebook only last March. Wow. So that's only been like just over a year.

Almost.

Same with. And with YouTube, I only started getting active again this January. Instagram, we just started getting active this January.

Yeah, you're crushing.

We've had two platforms. Like, for me, the. In regards to the question you're asking, for me, it was when I moved on from HuffPost, that's when I felt like this responsibility to be like, I need to really step it up.

Yeah.

Because when I was with HuffPost, it was a beautiful relationship, but you're also having that opportunity to be with one of the biggest brands in media. And then all of a sudden I decided to take that step out because I felt my thing was really growing and things were working for me. And that's when reality sets in. You're like, oh, now I'm on my own. Like, now there's no, you know, there's not a thing in your corner. There's not a name to rely on. There's just you. And for me, it was that point where I was just like, okay, now I've got to take content to the next level. We've seen content work, but for me as a creator, like, I see myself as someone who only wants to think, learn and teach. Like, that's who I am at the core of it, at the heart of it, I'm a thinker, I'm a learner, and I'm a teacher in the way I share. I'm a sharer more than a teacher. And for me, I'm always looking at, how do I just do that in my life?

Yeah.

So I get the most fulfillment when I redefine formats, when I create new content, when I'm testing what's working, what's not working. But I think the difference is that when I was 18, I was speaking in rooms of one to two people showing up, sometimes zero. So I've been speaking about the same stuff. I speak about my videos for 12 years, but I was speaking to zero people showing up. I was speaking to 10 people showing up and I was speaking to 20 people. Like, literally. I remember I was invited to speak at the London School of Economics, which is a really well known university in London. Zero people turned up in my first talk of all time. And I did it to the four walls just as an. Just to practice. And so I think social media became an obsession for me. When I was thinking about, like, okay, let me really think about how to craft stories for social.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And I think literally I'm not just saying this, to say this. Your content is the most, I would say, most put together, well, packaged content to actually get a message that I've ever seen. And that's from my heart.

Thank you.

And I was with my interviewed Amanda Bushy recently, and I know that you helped her put together her one of her videos. And I want to talk a little bit about the creative aspect. I think a lot with your videos, when I see your content, it's like, dude, like, how is he putting together these? I don't even want to call them videos, like productions. These. It looks like just something out of a movie, right? And his package just beautifully. So coming from my angle, it's like when it comes to production people, your team, how does that look? And really, how does everything just come into place from the back end?

Yeah, sure. So usually I have an idea, and the way I do it is if I have an idea that I think will resonate with someone, I first make an Instagram quote for it. So I make an Instagram quote, and if people really resonate with that Instagram quote, I'll make a short video to it with me just speaking to camera. And then after that video goes well, then I build a production out of it. So I've almost tested the concept or the theme because I really want to know that is that really, like, do people get the point I'm trying to make? And my point is I'm inspired by Einstein, one of my biggest inspirations. You saw him on the wall in there. Einstein said that if you can't explain something simply, you don't understand it well enough. And I believe that if you can't get people in 140 characters to engage and connect and know what you're talking about, then they're never going to watch you for three, three minutes later on 30 or three hours. So I'm always testing and pushing myself and challenging myself to say, when I put out a quote, do people get what I'm trying to say? Like, is it helping them? Is it serving them? Like other comments saying, jay, you just. You were thinking you're saying exactly what I'm thinking about. Or are people going, jay, I don't get this, but can you explain it?

Or.

I'm not sure.

Okay, testing phase.

Yeah, it's a testing phase because it helps you understand whether the audience understands the court process from a production standpoint. This is the surprise, and I wish I had a cooler answer, but I'm honest. So Paul Brazil, my good friend, my videographer and my editor, doing My stuff for the last year since I went independent, he videos and edits everything I do. I have another team in London called Filmworks. My guy Raj in Filmworks in London, he shoots everything I do in London. So I've got London, Raj, Paul in New York and la. And Paul edits everything. That's it. And I script, I produce, I direct, I write, I cast, I do the casting calls through Instagram myself.

If you're in New York, hit me up.

I'm in New York, hit me up. I'm in la, hit me up. I'm looking for actors and talent everywhere because I want to work with people who also follow me and are a part of the work. Because the kind of talent that I get to work with are people who love the videos. Like that for me is a huge win because you're working with people who it's so much more than just a job or a gig for them. They know the outgoing, they believe in it. Like we just made a video series that's coming out on Facebook on the 7th of August and the actress that we were shooting with over the two day period, like when we were recording her last monologue, she was crying. Recording the monologue for real. Because of how amazing the last two days of filming were like, and the journey she'd been on. I didn't make her cry. It was her own growth. And so I'm involved in everything. I don't outsource any of the creative because I just feel like that's who I am. That's me. That is, that is me. And so to outsource any of that would just seem unauthentic and it would take me a layer away from the audience. Like, I love my audience. I love everyone who's ever liked or watched a video. And the only way to re service that and reciprocate with that is to do everything. So I lit. Yeah, I do everything that is amazing. And so what I do is I come up with an idea, thought gets planted and over a month I'll build that into a story and then you'll.

Just know once thing if you know, people resonate with it, it's simple enough that they understand it. You'll go ahead and do the.

Yeah. And then we'll just book two days and we shoot two videos a day and just go all in and just create a miniseries. And now I'm doing a lot more miniseries.

I like the ones where it's like, watch this before.

Yes.

How did that come about? Because we were just talking about that on the way here. And like, I was like, that's so brilliant. Like, watch this before. Yeah, now everyone resonates with anyone, you know? Yeah, my kids could watch this before they get married. You know, it's timeless.

Well, I was just like. I was just like, we all need messages at certain times in our life, right? Like, yeah, we always, like, the big question is, like, what would you advice would you give to your youngest self? Like, what would you have told yourself when you were 18? We all needed advice, and we wish we had advice at particular moments in our life. So for me, all of my content is aimed at those moments. Like, if you are about to get married. And a lot of comes from my own life too. Like, I'm looking at, okay, what would I have wanted to know before I started a business? What would I have wanted to know before I got into a relationship? What would I wanted to know before I broke up with someone? Because if I knew that, I would have been able to process the whole experience much better. So for me, it all came from me really looking at, like, I want to make content that people will watch in a moment in their life that's gonna help them shift. And that's why I'm so grateful that I get literally thousands of emails a week saying, jay, you just helped me. You just stopped me from committing suicide. You helped me get through my divorce. You saved my breakup or my marriage. And it's like, I always say this to everyone. I was saying this to someone the other day that that stuff goes on my list at the top of where I want to live at forever, as opposed to how much money I make or wherever. And so for me, the videos have to be aimed at that. And I always replied to those people saying, it wasn't me, it was you. Because you watched the video.

Yeah.

And you made that change, like, recognize it wasn't me.

Yeah.

You know, so. Yeah.

That's beautiful, man. And I think I want to just say, I mean, just from the content, just from discovering your content and watching it, it's helped me more than you can ever even know, man. So I just want to say I definitely appreciate everything.

I appreciate that means a lot.

It means a lot because it's funny just bringing up the whole concept. Even, like, with my family, I have two brothers, they're older than me. They're kind of stuck in this rut in their life. And I consume a lot of content on social. But honestly, like, your content is the content that I show to anyone. It's like my good Friends back home, if they're going through a rough time, like, I always go back to your page videos, like, it's just something different. I think you're definitely the pioneer of just. I don't know what to call it, but the certain type of content that's just timeless.

I see them as short movies. I see them as short movies. I feel like we like to see ourselves in people.

Yeah, right. Like, I was even books, you know.

Video format is totally. You like to see yourself. You like to make. Mirror who you are in people. And so if people can see themselves and they can see characters. And I spend a lot of time studying character analysis in movies and video. And for me, it's like, if people can resonate with the characters, then they'll be able to think, okay, how does that apply to me? And I just never liked the approach of telling people what to do, because I fundamentally believe that people know the answer inside of them, and all I have to do is help them excavate that. So I'm always thinking about, you know, there's a reason why it's called storytelling, not story selling. Right. And it's like. It's like, how do I get someone to excavate the answer from themselves? Like, how do I make you realize that, Casey, you know, like, you already know what's right. I'm just gonna help you cut through all the rubbish and excavate that answer. Right. Like, that's all I want to do. That's the only role I'm playing. I'm not giving you the answers. I'm helping you find them in yourself. And that's really why the angle I take on content is less preachy and less telling.

Yeah.

Because I just don't think I have all the answers. I don't. I don't have all the answers.

Yeah.

Because everyone's got such unique experiences, and when I hear about people's challenges, I'm like, I wish I could help everyone. So anyway, the videos are just my way of trying to. Totally trying to resonate with everyone.

Amazing. I have a couple questions. I know. We have about 10 minutes left. Yeah, Yeah, I think I want to touch on. Right before we started the podcast. Podcast, you just said it was like, you don't have a vision board. You didn't expect things to happen like this. But from coming from being a monk, do you see both. Both sides of the world? You're like, if this. If you didn't have the things you have today, boom. You're the same person internally. And I want to touch on that when it comes to just inner peace, emotional intelligence. Because I graduated high school this year, right. And I think from coming from the education system, it's like they don't teach emotional intelligence. They don't teach you how to control yourself. And I think that's the biggest would say lack of whatever in the school system. So with you, and I think come at listening to all your content, you have an understanding of who you are, what you want, what makes you happy. And I think a lot of people don't, especially young people that are lost, confused, even people that I know personally. Right. So what would you say to people that are just lost emotionally? They, they're making impulsive decisions. They can't just control themselves. And obviously it's a long process to get that done. But what would be something that you'd want to instill in them to kind of make that change?

Well, I think is what you expose yourself to the most becomes your reference point. I'll give an example. If we were sitting right now with Steve Jobs, right? Let's say Steve Jobs was here right now and me and you were sitting with him, we'd feel really inferior that we hadn't built a product that changed the world. Now let's change Bill Gates. Let's say we had Jeff Bezos here. We would both feel really insignificant that we hadn't built an online platform, that that hadn't changed the world. Let's put the Dalai Lama here. We would both feel extremely insignificant that we weren't meditating to that level. The point is that most people's reference point or what they do is defined by the people around them. So the challenge is that if you're not exposed to a reference point broader than fame, money, success, cars, you're only going to think that that's what's going to make you happy. And the funny thing is, every person who's got all that stuff will tell you themselves. Yeah, that's not the stuff. 99.9% of people who have it will tell you that that is not it. Like everyone, like Jim Carrey's best quote, like, I believe everyone should become rich, famous, and get everything they want in life just to realize it's not the point. Right? Like, that's the thought process. So where I'm coming from is, and we've heard of this with everyone, like we know people who have had it all and been bankrupt, who've had their ups and downs and their moments. Imagine you could be at peace, ease and happy throughout all of that. And keep redefining yourself, keep growing and keep relearning. You'll be a lot happier. As opposed to feeling like all, like the Vedic literature. The philosophy that I studied talks about how when you have money or fame, most people waste all their energy trying to maintain it. Like your biggest energy is trying to maintain it.

Yeah.

But actually, if your energy at that point is switched to seeing how it can be used for beyond you, it switches up the game. And that's the part that I see we struggle with today. That service or using what you have for others is just not taught. And that fundamentally is the skill we learn as a monk. It's what we're training is as soon as you start thinking beyond yourself, that's when all of this stuff becomes a lot simpler and easier to deal with. And so I'm always pushing people to think, okay, you've got this, you made this. How do you change that experience for someone else? How do you become the servant leader that people need rather than just going, okay, I found my thing, I'm in my tower and I'm good. Yeah, you know, and I'm hoping that more people are becoming servant leaders and pushing out there and thinking about how their resources can help serve other people. And stop compare. Stop deciding what you do based on a comparison. That's the point. Stop deciding what you do based on a comparison. You will always do. If you think, if you around millionaires, you think you have to be one to be happy, but that's not necessarily true. I know plenty of people who are millionaires are not happy. And I know plenty of people who are millionaires who are happy. And that's not the gauge. The gauge is, are you doing what you love? Are you serving through that? Like, are you making a difference through that?

Yeah.

And have you got people, people around you that know you are helping you become more you and not more them? Yeah, like. Like it comes down to that.

Yeah, like.

And so I keep a small circle. I'm very careful about what influences even me. Like, if I go back into influences I had before, it's so easy for me to start thinking I need something else.

Yeah.

Like, oh, that awesome study. I read it said that most entrepreneurs, after exiting their successful business, they make the worst decisions in the two years after that because they think they have to become investors. They think that now they have all this money, they should become like a big investor. They go invest in a ton of startups that are never going to make it and they lose all their money. And that's A big statistic which shows that when we're successful, we think we have to be something else. And as soon as you think you have to be something, is your dream really your dream? Yeah, I just. That's the question I'd really be answering. Is it your dream or did it come from your dad, your mom, your sister, your brother? A social media influencer. Like, why does every kid today want to be a social media influencer? Because that's what they're exposed to.

Yeah, totally.

And so I'm not saying that's bad, but I'm saying is it really your dream or do you just feel the pressure to make it your dream?

Reference points.

Totally.

That's amazing, man. It's so funny because I feel like listening to this right now. It's like I get more from the last four years in high school just from an emotional standpoint, from a perspective of learning different things. And I feel like there's a lot that's the biggest challenge for me, coming from just graduating school is my content. The way I'm doing interviews is I want the people that have more experience than me to share their stories, tell their stories through a timeless effect as well, you know? So I kind of want to wrap it up with just talking about not just the social, but the impact. Right. Obviously, everything you're doing, like you just talked about is leading towards that impact. Impact. Right. You're. You're not putting out videos for yourself to watch. Right. It's for the billions of people that have seen it. So with you, what necessarily does impact mean for you, and how do you plan on taking from where you are today, moving forward with the whole entire social media sort of catalyst? You have to just impact millions of people.

So for me, it's super simple. I read a study that said that the most successful people in the world choose education over entertainment, and the most people are struggling in the world choose entertainment over education. My vision is to make education not entertaining, but to help entertainment have education. So it's. How do I make content that is entertainment first, education second. How can you watch a movie and it teach you about life? How can you watch a short video and it teach you about the mind? How are you watching stuff that you actually love watching? Because it's just fun, fun to watch, but it's helping you grow. And that's the content that we've never had. We've had courses forever. We've had books forever, We've had seminars forever. My unique. And I value all of that stuff. Yeah, like, I value all of it. I've changed because of books, I've changed because of seminars, I've changed because of courses. So I have the utmost respect for all of that. Where I'm different in what I'm doing is I'm going down the route of changing the entertainment industry.

Yeah.

Like, that's my vision. It's like, how is every TV show in the world not numbing your mind, but helping it enlighten and grow? And not just through documentaries, but through pure entertainment. And so I have a big belief that entertainment creates more cultural shifts and actually dictates the meaning and purpose we see in society. For example, if you see more entrepreneurs in tv, more people will think about entrepreneurship. Totally. If you see more people coming out about their sexuality on tv, we feel more comfortable in real life to do it too culturally. You look at the success of Queer Eye, right? Like, it's awesome. Like, I love it because all it's doing is giving people the confidence to be themselves. Media is creating more shifts in culture and life than any education platform or.

Education schooling system ever will overnight. I feel like, especially with the way we live on this instant social media media world. It's like when something goes viral, it's like it goes way viral in this whole society.

And I see that as the entry point. And I see all the courses, the books, the seminars, the conferences as being what helps people go on that journey. But I've been very consciously positioning myself in the space of. I just want this to scale.

Yeah.

I want every kid who has a smartphone to have the opportunity to find out about everything early so that they have options, so they have choices, so that they know what. What's happening out there so they don't have to waste 10, 20 years to then realize, oh, why was I wasting my time doing this?

Well, Jay, I just want to say, man, I want to wrap it up on that. I think that's a great point to end that, man. But for everyone listening today, watching today, I just. If they haven't seen his content, obviously we're talking about all his videos. You must go watch all of his content. And I'm telling you, once you watch one, you watch 30 in a row. It's like, it's contagious. I still. So everyone that's watching, I'm gonna list your Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, everything down below. But for everyone that's watching that may want to maybe send you a dm, send you a message, where's the best place to interact with you? Where do you spend most of your.

Time at Instagram, DM or Twitter.

Yeah.

Okay. Tweet me. I reply to nearly everything.

I was gonna say that, man. As soon as I DM you. Every time. It's like within five minutes, I feel.

Like, yeah, I'm on my phone a lot. The only time I'm not on my phone is when I'm meditating or when I'm eating.

Okay.

Those are my two times.

Beautiful.

And sleeping in the bedroom, it's more fun to eat and sleep with people.

So.

So don't, you know, don't take your phone to bed. But yeah, for me, yeah, just Instagram if you really want to get in touch. Like Instagram and Twitter.

Okay.

But. But I really like it when, you know, when Casey reached out, I loved what he was already doing. And, like, I hadn't, like, I failed because I didn't build something. Casey had already built something. Totally. And when that reach comes out is. When that reach comes out, you can reciprocate because, you know, the person's already put in effort. Right. So I value that value.

The thank you really means a lot because it's funny because I think a lot of people when it comes to outreach, right? It's like. It's funny because as I've kind of, like, we were talking about for the people that I've had on my podcast, a lot of these younger kids that are my age, maybe older, too, it's like, they'll try to DM someone, but they'll just be like, hey. And they don't have a distinctive purpose for reaching out. And I just want to put that out there because I think that's a core thing that a lot of young people are struggling with, is like, they're. They're not straight to the point, but they don't have an angle with reaching out to someone. Right.

So I think that's something that surprise people, you know? Surprise people?

Yeah.

Like, do something different.

Totally.

It really does grab your attention because we're in an attention, you know, landscape. But it's so hard to hold someone so amazing. Do something different.

But, yeah, totally, man. Well, everyone listening, Like I said, make sure you go check out his videos. I'm gonna list a bunch of different videos you can check out in the comments section below, in the subscription section below. So make sure you go check it out. And Jay, I just want to say thank you so much. And everyone, thanks so much for listening to the build your Empire podcast. I will talk to you guys soon.

Thanks to Casey. I can't believe he's 18. It's amazing. I love it.

Thank you.

I love it. And I love that he's 18. He's doing stuff, but he's still humble. You know, for me, humility is the most endearing quality, and I think the most successful people in the world don't really lose that. So, yeah, the fact that you're a humble at 18 and keep doing that, man.

Thank you, man.

All my haters keep my name in.

The mouth Y' all are hopeless this is a decade of devotion it's hard to stop my movement When I'm already in motion this ain't luck this is by design I had to work in the dark for my light to shine A lot of people are dope they just quit too soon A lot of rappers, A lot of rappers they got rich.

Legacy of Monsters An Apple Original series. The world is on fire. I decided to do something about it on November 17th. This place, it's not ours.

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The most massive event of the year arrives. If you come with me, you'll know everything. I promise.

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