When you hear the name, Robin Sharma, what instantly comes to your mind? Is it leadership? His books? Invaluable life advice? Success? Well, I had the honor of having an intense discussion with this iconic author and leadership expert, and I promise you, this is one of the best seventy-four minutes of your time you’ll ever spend.
In our podcast, Robin opens up about his success, the process that led him there, and how you too, can get to where he is. There’s so much sage advice that Robin shared with me, that I’d be doing you a disservice trying to cover it all in one blog post.
But, hey, here’s a sneak peek of what Robin had for us.
The Truth About Success
“Success without soulfulness is an empty victory” – Robin Sharma
The society has a very shallow definition of success. From how we are taught in school, to what most of our parents teach us, we are brainwashed from an early age to believe that success is about having great fame and fortune.
And while this concept as a whole isn’t entirely wrong, Robin sheds new light on what success really is. He defines success as, “Success is about a sense of having inner peace, and a sense of feeling that you are doing your own life – living by your own values.”
“Your instinct is more powerful than your intellect” – Robin Sharma.
When I asked Robin why he started writing, Robin says that instead of focusing on his reasoning and intellect, he trusted his instincts and intuition.
According to him, society’s notion that you should make decisions based on your mindset can only take you so far. You need to have more faith in your instincts – because they are the ones that’ll take you to where you need to be.
He says, “If you wake up, and you are brave enough to believe your instincts, and your faith is larger than your fears, you’ll be led to the best places.”
“Success is awesome, but it’s not the real game. The real game is who are you becoming, and how many are you serving” – Robin Sharma
We are living in a time where having the fanciest of cars or owning a collection of Rolex watches doesn’t make you a hero. The real heroes are out there saving lives, serving people, and shaping lives.
And Robin says, the people with real success, are the people who have found peace with their work. The people who are more than willing to serve others, rather than to be served.
He further adds that until you find ‘enoughness’ in your work, you’ll always be hungry. Wanting more and more, and more often than not, you won’t find happiness in your work.
In fact, he accurately describes this as a ‘golden handcuff.’ The more you have, and the more famous you get, the less freedom you have.
“The bigger the dream, the more the pain” – Robin Sharma.
“We grow and step into our heroism, not during times of ease, but during moments of pain.” This is what Robin had to say about pain. He says that pain is what molds you into who you are.
Your success is, therefore, a product of your pain. Robin believes that whenever you are thrust into turbulence, that’s when you’ll bring out the best version of you. That’s when you’ll reveal your leadership, your loving nature, your bravery.
So, embrace the pain, it’s part of the journey that makes your success fulfilling.
“If all of your energy is on chasing your destiny, all your energy is off the journey that will take you to your destiny.” – Robin Sharma
Robin emphasizes that your reward is in the process. It’s in the journey to creating your masterpiece. It’s in the craft of improving your art. In the process of serving through your work. In stretching your limits to see how far you can go.
He believes that falling in love with the process is the victory for your journey. And so, if you rush through the process to success, you miss out on all the rewards.
“The secret to happiness is service.” – Robin Sharma.
Throughout the discussion, Robin continues to show us that success is more than just chasing money. He shows us that it’s about patience, about enduring through the pain and learning through the process.
So, instead of rushing towards success, learn to savor the process, because it’s in the process that you’ll find happiness and success.
There’s so much more value in this podcast that I couldn’t cover on this blog. There’s advice on how to bring out your genius, excellent advice to leaders, the truth about technology addiction, and an exposition of the 20-20-20 technique from his book, ‘The 5 AM Club.’
Medium published an article a few hours after the podcast premiered titled, “Sahsin Govender and Robin Sharma Collaborate With The Millionaire Student Show.”
This is the inspiration that you really can’t afford to miss. So, head over to episode 29 on The Millionaire Student Show, watch this episode, and discover the truth about Success!