As leaders, we are tasked with “motivating” others. And empathy plays a role in that – in understanding what motivates others and hopefully, tying that to the goal you are trying to accomplish. But this is still a very ego-centric way of managing others. Making them “do what we want them to do” which my guest today tells us will never work. Today’s guest, Dr. John DeMartini shares the science of goal setting, why motivation doesn’t work, and how to discover your own – as well as others ‘- highest values so you can all succeed together.
Dr. DeMartini shares his powerful and inspirational personal journey involving overcoming learning disabilities, teachers who wanted to give up on him, his determination to learn how to read, write, articulate his ideas, and learn as much as he could, a near-death experience, his life as a surfer and a vagabond, a vision for his life that guided his trajectory, and his mother’s important words. You’ll love our discussion on sustainable fair exchange, how to level the playing field by letting go of ego and subservience, and he explains the 13 vectors of understanding your higher values so you can align your work and life. He shares a powerful free assessment tool you and your team can take so you can work better together – see below in the show notes for the link!
To access this episode transcript, please scroll down below.
Key Takeaways:
- Having a reflective awareness, an introspective heart, and an empathic understanding of other people allows you to meet them at their level of the world and help them to recognize their genius and magnificence.
- Everyone has an underlying drive of what is the most valuable and most significant for them. The lower the priority, the more of a distraction it is from your highest values and goals.
- Nobody works for the sake of the company, they work for fulfilling their values. If they can’t see how the company and the work they are doing fulfill those values, then you will find disengaged and uninspired workers.
“You find time, make time, spend time for things that are important to you. If you look honestly, like a drone hovering over what you really spend your time on, most of the time, it’s going to be a reflection of what you’re valuing.” — Dr. John DeMartini
About Dr. John Demartini, Human Behavior Expert, Polymath, and Internationally Published Author
Dr. John Demartini is a world-leading human behavior specialist, researcher, best-selling author, educator, and founder of The Demartini Method, a revolutionary tool in modern psychology. He has authored 40 books that have been translated into 39 different languages and presented his insights alongside some of the world’s most influential people, including Sir Richard Branson and Deepak Chopra. Harnessing almost five decades of research across multiple disciplines, Dr Demartini shares his life, business, financial, relationship and leadership empowerment strategies with people all over the globe – enabling them to transform their lives according to their highest values.
Connect with Dr. John Demartini
The Demartini Institute and free Values Assessment tool: https://drdemartini.com/
Book: The 7 Secret Treasures: A Transformational Blueprint for a Well-Lived Life: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-7-secret-treasures-john-demartini/1140858133
Don’t forget to download your free guide! Discover The 5 Business Benefits of Empathy: http://red-slice.com/business-benefits-empathy
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FULL TRANSCRIPT BELOW:
Welcome to the empathy edge podcast the show that proves why kashflow creativity and compassion are not mutually exclusive. I’m your host Maria Ross. I’m a speaker, author, mom, facilitator and empathy advocate. And here you’ll meet trailblazing leaders and executives, authors and experts who embrace empathy to achieve radical success. We discuss all facets of empathy from trends and research to the future of work to how to heal societal divisions and collaborate more effectively. Our goal is to redefine success and prove that empathy isn’t just good for society, it’s great for business. As leaders were tasked with motivating others, and empathy plays a role in that in understanding what motivates others and hopefully, tying that to the goal you’re trying to accomplish. But this is still a very ego centric way of managing people, making them do what we want them to do, which my guest today says will never work. Today’s guest, Dr. John Demartini shares the science of goal setting, why motivation doesn’t work, and how to discover your own as well as others highest values so you can all succeed together. Dr. Demartini is a world leading human behavior specialist, researcher, Best Selling Author, educator, and founder of the Demartini method, a revolutionary tool in modern psychology. He’s authored 40 books that have been translated into 39 different languages, and presented his insights alongside some of the world’s most influential people, including Sir Richard Branson, and Deepak Chopra, harnessing almost five decades of research across multiple disciplines, Dr. Demartini shares his life, business, financial relationship and leadership empowerment strategies with people all over the globe, enabling them to transform their lives according to their highest values. Today, Dr. Demartini shares his powerful and inspirational personal journey that involves overcoming learning disabilities, teachers who wanted to give up on him his determination to learn how to read, write, articulate his ideas, and to learn as much as he could, and a near death experience as well as his life as a surfer and a vagabond, a vision for his life that guided his trajectory. And his mother’s very important words. You’ll love our discussion on sustainable fair exchange and what it means how to level the playing field by letting go of ego and subservience. And he explains the 13 vectors of understanding your higher values, so you can align your work and life. He shares a powerful free assessment tool, I’ll have the link in the show notes that you and your team can take, so you can work better together. This was such an enriching conversation. I know you’ll enjoy it. Stay tuned. A big welcome to Dr. John Demartini. Today on the podcast, we’re going to be talking about the role of empathy in goal setting and motivation. Welcome to the empathy edge podcast. John,
Dr. John DeMartini 03:39
thank you for having me. I was looking forward to it. Thank you.
Maria Ross 03:42
So I would love to start with your personal story because it’s so inspiring and moving. And I suspect there’s a lot that there was a big role that empathy played in those experiences. So can you share with listeners a little bit about your personal story and some of the challenges that you went through to get to where you are today, you know, speaking on big stages, writing amazing books, and helping people embrace their best selves.
Dr. John DeMartini 04:10
You want the one minute, the two to three minutes. I was born with my arm and leg turned in with a bit of a deformity and a speech impediment in Houston, Texas in 1954. But six years of age going on seven elementary school, I found out that I couldn’t read. I had a form of dyslexia. I just couldn’t make any. I couldn’t pronounce the words. I couldn’t make any sense out of the words there was no meaning. And I spelled crazily. So I went from normal reading to remedial reading to the dumps class, and I had to wear a dunce cap.
Maria Ross 04:47
Oh my goodness,
Dr. John DeMartini 04:49
which I’ve turned into a wizard’s cap. But I am the only way I made it through elementary school really was asking the smart kids what they got out of the classes of what they learned from their reading and etc. And I asked questions which I still use today questions that were till I was 12 my parents moved to a small town where there was no really smart kids a low socio economic. I didn’t have anybody to help. I failed. I left school, I left home at 13. Wow. At 14 I decided I was gonna go to California because I picked up surfing and Texas wasn’t the surf capitol. So I decided I’m gonna go to California. I took my surfboard, I hitchhiked to California, hitchhiked down in Mexico, was a street Vagabond on kid for a while. At 15. I made it over to Hawaii, panhandling a bunch of money at Huntington Beach, California made up money to fly to Hawaii. I lived under a bridge first than a park bench than a bathroom than an abandoned car. And finally attempt. So I kept social climbing. I did really well in surfing. I grew in surfing skills. I survived there. That in a couple movies, three movies, I think and surf books and things did pretty good. And surfing was one of those late 60s early 70s long haired hippie surfer guys that I nearly died at 17 I had strychnine and cyanide poisoning from something I had consumed. And that damaged my nervous system. And I kind of looked like Joe Cocker had spasms. And I was led to a health food store and then to a yoga class to try to gain governance over my my physiology. It was there that I met a teacher named Paul C. Bragg, who inspired me one night to believe that maybe I could learn to read, maybe I could speak properly. Maybe I could someday become intelligent, and do something, no amount of something not that I wasn’t doing good in sports, surfing. But that wasn’t a sport of any significance. You didn’t get paid in those days. But I had a real epiphany that night I met him. And I saw a vision in my mind that night, which is painted in my office. It’s a big painting of me standing in front of a group of people and being able to articulate smoothly and moving people. And there was a million people in the audience. And I had a dream that night to finally figure out how to overcome my learning problems. Read, speak. And someday be intelligent. I went on a journey to I flew back to California hitchhike back to Texas. I got talked into taking the GED, I passed it by miraculously guessing I just literally close my eyes and filled in dots. Well, then I tried to go to school. And I failed again. I got the lowest grade at 27. Everybody else was above 75. And I thought I’m not going to be able to do this. This is a fantasy. I guess I’m going to do what my first grade teacher told my parents because they had to ask my parents to come to school and said, I’m afraid your son’s never going to be able to read he’s never gonna be able to write, he’s never gonna be able to communicate effectively. It probably won’t match anything or go very far in life. My mom saw me in the living room crying because I failed the test. And I gave up on my vision for that few hours about being a teacher and becoming intelligent. So I wanted to go and learn and teach. Because I thought teachers are intelligent. That’s what I thought of at that age. And my mom said something to me that only a mom could probably say that she saw me she said what happened? So why are you crying? What’s happened? I said I blew the test. I got to 27 She paused and then she put her hand on my shoulder and she said, Son, whether you become a great teacher, and travel the world like your dream with a return to Hawaiian right giant waves like you’ve done. We returned to the streets and panhandle. I just want to let you know that your father and I are going to love you no matter what was a very powerful moment in my life. And I my hair went into a fist I looked up and I saw the night vision that I saw with Paul Bragg that night, standing in front of a million people. And I said to myself, I’m going to mass the sinkhole reading, studying and learning. I’m going to Mass a sinkhole speaking teaching and as a teacher and I will do whatever it takes trouble whatever distance and pay whatever price to get my search of love across the planet. I’m not gonna let any human being stopped me, not even myself. I got up I hug my mom. I went into a room and I started on a dictionary. I started memorizing 30 words a day. Until two years later, I had 20,000 words accumulated in my mind that and we every day my mom would test me on spelling, pronunciation, meaning it by putting it in a sentence, and I worked, every minute, I couldn’t make sure that I was successful in 30 words a day. And I then started passing school. I then started excelling in school and up at the top of the class, not the bottom. And I went on a mission, to read everything I could get my hands on in every field, I stayed at 300 disciplines and read over 30,700 books now. And became a polymath, an autodidactic, polymath, and had been teaching since age 18. So I’ve been teaching over 50 years now. And I’ve spoken in 188 countries. So the dream that I had manifested. But when I see people, particularly kids, that have challenges, of course, I can identify with it. And I do what I can to assist. But empathy, in my opinion, was identifying with all of the challenges that I went through. When I see all those people I can relate to them. And it gives me an inspiration to be able to contribute to those individuals that have even any degree have that same type of journey. Well, there’s no way to do that without, I guess you could say, a reflective awareness and introspective heart, and an empathic understanding of other people. So you can meet them at their level the world and help them to recognize their genius and magnificence of sitting in there waiting to come surface.
Maria Ross 11:35
Wow, I mean, so many things there, what an amazing journey and you know, your life has led you to, you know, achieving that vision that you had back then I mean, being on stages with Deepak Chopra, and Richard Branson, and, and doing all the work that you did, given we’re going to talk a little bit today a lot today about motivation and goal setting. What do you think was? What was the true motivation in terms of, you know, how do you how do you create that vision that you you had for yourself? When you’re leading a team, or you’re trying to activate a group of people? Is there a way to externally create that vision for someone? Or does it have to organically come to them as it did for you? What, what was the impetus for that vision, as you reflect back? Did it come from you or from your teachers,
Dr. John DeMartini 12:30
it’s always a reflective of the combination, I think, every human being, regardless of age, gender, cultures, sexual spectrum, whatever, they live moment by moment, with a unique hierarchy of values, a set of values, a set of priorities that they live their life by, and things that are most to least important, consciously or unconsciously, whatever’s highest on that list of values. They are intrinsically called into action to fulfill and they spontaneously act on it without needing extrinsic motivation to act. But as you go down the list of those values, progressively, there’s a need for greater degrees of extrinsic motivation incentive to get people to do things. Some people discover what that top one is, and take off some people flounder, through the subordination of other people, by their comparison to other people. See, if you look up to people and down on yourself, you’re gonna inject other people’s values in cloud, that clarity of what that highest value is for you. If you look down on people and put them in a pit, and exaggerate yourself, you’re gonna look down on them and try to project your values onto them and be distracted with futility, trying to change you into others or others into you instead of both being authentic. But if you’re a leader, and you care enough about another individual, to identify what’s truly deeply important, and meaningful and inspiring, and fulfilling to that individual, their highest value and respect them enough to dialogue, and communicate what you value as a leader of a business, the priorities in terms of what they value, so they get what they want, helping you give what you what you want. The only thing that’s is that really allows maximum potential even as Adam Smith said this in his Wealth of Nations is sustainable fair exchange, where you’re not putting people above or below you. They’re not on pedestals or pitch they’re in your heart. And that’s where true empathy is. If it elaborate on my idea of empathy guy, yeah, please
Maria Ross 14:49
try that. I think we should because, you know, we’ve talked a lot on the show and in my book about empathy and, and busting the myths of what people presume to be empathy and And I feel that many of those myths hold leaders back from exhibiting empathy when empathy, you know, talking about selfish, external motives. My entire book was a business case for how empathy benefits the bottom line, because it was my way of Trojan horsing leaders into embracing empathy and then therefore being transformed from the outside in. But I would like to hear your your take on it. Because even when I was researching the book, every person I talked to had a slightly different definition of empathy. And we both know that the dictionary definition has changed over time even so share with us when you talk about empathy, what’s your take on that?
Dr. John DeMartini 15:43
I’d like to develop that because I, I’ve been in a number of books on empathy, there’s been many books written about it that I’ve had the opportunity to be part of. If you’re living by your highest values, the blood glucose and oxygen goes into the forebrain activates the medial prefrontal cortex and executive center, and gives you a higher probability of objective perceptions, where you’re able to see both sides of events instead of only a subjectively biased interpretation of what’s real. When you’re living by lower values, you’re more likely to be in your amygdala because of the unfulfillment and be looking for pleasure and avoiding pain, a prey predator mentality, where subjective bias is an essential survival system to accelerate adrenaline for catching prey and avoiding predator. So we automatically distort our reality when we live by lower values and automatically come to embrace our objective reality when we’re more objective. So we haven’t we are, we’re less likely to judge. And when we’re not, we’re living our lower values, we’re more likely to have bias and prejudice a judgment. Because we’re distorting things, and we get addicted to pride and get addicted to fantasies and projected onto other people. And then we block our ability to communicate effectively with assistance in their values. So I define empathy this way. So if I meet somebody, and I put him on a pedestal, and I infatuate with him, and I minimize myself and feel intimidated relative to him, and I’m too humble to admit what I see in them inside me. I have a deflective awareness, a disowned part, I have a dismemberment as Plato would describe. And I have in a sense of form of disempowerment, because now I’m going to try to live in their values to please them, and sacrifice what’s important to me. If I resent somebody and minimize them, and exaggerate me, I’m also too proud to admit what I see in them is inside me, and I have another disowned part, open part deflected part. And these deflected parts, these disowned parts leave me feeling empty. That’s why judgment doesn’t bring fulfillment, it leaves emptiness. But what’s more important is the disowned part keeps me from understanding and really having reflective awareness with that individual, which is the cornerstone of empathy. We can’t really have true empathy, unless we can have a reflective awareness. That doesn’t mean we need to be them. It means we need to realize that what we see in them in our own values is there, nothing’s missing. We, I’ve taken hundreds of 1000s of people through a process on reflective awareness. And whatever they resent, and other people is reminding them of something they feel ashamed of in their own life. And they’re really being reminded of that. And they’re trying to avoid that because of their amygdala being addicted to pride, and fantasy. They want to escape that individual and project a false attribution causality onto the other person and blame them. But whatever somebody’s doing, that you’re too humble or too proud to admit, is a reflection of you. And this has been known for 1000s of years. When you finally dig deep inside and reflect introspectively and allow yourself to have reflective awareness and realize that whatever you perceive on the outside of the sea or the scene in this scene is the same. And you level the playing field. You’re not narcissistically too proud, nor altruistically to shamed to have a sustainable fair exchange with that individual which maximizes business, maximize the sales, maximizes negotiation and maximizes leadership skills, maximizes communication, and makes people want to continue to flourish Lee do business with you. Because when you try to get something for nothing, it doesn’t last when they try to get something out that doesn’t last on your department. But when they both see a reflection, they’re looking in the mirror at themselves and mastering your art of loving themselves and others at the same time. And that’s really the key of mastery. And so, pure reflective awareness is the underlying cornerstone, you might say of true reflective empathy. not sympathy, not exaggerating, but empathy.
Maria Ross 20:04
Well, and I love that you talk about that sense of leveling the playing field, because empathy is all about creating that connection. And when you create that connection, you’re seeing yourselves together on the same side of the table, not necessarily agreeing. But you’re on the same, you’re on the same level. And I think so, yes. And so many relationships at work break down, because of that outdated, hierarchical order. Versus the leaders that are, you know, going to kill it in the 21st century, are the ones that adopt more servant leadership, the ones that adopt more, we’re in this together, I’m trying to understand you as an individual. And so my next question to you is, you know, you mentioned trying to really understand the higher values of the other person. Let’s say, for all my listeners, who are managers who are team leaders, I think the big question they have is, how do I do that? How do I uncover it? Because just asking someone sometimes isn’t always enough, especially if it’s a subconscious value. So do you have any advice around how you can uncover that, in another person that you’re trying to collaborate with?
Dr. John DeMartini 21:17
I’ve developed a value determination process that I’ve developed over the last 45 years. So I started working on values back back in 1978. If you ask somebody their values, I’ve done that hundreds of 1000s of times. And I only found one individual that was authentically true in what they stated, only one lady from Israel. majority people don’t know themselves. And that’s hard to face. They’re a composite of social idealisms. moral hypocrisy is expectations of the common culture, you name it. And they’re, they’re trying because of the division of labor and the fear of being abandoned by society, we tend to want to fit in and we can change in different groups, we could be in different groups. And we’ll tell you what’s important, according to the group many times based on the influence. So I had to get past that. So I looked at what I found common, what I call the 13, value determinants of people. So I’d like to, if I could go through this, then I like to share a story about corporations and this. If you look at how an individual fills their space, their space has proxemics. They have intimate space, personal space, social space, public space, and their most intimate foot and a half and personal space for feet or whatever, reveals what they value because they keep things proximal, that’s important.
Maria Ross 22:51
I’m sorry, I’m looking at my desk. I’m looking at my desk as you say this, and the like disarray that is on my desk.
Dr. John DeMartini 22:58
But there’s there’s something, there’s some underlying drive with everything that’s really important to you that you keep near you. Yeah, obviously, your ability to, from what I can see here, you want to share a message with people, because you have all the paraphernalia to assist people in sharing a message, you know, will be deeply meaningful and change their life. But you look at what they feel their space is, it’s not the items, it’s what the items are used for. What’s the purpose of that item. I’m in front of my computer most of the day, primarily for teaching, and then researching and writing. And then I travel the world full time. So my highest values teach research, right? And travel in my life demonstrates that I’ve delegated everything else out of my plate, I don’t do anything else. I don’t have any I don’t anything that requires external motivation. For me, I just delegate, I just let other people who love doing that do that for me. So they they’re inspired, and I’m inspired. But space is the first one, even a baby in a little crib. If you throw something in it doesn’t want it in it, it’ll scream and kick and holler and get it get it out of there. If it’s something they want, they’ll put it in their mouth, they’ll look at it, they’ll observe it to hold it. The second one is time you find time, make time, spend time for things that are important to you. And so if you look honestly, like a drone hovering over you what you really spend your time on most of the time, it’s going to be a reflection of what you’re valuing. Now there’ll be a pattern and what you fill your space with in time. And if you see the pattern, you’ll start to see which common then you do what energy you look at what energizes you what raises your energy naturally, whenever you’re doing something high on your value, your energy levels go up? Whenever you’re doing something low on your values, your energy levels drop. So what energizes you What do you keep your space filled with? What are you spending your time on? And there you already got something that’s indication. If you if I asked somebody they’ll tell me the idealisms peace, you know, harmony and all this other state
Maria Ross 24:57
integrity
Dr. John DeMartini 24:58
to what your fantasy is not To say, I’m interested in what your life demonstrates your life demonstrates your values. Because every perception decision in action is governed by the, you might say, the glial system and nervous systems response to what you value and filter in your world. The fourth one is your money. Whatever money you get, the hierarchy of your values dictates how you spend it. So if your highest value is your children, you’re going to spend on children, you may not have your rent, you may not have your car take care of, but you got to take care of your children, your highest value is your business, it’s gonna go to your business, if value is traveling, you’re gonna go to traveling, where is the most money going? And you look at the money, the space, the time and the energy, and there will be a pattern if you’re honest. And if there’s no pattern, there’s a lie. And I’m interested in in clarifying that pattern. The fifth one is where are you most organized, because you bring order to things that are hiding your values, you have disorder, things are not. Order means a disorder means missing information order means full information. And anything to time your values, you want to find more information, when you really value somebody you want to know about him. And you don’t value Him, you don’t want to know about him. So you have missing information in your lower values, you have a lot of edit information, and whatever is higher value have the greatest order. The next one is discipline, and focus. You don’t get distracted by your highest value, you keep going back to it. You know, no one can distract me from my teaching. I’m doing it 50 years. The next one is What are you thinking about? What are you visualizing? These are three of them? And what are you internally dialoguing with yourself about, about how you would really love your life to be that only shows evidence of coming true. Not your fantasies, not the things you’d beat yourself up about. But the things that you envision you think about and you talk to yourself about, about how you would love your life that shows evidence of coming true. I’ve been saying that I wanted to travel the world and teach since I was 17. That night, I met Paul Bragg. I traveled the world full time, and I teach full time today. So if it’s not coming true, it’s not what I’m asking for it. It’s got to be the one that’s congruent with what it is that’s deeply meaningful to you. That is also a pattern and all the other six that I just mentioned, if they’re not matching some things, that some lie here that I look at, what do you want to bring conversations to most when you’re around people. So if some people are interested in business, they say how’s your business, if they’re interested in wealth, instead, how’s your finances, how’s your investments, if you’re interested, your kids how’s your kids, they want to lead the conversation conversation to where they become more engaged and more extroverted. So they can feel the leadership role. So where do you keep wanting to bring your conversations to spontaneously and if you get to do it, you’re fully engaged and you don’t even think you’re tired anymore, you’re wide awake, your reticular activated system is on. The next one is what inspires you and brings tears to your eyes, which are signs of a moment of authenticity, where you really inspired. And you’re, in my case, whenever I see people that conquer challenges and be and go on to do something extraordinary. And they you know, they do something amazing, I get tears in my eyes go. That’s what I wanted to do with my life that’s congruent with what I how I want to live. So look at what you’re inspired by and what’s common for the people who inspire you. The 12th one is what is it you can’t wait to learn for me the thing that you have that’s consistent persistent on your goals that are coming true. The goals that you have that you’ve declared that are coming true, not the ones that you’re beating yourself up about, I keep sabotaging Why am I not doing this? But only the ones that you’ve committed to you have evidence of it’s been long term, you’ve been patiently pursuing it and you haven’t stopped? What are those goals? And there’ll be a congruent pattern. I’ve been doing this for decades. The last one is what is used spontaneous want to learn about read about study about watch on YouTube? What’s the common thread, minds on human behavior, anything to do with human behavior, maximizing human awareness and potential and doing something extraordinary in life I’m in and that can take me to any field 300 disciplines, but it’s about that. So if you find the common threads and answer three answers to each one and get 39 answers, and then summarize which one showed up most second, most and third, most, you will get an idea of what their ontological identity revolves around their teleological purpose is pursuing and their epistemological knowledge is excelling in the way they’re going to excel. And that’s very valuable. And we start there and every employee can do that exercise in 30 minutes.
Maria Ross 29:39
So, this is fascinating, and it’s, I think, it’s recommended for every human being to go through this process for themselves. As you said, many of us don’t really know ourselves, but in the reality of the business world, and the fast pace and the challenge and everything on people’s plates. Where can be The the most impactful places within this to start, especially, you know, let’s say you have a team of 10 or 20, you know, you’re not going to be able to spend 100% of your time of trying to figure out what their values are no, no. So Where where are some of the where
Dr. John DeMartini 30:18
I’ve done assessments of 1000 people,
Maria Ross 30:21
where are the most impactful places that a time strapped or resource strapped leader can start? That will have the most impact of them trying to understand the values of each of the individuals on their teams?
Dr. John DeMartini 30:36
Well, since I’ve specialized in that for decades now, it’s very simple. thing, go on my website, Dr. de martini.com. And for free, privately, I mean, privately, no one’s ever gonna see it. They can have anybody they ever hire to go through a process and go and answer the questions on it. They can learn to ask questions. And they don’t have to do it. They don’t have to do it all at one time. They can be paying close attention and asking questions, engaging people in their companies and know the questions and gradually get those questions answered, and then be aware of what they are. So but I don’t hire anybody. And 1000s of companies that are using this, don’t hire anybody until they’ve got that answer. Because nobody goes to work for the sake of a company, they go to work to fulfill what they value most. And if they can’t see how the job description, and the mission of the company is helping them fulfill that they’re disengaged, and they’re going to be needing micromanaging. They’re going to be Theory X type of people, as McGregor said, and they’re going to need, you know, pushing uphill, because they’re not engaged and uninspired. And that’s a symptom back to the owner or the manager, that they have not respected other people to make sure that they don’t have square pegs and round holes. So it’s a management issue as Drucker says that they have to care about human beings to make sure that the people that they hire are engaged and inspired to do the job. That’s, that’s required. So this isn’t hard to do. I’ve trained, I’ve trained many, many people, many managers, leaders, consultants, coaches, on how to it’s not hard to do. And it doesn’t take, you know, this individual can do it on their own and bring it and then you can do and confirm it in a matter of minutes. And it’s a very powerful tool, because you will see what they’re engaged in. By this process, I can tell if a person is going to work out in a company before, before they’ve been working for weeks, I can tell, and I’ve hit it. So this is a very powerful tool that assists people, because their identity revolves around it. And they’re not going to fit into an autocratic projection of your values onto them. That’s delusional. When people say, you know, these are the values of the company, and you have to fit those out. That’s all just crazy. The reality is, every human being has a unique set of values. And if you want to engage people, you want to make sure you communicate your values in terms of theirs. And if so, if they’re going to help them get what they want, they can help you get what you want. Can I share a great story of a real leader in that field on that?
Maria Ross 33:07
Yeah, absolutely. And then I have, you know, I have a few more questions for you.
Dr. John DeMartini 33:11
I’ll be glad to entertain him. Jeff Bezos has a little video out that you can go online and see about Amazon. And it’s the story about him, watching the guy who started Sony. And Sony wasn’t dedicated to making Sony great, Sony became dedicated to making Japan great, because he wanted to upgrade Japan worldwide. So we had a bigger cause than just himself or Sony BETOs got that customer centric insight. And realize he’s going to do that he’s going to be customer centric, and make Amazon one of those companies that put America on the map kind of thing. But he was so customer centric. And so dedicated to the empathy equation dealing with the customer. He overlooked his employees. And so what happens is, he was not paying attention to a balanced relationship with them. And eventually they gathered together and got the teamsters union to come in and say, Hey, we need to get this balanced. So he was a little out of balance there. And then what happens is, in every business, create symptoms, to try to get everybody authentic, and back into empathy. every symptom that’s going on in a business is trying to get people all to be living congruently with what they’ve engaged and inspired and empathetically authentic. So the second he went in and renegotiate with him now there was a smooth transition. Now everybody’s grateful to go to work again, the customer is grateful. But now the stockholder said well wait a minute, now our profit margins are a little less. So he was basically taking the lion’s share of the profit margin was great. So he had to readjust the profit margins again for the stocks and the dividends. Now they’re in balance. He’s got a little bit less he’s a little less khaki relative to the rest. He’s now back in humbleness. And now all of those signs and symptoms guide him back into an authentic state. If he doesn’t get to an authentic state, and he gets cocky pride before the fall, and companies get symptoms or relationships get symptoms. And that’s right when his relationship when he was learning that last two with his relationship went to different transformation. So these are all signs and feedbacks to get us back to authenticity. And as you described empathy, because the empathy is where you have a pure communication and communion between people heart
Maria Ross 35:36
to heart. So one of the things you talk about is that motivation doesn’t work. And is it because people are trying to motivate not based on an individual’s higher values, but by their own values?
Dr. John DeMartini 35:50
Yes, motivation is a rhetorical persuasion of one person’s requirements or values onto another individual.
Maria Ross 35:59
Yeah, how can I get you to do what I want you to do? Yeah, yeah,
Dr. John DeMartini 36:03
I’m not a motivational speaker. I get called that by people that don’t know me. I’m not interested in motivating you to do anything that’s not inspiring to you. I’m interested in you identifying what is truly intrinsically called to do in life, and help you navigate through your own illusions about perception, decisions and actions and help you master structuring your life in a way where you’re free to do that. And there’s no motivation needed. I don’t need motivation to teach. And I’ve delegated anything I might need motivation to to do. I don’t cook, I don’t drive. I don’t to, I have people doing every single thing that I need other than teach, research and write. That’s it. So I delegate everything, because delegation enhances the opportunities in the economy, for more exchanges, more economic growth, and more people have jobs and more people are doing that if I help them find what they love doing, everybody wins, and it grows the economy and society and gives more efficiency to people.
Maria Ross 37:04
So does I’m gonna do I’m gonna interject something here, though. That is very much a position of privilege. So what do people do that are not in that position? To delegate the things that don’t motivate them? Or that don’t speak to their higher values? What do you recommend?
Dr. John DeMartini 37:21
Most people think it is a state of privilege. But I’ve taken a child from Khayelitsha, who was 14 years old, had nine brothers and sisters, both mother and father died of AIDS, living in a shack with plastic on top to keep the rain from doing it mud floor, no bathrooms, no electricity, who is stacking bricks for 60 cents a day. And I showed him how to do this and how to organize his life and to prioritize his life and to delegate things. And he doesn’t live in a shack anymore. So it is not about privilege. Delegation does not take money delegation increases and enhances your economic position. Because as long as you’re not doing if you’re trying to do generalizations, you’re inefficient. Adam Smith knows that and Ricardos law of economy knows that you’re automatically repressing yourself by doing it all. But by finding out what your calling is, your your magnificence, and then doing that and being of service to people. If you care about human beings, you’re going to want to be of service to people. And you’re not gonna want to do it altruistically at your expense nor narcissistic at their expense, you want to do it with sustainable fair exchange. And you can’t stop an individual from rising in socio economic position if they are caring enough to do that. So it’s not a privilege system. But it leads to appreciation for where you’ve come and where you get to go. And you exemplify what’s possible for other people, and that’s inspiring.
Maria Ross 38:54
That is inspiring. Well, this has been such a great conversation about your turning on its head, our ideas of goal setting and motivation, and really working to understand what other people value and speaking to those values, which in my mind is the definition of empathy. So thank you for sharing your wisdom and your insight. We are going to put all the links in the show notes and especially a link to the assessment on your website that you referred to earlier in the interview. I think a lot of our listeners will be very interested in taking a look at that. But for folks that are on the go and listening to this podcast on the go, where’s the best place they can find out more information or connect with you.
Dr. John DeMartini 39:36
All you have to do is go to Dr. demartini.com dr. D M AR t ini.com. When they go there just there’s a little thing that clicks determine your values. Both of them are there. It just takes a second and it’s an educational website. You could you could spend the rest of your life and you still won’t run out of information. You can learn from it. It’s just filled with him. bench podcasts. I mean, I’ve done 9000 interviews. So there’s plenty of interviews, there’s plenty of podcasts, there’s plenty of stuff on there. And that is for them to go and do whatever they can. There’s a magnificence in everyone, but some people don’t give themselves permission to shine. So my objective is to help people shine. So I love the questions you have. Thank you so much for those questions. I hope that I was a value to your audience. But I just know that that the magnificence of who people are, the true them is more magnificent than any fantasy they’ll impose on themselves through the comparison others as Ralph Waldo Emerson said, envy is ignorance and imitation is suicide. And Einstein said my contempt for authority is what made me one I’m not interested in making you superior inferior. I’m interested in you being your authentic self, which allows you to see the magnificence as I was just in India selling in India distributors ago. And they have a term called Namaste. The Divine and made sees the divine in you and vice versa. Yes, that’s the place where empathy shine.
Maria Ross 41:04
I love it. I love it. Thank you so much for your insights today and your wisdom and for being on the show. I encourage everyone listening to check out the links in the show notes. If you enjoyed today’s podcast first of all, thanks for listening as always, and you know what to do, rate and review and share it with a friend or a colleague. And until next time, please remember that cash flow creativity and compassion are not mutually exclusive. Take care and be kind.
Maria Ross 41:37
For more on how to achieve radical success through empathy, visit the empathy edge.com. There you can listen to past episodes, access shownotes and free resources. Book me for a Keynote or workshop and sign up for our email list to get new episodes insights, news and events. Please follow me on Instagram at Red slice Maria. Never forget empathy is your superpower. Use it to make your work and the world a better place.
