One of the people who really inspire me is James Altucher. He is a bit of a goofball, and sometimes I wish he would stop talking so much, but he is so adorable and he is so audacious in the questions he asks in his podcasts, that he totally disarms his guests, and I am sure they are startled at their own degree of self-disclosure afterwards.

I mostly  listen to podcasts when I am working in the kitchen. Yesterday I made a batch of kitchari because I always need kitchari when I am alone, and I am going to be alone for the next 10 days while G is down south with her team.

So while I measured out the coriander and the fennel seeds and the cumin and the turmeric and the black mustard seed; and while I minced the ginger and rinsed the mung dal and scooped out the ghee and measured the basmati, I listened. And every once in a while put down the wooden spoon to takes notes from this really good podcast James did with Jairek Robbins who is the son of Tony Robbins.

Robbins just wrote a book called, Live It!  (which I promptly ordered), in which he describes how he operates s as a coach. He says , first you have to learn whatever you are going to teach or coach (duh).  And then you have to “live it.” He said he never coaches anyone on anything he doesn’t actually live himself.

Ding! “Yep,” I thought. Yepper.

None of that “faking it till you make it” bullshit. If you are going to tell someone they aught to be doing something, you better be doing it yourself.

If everyone operated like that, (with integrity) we would be surrounded by such paragons of authenticity, that we couldn’t help but be inspired to go out and live exemplary lives ourselves.

But instead, we tend look at advice-givers with a hairy eyeball. That’s because doctors who are fat are telling us to lose weight; and yoga teachers who smoke (god forbid) are telling us that the breath is paramount; and school teachers who haven’t cracked a serious book in a decade are telling us to read more.

So first: learn how to do it, then, live it, and after that, GIVE IT.

Yeah. Give it away. And give it without seeking or expecting credit or thanks.  Once it becomes clear that nothing is “our idea” anyway but just a reworking of someone else’s idea,  then we are happy to open source everything, so that good ideas can continue to grow and morph into great ones.