Alignment with Highest Values with Dr. John Demartini

In This Episode

• [02:40] – Dr. John Demartini shares his persistent strategies to achieve success, particularly in personal branding and event marketing.
• [07:31] – Dr. John records his engagements and contributions to measuring his track. He discusses his metrics and how they have been beneficial to him.
• [13:48] – How does Dr. John view the fulfillment of desires? He based his explanation on neuroscience.
• [17:58] – Dr. John shares how he helped a doctor grow his practice, focus on serving his patients, and express gratitude.
• [25:25] – What are the two forms of gratitude?
• [26:45] – Every night before sleeping, Stephan and his wife share three things they are grateful for, something he learned from Harville Hendrix. He also talks about some other practices he does to practice gratitude.
• [32:26] – What are the effects of imposing values on one another? Dr. John explains why most of us perceive others as making mistakes and how we can address them.
• [34:55] – Dr. John discusses imposing values on people in a company. Then, he gives a tip on how to fulfill one another’s values.
• [42:00] – How does goal-setting in marketing and business change when there is a values hierarchy through a value determination process among the team members?
• [50:06] – Dr. John describes his book, The 7 Secret Treasures: A Transformational Blueprint for a Well-Lived Life.
• [51:41] – Dr. John’s nugget of wisdom to all of us.

Jump to Links and Resources

John, it’s so great to have you on the show.

Thank you for being patient in getting here today.

It’s such a pleasure. You’ve been on my other podcast, Get Yourself Optimized, several times. We’ve had some really powerful conversations. I’ve attended some of your events—which are phenomenal—including The Breakthrough Experience, which is one of your keystone events. 

Let’s discuss how you market these events and your personal brand. You’re on so many different podcasts, various TV shows, and movies like The Secret and so forth. You’re everywhere. It’s really impressive. Do any particular strategies stand out for you as the secrets to your success?

A relentless pursuit of what I love doing is the first one. I’ve had a dream to travel the world and teach since I was 17. I wrote that I wanted to go to every country on the face of the earth. I’ve spoken in 181 countries now. I still haven’t gotten to all of them. I’m still working on it, but I have dreamed of doing that since I was 17. I’m 68 in just a couple of weeks, so I’ve been doing it for a while. 

I’m not a marketing genius by any means. I’ve just been on a relentless pursuit to do it, and I prioritize what I do. I’m relatively good at researching, writing, and presenting. My core competence is presenting. I’m pretty good at researching, and for writing, I just got three new books coming out next month. I’m able to do that, but the marketing is mainly me speaking.

I hired publicists, and I hired people to do everything. Their job is their love. That’s what they do. They would ask, “Would you like to have him on the podcast?” Sometimes, we get them called in, and I say, “I’m willing to do whatever it takes to get my message out.”

I’m not a marketing genius by any means. I’ve just been on a relentless pursuit to do it, and I prioritize what I do.

I’ve done about 9000 interviews on radio and television and about 3000–4000 podcasts. There will be five today. I sometimes do 2–5 a day. I’m on a mission. In between that, I’m writing a book, doing a podcast, doing consulting, or something that keeps me busy. I would get in trouble if I weren’t keeping busy doing what I love, so I do that seven days a week. I’m a bit of a crazy guy that loves doing what I do.

I don’t have the magic formula on how to market yourself. I just realized that if I concentrate on what I’m most matched with my core competence, deliver that in a way that inspires, understand what needs to be done, and delegate that to people who are more inspired to do that, I’ll get more done than me trying to do all that. 

I’ll get overwhelmed trying to do it all myself. I want to make sure that I’m doing something that serves people enough that they will want to buy what I’m doing so I can afford to delegate it. I committed to research. I made a list of every possible vehicle, which has continued growing as social media came in.

When I was 21, I wanted to contribute enough to be recognized in 1000 books. We’re over 700 now. I wanted to be able to write 1000 books. There are about 300 and something books now. I wanted to do radio, television, newspapers, and magazines. I’ve written for 1531 magazines. I keep a document or a metric on everything that I get to do to see if I am really committed to it. If I’m not, it’ll show. If I am, I need to modify the strategy, hire somebody, or do something.

I mapped out a strategy for reaching the world, just started doing it, and just kept attracting—slowly but surely—a team. Overnight success took 30–40 years. I just kept building a team of people that would do it. You’re one of those, so you helped us too. It’s not my genius. My genius is only teaching, researching, and writing. Outside that, I’m pretty well a klutz.

You’re very adept at what you do, and it shows. You have a huge tribe of people following you and listening to your words. It’s really impressive. You’re really changing the world.

If you do something long enough, everybody dies out, and you get somewhere. So you got to stay literally long enough to do it.

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That’s funny. If we could have a hypothetical peek at your metrics that you measure to see if you’re on-track or off-track, you mentioned the number of interviews, podcasts, magazines, articles, et cetera. What are some of the other metrics?

Every time I do a podcast, I keep a record of it. The same goes for all the magazines I’ve either written for, write for, or had articles in. I keep a record of them alphabetically.

Is that since the beginning of time, or is that this year?

As far as I can tell. There’s a small group of the first ten years of marking up that I haven’t merged with it yet. It should be around 1575 or something when I add those to it. It’s all pretty well updated last year. 

I also keep records of professional speakers I’ve spoken to, all the companies I’ve consulted for, and anything I keep metrics on that I set out to do. I have a metric on all the cities I’ve spoken in, which is over 2060 cities now. I’ve gone to every continent. I’ve got documents from all the cities. 

People say, “Why do you do that?” I say, “Because I had a dream to do those things, and the only way I know I’m getting my dream is to document when I get it and when I’m doing it.” So I keep a record of them all, and then I have a master list that records what I do every day that I’m grateful for. Those two are really helpful. 

If you’re going to run a major company, but you don’t keep some governance and control over it, it’s running you; you’re not running it.

I’m doing your podcast now. That will go on to daily “thank you and gratitude for the day,” and then it will also go on to the podcast. Then, when I do a speaking engagement, if it’s a keynote, webinar, seminar, or whatever it may be, I’ve got a document. I have a better idea of planning out the year, looking at what I can do, and managing my time more effectively. 

If I say I’m going to do something, I’m only committed if I put it in my metric. It’s like a company. If you’re going to run a major company, but you don’t keep some governance and control over it, it’s running you; you’re not running it. I’m a firm believer in documenting what I set out to do. 

For all the disciplines I’ve studied, I kept a record of every book for a long time. That’s been sloppy lately, it needs to be updated, but every time I read, I document what I read. It’s almost 30,700 books now. I’m constantly documenting that because I want to achieve my goal to a certain level. I firmly believe in setting a goal and then metric it to get it. 

When reaching people, we get a metric of roughly how many people watch the shows. I used to have a company. I could delegate it to a company in South Africa for a while. Every time I did radio, television, newspapers, or magazines, they give me the stats on who’s reading it, how many are watching it, how many people are opening that article, and everything, so I know how many people I’m touching the lives of because to me, that was important.

Then, I’ve got records of all the thank you letters I get. I’m a nut for metrics. It gives me tremendous gratitude to see those things being fulfilled and a great inspiration to continue building momentum doing it.

I believe the old adage, “What gets measured gets managed,” is true.

That’s some truth. I’m very grateful. I get a lot of tears of gratitude daily from this because I get to do what I love, which I set out to do when I was 17. I get to do it every day.

Amazing. Have you been in very many movies? I know The Secret, of course. How I first heard of you was watching that movie.

Fifty-four filmings. We’ve got another one that’s coming up that we’re filming in about 12 days that we’ll be finishing up. We just did one on autism. I just did another one on longevity and youth, and then we got asked to do one with Johnny Depp. So we did a preliminary film for that. That’s something called ‘The Respondent’ because it’s about his divorce or whatever they’re doing a movie on. They asked me to be on it in the psychology interviewing part. 

Of those 54, not all are out yet. Some of them are still in the making. Some have financial issues sometimes getting out, but we’ve gotten to do quite a few films.

I always said that I wanted to be in the movies. When I was in my 20s, I said I wanted to be in the movies but didn’t want to be an actor. I want to be myself. All the different films we’ve gotten to have been just being me, which I like. I don’t have to put on any act or anything.

I learned in Kabbalah that if you desire something—let’s say it’s to be in movies and play yourself—that desire is there because you’ve already achieved or received fulfillment. It just hasn’t materialized yet in the physical plane. Do you believe that one?

Exactly. It’s impossible for me not to fulfill my mission, for it’s my destiny. It’s not in the future. It’s in the now. All I do is see it in my mind’s eye, and once I can articulate it fluently and congruently, it’s just a matter of the people, places, things, ideas, and events coming into reality and making it manifest. I’m a believer in that.

When you say it’s in the now, that reminds me of something I learned last year: time is an illusion, and the past, present, and future are all happening simultaneously. On the other side of the veil in the upper world, it’s all eternal now, so time doesn’t even exist. What’s your take on that? I know this is not marketing-related, but—

Even in neuroscience, this is wisdom. In an article I read this morning, Brian Cox describes space and time as emergent functions of a deeper form of reality. He wasn’t saying he was describing panpsychism, but it was almost that. He was kind of hinting.

In the study of neuroscience, they found out just 3 ½ years ago—or at least it started to be published then—that for every episodic memory that involves storing information of the past, the hippocampus, grid cells, place cells, and the arrangement of that simultaneously creates an imagination. The two are trajectories that are present simultaneously, so they’re changing it from episodic memory to episodic moment. The truth is that our mind will automatically—if it has a trajectory into the past—and simultaneously counterbalance it with a trajectory in the future to counterbalance it, so we maintain a homeostatic now. There is now. It’s neuroscientifically demonstrated.

When you’re a leader or business owner, you can build a successful team by believing in and caring about your team members and their success. Click To Tweet

William James, in 1895, said in his book, The Principles of Psychology, within every memory is imagination, and with every imagination is memory. The inseparable are only separated by the conscious and unconscious minds being divided.

You have an amazing memory.

The second we judge, we divide it up and make this illusion of the arrow of time, which is entropy which makes us age—our mortal self, not our immortal self.

This is deep stuff. I love it. This is why I have a podcast all about this sort of thing. If you, listener, are enjoying this conversation, you should subscribe to Get Yourself Optimized. That’s definitely going to be worth your time.

John, I’ve been watching some Gaia shows. Gaia is a streaming network. I’m sure you’re familiar with it.

I don’t watch much TV, but I’m familiar with that. That’s worth watching.

Yeah, it is. I hardly watch any TV or streaming stuff other than things that will help me with my mission, but something that could be an opportunity for you is to have your show on Gaia. 

I’ve been watching something on a show called Sacred Geometry on Gaia. It is amazing. Imagine if you had a show like that. I would be wrapped up watching that. Just an idea to add to your list if you’re interested.

I would like to explore that. I’d be glad to do it. I love doing any TV, radio, shows, movies, or anything like that. That sounds cool.

I think you need your own show.

I may have to get your advice on how to do that. Then, I can do my teaching research where I put a team together to put together so I can show up with that.

Gaia would be the team that would put it together. You would be the talent. You’d show up, they’d tell you where to stand and sit, which camera to look at, and all that, and you’d just do your magic.

I’ll make a note of that, and we’ll explore that.

That’d be cool. Let’s talk about gratitude and how that relates to business, marketing, reaching people, and having an impact. Of course, it is very important, but some listeners may not see that connection so much. I wouldn’t have seen it so many years ago. I would say, “Oh, that’s a nice thing to do.” It’s like an affirmation, going to the gym, getting some good endorphins, or something like that. But, no, it’s much deeper and more important than that. Do you want to speak about that?

I want to share a story. I was in Chicago, and a doctor asked me to come up and consult with him. I was going to spend the day with him polishing up his office to help him grow his business and scale it up. 

The night before, we had dinner, and I asked him a simple question. I got a piece of paper out and wrote it down. I said, “I want you to give me the name of every patient that you can recall their full name. I’ll say go, and you’ll rattle them off nonstop, one after another, saying their name. The moment you pause for more than a second, I will stop and share something with you.”

He goes, “Okay.” He started rattling off names, and I kept going down and making a line for each one. I totaled them up, and there were 68. He had 68 names before he paused and had to think of a next name. Then I said, “How many days a week do you work?” He said, “I work four days generally. I usually take Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday off.”

I said, “So four days. If you multiply 4 by 68, that’s 272. Do you see around 275 patients a week?” He goes, “Yes.” “It’s almost a letter,” is exactly what I said. He’s like, “How’d you guess that?” I said, “Very simply, out of sight, out of mind. Now, here’s your homework tonight because I’m here to grow your practice. I want you to memorize 1000 names. I want you to start memorizing the names tonight and refresh your names because if they’re out of your mind, they’re out of your practice. If your innermost dominant thought is not your patients, you can expect them to have the innermost dominant thought to be your practice.” I made him go home and memorize 1000 names.

Did he?

He didn’t get 1000 that night, but he added about another 32. He wrote down the names, and he started thinking them through. He started reading them, so when he came in, he thought about them. He averaged between two to three patients a day. He had five patients he knew the next day; two of them were the people he thought of and wrote the names down. Two of them showed back up to his office and brought somebody.

I said, “If you take 1000 names, go through them, have your staff all read those names, think about those people, think about them, their names, their kid’s’ names, and what they do for a living, and get engaged with them, 20% of those people will show up in your business.” I’ve done this with over 1000 clinics, so I’ve proven this.

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He did. His practice went from 275 to 600 over the next year a week, and he had to hire new doctors to manage it. He says, “Now, my focus is not all my distractions. I’ve delegated that. My focus is now on serving my people.“

Then, I asked him to do one thing. At the end of the night, after we finished staying in his office all day, I made him list everybody he saw without looking at the appointment book to see if he was present with them because if he did, he knew who he saw. He had to write all the names of people he saw and write a one-line thank you for what they taught him that day and just something to be grateful for because when you’re grateful for what you have, you get more to be grateful for. I made him grateful to stop and not make anything up. 

What are you grateful for? What they taught you today? Don’t put some BS down. What are you grateful for, and what have you learned from them? I guarantee you that this will increase volume, referrals, and enthusiasm. It will put you in a different frame of mind.

When you’re grateful for what you have, you get more to be grateful for.

Peter Lynch, in his One Up on Wall Street back in the ’90s, was with fidelity money management. In that book, I summarized and got an essence out of it. He said after he does his quantitative and technical analysis to determine the stocks and companies to buy, he then gets on a plane and goes and visits the headquarters to see what’s the actual headquarters like. In other words, he’s just looking at numbers and not looking at people. 

He found that there are six things; if he sees these six things, he will invest in them. He says that the people are grateful for their job, they love what they’re doing, the vision inspires them, they’re enthusiastically working, have high energy, are confident and certain about their skills, and are present while they do it. If you invest in that company, you’re going to make money. It’s going to go up in value because it starts with gratitude. Gratitude has an impact on business without question.

Amazing. I love that. I recently made God my business partner, and that’s been a huge game-changer. So let me restate it as this: I requested that God be my business partner, and he said yes. 

We will have record-breaking revenues for this year that are higher than the last 12 years. This is our best year in 12 since I started this business after I left the previous company that I had gotten where they had acquired my company, and I worked there for a short time. 

I started this company 12 years ago. This is the best year. I do not doubt that it is because God’s my business partner. It might sound hokey for some listeners, but probably not that many because if they’re still listening to the show, they’ve gotten used to my spiritual stance.

The first form of gratitude is when somebody does something you think supports your values, and you say thank you. It’s superficial gratitude.

I learned that from a previous guest on my other show. His name is Kurtis Lee Thomas. He’s a breathwork expert. He’s got these online courses and does big group Zoom-based breathwork exercises and stuff. He’s really good. He talked in the interview about how he has God as his business partner. It’s so incredible. I tie that into the whole gratitude discussion because when you’re grateful, you’re connected to the bigger picture versus when you’re in the material world.

There are two forms of gratitude. The first form of gratitude is when somebody does something you think supports your values, and you say thank you. It’s superficial gratitude. 

Then, there’s deep gratitude when you would first see something you think is challenging. Still, you look again, dig deeper, and ask questions that break you through the unconscious and make you fully conscious, and then you realize that there was a higher hidden order in your apparent chaos. Now you have a grace where you learn, “Wow, my own limited understanding judges things, but there’s a higher order in what’s happening here, and I just discovered it. Thank you.”

That is the gratitude that makes things, as you say, synchronously happen. I’m a firm believer in that. That’s why I keep my gratitude journal every day. I learned from an Indian mystic when I was 23 not to go to bed until you’ve run through the day. Anything in that day that you can’t see on the way that you saw in the way that you were ungrateful for, go back and look at it from a deeper perspective until it’s on the way, so you don’t accumulate in your subconscious mind a day that wasn’t a thank you. That’s a ritual I started at age 23.

That’s so cool. That reminds me of another ritual that I learned from Harville Hendrix. He’s the creator of Imago Couples Therapy and the author of the book, Getting the Love You Want. He was also a guest on my other show. He’s been doing this practice for 20 years now, at least with his wife. 

Every night before going to sleep, without fail, they will share at least three things they’re grateful for with each other from the other partner. Like grateful to that partner for what they’ve done, who they are, or something from the past that was a beautiful memory—three things, at least. 

My wife, Orion, and I have done that. We fell out of that habit; I have to admit. We haven’t done it for a while now, but we have done it nonstop for at least three years. We missed a day here or there, but it was probably 20 days out of a year that we would have missed. It’s a game-changer. Have you heard of that exercise?

As my mom said to me, when you’re grateful for what you have, you get more to be grateful for. There’s nothing not to be grateful for. If you don’t see it as something of thanks, you do not see the truth. You’re not seeing the whole picture yet. You’re seeing a subjectively biased interpretation of your reality, not the objective truth.

In my gratitude journal, I write down things that I’m grateful for that are challenges. I’ve been doing that for a 1 ½ year or so. What I’m thankful for is that a challenge helps me to see it from a new perspective. Even if I don’t see it at that moment, it opens the door for me to see it later. If I’m only writing down the things I enjoyed, it’s like I’m thumbing my nose at the blessings yet to be revealed.

I also learned from Kabbalah—I guess it’s just Judaism in general—that everything is a blessing. Some blessings are revealed, and some blessings are yet to be revealed. The unrevealed blessings are things like, oh, that terrible car crash, and then years later, I ended up meeting my soulmate because we were at the same auto body shop. 

I’ve worked at developing questions to help me see past my illusion so I can honor what it is instead of imposing on what I think it should be.

I’m just making something up, but the idea that everything leads to or contributes to your highest and best good is a truth that you can’t necessarily see when you’re in the thick of it. Still, you got to leave the space to say, “All right, I’m going to take the time to do this gratitude journaling or meditation so that I can at least glimpse it, even if I’m in the middle of a firefight or forest fire.”

I’ve been teaching The Breakthrough Experience, and I have people with all kinds of things that people come into it with. They’re angry about this, resentful of that, had this happened, trauma. I ask them a new set of questions that makes them see things that they didn’t see before until they say thank you, and I love you to whoever’s involved, and then they don’t have to carry that around anymore. Baggage is turned into fuel. Gravity is turned into radiation.

Amazing. You’re familiar with the ho’oponopono prayer, right?

Yep. I’m a firm believer that there’s already perfection, so I don’t have to pray for perfection, or I don’t have to hope for perfection. It’s going to get perfect. So I must go, dig a little deeper, and discover it’s already here. There’s a hidden order in your apparent chaos. 

I’ve worked at developing questions to help me see past my illusion so I can honor what it is instead of imposing on what I think it should be. That’s where people get trapped. They have the amygdala wanting pleasure without pain or a one-sided outcome instead of embracing the two sides of life. We need the two sides of life to keep us centered.

Yeah. I think a better definition of prayer than asking or requesting things from God is simply being in conversation with God. I am talking to God.

Thank you.

Yeah, absolutely. Thank you as a prayer. The ho’oponopono prayer for our listeners unfamiliar with it is simple. It’s thank you. It starts, with I’m sorry, please forgive me, thank you, and I love you. 

It could be in any order, but I use that as a scaffolding for a full conversation if I have it with somebody. If it’s a person I’m not communicating with anymore—maybe they’ve passed away, won’t speak to me, or whatever—I’ll call Archangel Gabriel and ask him to relay the message to me. If I at least say those four statements and mean them, it changes the energy of the situation. If I’m in conflict with a person, it right sets it, if that’s a word.

I don’t even go with the idea of I’m sorry; I forgive because that’s me not understanding the hidden order and our roles in the dynamic.

I’m going one little step beyond that because we only perceive others making mistakes when we project our values onto them and expect them to live in our values. We only imagine ourselves making mistakes when we’ve injected other people’s values into us and expected us to live in their values. But we’re not making mistakes in a perfect divine universe, and we’re not making a mistake in our values. It’s only when we try to be somebody we’re not or have other people try to be somebody they’re not.

I don’t even go with the idea of I’m sorry; I forgive because that’s me not understanding the hidden order and what my role is and their role is in the dynamic. I just say thank you, I love you, and go and discover the hidden order in it because even if you’re saying I forgive you, you’re assuming that somehow that was a mistake. “I forgive you” or “I’m sorry” are thinking there were mistakes. 

I want to go even deeper in finding out the order of that. Those aren’t even mistakes because otherwise, I’m saying there’s a divine perfection that’s omnipresent, and then I’m going and denying it in those moments. I even say, “thank you, I love you,” and dig for those things. I want to get to the point that there’s nothing there to say I’m sorry or forgive me. 

In The Breakthrough Experience, when people finish my method, nobody says I’m sorry, or I forgive you. They say thank you; I love you. I’d rather go in, ask the questions, and see it so perfectly that there’s nothing to judge in the first place. Otherwise, I’m not complete.

I also learned in Kabbalah that when you’re judging, you’re not loving, and when you’re loving, you’re not judging. It’s binary.

Yeah, so when you’re judging and saying “I’m sorry,” you assume that what you did was wrong, or for “I forgive you,” that what they did was wrong. I bypass that, go right into thank you, I love you, and look at what my misinterpretation must be. I’m accountable for my misinterpretation because divine perfection has been forsaken if I start from that perspective.

Right. You talked about imposing values on one another and how that leads to trouble. How does that fit into companies with their core values and mission statement on the wall? Isn’t that imposing values on all the team members?

When you’re judging and saying, “I’m sorry,” you assume that what you did was wrong, or “I forgive you,” that what they did was wrong.

If it’s ineffectively done, that’s something that I confront in companies because there are no values to a company. There are values to people. People make up the company.

Imagine if I self-righteously assumed that my values were right, my employees were less important than mine, and my customers were even less important than my employees. Then I projected my values onto the customer. They’re not going to buy. They’re not interested in my values. They’re interested in fulfilling theirs. 

If they’re autocratic, my employees are not interested in subordinating. They’re interested in engaging in something meaningful to them.

An autocratic person or autocratic leader will try to impose values downhill on them. I’d rather go and find out what my values are, find out what their values already are because nobody goes to work for the sake of a company—they go to work to fulfill their values—and then master the art of communicating what I would love just like I would do a customer in terms of what their values are. Customers will respond beautifully if you do. 

The art of communicating is what I teach people, how to communicate what you would love to happen and your values in terms of their values which mean you have to ask the question, what are their values, and how does it help me fulfill mine? The more I answer that question, the more I can do that.

A few years ago, I taught 66 consultants value applications in Tokyo. We determined their values independently with my value determination process, which is a 13-step questionnaire. Once we did that, we partnered them in twos, so we had 33 couples. None of these people knew each other because the criteria were that they had to be with somebody they’re not met and someone they didn’t know. 

An autocratic person or autocratic leader will try to impose values downhill on their members.

Then, what happened was they had to go and take the top three values of this individual and ask how specifically this individual is fulfilling their top value. How’s that helping you fulfill yours?

At first, you go, “I don’t know.” But your job is to find the link: How does your top value fulfill theirs, and how does their top value help you with the second and third ones? Finally, how’s their second one help all three?

They spent about 2 ½ hours linking the values of people they didn’t know anything about. By the time they were through, the degree of dialogue—instead of alternating monologue—skyrocketed. The degree of respect went up. 

Of the 33 couples, people, or pairs, 27 were in business with each other and started doing business with each other. They never knew each other, but because they could see how they could help fulfill theirs and do this, they leveled the playing field. 

If you think your values are superior to somebody else, you’ll talk down to them carelessly, and you’ll be more of an autocrat and narcissist expecting to get something from them. If you minimize yours and exaggerate theirs, you’ll walk around on eggshells, carefully worrying about their loss in your life. But if you level the playing field and see how both help each other’s values, you’ll have caring, which keeps rings on their fingers in relationships. Now you’ll see that what they’re dedicated to will help you, and what you’re devoted to will help them.

There’s a natural organic response to one engaged and wanting to participate in helping each other get the goals. There’s no autocratic system of top-down values for people. If you hire somebody and don’t know their values, but that’s not what inspires them, you’re going to end up being an autocrat motivating them in punishment-reward systems, which are the least effective strategies in marketing and building a business. Motivation is a symptom, not a solution.

If you hire somebody and don’t know their values, you will end up in punishment-reward systems, the least effective marketing strategy.

They’ll be engaged if you find out their highest values and the job description matches them. You don’t have to micromanage them. They’ll go and do a greater job than you because that’s what they love doing. You don’t have to push them and autocratically say this is what you have to do. Instead, you appreciate them because they’re helping you get what you want. 

Caring enough about another human being to find out what they value most and then communicating and articulating your values respectfully in terms of that is far more profound in building a business, engaging people, and maintaining relationships than an autocratic, top-down authority of some artificial value system that a company has that nobody’s living by is moral hypocrisy.

I’ve had many employees and contractors do your value determination process as part of the hiring or onboarding process, just like they would do the StrengthsFinder or DiSC assessment. They would do the Demartini Value Determination Process on drdemartini.com. It’s great to have that, understand what drives them, and then associate the different job duties they’re given with those highest values so that they feel intrinsic motivation and you don’t have to keep asking them to do their job.

They are micromanaging and motivating people by pushing stuff uphill. As I said, if you have to motivate people extrinsically, there’s no match. When they’re matched, you don’t have to do that.

As I teach research and write, everything else is delegated. So I don’t get engaged in that. I don’t have to deal with that because I do what I do. I learned a long time ago to stay out of people’s lives, quit trying to impose your values on others, and let them excel at what they love.

It didn’t occur to me until we were talking now that I could do something along these same lines with my staff and my clients too.

They can’t wait to refer you and do more business if you do.

Really cool. How does this fit in with the ideas of goal-setting? Let’s say that you’re running the marketing department, campaign, or business, and you need to set goals for the quarter. How does the goal-setting process differ because you have a sense of all the team members and all the different constituents’ values hierarchy?

If you tell them, here are the goals, the punishment if you do it, and the reward if you do it, you’ll use extrinsic motivation. But if you ask them a simple question, here’s our objective and here’s your value, how could this objective help you fulfill your value and help them see it so it’s not an external motivation, it’s an intrinsic calling? If they can answer that question, the more they answer it, the more they’re doing it because they want to, not because you’ve imposed it. 

It’s about asking questions. If we ask questions that help them see how what you want to do helps them fulfill what they are intrinsically driven to do, they’ll do it automatically. You don’t have to remind, motivate, or retrain them because they’ll want to do something that helps them get what they want.

Can I share a good story about that? I had a lady that used to work for me. Unfortunately, she passed away but worked with me until about 2009. She was a single mom with a beautiful daughter who wanted to be an equestrian vet. She wanted to help work with horses, loved horses, and wanted to be a veterinarian in medicine. This lady was working for me, saving a portion of it for college for her daughter, and living by herself with her daughter. 

Her daughter had a special function on a particular weekend. It was also a time when I had a big convention in Las Vegas. I knew that was a significant week for the business. I wanted her to be there because she’s the best salesperson. I knew she wouldn’t want to be there if she didn’t take her daughter, but I knew her daughter had a special event. 

Everybody makes decisions based on what they believe will give them the greatest advantage over a disadvantage at any moment in time according to what they value. That’s how we make decisions. I went to her and said, “Linda, if I’m not mistaken, you have a special event with your daughter in a few weeks.” She says, “Yeah, she’s looking forward to it.”

I said, “That happened to be the same weekend where I happen to have this big conference in Las Vegas where there are 8000 people. They will be listening to me speak, and I would love your expertise there in helping sell. I know that that’s a weekend, and that’s going to cause a bit of turmoil because what I would want, what your daughter wants, and what you would want is unclear. I know people make decisions based on what will give them more advantages, so I want to make this offer to you just in case you would like it. I looked up, researched, and found out that there is an equestrian college or school for people that are going to be veterinary specialists dealing with equines. It’s a fine college there. I have no idea if you would have an idea where your daughter wants to go, but I just thought if you would like to go and visit that, I’d like to have you come up and join me and spend an extra day going and taking you and your daughter to that location just in case it’s something that would be meaningful. 

I also would love to have you come and join me and sell because nobody can sell like you. You make a huge difference. I like to do something special because I know your daughter has that special event. I want to offer it where every sale you do, I’m going to match a certain portion of it, and it’s going to go towards your college fund for your daughter. 

I would also like you to have an extra day Saturday night—because I’ll speak Friday—but you’re going to stay Saturday and Sunday. So Saturday night, you can go to any shows you and your daughter want to go to. I’ll even pay for two. 

Respect how others live their lives. Don’t try to impose your beliefs on others. Allow them to excel based on what they passionately value. Click To Tweet

And out of the 8000 or so doctors that will be there, probably more than half of them, or about 70%, are men. Of that, 14-15% of them are eligible men. You’re single. I know when they’re going to come up to my table, they’re going to see you. Just in case you would like to meet some nice man there that would like to take you maybe out, have a drink, or whatever, I want to let you know that they’re going to be there and this is an opportunity for you to be exposed to a whole lot of men in a short time. You’ll be the center of attention because they will be coming to that table, and they will meet you and say hi to you. By doing that, you and I will score because they’ll want to buy from you. After all, you’re so amazing at selling, and they’ll possibly perk up when they see you because you’re an attractive woman. 

I want to offer that. Now, if that doesn’t work for you, I totally understand, but I want to ensure that if you believe that the issue with your daughter is more important, you will make that decision.

If that’s not sufficient, let me know because I might even add a few more bonuses on there because I want her to be able to go to the school she wants, I want to be able to help you fund this college, and I want you to be able to help do it. So the more we do, a portion goes there.”

She can come, help, and make a bonus, too, so she’ll have extra spending on the weekend if she’d like to do it and go to Las Vegas Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. We’ll get there Thursday night, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, go to an equestrian school to see everything, and maybe visit a ranch.

I talked in terms of her values and gave them up to her for whatever she did. I had a backup person do it. They will be second in making sales, but I’d rather have her. I spoke in terms of her values, her daughter’s education, her daughter’s goal, men, extra bonuses, Las Vegas, a little fun action, and going to a school for her. I knew those were her values, so I cared enough to communicate her values.

She talked to her daughter, spoke in similar lines to me, and her daughter said, “If I could do that, I’ll pass up on this thing here if I could see the school and I could go into Las Vegas.”

They came, and we knocked it out of the ballpark on sales. So she got to see this equestrian school which inspired her to do well. She had an extra $4000 towards her college fund that day.

If I care enough about the people to communicate what I want in terms of what they want, they’re more likely to make a decision not because they have to but because they’d love to. That’s way more engaging and inspiring and will get more sales and appreciation for the company. They’ll appreciate the company if somebody does that for them than if they do if they have to do it.

It sounds like she didn’t feel forced or arm-twisted.

No, there was no force. She’ll feel forced if there are more disadvantages than advantages, but if I give her enough benefits in her values, she’ll feel grateful. The difference between manipulation and caring is how many advantages in their values you provide. The bottom line is if you care about them, you’ll make sure they win out of it.

Everybody listening should do this value determination process which takes about 15–20 minutes or something like that on the website. It’s free.

Give them 30 minutes because that way, they don’t rush it.

Not only should our listeners do it. Should is—according to Marshall Rosenberg, the founder of Nonviolent Communication—the most violent word in the English language according to Marshall. But it’s highly recommended, if this resonates with you, to do the value determination process for free on drdemartini.com/values. 

Imagine what you can do to change the world, your company, and your relationships just by having everyone you care about take this value determination process. Really cool.

I just finished two new books, and another one is about to come out: The 7 Secret Treasures: A Transformational Blueprint for a Well-Lived Life. In there, I talked about values. There’s a whole section on how to communicate effectively in values. 

We have treasures sitting in us that were dormant and that we’re not mining because we’re not using and communicating effectively in values.

We have treasures sitting in there that were dormant and that we’re not mining because we’re not using and communicating effectively in values. That’s the cornerstone. In taking the time to do that, I don’t like to use the word should, got to, have to, or must do, but I’d like to share that it’s an opportunity for them to be able to have a more fulfilled life and to get more of what they’re wanting by helping other people get what they want.

Get that book, get out there, and get some of your loved ones, colleagues, customers, and so forth to do the Value Determination Process. It’s really awesome.

I know we’re out of time, so what would it be if you had one little nugget to share that you haven’t shared already in this interview as our last bit of wisdom for today?

The magnificence of who you are, which revolves around what’s highest on your value, is more magnificent than any fantasies you’ll ever impose on yourself. You don’t have to compare yourself to others and put people on pedestals or pits, but it’s not unwise to go and reflect and see that whatever you perceive in them, you have inside you. You’re not distracted by judgments. You’re just inspired by the love that comes out of your heart that directs you wisely to do something extraordinary on planet Earth.

Well said. You’re such a light in the world. Thank you for everything you do for humanity. Thank you for being on this show. I value you as a friend.

Thank you, Stephan.

Thank you, listener. Get out there and make the world a better place. We’ll catch you in the next episode. I’m your host, Stephan Spencer, signing off.

Important Links

Your Checklist of Actions to Take

Relentlessly, passionately pursue what I love to do. If I’m enthusiastic and passionate, I’m more resilient when encountering obstacles.

Write down my dreams and goals with a pen, on a tangible piece of paper. There’s something about the process of writing that allows me to visualize my dreams clearly. 

Journal what I’m grateful for daily. Gratitude helps me feel more positive, cherish good memories, improve my health, deal with struggle, and build strong relationships.

Don’t force my beliefs on others and don’t let others dictate my beliefs. Mistakes happen when I project my values and expectations onto others and vice versa. 

Communicate my values with my team and, in return, discover their values. Invest in and know my employees and colleagues to enable efficient and harmonious teamwork.

Treat those around me as equals. Their principles and beliefs are valuable and valid. No one is superior or inferior.

Stop comparing myself to others. Don’t waste precious energy focusing on other people’s lives. Comparisons can cause resentment toward others and myself.

Be mindful and in control of my perceptions and actions. Positively react to situations and ideas, whether or not I agree with them. My effort impacts me and my surroundings.

Grab a copy of Dr. John Demartini’s new book, The 7 Secret Treasures: A Transformational Blueprint for a Well-Lived Life, to reacquaint myself with the power I already possess within.

Visit Dr. John Demartini’s website to determine my values by taking The Demartini Determination Value Process, access his free masterclass for podcast listeners, and learn more about his other events and courses. Also, download his free workbook on empowerment, 7 Steps To Expand To The Next Level Of Empowerment.

About Dr. John Demartini

Dr. John Demartini is a world-leading human behaviour 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. Learn more by visiting www.drdemartini.com.