No Man Is and Island - The Key to Happiness That Will Surprise You

Most people spend their entire life stressed without ever giving a single thought as to what it is they really want or what's important to them. See, I'm here to cut through all that noise connecting you to yourself and the life that you were meant to live. I used to slave away at a corporate job that I hated, but I broke through the social norms and pursued my passion. As a result, I own my own coffee company, I'm espresso sommelier and I get to travel the world. You too can live a life that you love, but it starts with getting clear about what you want. It starts with a new decision. I'm your host, Donnie Rouse and you are listening to the podcast One Life. No man is an island. Relationships are the one thing that will literally transform your life. When at least people here in the western world, when you think of happiness, when you think of what is going to get you to that level of joy, we always put into like we always get into our mind. It's what we're going to achieve. It is the end. It's the goal. Once we've achieved the goal, once we've achieved that thing, then and only then will we have this happiness. But I'm telling you, if you're waiting for that moment of success, if you're waiting for, for the attainment of that goal in order to be happy, not only are you wasting your life, but you are deluding yourself. Joy comes from the people around you. Joy comes from friendships. I remember reading in a book, I don't recall what book it was, but there was a company that whenever they would hire a individual, they would look at the person's relationships. They would ask them questions, well, what do you do outside of work? What do you do in your spare time? What they were looking for was that they were looking for people who had relationships outside of work. Because their findings showed that the people who had fulfilling and close relationships outside of work were the most happy and as a result would contribute the most important in their jobs. It's not so far fetched to think when you're happy, how do you work? What do you do differently than if you're stressed when you're unfulfilled or when you feel alone? Oftentimes in my life, oh, actually it's funny, I get these lessons in life where they start to. I'll notice something where I'll get a series of lessons and they literally one right after the other. And I take that as a divine message that is trying to give me a little shake. And what I'VE been getting lately has been that of relationships in terms of building close relationships, because that is where the ultimate fulfillment is. But before we go there, I want to ask a few questions and I want you to keep these questions in mind and be honest with yourself and listen to this podcast to the end. Again, listen to the end, because I think that what I'm going to share with you will literally transform your life if you put into action what I'm going to say. Question 1 what do you want? What is your ideal friendship? When you think of your best friend, when you think of the person that you want to be around every single day in your life, what do you want that person to be? Right, let's start to get clear about who we want to involve in our lives, what they're like, what their values are. Write it all down. How do they treat you? How often do you hang out with them? Put these things on paper. How do they make you feel? The second question, and this one is going to be the most important question that I ask. How have you been showing up? Right? If you say you want a great friend who remembers your birthday, who makes time for the little things like going for a cup of coffee and just talking through a problem that you may have and is always there for you, how do you show up for others? How do you show up when people need you, when they just want you to lend them an ear? Are you too busy? Or you say, oh no, I don't have time, sorry, I'd love to get together for dinner but I have work or I have to wake up early in the morning because I'm going to get my hair done, whatever it may be, how do you respond? And the second part to that question is are you being the type of friend that you want in your life and once you've gotten real with yourself, I want you to take the next question is just what actions do you have to take? Right? You just wrote down exactly the kind of friend you want to attract in your life. The next step now is for you to be that friend to others. I have several stories that'll push the pointer. Um, give you an example. So I was doing, I was helping out my sister in law. She just moved into a space where she teaches children's classes and we were doing a building a bunch of her furniture. And while we were building this furniture, at first it was me on this one piece by myself and then my, my brother and my father another piece and then her brother was standing there in her as well as her Father. When we started building it, the first reaction or the first thing I heard in my mind was, I am going to build this faster than all of them. I was turning it into a competition. But then because of the passage I had read in one of the books, I said, well, no, that doesn't make sense. Wouldn't it feel better to include everybody in it? Wouldn't I enjoy the process more rather than feeling like I have to push harder and faster and stronger than everyone else? Wouldn't it just feel good to have someone do the thing with me, to be on that journey with me? As a result, I called her brother over and said, hey, you know, And I was, you know, there is a little bit of a language difference. He speaks English, but it's. It could be broken at times. So I guided him. I told him, you know, the things we could do to work together. And then I would actually. Would give him more things to do because it actually felt good getting other people involved. And her father has, like, an injured back, and he was. So he was limited to what he was able to do. But one of the things he would do and it helped tremendously, is he would go around as we were taking apart all these boxes and just keeping the space tidy, which, if you've ever done any kind of construction work, you realize that in order for you to be productive, you have to keep your space clean. Otherwise, when things are a mess, you can't think. Things get lost. So everyone was adding value in it. So as her brother was helping me, I was just thinking this lesson was going over and over in my mind. Then on my birthday, I was something else that popped in my mind. I was looking at. I was doing this course online, and it was saying, if you want a good friend, you have to be a good friend. And I thought about that. And again, I reflected on my own life. I reflected on my own friendships. How was I showing up in my friendships? I was the person who was like, no, yeah, I want to do this, but I'm too busy. Or, you know, I would push the most important people in my life away from me, the people who support. And it would always give me the will to move forward. Or if I was going through something, like recently I was going through, it just felt very heavy. When I came back from my trip, I came back and I was questioning everything. To try to put it into words, what I was feeling. I felt lost. I felt stuck. I felt afraid to move forward. Like I didn't have the power within me. Like, everyone was like, everyone is succeeding and moving forward. And I was just staying behind. This was like this a mind chatter that I often would hear. And then as I was listening to that, I realized that, you know, my friends, the people who, like I have a handful of really good friends that will support me and they'll always lift me up. Why wasn't I leaning on them? Why wasn't I calling them? You see sometimes when you might have good friendships, but if you don't maintain the friendship, it almost feels awkward for you to give them a call and to even ask them for advice or even just to lend you an ear. So I end up calling one of my friends or a couple of my friends. Actually was just kind of sharing and just being around them because they're all inspiring people. They all have big hearts, they all have big aspirations. So just being around them lifted me up. But as I shared like the weight that I was feeling, all of a sudden it just felt lighter. I felt in a better mood. I started to smile. So my birthday had just passed and one of the. I hadn't had a birthday party where I had, where I've had my friends and family together at a table for dinner in literally 15 years. The last time I did that, I think was just post, post college. So I was at the table and I have all my friends and some of my friends. I couldn't fit everybody at this, at this, at this restaurant, but I had a handful of my friends and family there. And when they passed out sake, it was a Japanese place, they passed out cups of sake. And I did a, I did someone, my sister in law was like, give a speech, give a speech. So I stood up and I gave a speech. I had everyone held up their glass. I said, I guys want to thank you guys for being here. This is literally the first time that I have done a dinner with family and friends in about 15 years. It's also one of the first times I've been in the country for my birthday in 15 years. And I said, I want to apologize for not showing up as a better friend. One of the things that I realized that if I want good friends, I have to be a good friend. So I vow from this point forward to show up to be the friend I want to have. And I said to you guys, cheers. And then we all cling, cling to that. And we all drank the sake. So how are you showing up in your life? How do you show up in your work? One of the things I just mentioned was when you don't, when you don't nurture a relationship, it starts to degrade. It starts. You don't feel close. You could have such a great connection with someone, but if you don't nurture the relationship, then it starts to feel distant. It feels awkward even contacting the person. One of my best friends, my best friend Lucas, you know, I haven't spoken to him in a while. I didn't get a happy birthday from him. But I'm not. I don't hold that against him, actually. A lot of people. When my birthday came, I got a lot of text messages, right? A lot of text messages. Some voice memos, even some videos, which was really good. When my friend Ryan sent me playing Happy Birthday on piano, that was probably one of my favorites. But, you know, a call, right, because it's easy to send a text message, it's easy to make a video, but to have a phone call, right, to take the time out of your day, although all these require some time out of your day, there's something personal to say, listen, I am going to give this person a call just to wish him a happy birthday. A few people did do that. And I'm not, you know, I'm not upset. I'm not angry at the friends of mine who did not. Because to be honest with you, I haven't done that in the past, right? There. There has been some where I would call, you know, some of my friends, I would call and wish them a happy birthday. But other ones, I might have responded to texts or sometimes I forgot and I would respond days, maybe even weeks later. So I wasn't angry. The first thing that came to my mind was I have to be the friend I want to have. And then one of my other friends, my friend Nando, I hadn't spoke. I haven't spoken to him literally in quite a while. He came, he called me up on my birthday to wish me happy birthday. I was actually very surprised. He was the last person I was actually expecting for to give me a call on my birthday. And we had been to like. We had been like brothers, literally for our entire lives. He moved up a few towns up, and last few years, I haven't really heard much from him. So as a result, I mean, my. My. One of my brothers was over. We were talking about dinner and my brother kind of like bit his tongue. He's like, oh. You know, because he realized that my friend Nando wasn't invited to the dinner. And at first I was like, I felt awkward about it. I'm like, well, yeah, it's kind of awkward. I don't want to talk about dinner while I'm on the phone with him. But it doesn't matter, right? It doesn't matter. I've made attempts to connect with them and make plans, but it wasn't reciprocated. And if the relationship is not being nurtured, then naturally it goes into decline. It starts to fall apart. Just because that happens, does that mean it can't be reconciled? Absolutely not. But it takes conscious effort. And again, the second word. It takes effort. So what I want you to gather from this entire episode is the most important thing in your life is relationship. It doesn't matter what you achieve. It doesn't matter where you travel to. Doesn't matter how much money you have in your bank account. The most important thing in your life are your relationships. Are you showing up the way you want people to show up for you? Are you being the friend you want to? Have to drive this point even further. Let's make a list. Let's make a list of all of your friends, all the people in your life who are the most important people in your life. It may make sense right now to even write down the birthdays. Do you know their birthdays? I will be honest. I'm going to have to ask a lot of my friends their birthdays because I don't have all of them up. Some of them are my phone, but a lot of them are not my phone. So I have to. It's a conscious effort now. I'm like, all right, I got to put these most important people. I literally have to make time on a. At the very least on a monthly basis to reach out, connect, and have some kind of personal contact with them. Who are the most important people in your life? Write that down. Next is, what is your vision for your friendship? How do you want your friendships to be? And whatever you're writing down, I'm willing to bet that whatever you put down, they could far exceed that. The joy can far exceed it. How have you been showing up? Next. How have you been? Like, who have you been? You have to change first. I'll give you a story. I remember, like, my brother, like, a long, long time ago. I would always kind of. I would always, like, take clothing from my brother. And I would try to. I would go to school and high school. I would wear, like, a jacket over one of his nice, like, Tommy Hilfiger shirts. And then when I would get to school, I would take it off and I'd be wearing the shirt to school. And then when I Would go back home, jacket comes back on. I sneak into his room, perfectly fold the clothing and put it back. And we would always get into these arguments and fights over it because he would. He would literally want to rip my head off. But then there was a time where he was going through a breakup, and he would ask me if he could use some of my clothing, like things from clothing and even made headphones and stuff like that. And I would say yes. And then I remember one time I had taken one of his shirts and he saw me wearing it. I was like, oh, fuck, I got caught out again. And he says. He said, listen, I don't care if you wear my shirt. Just. Just wash it and put it back. And as a result of. I was like, huh? Okay. It was just, I. I was not expecting him to respond that way. I'm sorry, let me rewind the story. I think that I would. Whenever he would. He would borrow something from me, I would react the same way, right? I would explode. Like, why are you taking stuff without asking? But when he responded that way, all of a sudden, it changed my response to him. All of a sudden, now I was like, oh, he's. Donnie, can I borrow your head? Yeah, sure, go ahead. Just again, make sure you put them back. I responded the same way. It was reciprocated. He was being a model for how he, maybe without even knowing it, of how he wanted me to respond. And as a result, I was the same way. And the relationship was better after that. So who do you need to be in order to have those friendships? And of course, the last step, as in everything we do, is taking the action. Once you know what that end is, once you know what it is that you want to attain, what it is that you're going for, the next step is to start to take action for that. The action you can take could literally be what I just mentioned, right, a few moments ago, just writing down a list of the people who are closest to you. And in that list, maybe just starting, just writing the list, but if you want to take it a step further, just start to write down their birthdays. So this way you can give them some kind of special touch message or, you know, birthday wish. So I hope you enjoyed this podcast. Relationships matter. Whether it be in your work, the community that you. That you touch, relationships are the thing that will move that line forward, that will leave you feeling happy and fulfilled. If you enjoyed this podcast, please give it a thumbs up. Subscribe by subscribing, you help get the word of the podcast out so share it with someone who needs to hear this. If you would like to ask a question, comment, or just share your own story, I would love to hear it. You can send it to me via my webpage at www.donnierouse.com. again that's-o n n y r a u s.coM-O-N n y r a u s.Com if you like great coffee, you can purchase some coffee. Because again, all this is about just enjoyment of your life. Living the most passionate expression of your life. And what better way to do that than with a great cup of rous coffee. You can go onto my website at www.donnyrouse. i'm sorry, you can do it that way too. Rousecoffee.com, r a u s coffee.com again r a u s coffee.com there. Just use the discount code onelife O N E L I F E all capital letters and you'll get 10% off your order. Delicious coffees roasted fresh all the time. And if you really like espresso, my cold rum espresso is second to none. Delicious, convenient, quick, it will make your day. So I hope you enjoyed this podcast guys. Thank you so so much for tuning in. Remember you get one life. Live it. God bless and I will see you again soon.