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Jason Schwartz & Steven Snyder 8-7-2023- Jason interviews Steve Snyder, one of the world’s foremost experts on Accelerated Learning and Personal Development, a pioneer in the Human Potential movement; GLOBAL SPEAKER AND TRAINER OF CEOS http://pen.tools Author of book, FOCUSED PASSION
Summary & Full Timestamped Transcript below
Summary of Video Content Featuring Steven Snyder on The Neutral Zone (August 7, 2023)
- [00:00 → 04:52] Introduction and Context
- Jason Schwartz, host of The Neutral Zone, opens the show emphasizing the program as a civil, non-combative dialogue platform where diverse views can be discussed respectfully.
- The show supports call-in participation and is accessible via MauiNeutralZone.com, YouTube, and akaku.org.
- Guest Steven Snyder is introduced as a man with a compelling background tied to The Mankind Project, a men’s group focused on personal growth and societal contribution.
- Steven is noted for his book Focused Passion: Become Better, Faster, Smarter and Happier with Far Less Stress and Much More Passion.
- Jason highlights Steven’s global expertise in learning and personal development, working with audiences including CEOs worldwide.
- [04:52 → 12:32] Steven Snyder’s Background and Core Concepts
- Steven has conducted over 7,000 seminars in more than 100 countries, starting from age 15.
- He invented a speed reading technique at age 12 and has focused on teaching learning and performance skills.
- His early work was with school teachers aiming to improve education, but he shifted to working with CEOs and business leaders who have more influence on societal change.
- He is a top speaker for Vistage International, a large CEO organization, delivering over 2,000 presentations.
- Steven teaches how to focus the mind, block distractions, and harness 100% of mental power for peak performance, creativity, and accelerated learning.
- The concept of mindfulness meditation and entering the alpha brainwave state (focused, relaxed concentration) is central.
- He describes the alpha state as the “zone” or “flow state,” where one is deeply absorbed in a single task, enabling greatness.
- Importance of breath control: deep, conscious breathing signals safety to the brain, enabling focus; shallow breathing triggers fight-or-flight and distracts the mind.
- [12:32 → 19:22] Brainwave States and Focused Passion Technique
- Steven explains the four brainwave states measured by EEG:
- Delta: deep sleep
- Theta: light sleep/dreaming
- Alpha: focused attention on one thing (peak performance)
- Beta: divided attention, anxiety, panic, stress
- Most people live in beta (divided attention), multitasking and distracted.
- The goal is to enter and stay in alpha, where the mind can fully engage with one task.
- Children naturally dwell in alpha states, but adults often lose this ability due to stress.
- A key practice is to choose a peaceful, safe mental “place”and return to it habitually to enter alpha easily.
- Steven shares his own mental safe place: a meadow with a babbling brook and deer, enhanced by a rainbow symbolizing Maui.
- The mental place can evolve but should remain consistent as a “front door” to relaxation and focus.
- Steven’s book and teachings begin with this alpha state meditation before applying it to various skills like reading, learning, and creativity.
- Steven explains the four brainwave states measured by EEG:
- [19:22 → 30:29] Accelerated Reading and Mind Training
- Steven’s speed reading technique trains the mind to read groups of words at once (phrases) rather than word-by-word.
- This method improves reading speed and comprehension, as the brain processes meaning holistically rather than piecemeal.
- Entering alpha before reading is critical to maintain focus and prevent mind-wandering.
- Closing eyes and deep breathing reduce sensory input (86% is visual) and help slow brain activity into alpha.
- Steven distinguishes his technique from scanning or skimming, which sacrifice comprehension.
- He emphasizes that focused passion requires practice but can be learned quickly.
- Steven references Jose Silva’s Mind Control method, highlighting similar principles of alpha state use for performance.
- The practice of going to one’s mental safe place and deep breathing is repeated before any important task to maximize performance.
- [30:29 → 40:46] Pathways to Happiness
- Steven discusses the psychology of happiness, emphasizing that:
- You cannot be happy if you feel unsafe or stressed.
- Stress exists in two forms:
- Acute stress: immediate, real danger responses (e.g., sudden braking in traffic).
- Chronic stress: ongoing worry, regret, and imagined dangers.
- Key to happiness is training the mind to respond (not react) to worry by relaxing muscles and breathing deeply.
- This signals safety to the brain, allowing happiness to emerge.
- Interrupting chronic stress with “mini vacations” (brief mental breaks with closed eyes and deep breathing) helps reset stress levels.
- Steven outlines six pathways to happiness:
Pathway Description 1. Feeling Safe Managing acute and chronic stress through breath and mindfulness to create internal safety. 2. Love and Kindness Self-love and kindness toward others as foundational to happiness. 3. Gratitude Appreciation and consciously recognizing positives multiple times to outweigh negativity. 4. Optimism Vigilant positive thinking despite external negativity; requires conscious effort. 5. Purpose Having meaning and goals in life; aimlessness correlates with unhappiness. 6. Optimum Health Physical wellness supports emotional well-being and happiness. - Steven stresses constant vigilance to replace negative thoughts with positive ones.
- He acknowledges societal and media tendencies to focus on negativity but encourages active management of one’s mental environment.
- Steven discusses the psychology of happiness, emphasizing that:
- [40:46 → 51:28] Focus, Attention Span, and Marriage Advice
- Steven advises that even people with short attention spanscan succeed by taking frequent short “vacations” into the alpha state and stringing focused intervals together.
- His mental “place” is vivid but can vary in details (season, time of day), while remaining consistent as a safe refuge.
- On marriage, Steven shares four guidelines for a great relationship developed with his wife of 24 years:
Guideline Explanation 1. Compassionate Honesty Always tell the truth with kindness and choose the right moment to discuss difficult topics. 2. “More Important Gets to Decide” When disagreements arise, the partner who cares more about the issue decides to avoid arguments. 3. Empathy Practice Daily practice of imagining oneself as the partner to understand their needs and desires. 4. Give Love Their Way Learn and express love in the form your partner values most (words, acts of service, gifts, quality time, touch). - The couple’s system avoids fights and promotes kindness.
- Steven recommends The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman as a resource.
- Empathy and kindness underpin their thriving marriage.
- [51:28 → 56:34] Personal Life, Hobbies, and Closing Thoughts
- Steven lives in Maui with his wife, who has Alzheimer’s; they split time between a 70-acre tropical fruit farm (notably the largest durian farm in Hawaii) and a more accessible home in Wailea.
- He enjoys reading widely, especially science fiction classics(e.g., Robert Heinlein’s Time Enough for Love, Isaac Asimov’s Foundation trilogy), biographies, and mysteries.
- Steven’s favorite books are listed in the back of his own book Focused Passion.
- Despite challenges in the world (including COVID, political tensions), Steven strives daily to maintain optimism and positivity, acknowledging the work it takes.
- He quotes Timothy Leary on optimism: “What choice do I have?”
- The interview closes with appreciation for the conversation and encouragement for viewers to explore Steven’s teachings.
Key Insights and Takeaways
- Focused Passion is a method of entering and utilizing the alpha brainwave state to achieve peak mental performance, accelerated learning, stress reduction, and overall happiness.
- Deep, conscious breathing is the critical physiological trigger that signals safety to the brain and allows entry into a state of focused relaxation.
- The mind operates best when focused on one task at a time, and the ability to do this can be trained via mindful practices and mental safe places.
- Managing both acute and chronic stress through breath and mindfulness is foundational to happiness.
- Happiness stems from feeling safe, practicing love and kindness (starting with self-love), gratitude, optimism, purposeful living, and maintaining physical health.
- Healthy marriages rely on truthful, kind communication, empathy, shared decision-making based on priorities, and expressing love in ways meaningful to one’s partner.
- Regular mental “mini vacations” into alpha aid focus and combat the negative effects of modern life’s distractions.
- Steven’s teachings are practical, accessible, and applicable across many life areas, from personal relationships to professional leadership.
Recommended Resources
| Resource | Description | Link/Note |
|---|---|---|
| Focused Passion by Steven Snyder | Book covering his techniques and philosophy | Available on Amazon |
| The Mankind Project | Men’s personal development organization | mankindproject.org |
| Vistage International | CEO peer advisory organization | vistage.com |
| The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman | Book on personalized expressions of love | Widely available |
| PEN Tools | Free self-improvement programs website | pen.tools |
Summary Table: Brainwave States for Performance
| Brainwave State | Description | Typical Activity/Experience |
|---|---|---|
| Delta | Deep sleep | Unconscious, restorative sleep |
| Theta | Light sleep, dreaming | Creativity, intuition, meditation |
| Alpha | Focused attention on one thing | Peak performance, flow state, learning |
| Beta | Divided attention, stress | Anxiety, multitasking, distraction |
Conclusion
Steven Snyder’s interview on The Neutral Zone offers a comprehensive and insightful exploration of focused mental states, stress management, happiness pathways, and relationship dynamics. His approach is grounded in decades of experience and scientific understanding, offering practical tools for individuals seeking to improve mental performance, emotional well-being, and life satisfaction.
The emphasis on mindful breathing, mental safe places, and focus on one task provides a replicable framework for reducing stress and enhancing productivity. His personal stories and marriage advice further humanize the teachings, making them relatable and actionable.
This conversation is valuable for anyone interested in personal development, leadership, mental health, or building stronger relationships.
Full Timestamped Transcript
00:00
[Music] good morning everyone Aloha it’s the neutral zone I’m your host Jason Schwartz Welcome to our show well it is Monday August 6th 2023 7th August 7th yeah they keep slipping by um I’m glad that all you came to visit here today to the neutral zone you can find all our shows at Maui neutralzone.com you can probably also find it if you look on YouTube and you put in Jason Schwartz Maui you’ll see all kinds of things come up and um you’ll also be able to find us at um akaku.org they have a link to our show
00:52
also now the reason this show is called the neutral zone it is anything but neutral but um I like to say we’re a place where we can talk about anything and we don’t come in with a heavy hand you know if I have a guest for example if I had Donald Trump and I don’t agree with him um I would still be here talking with him and not be very combative try to do it in a civil way and let the audience make the decisions and choices on what they want well they can hear a dialogue that isn’t combative we also are set up
01:34
as a call-in talk show so the second half of the show time if you want to call in and talk about anything including what we’re doing with our guests 808-873-3435 now you on radio cannot see that I have a man here that if you were to look at him you would say wow how did you get this guy here to your show isn’t that Steven Snyder and it is Steven Snyder Steven Welcome to our show thank you Jason pleasure to be here you know I had the good pleasure of meeting Stephen in a group that you’ve heard me talk about before the
02:18
mankind project which is a little bit different in my sense than women who always get together and I talk and man all right so much getting together and talking about things and values quite the same and um we’d like to think that after we are not here that we have some kind of a pathway toward making our society better to having something to contribute and so we get all kinds of people that get involved in fact we have another they call it a new Warrior training Adventure coming up later this
02:56
year so if any of you are interested you can go to mankindproject.org and you can speak to or you can speak to someone like me or some of the guests on our show I mean if I look at some of the names of the people that have been on our show we’ve we’ve had all kinds of people and a number of them recently in the last year have been or maybe even a little bit more have been out of the mankind project group they have these things every week they call them uh integrated uh groups they where you basically after
03:30
your weekend Adventure of uh really diving deep into your world with a group of men you get to keep that going on every week by staying in touch with each other and it was just through that process that I met this gentleman Stephen Snyder and said boy he’s interesting then as I got to know over a little bit of time I said Steven Snyder he has a book doesn’t he he has a book called focused passion and if I had my glasses on I’d give you the subtitle which is become better faster smarter and happier
04:13
with far less stress and much more passion doesn’t that sound like something you’d like something I’d like Stephen is one of the world’s most foremost experts in learning and personal development and actually he’s going to tell us more about it but you travel all over the world and teach groups and actually CEOs of companies large and small and teach them some significant Concepts which we’re going to share some of it today so this show is a doorway into focused passion and Steven Snyder
04:52
Stephen again Welcome to our show thank you Jason it is a pleasure to be here I’ve I’ve always enjoyed doing radio and TV it’s lots of fun so um now when I look at you I I might say you’re sort of like Clark Kent you know you know on first glance you use a regular guy but when you get up there on stage and with the subject that you share obviously you’ve shared them um all over the world how did that happen well I’ve been at this a really long time I’ve actually worked in more
05:29
than 100 countries I’ve done over 7 000 seminars around the world in my life it’s I started when I was 15 years old uh and never really had a job I invented a speed reading technique when I was 12 I invented some techniques for studying and memory improvement and test taking and performance skills I basically had to be a great learner you know and I started teaching that to kids and I loved working with kids but then I realized I’d be more powerful if I talked to school teachers because
05:57
they’ve talked to lots of kids so I spent about a dozen years working with school teachers and and realized what my my great passion is the general overthrow of the school system and school teachers really don’t have the power to do that so I started focusing on the people who do the CEOs of the world and I’ve been the one of the number one speakers for the world’s largest CEO organization vistage International I’ve done more than 2 000 presentations for that organization over
06:21
the last 30 years and and and uh I teach CEOs living skills and learning skills basically how to focus the mind block out all distractions and give 100 of the mind’s power to the task at hand and and use it for Peak Performance and creativity and accelerated learning and and it just had to be better faster smarter and happier it’s it’s really a powerful technique using uh the concept of mindfulness meditation getting into the alpha brainwave State out of the divider detention State into the focused
06:52
State total focused concentration Amplified passionate interest you know it’s the Zone the flow technically it’s it’s a state where you’re giving everything you’ve got to the one thing and when you do that you do your best so how to how to there’s so many distractions in the world about how to block those out and focus on only one thing at a time that’s really the Key to Greatness wow when I hear that focused on one thing I had a friend who was a a master at Kung Fu and and he’s I said how do
07:25
you deal with multiple opponents and he said one at a time yeah it’s one at a time one breath at a time you know it’s really basically the breath is so important in the mind and and when you breathe shallow your mind thinks you’re in danger and and it looks out in every single Direction you know uh fight or flight but when you take one slow conscious deep breath that means paying attention to the breath in the moment then your mind realizes there’s no real danger out there and it can fixate and
07:54
focus on only just one thing breath is the core of it all he starts with the one slow conscious deep breath and that takes the brain out of stress into focused relaxation so when you go and teach CEOs is it mostly one-on-one or do you find yourself with a CEO and their group or I guess it’s both mostly groups of CEOs they the CEOs join this organization called vistage and they meet once a month with about a dozen to 20 uh other CEOs in non-competing businesses so that you know there’s no two people in the
08:35
same industry and they they spend half of a day talking to each other about their businesses and what they can do to solve their problems and the other half the day they bring a world-class speaker in to talk about a different subject like sales or marketing like uh hiring or firing and and my topic is the powers of the Mind how to how to use your mind most effectively I see wow and when the CEOs use it I guess you must be filled with all kinds of stories where CEOs are reporting back to you and telling you
09:12
how it’s been a major change yet that’s been one of the joys of my life is to know that I’m influencing influencers that I’m teaching people who have the power to teach dozens if not hundreds of other people and their families as well so yeah I it really feels like a very very powerful thing that a gift that I’m giving them to be able to focus their minds to block out distractions to handle stress that’s a big deal when when you’re stressed out it’s really hard to perform at Peak levels but if
09:42
you know how to release the stress then all of a sudden your mind is like fixated not on Survival but on growth you know there’s really only two basic programs in the human mind survive and grow so if you’re not focused on survival if you’re not worried or anxious or nervous about survival then your mind can give all its power to grow into getting better to improving and I’m only guessing but I’m sure it’s so that when you get into the growth after being able to relax and get rid of
10:17
that stress like you say your ability to to focus now do you find that the well I was going to say I was looking for an example already but I can only imagine like when when I go into stress and I try to relax I try to close my eyes and and imagine a more subtle place where I don’t have the distractions of everything any simple tips I know that people reading your book or or hearing you get a full Dynamic delivery um when I originally thought about this and I said let’s see you’re talking
11:02
about an alpha state um although I know what it is I think what is an alpha State I mean there are different states of being yeah there are four different brainwave States and measured on the machine the electroencephalograph the EEG has been around over 100 years and and basically scientists divided the electrical conductivity of the brain waves the electricity the brain is giving off and divide it into uh four categories Delta is deep sleep Theta is light sleep mostly dreaming States Alpha is focused
11:37
on only one thing and beta starts with divided attention and goes all the way up through Panic anxiety confusion and Terra totally nervous breakdown so so there’s four states deep sleep light sleep paying attention and divided attention and when you’re most people spend most of their time in divided attention they give out a whole bunch of things at the same time but when you can bring it on down to thinking about only one thing then your mind realizes there’s no danger and it realizes that it can give
12:03
all of its thoughts and feelings emotions and intellect to whatever the task at hand is so the alpha state is a state of of greatness of Peak Performance it’s a state of a chess master or a great athlete or any Peak Performance and anybody who’s greater than anything is doing it because they’re giving it their all so the ability to master the alpha state which is really easy to do it’s a natural state children live in the alpha State before they get all stressed out in teenagers you know most of the time
12:32
they’re just really focused on one thing at a time so so learning how to do that as an adult how to how to close your eyes take a deep breath and find a place inside of your mind where you feel peaceful where you feel safe and at calm and quiet and relaxed and and just practicing with that place over and over and over again so it gets to be like second hand second nature you just can go there just close your eyes and you go there and and you do that before anything important you you take your
13:01
mind off of everything else you’ve been thinking about and bring it down to that place and then from that place that focused passion you have in that place you can bring your mind to whatever the next task at hand is and can be great see when I I remember there was a guy named Silva Jose Silva one of my earliest mentors right is I was going to say along that same line is it indeed Jose was uh basically just a worker you know a Mexican worker and he was concerned about his kids learning in school and so he thought about it read
13:40
about it and came up with this concept that he called Silva mind control uh it’s been around since the 60s it’s really great uh and I studied that I’ve even taught it a little bit back in the 80s and it’s very similar to the kind of stuff that I teach he had he taught it for children my now is focused more on on adults primarily CEOs but it’s the same basic concept it’s about getting into the alpha State and using that state to enhance your life do you I don’t know how important it is to
14:12
choose one place it is important to choose one place and then stay with it yeah because then you create a greater habit now once you’ve gone to that place for a few moments then you can go somewhere else but you you want to have the front door the the you go in the same way every single time so it becomes habitual comes inculcated as a natural part of the brain and you’re used to doing it so your place can evolve like my place that I came up with when I was like eight years old uh is like a
14:39
beautiful Meadow a kind of a memory of Yosemite National Park a beautiful Meadow with a Babbling Brook and these three deer that came out of the woods to drink out of the Babbling Brook because as soon as the three-year got there I realized I’m safe you know because if there are any danger the deer would run away so so I always go to that safe beautiful place um and I’ve been doing it since I was eight years old and I’m 71 so quite a long time but but when I moved to Maui back in 2005 I thought oh Maui this is
15:06
this is a beautiful amazing place and I realized but I had 50 years invest to that Meadow so I wasn’t going to give that up so I added to my Meadow a rainbow over the meadow which signifies Maui for me so your place can grow and evolve but basically you want to pick a place and keep going back to that same place a bunch of times every day so it becomes so easy to get there and and it takes your mind off of everything else and you’re totally there and then from that state you can bring it to whatever
15:32
else you want to do next well I remember that as I was beginning reading your book and you started by sharing us with us about um how to get into that state and then also you were focused on using it on reading technique that was where it began for me um I was a child prodigy I learned to read when I was two by the time I was uh going into first grade I’ve read 1400 books wow I currently read 20 books a week I still read a lot but when I went to school the teacher didn’t know what to do with me I was the only kid in
16:06
first grade that knew how to read so they stuck me in the corner and said you read while I teach them and I realized that my mind works different than the other kids minds and I started to get fascinated with the nature of the mind and and ever since then that’s been my favorite topic is understanding the human mind and and I’ve studied it and read about it and and when I was about 15 years old I started teaching this accelerated reading technique I came up with this idea of training the Mind
16:31
through the uh Alpha brainwave state to read groups of words at a time instead of one word at a time and if your eyes are moving at the same speed as they usually did but you’re reading three or four words each time you’re looking you’re reading three or four times faster and all of a sudden reading so much better because your mind doesn’t wander the reason people’s mind wanders is because they’re they’re think fast but they read slow and so there’s not enough to keep their mind interested but
16:57
if you’re reading a bunch of words at a time all of a sudden there’s much more coming in quickly and it’s enough to keep your mind occupied and so your mind doesn’t wander and you read so much faster and so much better and you don’t find you’re missing the detail not at all in fact you’re getting the detail much more when when you read like the phrase in the house what happens is your mind looks at the word in and said what’s in oh it’s the opposite out and then what’s a the I don’t know nobody
17:21
knows what the means it means proceed to next noun and then you look at the word house and you get a picture of the outside of a house before the brain correlates the data puts it together and gets it in the house so if you read in the house all at once you instantly get inside the house so the comprehension is even better because you don’t have to go through what’s an end what’s the what’s a house before you get to what’s in in the house so it really enhances comprehension dramatically
17:45
so all these different um reading techniques that over the years we’ve heard you were there you were there yeah this I invented this in 1964. um many of the techniques uh were skimming techniques or scanning techniques where you’re you’re moving your fingers or you’re you know like yeah and and you know that’s really good for getting the gist to getting the essence of what you’re reading but it’s not really good for getting full comprehension because people do Skip and
18:14
skim over things when they read that way the technique I’m talking about you read every single word you’re just reading them several at a time wow um as I’m beginning to try to embrace your process I’m finding I I’m wondering whether I’m yet in that Alpha State you know I wonder where how do these steps grow in me um do you spend a lot of time building the that state of relaxation before you get into the reading technique it is essential to do that um it doesn’t take a lot of time to get
18:57
really good at going to the alpha State it’s a natural state usually usually just closing your eyes is enough to get into the alpha State because of all the input that comes in through the five senses 86 percent is visual so when you close your eyes you cut sensory input down from 100 to 14 that’s enough to slow down your brain now closing your eyes and taking a slow conscious deep breath that’s almost guaranteed to get into the alpha State and then closing your eyes taking a deep breath and
19:22
imagine yourself someplace quiet and peaceful and safe that’s for sure enough it’s easy to get to the alpha State most people use Alpha primarily to space out to daydream to look at the clouds or the stars or listen to music and nothing wrong with that but the focus of my program is to use the same state to space in the space into Peak Performance and creativity in Excel learning and just how to be the best you can be um wow I’m I imagine that this is something that everyone should be
19:53
embracing well I don’t tend to on people but I think any anyone could do this and and most people would benefit from it for sure and uh although it is a night I like books that are nice and thin yeah it’s not because you don’t have to waste a lot of words and and you say it I can tell just in the way you speak you take the whole concept and you gave us the whole concept in a Flash and I thought oh we got a whole hour now you’re not taking stretch it well there’s a lot to cover for sure but the
20:29
the essence of it is pretty simple and that is focus your mind and get good at focusing your mind and so that you can take that focused mind and do whatever it is you want to do with it and and for most people that means enhancing the quality of their life being better parents being better uh partners with their spouse uh you know being better employees or better Employers in the case of the CEOs I work with it’s it’s taking the aspects of your life that matter to you the most and being able to do those in a
21:02
state where you can be the best you can be where you can give 100 of your mind where you’re not worried about other things at that moment you know the other things will come up you know that you’ll you’ll be worried about life everybody does but you don’t have to be worried all the time and when it’s when it’s time to do something that matters like have that important conversation with your spouse or or discipline your kid or or make that sale or whatever it is when it matters at that moment you don’t want
22:12
book that uh where you have ah no he I guess he wanted me to be in front of the microphone okay there’s a whole section where it’s almost like different subjects and you you take us through the introduction into different areas of our life that we might be able to employ this right it’s one tool but lots of lots of different applications and as you mentioned sometimes things like gaining confidence some people need that more than others some people are overconfident so they may not need that releasing stress most
22:50
people need that one most people are definitely too stressed especially in those moments where the the pressure’s on the game’s on the line so to speak um but but my my passion is helping people just have a more higher quality of their life and and that really is up to them as to what application they want to use what they want to focus on in this I’ve I’ve got lots and lots of information on this stuff in fact I have one of the largest websites of free self-improvement programs in the world
23:17
uh at the website is pen p e n dot tools no.com or dot net it’s taught tools pen dot tools there’s over 250 D free self-improvement programs on 250 different topics you know virtually every subject I could think of that will help people and they all start with me guiding them into my the alpha brainwave state every single one of them starts with Alpha and then we we talk about uh how to I have a partner for for my radio show that I did for many years he and I talk about um how to use this area of their life
23:51
how to improve and then we finish with a guided meditation we take them into the alpha State guide them in and and have them imagine themselves being whatever it is that they want to be having imagine themselves being better at whatever it was that they’re focusing on so so there’s lots and lots of information out there uh at Pin dot tools and of course the book focused passion is available on Amazon and and uh it’s there’s just a lot of good information about a lot of applications
24:19
but it really comes down to just that one tool and that one tool is getting out of stress and into focused passion right I was just going to say it boils down to that one thing it does yeah what was that a City Slickers movie where the guy said it’s about one thing I said right it’s all about one thing what’s the one thing you’re not there for you to decide but it’s all about one thing yeah well I am going to concentrate for just a second and you know we have sponsors for our show here
24:52
for um I’m just looking here you want a baby put a few in the thing I want to make sure our our listeners know if you want to call you’re most welcome 808-873-3435 we’re on Kaku with Steven Snyder uh a global speaker and also a writer of a great book called focused passion become better faster smarter and happier with far less stress and much more passion so let’s give word to our sponsors we find it and I if I don’t find it I’ll there it is Aloha I’m Noel Lowe today on the Maui
25:43
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26:19
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27:00
two hours of great Celtic music from fun Jigs and Reels to lovely ballads to Funky Celtic Rock that’s Sunday morning 8 to 10 a.m and repeats in the afternoon 5 to 7 P.M there you go a bit of Celtic music video on Maui tune in Sunday talk to you then cheers hi I’m Vince Bode co-host of the biscuits and gravy show Kaku is a listener supported station this means that all the great programs you hear like mine are supported by you as well as our Underwriters if you would like to help keep the voice of Maui talking loud
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and clear go to k-a-k-u-fm.org donate today and give and don’t miss the biscuits and gravy show Wednesdays at 11AM on 88.5 FM the voice of gravy we are back here at the neutral zone Maui neutralzone.com we’re at 88.5 FM k a k u Radio and on channel 55 which is a Maui Community media I used to say Maui Community TV but now in this age of Internet we are in a period I’d like to say I heard someone say it yesterday that our phones and all the media is a a method of mass distraction you know it’s
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like it is instead of being focusing we have so much input from all over um with the different kinds of ways to apply this maybe we can jump into some of them and uh have you kind of explore with us some of those subjects sure why don’t we start with um happiness is there such a way to start with happiness yeah absolutely that’s one of my favorite topics actually and and the core to understanding the nature of happiness is that if you’re feeling endangered that you’re worried or nervous or anxious or
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afraid of something you can’t be happy because survival is much more powerful survival overtakes everything so unless you’re feeling safe you can’t be happy so that’s the core of of starting to create happiness in your life is feeling safe and there’s two aspects to feeling safe one is to deal with the acute stress you experience in your life and the others to deal with the chronic stress you experience your life the acute stresses is the way you react to Danger you tighten your muscles and hold
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your breath you get ready for fight or flight now that comes when there’s real danger like if you’re driving down the highway and the guy in front of your Slams on his brakes you know that’s real danger and and your right foot’s on the brake pedal before you can have time to think you know uh you react to Danger real danger automatically but the vast majority of what stresses us out is not real danger it’s imaginary danger comes from worry mostly also from regret remorse embarrassment shame from the
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past but mostly it’s worry stuff and so when people are worried and they react to that worry as if it’s actually happening they they tighten their vest and hold their breath then they can’t be happy so the secret is to train your mind to respond not react but respond to worry thoughts in a positive way instead of a negative way worry thoughts are not dangerous worry thoughts are an alert to something that could happen in the future and you want to have them because if you didn’t
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worry you’d be blindsided by every bad thing that ever happened so you want to worry what you don’t want to do is is react to the worries if it’s actually dangerous right now so if you can train your mind and it’s easy to do this actually train your mind to respond to worry Thoughts by instead of tightening yourself and holding your breath by responding by ah letting go of your muscle tension and releasing your breath if you do that then your brain knows you’re safe because if you weren’t safe you’d be
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getting ready to run or hit but if you can let go then your brain goes oh well I can’t possibly be in any real danger because I’m not getting ready to run or hit so training the mind to respond to worry Thoughts by taking a deep breath instead of holding your breath is the first step to happiness that deals with the acute form of stress the second kind of stress we deal with is the chronic stress the build up stress the stress that comes from everything you know traffic and deadlines and stupid people
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in war and taxes and stupid people mostly stupid people the way we react to that stuff by our stress building and building and building and building what we need to do is every now and then once an hour maybe take a little mini vacation from it and close your eyes and take a deep breath and go to that peaceful place in your mind and stay there for like 20 seconds enough time for the body to relax and and the breathing to slow down in the mind to calm down and quiet down a bit and and like let the stress out of the balloon
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so to speak let the air out of the balloon and then come back to your normal day and just start building stress again but you’re building from empty instead of from halfway full so those two techniques letting go of the stress from of the course of the day by taking little mini vacations and also by monitoring your thoughts becoming mindful of your thoughts and when you have a worry thought notice you’re having a worry thought and take a deep breath and release it with that you can begin to feel safe now once
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you feel safe there are six different Pathways to happiness that I’ve illuminated in my life that I use and any one of the six works or all six of them work but but let me let me lay those out sure so it starts with after feeling safe uh love and kindness you know love being loved being loving being lovable those are wonderful feelings that make you that bring a lot of happiness and although many people miss understand the nature of love like some people really think that if you love me I’m feeling your love I can’t feel your
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love you’re loved inside your body what I’m feeling is my love for me resonating in harmony to you loving me so we can only feel our own love so my favorite line I ever wrote all love flows through your own love for you so it comes down to you loving yourself self-esteem self-respect self-worth that sort of stuff so with that loving yourself every time someone loves you you feel that resonate inside of yourself and and you have that to resonate inside of other people and then of course the great
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expression of love to me is kindness that’s that’s the sweetest thing you can do you know it’s it’s almost like Instant Karma be kind to people that it comes right back to you Dalai Lama said uh whenever possible be kind and it’s always possible you know so even even to people you don’t like you don’t have to be mean to anybody you can always be kind so love and kindness the next one’s the easy one if you if you want an instant happiness just instant happiness gratitude and appreciation just brings
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instant happiness and and so many people forget that they forget to be grateful they forget to to appreciate things I I have a wonderful habit of appreciating things twice if I see something I really like I stop and I really like it the second time you know I I doubled my pleasure kind of thing and because because negative thoughts are so much more powerful than positive thoughts because negative thoughts about survival and positive thoughts are only about growth so so survival thoughts are powerful so negative thoughts have to be
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replaced by several positive thoughts to make up for it so gratitude and appreciation is an easy form of feeling happy the hardest really hard but it’s a lot of work but it’s really worth it it takes constant vigilance is optimism and positive thinking there’s so much negativity out there it’s really really challenging to be an optimist you know the world looks pretty a lot of times but but what we can do is not ignore it because if you ignore it it builds up and comes back at you is pay attention
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to the bad stuff and then ah take that deep breath and then in your mind fill the Gap that you just made with good stuff and so you have to be constantly on the alert but noticing all the bad stuff but taking it in releasing it and then filling your mind with good stuff it takes a lot of work to be an optimist it became much harder with covid and Trump you know to me those those two things together really made it hard to be an optimist but I’ve done it I’m proud of myself but I’m still doing it
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uh every single day I work really really diligently at staying to be keeping optimism alive through meditation getting into an office day yeah always that but also noticing the negativity I don’t ignore it I watch the news I pay attention what’s going on out there but then I ah take a deep breath which lets my mind know I’m not in real danger right now and then I start thinking positive stuff I start filling in with with good things and and positive outcomes and and imagining better things happening and
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the experiencing the love I have in my life and appreciating things so when I keep uh I myself I’m conscious of wanting to be positive but I feel that negative it almost like keeps coming at you I bet more than 20 seconds an hour would probably be or maybe do it as many times as you need to do it that’s right whenever something negative comes in pay attention to it uh take a deep breath whenever you take a deep breath your brain knows you’re not in real danger that’s a big deal because
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when you take that negative stuff in and you breathe shallower or makes you hold your breath every shallow your brain is going to think this could be really dangerous right now so I got to get ready to fight or flight I gotta get ready to run or hit but if you take a deep breath your brain knows it’s not really dangerous right now and it lets go some of that fear not all of it but some of it and then that makes some space inside of your mind for putting some positive stuff so that’s where the
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vigilance comes that’s where the diligence comes you got to keep paying attention to that negative stuff releasing some of it and filling in the empty space with positive stuff and and it you just try and keep make a balance of it you know it’ll never be all negative it’ll never be all positive but for many people it’s mostly negative and for some of us it’s mostly positive and that’s what we try to do um I don’t know if this is part of the cinema but what about the fact that we
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many times we live in a world where not as many people as you or I might like employ not only these techniques but employ the idea of being positive and being kind and being grateful it’s been a bit elusive at least in the media it seems like the media likes to report things that cause us I don’t know maybe that they find it more interesting or something well it sells newspapers and it sells radioed ads and stuff I mean dog bites man will sell more than dog licks man you know people people just are attracted to uh hearing
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about negative stuff I think it’s because part of the brain knows that survival is dependent upon understanding the bad stuff and the only thing that comes from understanding the good stuff is you get better well that’s not as big a deal as survival survival is a much bigger deal so we’re attracted to negative stuff and and ignoring it doesn’t help because it just you know builds up and builds up and then it explodes so you got to pay attention to the negative stuff but again it’s
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addressing that negativity by taking a deep breath I can’t emphasize how important that one deep breath is in dealing with emotional stuff when stuff comes in it’s it’s your brain is thinking is this dangerous or not if you breathe shallow it thinks it is dangerous if you breathe deeply it knows it’s not dangerous it’s a big difference so by paying attention to the negative stuff and there’s a lot of it there’s more of it than there is positive stuff it’s true uh by paying attention to it
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and then fight but there’s lots of positive stuff plenty of positive stuff lots of beautiful trees out there that you can love lots of beautiful clouds in the sky you can always find and lots of beautiful people too you know you can always find things to appreciate and and to to love so it’s hard work but it’s doable to be an optimist so that’s that’s a difficult kind of uh way to be happy but it works it works really well beyond that if you can find your purpose in life that’s a real powerful happiness
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inducer if you know what universe or God or whatever put you on the earth to do and you’ve found that and you’re doing it that just brings so much joy and happiness but even if you can’t find that in your life if you can find something that you love and do that that brings a lot of joy and happiness too it’s people who are aimless and purposefulness and and it just can’t find their way they don’t know what they want that are the most unhappy people happiness comes from moving toward
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getting what you want and if you don’t know what you want it’s really hard to be happy so knowing what you want finding something that you love that’s a really big deal and then Optimum Health and Wellness is another key to happiness not that you can’t be happy if you’re not healthy but it’s just a whole lot easier if you are so I would think so those are my basic ideas of of pursuing happiness in your life start by feeling safe by monitoring your mind and noticing when those negative thoughts
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come in and take that deep breath and release them and then put some positive thoughts in there pay attention to the fact that your stress builds up during the course of the day and once in a while during the day gotta take a little 22nd or 30 second mini vacation and let the excess stress fade away and then come back sort of refreshed you know and then love and kindness and then you know gratitude and appreciation is the easy one optimism’s the hard one but it’s worth it and then finding your purpose
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or finding something else in an Optimum Health and Wellness to me those are my keys to happiness well those are really very powerful powerful powerful they are yeah and um I you know I I always have wondered about myself over the years like I have a short attention span because I jump from this to that to this to that but uh the technique of slowing down taking that breath and getting myself into this Alpha state is something I’ve been working on that’s excellent and you know there’s nothing wrong with a short
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attention span especially if you can put them back to back to back you know you have a shortage in Spain take a little five second break in the alpha State and go to your peaceful place and then come back and do another minute or two or three or five or whatever your attention span is and then you know short attention span it’s a great thing if you if you can put them back to back if if you every few moments go off to something else go off to something else you never get anything done so you do
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need to get stuff done and so that that means that you have to put your attention spans you know next to each other but you don’t have to pay attention for a long time it it’s great if you can but it’s not a big deterrent if you can it’s a matter of whatever you are paying attention pay attention to what matters and you get to go on a lot more vacations yeah indeed the Mind loves these mini vacations yeah I can imagine after all these years your your place that you’ve uh created for
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yourself is very well developed does it change much or yes it gets to be a deeper and deeper experience well both of those are true it doesn’t it never really changed and it’s always this Meadow with this Babbling Brook in these three deer but sometimes it’s winter time and it’s covered with snow and sometimes it’s springtime and the flowers are blooming and sometimes it’s midnight and the Milky Way is gleaming and so I never know where the shadows will be or what season it is or what
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time of day it’ll be it’s always a little different it kind of surprises me each time but it’s always that same place I never have to think what place am I going to go to this time you know I always go to that same place but but um sometimes use usually actually it’s daytime and the rainbow is overhead but sometimes it’s midnight you know sometimes it’s the middle of the night so I never really know exactly what’s going to happen but I always know it’s going to be a meadow with a beautiful
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Babbling Brook those wonderful deer well I’m happiness so let’s pick another subject and we’ll let you choose how about how to have a great marriage that’s a good one this is something that I care a lot about I’ve been married for 24 years um I was 47 before I got married so I Was A Bachelor a long time uh and I really appreciate the fact that I found this wonderful woman and we’ve been able to be together well she actually helped me create this uh program on how to have
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a great marriage uh how to have an alpha marriage you know we call it basically how to how to live Alpha I do that’s French for Alpha for two kind of thing um and so we came up with four guidelines for a great marriage and and they’re pretty simple uh but they’re really powerful if you use them right um the first one we call Compassionate honesty and it means you always tell your spouse the truth because whenever you lie you don’t feel safe that’s what lie detectors measure they don’t measure
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lies they’re people feeling unsafe telling them so so when you lie you get stressed out and then you’re in beta not Alpha and you’re thinking about a whole bunch of and you’re always worried about getting caught in the lie you know and that you know you get all kinds of bad things will happen so I don’t I don’t lie I always tell the truth but that being said this is a great songwriter Paul Simon who said just give me some tenderness beneath your honesty because you know honesty can be mean it can be cruel and
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hard and cutting so we we call it compassionate honesty it’s like like being nice as well as being honest and what my wife and I do is we find like the right time and the right place to to bring up stuff you know usually I can let the little things go and I don’t sweat the small stuff but if there’s anything big that that I need to you know tell her about I’ll wait until the right time and and what we did is we sort of set up a a time where we’re both ready to talk about hard stuff you know
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and it’s like issue time kind of thing so we wait and and most things can wait they don’t have to be right this minute you know so when things are going smooth and good then you know sweetheart I got something I need to talk to you about this is my problem not yours but I need to you know and and we do it as gently and lovely as possible so compassion and honesty is the number one number two and this has really served us extremely well is that whenever we disagree and you know that happens a lot
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in a marriage usually because you marry somebody totally different than you you know whenever we disagree we have a thing that’s that basically whoever it’s more important to gets to decide so we don’t fight or argue we just say is it how important is this to you on a one to ten and she goes well it’s a seven as well it’s only a three to me you decide no fighting no discussion no arguing it’s more important to her than it is to me she decides more important to me that is her I decide and almost always when I
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have a high number she has a low number and she has a high number I have a low number almost always so we really never fight we don’t even discuss or argue it’s just whoever is more important to gets to decide in the event of a tie we’ve actually never had one but we have a plan because it could happen well actually we’re on our second plan our original plan kind of stupid I got excited about a notion I’m a big college basketball fan I went to UCLA when Bill Walton did we lost two games in four
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years so it’s pretty amazing well in college basketball you know um when the ball goes out of bounds or whatever they don’t have a jump ball like they do in the pros they have um this team gets it first this team gets it next and this team gets it next so so I thought that sounded so fair so she gets the first tie I get the second time she gets the third tiger that seems so fair and then I thought for a minute I go wait a minute what what if it’s really important to her and it’s my turn
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that would be kind of a disaster so let’s not do that I came up with a better way of dealing with ties she loves this way I basically decide if we ever have a tie she gets all the ties it works great and the reason is that I’m an optimist and she’s a recovering pessimist so optimists are way better at getting over not getting what they want because they said high goals and they don’t always get what they want pessimists on the other hand set very low goals they don’t expect very much
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and they usually get what they want which is that it won’t work but so so it’s harder for a pessimist to get over not getting what they want so let the less optimistic one half the ties that’s sort of the rule so number number three this one’s fun every day close your eyes and take a deep breath and go to that peaceful place and and and take a couple of minutes and imagine that you are your partner like step into them and be them for a couple minutes and like walk a mile in their shoes kind of thing and
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and imagine like if you were them what would you want what would you need and then wake up and give them what they want or what they need what you think they want or need uh before they even have to ask and and it’s kind of like empathy it’s like pretending you’re them and understanding how they feel and you’re not can’t do that very well with people you don’t know but with your spouse you can do it and you can learn from your mistakes and get really pretty good at it over the years so right now I
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I every day pretty much I imagine I’m Theresa and what would she want what would she need and then I wake up and give her that as best as I can and she does the same for me so it’s kind of cool and it goes back to that gratitude and kindness thing it does it very much does that uh you know if you have it in your in your being to be kind that’s so cool gentle it makes relationships you know where you’re very conscious yeah like you say give her the ties and realize the value in in that giving that
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just brings up your whole attitude and be grateful that you have the room to be able to do that that’s so true in fact the way I Define a bad marriage is you don’t like each other a good marriage is where you like each other but when you disagree you get mean and a great marriages are always kind this is pretty simple and and the fourth and final way of of sharing of creating a great marriage is to give them the kind of love they want not just the kind of love you want there’s a great book called The
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Five Love Languages I highly recommend it wonderful book and and the author uh Carey Chapman delinates five basic ways we can share love affection attention and appreciation and their words words of appreciation Words of Love acts of service that’s doing something nicer than they haven’t asked you to do the above and beyond kind of stuff same with gifts not just the obligatory birthday anniversary but gifts for no reason kind of gifts quality time not just time but quality time and touch sexual and
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non-sexual touch so what I discovered I love the words so when I met Teresa she was telling me how kind I am and how smart I am and it was wonderful it’s just wonderful and then I started telling her how brilliant she was and how beautiful she was and it was like water off a duck’s back it was like she’d say Steve talks Chief you know that doesn’t mean crap you got to do stuff she needed she needed acts of service she needed me to do things for her to make me make her feel loved so
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like I put a pitcher of water on her bedside table when I noticed it wasn’t full and I’d pick up a briefcase and put it in her office for her you know things like a little thing she didn’t ask me to do but that that was a big deal to her uh if she’d have picked up my briefcase move that I’ve been pissed off because like what do you mean my damn briefcase you know but we’re real different that way so so there’s there’s words there’s acts of service there’s gifts
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um some people really really love getting gifts you know other people it’s not a big deal uh quality time meaning not just being together but actually interacting and being together and and finally touch like like I wasn’t raised with parents that touched each other in front of us they’d go to the bedroom for that and so I thought that’s the way it’s supposed to be so here I am like 20 years old I’m starting to date and I’m not being affectionate with the girlfriends until we get in the bedroom
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but you know if you’re not being affectionate you don’t get in the bedroom so so I was like you know realizing that that touch is really important to my wife and so when I walk up to where I stroke her on the cheek when I walk behind her I kiss her on the back of the neck when I sit down next to her I stroke her leg hold her hand when we walk that’s a that’s a real big deal to her so finding the kind of love I love the words and I love the gifts she loves the action she loves to touch so
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finding the kind of love that works for your partner so those are the four basic techniques compassionate honesty whoever’s more important to gets to decide imagine being them and give them what you know you get they need and then give them the kind of love that works best for them that’s how to have a great marriage I’m going to change the subject just we’ve got a few minutes left but I’m just you change the subject a little bit this clearly I I feel your passion with what you’re doing you couldn’t be doing
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this for all this time 55 years wow do you um what do you do when you’re not in this I happen to know you have a I’ll let you tell you have a a farm outed here in Maui I do I have two homes in Maui now um for since 2005 we have this uh beautiful 70 acre tropical fruit farm in lower nahiku just before Hana on the North Shore and we raise all kinds of things we actually have the largest durian Farm a lot of people don’t even know what that is but it’s pretty cool it’s the king of fruits we have um uh
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mangosteen which is the queen of fruits and lots of citrus and avocados and bananas and all those kind of great it’s really beautiful and wonderful I had no idea I’d grow up to be a farmer you know it didn’t occur to me ever but but it’s wonderful and we lived there until full time until a couple of years ago my wife was recently diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and she’s doing pretty good but the doctor suggested that she needs more mental stimulation so we bought a really beautiful home out in Wailea with some
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guest rooms and now we have relatives and friends come from the mainland and visit her and us and and you know have conversations and and stimulate her mind more and we can go to restaurants all the time in in lower nehiku the closest restaurants an hour and a half away pretty much so so it’s really much more stimulating for her so we’re splitting time between the two locations and I spent we have two beautiful golden retrievers as well that we spend a lot of time with but for me I spend most of
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my time that I’m not with her reading I I read a lot and I love reading all kinds of different things and and so that’s just really my escape and my passion is reading any good books you’ve read recently we should know about oh gosh so many um it really depends on the genre or the topic um I I hesitate I always go back to if you love science fiction there’s maybe the best science fiction book or my favorite science fiction if it’s an older book it’s the 60s but it’s called time enough
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for Love by Robert Heinlein and it’s about this guy who essentially lives forever and it it’s sort of the story of his lives you know as he he ages and gets to the point where he can’t stay in the same place anymore because people wondering why he’s not dying and so he has to change his identity and go to a new place and change and it’s just a fascinating story uh same author that wrote Stranger in a Strange Land Robert Heinlein is a wonderful the foundation Trilogy by Isaac asimov’s another great
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science fiction the old science fiction I love that stuff um biographies I really really enjoy uh Einstein and the one on Steve Jobs was really really good um uh I love mysteries um the the old Nero Wolf series The Sherlock Holmes books um gosh there’s so many great books in the back of my book is my Hundred favorite books so so there’s another reason you pick it up but I tell you this book you know I’m taking it slow and in bites like yeah and I’ve really been enjoying it and growing along the
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way I feel like uh like you say first I kind of skimmer tank look at the territory and then I can go back and and greatly Dive In um I think we should mention the title again so people can easily find focused passion by Steve Steven Snyder and uh Focus passion becoming better faster smarter and happier with far less stress and much more passion um you are um really uh I’m you know you mentioned about your positivity that is what I’ve noticed about you when we’re there in the group you seem to just be a
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very positive uh spirit no matter what’s going on you seem to just put out this very positive mind well I appreciate that I am an optimist and I work I work diligently at it to become an optimist I don’t avoid the negative aspects of the world I I embrace them and release them I’ve worked through them as best I can but you know on my radio show uh I did with a friend of mine for many years we had lots of guests too and and I always remember I guess he had uh Timothy Leary and you know what a guy
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and he said Timothy are you an optimist and Timothy said what choice do I have and that’s what I’ve followed well we are out of time I’m really amazed we went through that hour quickly Steve absolutely thank you for joining us back again thank you Jason I’d be happy to hello everybody thank you for joining us as well aloha aloha
