Hi, I am here with Daniel bruce Levin. He walked away from a huge opportunity (to work his way up from pushing a broom to running a billion dollar business), to hitchhike around the world to find happiness and inner peace. His life has been dedicated to finding the peace and contentment that comes from truly knowing yourself. His mission has become holding the space for others to find that peace too.
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Ari Gronich 0:00
I'm Ari Gronich. And this is create a new tomorrow podcast.
Welcome back to another episode of create a new tomorrow I am Ari Gronich your host, and I have with me Daniel Bruce Levin, this is a man I'm gonna let him tell you about himself. But he basically turned away walked away from a billion running a billion dollar company. And in exchange for that, decided to hitchhike around the world, find inner peace and happiness. Live is a monk in a monastery, I mean, this guy or being a rabbi, you know, he's got the beard. So, you know, he's got that that Rabbi ask, you know, frame around him, if you if I was able to show you on my wall here I've got I've got a great Rabbi got the same beard, you know? So anyway, why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself and how, how you became this sought after person who could choose to walk away from running a billion dollar opportunity.
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:26
I've lived a really interesting life. I think a little different than most people, although everybody's life is different. So I don't mean to make mine better or worse. It isn't a compare. It isn't a comparison. It's just I've lived a different life. And I think the most compelling thing that brought me my why was losing my parents two years apart on the same day. My dad died when I was 13. And he was my hero. I looked up to him, and I couldn't understand why my hero would be taken from me for no apparent reason. My mom died two years later on exactly the same day at exactly the same time. And so I was a naive little kid very protected in a very protected neighborhood in Philadelphia. I remember when john F. Kennedy was running for president, he came down one of the side streets that we did by the house where we lived in a parade, you know, sort of just she's just getting votes, I guess. And the big talk was that he was the first Catholic ever running for president. And I remember walking back to my mom and saying, Mom, I can't believe it. So all the presidents have been Jewish there, since they've had them. That's how sheltered and protected I was. And she said, No, Danny, that's not there hasn't ever been a Jewish president. But I was a naive kid in a sheltered environment. And my parents just loved and adored me in a way that I've never, I always wanted to be loved and adored. And when they were going to wondered, why was that taken? Not only why, where did they go, but why was that taken from me? Where was I ever going to find that love again. And it was only in writing the book that's over my left shoulder. For anybody who's watching this one video that I realized what happened is, when my parents passed away, I asked the adults who were the wisest people that I knew Where'd my parents go.
And they told me, they went to a place called heaven. So as a kid, I set out on a search for heaven.
I didn't know where it was, I didn't know if it was if it was a story that I could go to on the main square in the main square. You know, I didn't know what it was. So I just set out in search of that place. And I was given all these opportunities when my parents passed away. My uncle was a household name around the world. And in those days, this was 50 some years ago. In those days, men didn't give their businesses to their daughters, even though their daughters were smarter, and probably way more capable than AI. They just didn't give them to them to them. And when he saw me come into the family, he didn't have any sons. He said to me, I'm going to watch you for a little while. And if I see something in you that I think I'm going to see, I'm going to change your life with an offer I'm going to make to you. And about a month and a half later, he said to me, he took me out to lunch. And he said, Danny, today's a day your life is going to change. And I said really what's going to happen? He said, I've been watching you and you have a peculiar trait about you that will either make you incredibly successful or make you a complete failure. I hope that I can mentor you towards success. What I'd like to do is start you tomorrow, pushing a broom in my office. And I want you to rise to the level that you can naturally rise to and I will be mentoring you in the hallway along the way so you will not fall And when you get to the place where you no longer have the skill and ability to get farther, I will mentor you pass that fifth place, because I believe I see in you somebody that can in 15 years time take over my business. That was a multi billion dollar business
Ari Gronich 5:15
yet, you know, we talked about this in our pre interview. And, you know, my first response is, I wish that could have happened to me, right?
Unknown Speaker 5:26
Yes,
Ari Gronich 5:27
I wish that somebody back then at that level, would have said to me, I see something in you. And I want to take you under my wing, and I want to mentor you into becoming the best and the greatest that you can be. Yeah, however, you had a different outcome. So we'll just get into that. But I just wanted to interject my, my own thought of No, but, you know, that was like, Holy moly. What, what? What would have stopped me from doing that?
Daniel Bruce Levin 6:06
Yes. I, you are, like probably 99.9% of the people in the world, which my uncle pointed out to me when I said to him, I would like you watch me for a month and a half. And you're, you're brilliant, man. Look what you've created, you've created this international conglomerate of business that in your household name. I'm just a kid. I can't make a decision like that. Right now. I would like to watch you for one year to see if what you're offering me is what I want. Of course, it sounds beautiful. From a financial point of view, who doesn't want to be a bit or doesn't want to run a billion dollar corporation and have more money than God? But I want to see if if what it brings with it is something that I can live with.
Ari Gronich 7:02
Right. But and so Okay, so So before you go on. So how did you get to that place? At? How old were you at the time? 17, 15 ,15. Okay, so you're a 15 year old kid that's been sheltered, just lost his mom and dad. And yet, you're telling your uncle who's a billionaire. You know, I want to watch you and see if who you are is who I want to be. Yeah, I mean, that takes some Kahunas as well as, amid some stupidity. A level will stupid. Yeah, but a level of maturity. Yes. Same time. That is crazy. So how did you, you know, like backstep yourself? Yep. Analyze who you are before this? Right. Yeah. How did you become a person? What was the what were the things that made that be something that you would say?
Daniel Bruce Levin 8:09
Yeah, beautiful question. Remember, what I discovered through the Mosaic, and what I discovered, after only five or six years ago, five years ago, writing the Mosaic, I didn't know the answers to that question then. But in looking back, in retrospect, I realized that I was looking for that place called heaven. And for a lot of people that have been would have been having a billion dollar company here, because having money is what people think will buy them happiness. But what I ended up seeing was the happiness that I was looking for wasn't a result of that money. There were people that had that money that were happy. There were people that had that money that were miserable. And one of the things that kept me from doing it, because I said, I'd like a year to see how who you are. A year to the day, he took me out to lunch again. And in and he said, I'd like an answer to my question. And I said, you have to be in the permanent, you know, punk that I was. I said, you got to ask a question before I can give you an answer. He said, Oh, so you forgot what you promised me a year ago? I said, No, I didn't forget. I just forgot that today was one year. And I'll never forget that again. I see how exactly you're. So I he said, Do you have an answer? I said, Yes. It's going to come in the form of three questions. And he said, okay, that doesn't sound good. You know that 99.9% of the people would have said, would have said when I first asked them, where's the broom? Let me start today. Not not wait till tomorrow. And now it's a year later and you have three questions for me. This doesn't bode well. Tell me what your three questions are. And remember, I said you you can either this quality that you have can either make you a huge success or a huge failure. And I have to say I'm in intrigued by the fact that you just don't run like everybody else would to that answer, because there's something in you that intrigues me. I don't know, I've never met somebody like you that's not influenced by the, by the power of what that money can give you. So I said, Okay, I have three questions for you. And when I asked him the three questions, it was clear to everybody,
both of us for sure. that that wasn't meant for me to do. And he said, You know, I'm going to have to excommunicate you as a result of that.
And I said, I said, I didn't realize you were going to have to, but I assumed you could. Because that's what people do, when like, you've given me your heart and soul, you've poured out on the table, everything that is important to you, you've offered to me, and you feel like I'm walking away from it. With with, with no respect. But that isn't what's happening. Like, it's in respect of, it's, it's an out of respect for you that I can't do that. Because that can never be the another version of you. And there's no room for me to be me in the company that you created. And so, I would rather be an unhappy version of myself than an unattainable unhappy version of you. Because I think I'll find happiness and being made whether I have money or not, that will make me happy. But I want to, I need to find myself, I need to find that Evan that I'm looking for, which is that place of unconditional love. And it starts with me, honoring and respecting and unconditionally loving myself. Alright, to the point that I know what's right, again, please 16
Ari Gronich 11:47
What year is this?
Daniel Bruce Levin 11:49
This was I was born in 55. So it was 1971.
Unknown Speaker 11:53
Okay,
Ari Gronich 11:54
so you're citing 70?
Unknown Speaker 11:56
Actually, you're 16.
Ari Gronich 12:00
This is the beginning of the 70s. We've got the hippie movement, right was in and crossing over to the disco world, right? This is what's happening in the world. We've got gas shortages, we've got Nixon we've got right, this is what's happening in the world. And you're telling your billionaire Uncle, I am looking to be happy within myself. Yeah, again, I'm just I'm repeating this because I think it's important that people realize the mindset that comes along with whatever success you're you're partaking in, and how important it is to feel honoring within yourself. And, you know, I like you watch a lot of the people who appear to be in power. And because I've had the opportunity to be hands on, so to speak with them. I know whether they're happy or not, I know whether they're fulfilled or not. And I know, kind of the the pieces of where they're fulfilled and where they're not. But I'm also an adult, at this point who's had a lot of years of experience, right? So you're 16 you're in the 70s it's the beginning of this movement of turning over for the Age of Aquarius, right? So everybody's preparing. And you're telling your uncle that you'd rather be happy than be a billionaire?
Daniel Bruce Levin 13:42
Yeah, well, it wasn't that I'd rather be happy than be a billionaire. But I wanted the ability to be myself. And I honestly when I look at the world around me today, one of the things that I see is that there are a lot of people that have a lot of money. But there are not a lot of people that know themselves very well. It doesn't mean that people that have money don't know themselves or people that are poor don't know themselves. I don't find anybody I don't find many people in any of those stratosphere is that actually know who they are and feel comfortable in their own self. And when you find somebody like that, that person can be Richard before can be ugly, can be sad, can be can be old can be young. But when that person walks into a room with a prayer with the presence of knowing themselves, and feeling that presence, people are drawn to it like bees to honey. And, and that was what I was looking for. I was looking for that unconditional love that my parents gave me. I wanted to be that I wanted to feel that and as as much as that business would have given me so much joy, so much ability to have to have things that nobody in this world could have
I didn't see the possibility for me at that point for it to give me the ability to have what I wanted.
In retrospect, now, what I've learned about the heaven that I was looking for, is that heaven is a change of perspective, that heaviness, the ability to sweat to look at what we've always seen one way, and see it entirely different to be curious about how other people see it. And now in looking back, what I realized, I could have easily gone into my own boss company. I could have easily changed my perspective, and been and found my happiness, right, in that I could, I could have found that in, in starting organizational psychology when my hair was down to my waist. And I said to my professor, what in the world do you see in me that looks like an organizational guy? What are you crazy, but I was so arrogant and so sure of myself, that now when I look back, some 40 years later, I'm working with organizations and i'm doing i'm doing organizational psychology with them now. And in the work that I do, sometimes, I could have been that in the rabbinical school. What we do doesn't determine our happiness, who we are determines our happiness. But I didn't see that then. I was just a kid and I didn't.
Ari Gronich 16:25
Is it who we are? How we are?
Daniel Bruce Levin 16:29
Yes, it's, it's, it's, it's probably all of that. But when I say who we are. There, we I did some work, I branded a coaching company is one of the things that I did. And they had a beautiful assessment that they did with people. And they look at the seven different ways that people show up in the world. And who a person is really determines how they show up in the world. And they can either show up as a victim, as a confrontational person, as someone who rationalizes everything, as someone who wants to please other people and will do everything they can for other people, they can show up in a win win situation where everybody wins, they can show up in a place where there is nobody to win with, there's only one, we're all together, we're all united. Or they can show up in the place where none of this is real at all it all just as an illusion. And depending on where you where we show up, where I show up in any situation, determines the outcome of how that situation looks to me. And it was really beautiful.
Ari Gronich 17:46
So So then I go back to the previous part of your story. What are the three questions that you asked your uncle?
Daniel Bruce Levin 17:54
I thought I could slip by that. But I see your sharp you won't let me go on. So I remembered who he was he had a they had a beautiful big house and in the Midwest. And for his birthday, one year while I was there that about 400 people showed up for his birthday party.
Unknown Speaker 18:14
And I went up
Daniel Bruce Levin 18:15
to him and I said at one point in the midst of the party, I said, Boy, you must feel so happy. You must feel so proud of who you are as a human being that you would have 400 people come here and celebrate your birthday with you. I mean, how does it feel to be that loved and admired? And he said, Danny, let me let me tell you something. You have you have rose colored glasses. And that's the way you look at the world. These people aren't here because they love and admire me. These people are here because I have a lot of money.
And they want something from me. So I said Do you remember when you said that to me?
And he said, Yes, I do. I said why would you want to give me that gift? Why would you want to give me that the lack of faith in myself. I wasn't a lovable I wasn't I wasn't the friends that I had didn't want to be friends with me. They only wanted what I had. And maybe I and then he said, Okay, I see. I see where you're going. This isn't looking so well. What's your second question?
Unknown Speaker 19:27
And I said,
Daniel Bruce Levin 19:28
I said, Let's imagine for a minute that I could get past that hurdle. But I doubt I could I mean you're brilliant. You're, you're you're wise intuitive men. So if you can't get by it What chance do I have getting by but let's imagine for the moment that I could. I remember sitting around the dining room table with the family one one night having dinner. And the girls were just starting to get boys at boys were just starting to get interested in them and they were talking about The boys that they liked and the boys liked them. I said, Do you remember your response? Do you remember what you said? He said, Yes, I do. But what do you think I said them. I said, here's my recollection, tell me if I'm right or not. You said to them girls, as attractive as you are as smart as you are as as, as kind and funny as you are. These guys don't give a damn about who you are, they give a damn about what your last name is. And just be careful that the only reason they love you is because of your last night name. Because you single handedly can change the projection, the trajectory of their life just in a relationship. So just be careful that they're not using you for your for your last name.
As it's to say, I could get past the first hurdle. Why would you want to give that gift to my children?
And he said, Okay, this doesn't look so great. What's your third question? I said, I love that you want to start me at the bottom pushing a broom. And I love that you don't want to just hand me over something that I'm not that I haven't I haven't earned. But as I come up from pushing a broom and talking and being involved with every level of every person in the construction company, I imagine I'm going to see certain things that you don't see anymore, because you're not that you don't have that involvement with them. If I see things or hear things from those people that I think could really change the company and help the company to have a culture that's even better than the culture that's there now. Would you allow me the space to make those changes? I said, Do you remember what you said to me? He said, like it was yesterday, tell me what you think I said to you. I said, I think you said to me, if it ain't broken, we fix it, Danny. And he said, That's spot on, I would say the same thing to you again.
So I said, if I could get over the first hurdle, if I could get over the second hurdle. I still have a third hurdle, and that there's no place for me really in your company.
Because I wouldn't be permitted to make the things that were when MIT would put my earmark on it. And he said, What do you really think?
I mean, have you started any billion dollar companies? I said, Of course not. So I said, I think we have our decision, don't you?
And he said, unfortunately, so remember I said to you, your intelligence would either make you successful? Or would or would make your proper I think it's going to make you a pauper right now, this is a stupid decision. I said I understand. And you're probably right. But I would rather make a stupid decision on the chance of being happy being made, then make a wise decision with with the possibility of ever being new, and being unhappy the rest of my life doing that.
Ari Gronich 23:10
All right.
Unknown Speaker 23:12
Wow.
Ari Gronich 23:13
So I just I keep going back to your 18 years old, your age at the time and the level of maturity. But also, where did you learn the value of questions? Because obviously, obviously, you had them at an earlier age. And I would imagine that you had them before your parents passed. But where did you learn that value of curiosity, the value of of questioning and being curious? Well,
Daniel Bruce Levin 23:55
I mean, even when john kennedy went down the street, outside our, by the border, our neighborhood, I said, Does that mean all the other presidents were Jewish? You know, I mean, a questions like I was always I tested it in, in preschool in preschool and elementary school, with an IQ of a genius. And I never really said much about it or cared much about it. But I think the genius mind is a mind that's inquisitive. I think, you know, part of the curse of having a genius mind, is it's so easy to think that I know something that I don't know. And, and somewhere along the line, I realize the curse of the genius mind is the arrogance that comes with it, of knowing things that other people don't know. And I realized that I can ask questions to find out what people do know, rather than assume that I know what they did. They know oftentimes what they told me was exactly what I thought, but sometimes it wasn't. And I always, even to this day, have About 10 or 15 years ago, a company by the name of Vistage. They train CEOs. They hire people to train CEOs, how to better their business. And they recruited me at one point in time to see if I could be one of their people. And I ended up not going with them. But they have Cogan and the saying that goes along with their company that I wish to God I had come up with, but I didn't. So I give credit to them for it because it's exactly what I do. They said, when people come to us, they think that we're going to answer their questions. But in truth, what we do is we question their answers. I thought that was brilliant. And it's really the practice that I do. I question. All through my life, I've been a disrupter. Even as a kid, I questioned the answers that people gave me because I didn't see the same way they saw. I always saw things differently. And in seeing things differently, what they thought was just cut and dry, easy answer. When I questioned them, I realized they didn't really know the answers to the questions of their answers. They just said their answers because they were the answers.
Ari Gronich 26:15
So how often do you say the phrase? Yeah, I know.
Daniel Bruce Levin 26:22
Rarely,
Ari Gronich 26:24
I asked that because I remember being a kid. And you know, I was unlike most I was five years old, when I first started having conversations about philosophy and religion and politics. And I never understood kids my age, necessarily. I was definitely an introvert who likes to read and like to study and research and I read non fiction biographies of people in history. That was like my thing. I loved learning about people, and why they made the decisions that they made. And I was curious, but I also had that I know that because I would study so much that I felt like I knew. And then about 2000, the year 2000. I did the sterling men's weekend. So I was 24 years old and and doing this thing called the sterling men's weekend, which came out of asked and is a powerful experience. And one of my buddies that I met through that organization, his name is Bill Chapelle. And Bill Chapelle was one of Werner Earhart's coaches back before asked. Yeah, he also was one of the first five rebirth authors with Leonard or on the planet. I mean, this is a guy whose ability at psychology and knowing the brain and knowing motivation and all that is unparalleled. And he became a very good friend of mine. But he used to say to me, for me, to think that I know anything about anything, including what I'm saying right now, is the height of arrogance. Yeah. Because for all I know, I could be the ball in somebody's pinball game, being flipped around all over the place and have no control because 99.999% of what reality is, is unperceivable to the human condition. Yeah.
Daniel Bruce Levin 28:55
When I say very rarely, I say, I mean, I meant that now. But growing up as an African kid, I've probably said it a lot.
Ari Gronich 29:03
Oh, good. I just wanted to make sure that, yeah,
Daniel Bruce Levin 29:06
I would I because what my gift was so to speak, was I was great at breaking down walls and starting things up. And I also had the gift and still do, of knowing how things and so when I knew how things were going to end, and when I started things up, and I knew how things were going to end. I had very little patience for the time in the middle. Because I wondered, well, it's obvious This is what's going to happen. Why do we have to waste all this time getting there? What I realized in my older age, is that tendency has made me miss out on most of the beautiful things and most of the pains and most of the things that give life all of its texture and all of its color. Because I didn't take time to sit there and smell the roses so to speak. I didn't take time to experience some of the experiences because I was as hell bent on getting to the end and starting up something new. And I didn't even feel like that was something that I was missing out on. Until I realized there's some things in my life now that I want to look back on. I haven't dealt with I haven't resolved, I haven't given the time sales. And all those things are important for us to determine who we are and what we feel, not to just glaze over them and run past them. But just I'm not, I'm not suggesting that we build houses in them, and stay stuck in them. But I am suggesting that we take a walk through them and walk into them and walk out of them. And when we can do that we we leave them in because they've even been our best, rather than in a room that we've locked them in with padlocks and scared to death that they'll come out one day at a second.
Ari Gronich 30:54
So I'm going to ask you a, I think it's probably a tough question that you'll find easily. But it's a tough question for many people, logic and emotion. And the question becomes, I can so I'll just take me for an example. I can experience an experience, logically know that that was an experience that had all kinds of intricacies and nuance to it. But the emotional triggers may still create reaction in the future versus response, right. So I'm reacting to what was when, even though I logically have I have this logical mind that says, Okay, this is just silly. So how do we how do you get? How do people is there any tools or techniques that get people from the logic where you can understand something to the emotion where you actually will do the thing that may emotionally be outside of your history and pattern?
Daniel Bruce Levin 32:16
Yeah, when I find out, I'll let you know. But, you know, they, there's that common saying that the hardest, longest hardest journey we ever take is about an 18 inch journey from our head to our heart. That when you speak of what you speak of I can I, you are a mirror of me saying the same thing to myself. I know, I know things. And I feel things. And for me, the greatest moments of conflict are when core values of what I know and what I feel, are in different places and are in opposition to each other. Those are the places where I have the most difficulty getting through. Because either way I lose and I win. And it's hard to lose, it's hard to give up something that you that you really want. Because there's something else that you really want. It's not that. And so in both cases, you've come out scarred, I came out scarred. But that doesn't like the only thing that I can tell you now that I'm experiencing in this moment, is what I know means nothing. Unless it's unless it's in alignment with what I feel. And what I feel when when head and heart Come in alignment. Then I operate in a flow, I don't operate in an opposition. Part of the reason the the mosaic is so valuable to me. It's the book that I wrote that that speaks to a different story. It says it's a simple, beautiful story in the words that it tells. But the story is told also in the spaces between the words. And in the spaces between the words, the story is that everything is connected, nothing is as it seems. And so if nothing is as it seems, it doesn't matter what I think it is. It doesn't matter. All the stories that I've told myself over hundreds and hundreds of times that I now believe are facts, when they're just simple stories. They're not facts, they're stories. But I've told him to myself so many times that I believe they're real, but they're just stories. And it's in the dismantling of those stories. That worlds crumble from I mean, for me, at least I'm talking about my world. Because on those stories on those facts, stories that I believe were facts, I built houses and communities and villages and towns and cities and states and countries. And when I unraveled those big I realize any truth. And it's just a story that I've told myself over and over and over again. Everything crumbled, the village, just towns, the cities, this countries. And it's a scary place to be. But it's also an incredibly exciting place to be, because all of a sudden, everything is seen differently.
Ari Gronich 35:23
So I'm going to,
I'm going to use a saying that I use a lot on here. It's one of my favorite quotes that I created. Because it's so simple, but the quote is, we made this shit up, we can do better. So here's an, you know, then the tagline for that is, so let's create a new tomorrow today and activate our vision for a better world. Right? So because we want to walk,
Unknown Speaker 35:57
I couldn't have led you in that path any better. But, exactly.
Ari Gronich 36:01
So here's the question. We made this shit up, we can do better. However, people become married to their construct, so much so that the even concept or idea that it's a construct that we made up, falls short on the perception of the person who constructed it. And so we're married to this thing that we've created that we can all see is, at best sub optimal, not performance based. But the attachment to that construct is so great. That having people realize that, like, you can create a totally different form of government and not have it be socialist democratic, or Republican, Republican communists or it could be like, the the, the the leaven society, you know, like, I mean, it could be any possibility of thing that we can create next, right? Yeah. But people are so married to the, to the idea that this label means this because we created it that way. Yeah. And so it can't ever mean anything else. False fall short. So anyway, that's, that's, that's my, my question to you is, how do we get the construct to have less value than the end result? And the journey be such a great experience in the journey of creating new constructs, that people won't be so uncomfortable with the d raveling? of the old one?
Daniel Bruce Levin 37:53
It's a great question. And it really is your it's, it's at a further question on logic and emotion, right? Because we understand something in one way we feel something another way. What we feel prevents us from seeing what we're able to see, when when one of the underlying currents of the mosaic is that nothing is it seems. A very, very simple concept, but a scary as hell concept. When you sit with the idea, or the possibility, let's give it a possibility, let's not make it a fact. Sit with the possibility of nothingness as it seems. The way it happened for me in the book, and this is through the words of the story is that mo is a is a young boy who loses his parents two years apart on the same day. It's a fable is version of my life. And when he asked the adults where his parents are, they tell him they're in a place called heaven. So he sets out that day on search in a place called heaven. But the people he meets along the way are not the rabbis and the priests and the Swamis and the gurus. And the shamans and the aborigines elders and the medicine women. They're common ordinary people. They're the trash man and the road worker, the homeless guy in the blind woman, this juice man in the street artist, the gardener and the waitress. And he wonders why in the hell am I meeting these people? They don't seem like the people that would be able to show me. But he hears a voice inside of himself that says you're here with them, have the decency to just sit with them and let them tell you their story? And are you in 100% of the cases, when he takes the time to just sit with them and listen to their story? When he realizes that the person that he had originally saw isn't at all the person that they are now. There's so much deeper, so much more, so much for so much greater than then who he thought they were and Even the things that they do are examples of if we would use what the just use the things that they do as as parables to help us live a better life. For instance, can I tell you one story that's in there?
Ari Gronich 40:14
Absolutely. Yeah, please do.
Daniel Bruce Levin 40:18
So along his journey, he's walking down a city street. And the street is absolutely pristine clean. He has nothing in his pockets, no backpack on his back. He's just walking empty with nothing, nothing to encumber him. And to his amazement, a truck pulls up beside and stops. It's a trash truck. And the trash man looks and says, Don't you have any garbage that you want me to take from you? And Moe looks down around them. He looks on the streets, he looks on himself. And he says, he's about to say to the man, what are you crazy? I mean, the street is clean. I have nothing on me. Like, why would you be first of all? When did the trash structure stop and ask a person if they have any trash that they want someone to take? And don't you see there's nothing here? And he's just about the land of the guy and say, What are you crazy when he catches the glimmer in the trash man's eyes. And he realizes the trash man isn't asking them about physical trash. He's asking him if he has anything emotional, or spiritual, or mental or thought processes that are keeping him from having what he needs. And he starts to break down and cry. And he said, Oh my god, I was about to yell at you and tell you, you're crazy. But I have so much trash. I don't think I can get it out on my own. And the trash man looks at him and says, that's why I stopped the truck. I'll help you. Let me come down and bring my cat. And he brings his trash can down. And he puts it by the side of the road. And he says mo but everything that her pains you everything that ails you everything that's keeping you isolated, everything that's keeping you from having what you want, just put it into this trashcan. And the more that you put in, what I want you to just realize is I want you to be free of it for just one minute. I'm not going to put it in the truck and take it away until you tell me to. And if you don't want me to take it away, we can keep it in the can. But I want to, I want you to experience One moment, what it feels like to be rid of all that stuff. To just not have that blocking you anymore. You can put it just all of it right here in the trash can is when you think you're done. Go back in and get find more. I have tons of trash cans that we can fill up. You won't he won't overfill my cans, don't worry. But everything there and I'll help you with anything that you don't need help with. I'll help you to get it out. Because I want you to know that one moment where you see yourself the unlimited power of yourself when you actually see who you're all my life. I wanted to be a trash man, I would sit out when I was four years old and watch the trash man come and collect the garbage. And one day after about watching them for six months, the trash man looked at me and said you want to come for a ride with us around the block. And I was like ecstatic. It was like I you know, a God himself had come to me. And I started to get on the truck and my mom was watching through the kitchen window. She said, Daddy, where you're going? What are you doing? Where are you taking my son? And they said, Ma'am, I'm sorry, we're not going to do anything to him. We've just watched him. He's been here every Friday, for the last six months. We just asked him if we just want to take them around the block and let him have the thrill of pushing the button that grinds the trash up. Because kids like to do that. And she said if he's not back in 10 minutes, I'm going to call the police. They said met them Don't worry, we have we mean no harm. We want to give him a present. And I came back and I said Mom, I want to be a trash man. I love that. And she said to me, Danny, you have a genius IQ. You can't be a trash man. 60 years later, my mom's probably turning over in her grave. Because what I realized is I'm a trash man. That's what I do for people. And if my son wanted to become a trash man, and wanted to become that trash man, I would spend every dollar I had helping them to do that. Because that's what this world needs. It needs people that will help us to see ourselves as we really are. Now that's a trash man. Most people walk by the trash man and don't think he has any value at all. That those aren't even the stories that he tells that's just in the work that he does. But when we're able to see the beauty of everybody's station in this world, not as a below or above, not as higher or less, not by them The money they make or the or the house that they live in, or the religion they practice. But when we see them for who they actually are and what they actually do.
We have there, the world is showing us so much. And we have so much opportunity to learn from them, and be with them and understand them and practice the practices. They practice. And they weren't great religious leaders, they're not spiritual giants. They're common ordinary people. Nothing is as it seems.
Ari Gronich 45:36
It's a It's a beautiful story. Yeah, it's a beautiful story. I'm gonna ask you in a little bit more of what mosaic means and, and what the book really details. But before then I want to get to some of your personal Mosaic, which is your life. So you went to seminary for five years. You left one day before becoming a rabbi. So you didn't actually complete this five year process. And then you went and lived as a monk for 10 years. somewhere else? So tell me the transition that happened that like, what, what were the mechanisms of thinking that that occurred? You know, and and I'm gonna say this, it's about pivot. Because any business has to pivot, we've had this whole Corona thing we've had to pivot we had, you know, pivoting is in transitioning from one thing to another. It's kind of a theme I think, I've gotten started with you today is this whole idea of transitioning and transmutation? But, you know, tell me, how did you go from Rabbi to monk?
Unknown Speaker 46:58
So,
Daniel Bruce Levin 47:00
again, the the moment that changed my life was the death of my mom and my dad, my dad and my mom. I was so close to my dad. He was my hero. My mom, I love my mom was like an Ozzie and Harriet mom. Most people won't know what that is. But she was the wolf. She was the mom that came home and had milk and cookies on the table for us when we came home from school, and sat and made sure we did our homework and where we grew up in a lower middle class family, what we lacked in money we wish we had abundantly in love for each other. And so that was the environment that I grew up in. I lost your question. Tell me what your question is again.
Ari Gronich 47:43
transmutation. transmutation. Okay. So
Daniel Bruce Levin 47:45
pivots. So again, what what I was looking for in every situation was that having that place where I could feel that unconditional love again. And so I went, I went in search for that it wasn't in my uncle's business. It wasn't in school selling, learning psychology. It wasn't hitchhiking around the world. It wasn't in the seminary, when I realized that I would, if I were to go through the process of being ordained, I would never represent the rebby in the way that he wanted to be represented, because I came there and route to India. And what he said to me was, Why were you born Jewish? Were you born Jewish to become a Hindu? And I said, I can't answer that question. He said, so then sit with me and have the courage to be here with me until you come up with an answer to that question. I said, I think that's a beautiful challenge. I would love to do that. And what he said was really a beautiful thing, because I was having all sorts of problems with Judaism. This was Orthodox Judaism. Right? Right ultra Orthodox Judaism. And, and I said, I just can't relate to a lot of these things. And he said, Danny, problems exist on the same level. They're always at the same level. What happens is we we grow and shrink in our own life. When we shrink, the problems look insurmountable. When we're not strong in ourselves, when we can see where we are, when we don't know what's going on. The problems seem like they're, they're mountains that we can never get over. But when we grow in ourselves, those same things that appeared like mountains moments ago now it seemed like molehills, and we walk over them with one simple step. Just put things on the shelf, Danny, anything you're having problems with. Now, it's because you're weak in what we're doing. You don't understand it. As you stay here and understand it more. Just keep looking at your shelf. Because you right now you're looking up at this mountain. Soon you'll be looking at it as a as a molehill. The day before I was to be ordained how Went to the rugby and I said rugby, my shelf just gave them everything that was on it is all over the floor, it's a mess in that in my room. I can't do this anymore. And I can't in good faith, be ordained in your name and not follow the integrity of the teaching that you've given me. Because I wouldn't do I wouldn't use it the way you would use it, I would use it as a title to get me further along in my way. But I would use it to embrace all religions, not just Judaism, and out of honor and dignity to you and love for you. I can't do that in your name. So I think the only place for me to go is to walk away.
Ari Gronich 50:40
So okay, so so I'm just going to repeat 16 year old billionaire asks you to run a billion dollar company? No. Because I would be going against me.
Daniel Bruce Levin 50:55
I be out of integrity with myself
Ari Gronich 50:57
right out of integrity with myself. Next rabbi. I mean, out of
Daniel Bruce Levin 51:02
the box. Next was my psychology professor in school. Right? Okay. He wanted me to be his mentor in organizational psychology. And he, he wanted me to be his mentee, I'm sorry, not as mentor. He wanted to mentor me. And he wanted to be able to, for us to develop organizational psychology together. And I looked at him and I said, What are you crazy, that is huge. That just isn't me. Third step was Rabbi saying, I want you I want you to create schools that I've created and change the way people think about Judaism. But it wasn't me. Okay, and so, so many people,
Ari Gronich 51:42
I just want to get get to this, you're a very contrary person. So what where I, where I'm going with this is people are so afraid to let somebody else down, that they will absolutely 100% let their entire life down. Personally, in order to please, other people.
Daniel Bruce Levin 52:14
Yeah. And I was, I was scared to let people down to though, I just didn't want to let my uncle down by not being able to do what he wanted me to do. I was scared to let my professor down by not being able to do what he wanted me to do. I was scared to let the rabbi down by not letting him do what, but without letting me do what he wanted me to do. So I had the same neuroses of everybody else. I just had the integrity of my own belief system to say that, who being true to myself was as important as being true to somebody else. Because I realized somewhere early on,
that life was short, because my parents were taken from me. And if I didn't have the guts to practice and try and learn
who I was, and what I was doing here on this planet, that I would never live a life of fulfillment. I might be rich, but I wouldn't be fulfilled. I might be, I might have fame, but I wouldn't be fulfilled. I wanted fulfillment. Because right now, I can honestly say to you, I could live under a bridge or I can live in imagine it wouldn't matter to me, because I know who I am. And I feel content to be who I am in the space that I'm at. Because my teacher was an Indian was an Indian girl by the name of paramahansa Yogananda and Parma Honza Yogananda used to say, people think that hell in heaven are these places above and below us. The truth of the matter is portable paradise with Wherever we go, or our portable hell with us wherever we go
Ari Gronich 53:50
there within us, not without us.
Daniel Bruce Levin 53:52
Yeah. And so what I somehow had the had the blessing to to feel without even knowing that I was feeling it was there was a portable paradise in me that couldn't be couldn't be altered by how much money I had or what religion I practice or who was proud of me for doing what they wanted me to do. That it was more important for me to stay true to that portable paradise. And even if I made mistakes, which I've made tons of that I was trying to stay true to the integrity of valve holding that portable paradise as mine and sharing that paradise with as many people as I could.
Ari Gronich 54:29
Alright, so I'm going to go to the side that looks at it from a little bit of a different angle.
So
the world is a little crazy,
Daniel Bruce Levin 54:43
right? Yep. And maybe a whole lot crazy, by the way,
Ari Gronich 54:50
just a little. You know, the thing is, I was watching an interview with Jordan Peterson and, and he's an interesting you know, Canadian cat. very controversial in many ways, but he was talking about this a little bit as well. And the he's a psychologist, right. He's a clinical psychologist, not organizational, but clinical. And he's talking about motivations. And he's talking about about all these things. But now I've lost my thought a little bit. Where was I?
Daniel Bruce Levin 55:30
You were saying he was controversial? And he was.
Ari Gronich 55:35
Okay, so so the construct, I go back to the construct, and the idea that, that we are designed. So what he was saying is that human beings that it's, he says, it's a bloody miracle, that we're all in this room together. And nobody is killing anybody. And we're peaceful, and we're able to be human and peaceful. At the same time. He said, that's a bloody miracle. That that is not how we're designed, right? We're designed as humans to be controversial and self serving and so on, in many ways. And, you know, some of that I agree with some of it, I don't. But the point is, is that within the constructs, right, we have people who work for companies, for instance, for 40 years, and are miserable, the entirety of the time that they're doing it make their families miserable, make their lives and their kids miserable. But they do it because they have a sense of responsibility. So that the question becomes the pivot, versus the responsibility. My parents used to say, I want you to be a happy, healthy, productive member of society. And if you can't be happy, and you can't be healthy, at least be productive. Right? So I was raised to always be doing less being, even though I would study ways of being. So it's kind of interesting. That's kind of how I got my I'm a Gemini too. So I have multiple personality disorder. And I'm a Jewish Gemini, which means that if you have, you know, 10 Jews in a room, you have 100 opinions. So yeah, that to a Gemini, you got 1000 opinions in one head, and a committee for the committee for the committee. So I am no
Unknown Speaker 57:33
joke, because you feel one of the things or the other. Right,
Ari Gronich 57:35
exactly. And it goes both ways. It's like, okay, but I want this, but I want this, but I want this, but I want this, I want, I want the world a better place. And I want it to be a certain way that I want it to be right. So you are here. And you're you're going through all of these experiences monk training for 10 years living as a monk, five years for rabbi, organizational psychology, that's another at least six years in school, right? You're going through all these trainings, and you're going and you're going in them long enough to have invested a massive amount of life in them. Yeah. And then saying, yeah, that didn't work for me. I, you know, I could see, I don't
Daniel Bruce Levin 58:20
think I ever said it didn't work for me. Well, I
Ari Gronich 58:22
mean, it doesn't leave. It worked for me, as a lifelong profession.
Unknown Speaker 58:27
Yeah, but I never
Daniel Bruce Levin 58:28
I don't think I ever looked at things as a lifelong profession. Because, again, the beauty of losing my mom and dad if there was a beauty to it, because I didn't have anyone that I had to please. I didn't have my parents saying, Our getting this, you know, that I could, I was free. My aunt and uncle tried to be my parent parents, but I would I was arrogant kid. And I said, You're not my parents. I don't have to do what you say. You know, because I just thought I knew better. And, and that that was my shortcoming. But I didn't have to live up to anybody else's standard of who I had to be. I will end and I was forced to be independent. I wasn't my choice. But in my independence, I realized hold it. There's freedom here. Like I don't have to decide at 15 what my life's occupation is going to be I just have to decide what makes me feel good and happy and fulfilled right in this moment. And so when I went to school and studied psychology, I, I was in college and 16 years old, when I went to college at 16 years old, and I took two years to study psychology, and I sat with my my professor, I loved the the practice of that. But when he said organizational psychology, I looked at him and I said, What are you crazy and and what I realized is psychology didn't answer my questions of why my parents were taken from. And so I left my uncles and aunts. To the questions of why my parents were taken from me put it put a whole nother world over that. But I could have lived in that other world without answering the primary question that I had to ask myself, of Why does a kid 15 years old lose the people love sincerely, and that love him dearly? And why does he lose unconditional love in a moment not know why. And so, when I, when I went into The Revenant, I had the same quote, I had the same thing that happened. You know, what? At a certain point, it didn't, it wasn't the life that wasn't going to answer my questions. When I went into the monastery, it didn't change. It didn't answer my questions, and everything, put a nice new facade over the life that I was going to live. That would have made me very, very happy. Because there were beautiful facades, but they didn't answer the question. It wasn't until five years ago, when I finished writing the mosaic. Or I started writing Mosaic, that what I realized was that might happen was that perceptual shift. And had I been able to see what I was looking at differently. You know, there's that picture of the old hag and the young socialite, you know what I'm talking about that, that black and white. And when you look at it, you see one or the other, you can't see both of them at the same time. And I remember seeing the old hag when someone showed it to me first. And my friend said to me, what do you see the beautiful young socialite I said, Come on. I don't I don't mean to be politically. But this is an old woman here. She is not a beautiful socialite. And they said, No, you're not seeing it. Clearly. If you see it differently, you'll see it. I said, You're crazy. There's, this picture is an old tag. And they said, just look at it and look at it. And what I realized is, suddenly, I saw the young socialite, a beautiful young socialite. And as soon as I saw the socialite, I could no longer see the old tag. So what I realized is what we see in the world that we live in, literally blocks us from seeing everything else that's in that same frame. We can't see what's there. And so we have to slide ourselves out of the way to see what's there, when we're not when, when when we are not there. The world that I see is not the world that is it's the world that I see. And so in all these places, these are, the reason why people think I'm crazy, is because every one of those situations for them would have been their Heaven, who would want to walk away from a billion dollar business, that's Heaven, for a kid 15 years old, to be handed the opportunity to have a billion dollar company, and the run that we have the lifestyle that goes with it. That's what most people dream of, and feel like, they'll be happy in that life. It wasn't my heaven. And so what I grew through learning in that, is that what seems like heaven to one person is not having to another, and to really be able to listen to other people and hear what is your having? What is that place that makes everything in you completely aligned?
Unknown Speaker 1:03:12
Where you feel you
Unknown Speaker 1:03:14
where you are you
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:03:15
where you're not somebody else's dream of what you should be your your own dream of what you think you could have been, if someone else would have done something for you.
Unknown Speaker 1:03:24
Who are you?
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:03:27
And what I found, can I tell you another little story, I'm a storyteller, but I don't want to talk my way through it.
Ari Gronich 1:03:33
Absolutely. The only The only caveat to to this particular story is we're going next to a Hay House. And and so I just wanted to give you that heads up that we were going to the next transition or one of the next transitions thereafter. So
Unknown Speaker 1:03:49
okay, let
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:03:51
me just tell you a short story. Because when I left my aunt and uncle's place, the two years that I was there with them, I became really close, my best friend was, was the son of another billionaire. And we had talked about what we would be able to do together in the world together through our friendship, and through the way we saw the world because we thought we saw the world in similar eyes. And when I left, he got so upset with me. And he said, You are just in absolute idiot. How can you do this to me? We had this we had planned out what we were going to do with our life with you being you being where you were and me being where I was and coming together to do these things together. And now all of that is from is gone. said none of it's gone. We can still do all of it. I just won't be in that same position. He said not you're making a stupid decision. I don't want anything to do with you. And he just defended me at this at that same moment.
Ari Gronich 1:04:48
Did he hit a button?
Unknown Speaker 1:04:50
Even while most almost it's like, you know, canceled culture, right? It's like It's like if it was Facebook, it would have been a lot easier
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:04:59
and it hurt me You've heard me to know and but I said, you have to do what you have to do. About 30 years later, I was staying in New York at the Mandarin Oriental, and I was friends with the people that that are in charge of the Mandarin Oriental around the spa. And they would give me a friends and family rate there. And the friends and family rate was cheaper than some of the dive hotels in New York. And so I was I had the I had the opportunity every time I was in New York to stay at this beautiful luxury hotel, at a frat, you know, a fraction of a fraction of its costs. And the Mandarin Oriental is unique in that the lobby is on the 34th floor. And the lobby overlooks Central Park. So you have to take an elevator up from the ground level to the 34th floor, to then get on another elevator to go to your room. Well, one night, I was coming home at about 1030 at night. I took the elevator from the lobby from the ground floor to the lobby. And as I was coming out of the elevator, I saw my best friend from from, from when I was 15. walking in with three girls around him into the elevator. And I looked at him I said, Neil, and he turned in so fuku said my name. I said I did. He said How the hell do you know my name? And I said, Really? You don't even remember me? He said, I have no idea who you are. Who are you? I said I'm Danny, I was your best friend when you were 15 years old. He said, Oh my god, Danny, I didn't even recognize you. I said obviously. He said come to the club with us. Where are you going to come we're going out to the club, we're going to have a great time we're going to drink and we're going to smoke dope, and we're going to dance and we're going to do stuff and I have these three girls with me. You know, and we'll get more and we'll just have fun together. I said, Not me, but it's okay. How about if we have breakfast together tomorrow? He said, No, no, I'm not going to pass up on this opportunity. So gross. If you want to go to the club, go to the club, you have my card, you can you can use all my you can use my money to buy yourself whatever you need. I'm going to spend time with I'm going to spend time with my friend here. He said, Do you drink scotch and smoke cigars? I said I normally don't. But I will with you tonight. He said I've got a great bottle of scotch up in my room, I'm going to bring it down. I've got two great cigars that sit in the lobby and just spent time together, catching up on 30 years. We sat from 1030 at night to 430 in the morning. And as we were getting ready to go call the night, so to speak. He looked at me and he said you know I hated you. I've been so mad at you for all these years. I didn't understand why you would do something so stupid as to go find yourself like what the hell is go finding yourself. We had a chance to change the world together. And when you didn't take that with me, I lost all my hope and being able to do it because I needed you to do it with me. But I look at you now. And as stupid as you were. I see you have the one thing that I want that I can't have. I have more money than God. I have. But my I have no I've been divorced three times. I'm cheating on my wife now with the three girls you saw me in the elevator with. And that's only in New York, I have three more and every other city like my kids, don't talk to me. I'm an alcoholic. I'm addicted to drugs. And I look at you and I see you have this peace and this contentment that I would give anything for this moment in my life. And I said Neil, that's easy. Like, let's just say you're my Premier, my friend, no matter what you did to me, you still I remember you as my best friend when I was 15 years old. It's not gonna cost you anything we'll just as friends are, let's just hang out together and do stuff together. And, and I'll help you to find that because it's not so hard to find. It's much harder to do what you've done and to find Europeans and to find yourself yourself. You are yourself. You can't not you can't not know yourself.
He said as soon as I get home, I'm going to call you. That was 15 years ago, I never heard from him or heard from him since he I
Ari Gronich 1:09:25
knew that was coming.
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:09:28
Yeah. And so I believe that people inside themselves really want to know themselves. But I believe they're scared to death to leave all the things that they think they have, because they don't think they can have. But knowing yourself doesn't mean you have to lose anything. Now what I say is it's just a change of perspective. You know,
Ari Gronich 1:09:52
I'm a I'm a big fan of mirror work. I talk about it a lot on on the show. I'm just in, in my life in general, you know, I tell people I wouldn't recommend or wish my life on anyone, not that my life was so bad for for others, because I believe that we all are given what we can handle, and we're not given what other people can handle. So I may not have been able to handle having a silver spoon in my, you know, hand as much as I would have loved in theory to be born with that silver spoon. So, or, you know, in Trump's case, a gold, you know, gold plated spoon. But the thing is that, for me, mirror work is all about unraveling the mask. unraveling the things that we put on top of ourselves, I get to look in the mirror and uncover that. Right. So I find myself not by creating some new version of me or, or, or shifting or changing or, you know those things, and this is my philosophy. But by uncovering the real me and taking away the mask of trauma, the mask of experience the masks that I put on, right.
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:11:36
So your man or the first person? Go ahead, I'm sorry,
Ari Gronich 1:11:39
I'll let you complete I was just gonna ask you what masks Have you taken off and put on. I have masks all
Unknown Speaker 1:11:51
male.
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:11:56
It's almost easier to ask what masks have remained. And what masks have I take don't take an odd foot. But in my if I can, in the Mosaic, one of the characters is a mirror maker. And if I can tell you a story of how Moe meets the mirror maker, I would love that.
Ari Gronich 1:12:15
Absolutely.
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:12:16
So as you know Moe's on this journey to find heaven. And sometimes it takes him into the midst of the cities and beam interacts with the people that are there. And other times he just wants to be in the quiet. And he goes into the farmlands and he goes into the into the countryside. And he had been in the countryside now for weeks or months and hadn't seen another human being because he just was in isolation and by himself walking through these places where nobody walked. And suddenly, one one day his day was becoming evening, he saw the lights of a village on the top of the hill close by him. And he realized if I run quickly, I can make it to that village before they shut the doors. And I'm really lonely. And I really would like to see somebody. And so he runs to the village. But by the time he gets there, most of the village is shut down. There's only one store that remains open. And the door is wide open as if it was expecting him. But he doesn't know that it's expected him. And so he stands by the door because nobody's there. And he wonders if he can go in or not without being invited in any things to call out to the to the shop owner and say Is anybody here but he thinks I don't want to disturb anybody. Because I'm not going to buy one of these big mirrors. I'm walking on one hour journey walking, I have nothing on me very little on me. So he just decides well the door was open, I can walk in and walk in. And he walks in and he sees it's a mirror store. He sees these beautiful mirrors in these beautiful frames, big mirrors, flirt floor, almost floor to ceiling mirrors, not quite but you know, big mirrors. And he looks around and he doesn't know if what he's seen is what he's seen or if it's a reflection of a reflection of a reflection. And so in order to get more of a vision, he walks in, he walks close up to the mirrors and he and he thinks he's the most beautiful mirrors I've ever seen. But there's one mirror that completely captures him. The mirror is not made of glass, it's made of bronze. And the bronze is polished so so well that he sees his reflection in the mirror maker must have known that this was a special mirror because there was a light shining right on it that made him see himself even more clearly in the mirror. And he stops and he's transfixed by this mirror. And suddenly you here's the voice of the mirror maker behind them. And she says, what does the mirror see in you? And what most says to her is what he sees in the mirror he says, I see a man that's older now I started out as employed. I've been on this journey for a long time. I see how it's how it what it's given me and I see what it's doing. come from me. And I see all the pains that I've gone through. And I see all the all the all the wrinkles in my face now that I didn't have as a boy. And she said, that's beautiful Mo, but I didn't ask you that question. I didn't ask you what did you see in the mirror? I asked you what is the mirror see in you? The mirror doesn't know any of your stories, it doesn't know any of your hesitations. It doesn't know any of your doubts when the Miran looks at you, free of your stories. What does it say? He says, gosh, I
Unknown Speaker 1:15:30
don't know.
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:15:32
I don't think I know who I am without my stories. And she said stick with it now. And just be with it for a little while and see if we can find out.
Well, I'm not sure to this day, I know who I am without my stories. Because the more stories I unravel, the more mess I take cloth, the more seemed to be there because it's mask upon mask upon bats upon mass, because I've been so scared of actually being seen and seeing myself that I've just taken off a mask and how how great I am to take that mask, only to reveal another mess than sitting there on my face. And so when I say to you, it's almost easier just to say to you what mess still remain, it's because I have no idea if the mask I've taken off is really unveiled myself or not. Or if it's just a reflection of a reflection of a reflection of a reflection. But still the process goes on of just asking myself, what would the mirror see and me. And so the stories that I'm telling you on this on this conversation with you are not just random stories. They're stories that I want your listeners to know. Because now these these characters have become archetypes in my life. The trash man is someone that can call in any moment when I feel like I need to let record some things. The mirror maker is someone that's right there for me that when instead of me looking into the mirror, like the way you do your mirror, work is so beautiful. Most people look in the mirror and just say I love you to basis and then that they don't love. But with the way you do the Mirror Mirror work is like the mirror maker would do it. And I would like to invite them people that are listening to do the mirror work that you do. And the mirror work of the mirror maker that's that would ask yourself, what does the mirror see when it looks at you? It doesn't know your stories. It doesn't know your rationalizations. It doesn't know your excuses. It doesn't know all the money you made or all the power that you have, or all the prestige that you think you've got. It just sees you. Who are you.
Ari Gronich 1:17:37
And there's no judgment in a mirror. A mirror is a reflect it's just the reflection. It's not a judge. It's there's no judgment. And that's one of the things that I've found interesting is working around the judgments in the eyeballs that are in the mirror. Versus, versus the mirror is showing me. Yeah, you know, so it's, it's odd, it's an odd thing to take away. yourself out of the situation. It's like being a fly on the wall in your own head. Yeah, right, because you got to take yourself out of the situation, just like in any science, they say that the scientists are part of the experiment, no matter how much or how little they're involved. Yeah, the fact that they're involved means that they are influencing that experiment. And the same thing. For me, I try to influence as little as possible, the reflection, and then just allow myself to feel whatever, you know, that reflection is showing
Unknown Speaker 1:18:52
me. I love that.
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:18:54
When I finished the Mosaic, one of the things that told me is I had to get out on the road and do what Moe did. I had to go to every city, every town, every country, and I had to sit with the people that nobody sits with and talk to the people that nobody listens to. And just listen to them. And I could do that on street corners or in cafes, or in boardrooms or angels, or in hospitals or in prisons. And I had set up a trip. And 14 days before I came and said not on my watch, buddy, you're going to stay home for a little while. But the idea was to go around the world and be that near for people that says to them, what would you see if you could see yourself and really see yourself? What would you like to say what is the things you haven't been able to say? If you were just loved and accepted and listened to and heard and acknowledged and validated for being yourself? And you felt free? And you didn't have to defend yourself and you didn't have to have any of your stories? What is it you would like the world to know I have story a funny story, but I'm just gonna shut up and hold the next story till next time.
Ari Gronich 1:20:08
Yeah, no. Let's go to Hay House.
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:20:12
Okay, you got to turn right on the freeway and comes out.
Ari Gronich 1:20:17
Yes. Well as north towards Malibu and West.
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:20:22
Now it's in San Diego. County of San Diego. Yeah.
Ari Gronich 1:20:26
When she passed away, I used to love hanging out with her and her at her house in Malibu, Louise Hay, by the way for the audience. And Hay House is the probably the most I think, successful self publishing company in history. They'll help
Unknown Speaker 1:20:44
there they're probably the premier self help publishing company in the world.
Ari Gronich 1:20:48
Right. And, and part of that is due to some, some guy I've met recently, he's got a big beard. And he, he he looks like a rabbi, but he never got again.
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:21:02
Santa Claus is that you're talking about? Santa Claus? Yes. So when I came to Hay House, they were doing they were basically publishing the ways. It was, it was a boutique publishing house, Louise had written a book called you can heal your life. An amazing book for anybody who hasn't read, get that book. And it talks about the fact that she was diagnosed with cancer, late stage cancer. And she was told she had a few months left to live maybe a couple months, I can't remember exactly how long. And the doctor has said, there's nothing we can do for you. So just go home and live, live a good life, live a happy life, do things that make you happy. And come back, if you're still around, come back in six weeks, I want to see you again, had given her a two month diagnosis, knowing that she would be gone before that. So when she showed back up six weeks later, he was shocked. And what he was even more shocked countenance and what and the happiness center step in the end the freedom that she moved, because he expected her to stop and dine. He said, let's do an MRI, he put her on, he did a CAT scan and did a CAT scan. And he said there must be something wrong. And we've got to do another cat scan. And when she came out of the CAT scan, he said, I don't know how to tell you this, I'm sorry to tell you this, but you don't have cancer. And she and her, you know, sort of confrontational, beautiful manner, would say why in the hell would you be sorry to tell me I don't have cancer. That's the best news you could ever tell me. He said what I must have made your life terrible for the last six weeks. Because I told you, you were going to die within two months a year. When I look at these CAT scans. There's not a there's not a cell of cancer in your body. And she said, Does it look like you put me through hell for the last six weeks. I'm the happiest I've ever been. And he said, I don't know what you're doing. But just keep doing it. And she said, Well, I want you now to get the CAT scan from six weeks ago where you diagnose me to live only two months. And I want you to put it up against the CAT scan of what you see today. And I want you to tell me now what did I have? And he said, I'm going to humor you by doing it for you. But I'll tell you what I saw you had you you weren't going to you were not going to make I gave you two months out of kindness to you because I didn't want to tell you that you had days left and live your cancer was so extended all throughout your body. What did you do? And the story of what she did was written in a book called you can heal your life. That book sold millions and millions of copies. They put her on the New York Times list and that was a
Ari Gronich 1:23:53
real life and and just as a as a thing. This is you know, there's a small version of this book that anybody can get. But practitioners like like me, we've been using this with our clients and patients. I have been for 20 years 20 plus years. Because it's so basically easy and effective. that anybody can do it at anytime and it's really cool. Because nowadays you could just look up Louise Hay on on that Dr. Google thing. You can look up Louise Hay affirmations or or a symptom or a thing and it'll come up with with all of what she came up with in that book. It's pretty awesome. But that is Hay House. Yeah, so
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:24:45
that was the Hay House that I walked into. And I walked into it with the thought of i saw i i was friends with the man who ran it. I saw that they were doing conferences with what they were doing. Louise was Speaking and she was drawn in about 1000 people. I was part of a spiritual community up in Northern California.
Unknown Speaker 1:25:07
And in any man,
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:25:09
it was called the Nanda Ananda. He was a disciple. It was a direct disciple of Yogananda, but he was thrown out of SRF. And he would speak and he would have 250 or 300 people would come there. So I went down there, and I said, How do we get from 250 to 1000? Because you guys have done it. And so I'd like to learn from you. And even more, what I'd really like to do is I'd like to join forces together. And why don't we create conferences, where we will bring together four or five or six people, and Korean on the wall, bring his 250, Louise will bring her 1000 somebody else will bring their 500 someone else bring the 1000. And we'll and we'll have workshops that will take around the country. And they said, Well, we don't have time to do that. I said, I'm not asking you, if you have the time to do it. I'll do it all for you. And we'll share the profits. And so they said, Okay, well, that seems senseless for you to do that. But if you want to do it, we're more than happy to do that with you. And so I thought, Okay, I need to find people that will that will be good people for that. So we had Louise and we had Grenada. So I said, I want a few more people. So I, I approached to a guy by the name of a guy that their publishing house couldn't even pronounce his name. They call them orange wire. But it was Wayne Dyer. And I said, we're doing this thing and I know you love to speak, why don't you send this in the five of them, and we'll pay you good money to do. And I approached a woman who was at the top of her game, but was coming down and was on the decline. Her name was Shakti gwaine. She had done creative visualizations. And I was looking for one guy, that to be a part of it. And I went to Bantam Books, and I said, Who Can you recommend them? And they said, you, you will not have heard of them, but I promise you, you will not be upset. He's up and coming, and he will be a big star. And I said, Okay, who is it? They said, his name is Deepak Chopra. And I said, Okay, let's do it. I'll trust you. So we had the five of them doing a workshop for one day. And people would pay people paid $35. To come in here, all five of them speak for the whole day. The room that the auditorium hold, held, I think it holds first one we did, it was in San Francisco at the circle, full circle theatre, and the stage turn so that people could be integrated and close. And we sold out of that in about 20 minutes. And so when we got there to set up, we had seen people were sleeping around the building, because it was first come first serve. So I said this is ridiculous. And it's also hazard we're going to get we won't be able to do it like this, why don't we put up premier seating, where we save seats, and we'll get four or 500 seats next time in premier seating? Why don't we charge $150 for those and see if anybody takes them? We can always open them up if nobody does. Those sold out in eight minutes. And so we started to go around the country taking these five people. And people were just amazed. You know, the I emceed it, you know, and I was the one that would introduce them and bring them together. And so we did that for a little while, and I and finally read and I sat together and said, what you've done, it's been so successful. Will you ever think about coming here and working for us? And I said, I can't come to you. But I can work with you. I said, my wife right now is dying of cancer, so I can't leave her I have to take care of. But I can work from home and do everything that I can do from your office, I don't need to be in your office. And he said deal. And I said what do you want me to do? He said, I've watched you over the course of the years you've had, you've had at least eight ideas. And I know there could have been multimillion dollar ideas. But you were never allowed to do them in the organizations you were with. I'm giving you free rein to whatever you want to do. And we'll support you. Because we know that they'll pop and they'll be good ideas. And so one of the big ideas that I had was to if we were a self help publishing company, what I thought is we needed to have all the self help publish all self help authors published with us. And so I said to read, I'm going to go after all the self help publishers. I mean, I'm not all the all the self help authors. And I'm going to try and get them to publish something with us. He said, Danny, it will never happen. You're I know you're you're wide eyed and bushy tailed, but it'll never happen. We're a small publishing house. And they're getting million dollar advances and we'll never give that up for And I said Nevers a long time, we don't know that it'll never happen.
Never is a long time what you said, you'll give me free rein. Let me just run trains with us. And he said, I think you're setting yourself for a big failure. I said, I love that challenge. And so I realized that publishing deals with the publishing houses they were with, and they couldn't get away from those publishing deals. So I decided I was going to before I, I created something in the, in the, at a Nanda, when I was running the publishing house there with my, with one of my friends, and we call them de cards. And we took just these, we created 50 cards and put them in a in a package. That was that was a stand that would stand up on its own, and you can close them and, and we call them Day cards, and the and it was distributed. Wonder books came and saw stuff that we were doing and said we wanted to, we want to buy you but we couldn't they couldn't buy us because we were religious community. So they said well distributed you and they help to distribute it, but it never really took off. So I said to read one of the things that I think could really take off if they didn't, we didn't do them the way I wanted to do them, I would like to do them better. And so they were called debit cards, but we don't have to call them their cards, we call them card decks. And what to do is I remember when people used to want to read a book, but didn't have time to read it. They bought the Cliff's notes version of that book, they bought the best thoughts in a condensed version. And they can they can say they read the book, because everything that was important in the book was in those short pages, and said, I want to make a new Cliff Notes that's called that's called a card deck. So I want to take top 50 thoughts of people that are that are world renowned, that have New York Times bestselling books, I want to create a package that is that is beautiful. I want to have tremendous artwork on and I want to put them in a box that will become a giftable. And let's make them he said I don't know what you're really talking about. So I wrote the first deck, I called them Zen cards. And the first deck was n cards. I bought a BMW M three with the royalties that I got from those SIM cards. And we went to Wayne Dyer. And we said, we know you can't publish with us. But why don't you do interpeace cards, and your publisher will never do card decks. And we went to the guy who wrote Four Agreements, let's do your four agreement cards. And we went to movie and said, Why don't you do power thought cards. And so the first four decks we came out with was power thought cards and four Four Agreements, cards, interface cards and SIM cards. And from for a guy like me, nobody knew. But the topic Zen was so so popular. It just sold we had it had it had I not done that we wouldn't want to like somebody like Phil Jackson, Phil Jackson, and you know, if the coach of the coach of the bulls and the and the Lakers, and we would said your Zen guy, why don't you write these. But fortunately, I got in under the wire there. And those cartoons became successful that some of those decks were outselling The New York Times books 10 to one. And the authors finally came up to me and they said, Danny, we didn't do anything, you created these floors. And these are outselling our New York Times bestselling books 10 times the one. Why would we publish our books with you? And I said, Well, there's a very good reason you're getting a million dollar advance and you have a commitment to your publisher. But if you want to, we can raise your royalty, we can give you more money, you're selling your book. They're not doing anything for you. They're getting your books in bookstores, we can do everything they're doing and more books. And if you want to join in partnership with us, and just give us something that they won't take. We'll do it for you. And we sat with Sylvia Browne. She was a world renowned psychic in those days.
Ari Gronich 1:34:03
Yes. We remember her from Montel. Most of the Montel Williams shows.
Unknown Speaker 1:34:10
Yeah, yeah.
Ari Gronich 1:34:11
He had a regular appearance.
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:34:13
Yeah. And that regular appearance got more regular when we started working with because what happened was she had a book that was completely out of print that nobody would touch. Nobody wanted it. And we said this is just flat out stupid. You're on mantella once a month. Why don't we just take ads out on that show around your book that will publish called Adventures of a psychic? And why don't we publish a book that nobody wants and see what we can do with it? Long story spoiler. It was on the New York Times bestsellers list for 52 weeks. And she started she said well, what you guys did for me is unbelievable. You You brought something that nobody wanted and it's like alchemy.
Ari Gronich 1:34:59
You think she could Seeing that common
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:35:01
you thought you were a thought. But she was never good at doing ad predictions for herself. She was better at predictions for other people. And so once that happened, she became like our biggest fan. And so she would talk to other people, or she would ask her if someone could call her and say something, and to take a chance with us, and it's still a little while. But the card decks then developed into into people taking a chance with us and publishing books. And what we did for them was far more than anybody else would do for him. So even if they didn't quite sell as many books, which they probably did anyway. But even if they didn't, the experience they had with us was way better way more way. They felt like part of a family, they felt like part of a culture that we had created, that I had helped to create, from from that team with with other people. And when I look back on it, none of the people that were doing what we were doing, were extraordinary people, myself included, we were very ordinary and very limited in what they do. But one of the things mosaic has taught me is that it's the ordinary people in the world that change the world. Yes. And when extra ordinaries come together extra things. Absolutely. It's not, it's not these people that think they have to have their superpowers and run around in capes and masks, we have enough people nest and cakes that aren't doing that much for the world. What we need to do, we never intended to do it on our own, we're intended to do it together. And Hay House was just another beautiful example of seeing something that no one else saw the card decks of working together theme and as a family made something that was beautiful, and all of us supporting each other and making something very happen.
Ari Gronich 1:36:49
So I'm going to, uh, I've been, I want to talk to you about mosaic a little bit, but I just keep getting more places to go, you know, more, more, more places to dig deeper. But, you know, the world is very different than it was when Hay House started, there's a lot of a lot more noise than there was back then there's a lot more players, there's a lot more noise, there's a lot more con artists, there's a lot more people who are repeating the same thing that has been repeated 100 times. Right. So people aren't really,
I guess,
taking on some of the stuff that we used to take on in the 90s that was new, then, you know, 80s 90s 50s it was new, then it's not new now. And people really want the new. So my question is, how does one do that navigate that world now. Versus I think it was a little probably easier back then. Even though it looks like it should be easier. Now with all of the the availability of tools, you know, the Yellow Pages and the billboard are still the things that work back then. Word of mouth was amazing. Nowadays, nobody believes anybody's words of mouth. You know, it's so very odd, kind of kind of a place and world that we're in. So I wanted you to kind of address that along with, okay, we've gone through losing mom and dad 16 turning down billionaire company to, you know, maybe 20 doin, turning down the organizational psychology to, to the rabbi to the to the monk to the to the businessman, that's very successful. So, to me, this is what the mosaic is kind of so I want you to go into how you recognized the mosaic in your life and, and talk a little bit about that. But first, I want you to just kind of how does one navigate this crazy craziness of a world we're in?
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:39:25
So I love when two questions are really the same question just and so I'm going to treat them as if they're the same question. without us even knowing. What I did then was what I've done all my life, but I didn't realize they did it all my life. saw things differently than other people saw them. And most of my life that isolated me and made them and made me feel like I was alone and separate. But I wasn't alone and separate. It's just people didn't see what I saw. And for a while I got arrogant and thought, Oh, look at me, I'm some great sage, you can see what other people don't see. But what I failed to see is something I didn't see either. And it was when I could see what I saw. And they see what they saw came together and used our vision to see something new. That together, both of us now could see together by seeing what the other saw that real success happened. That's what's missing in the world that we live in now. We have grown into this beautiful community of like mindedness. And I love like mine, I used to love them a lot more than I do now. Because I remember when I first found my like minded community, I thought I'd died and my dad and I couldn't believe that there were crazy mofos out me out there like me that believed what I believed. And I loved that I didn't have to defend every belief that I had, because these people felt the same way I felt. But as it says, in ecclesiastics, everything there is a time and a time for every season under a time to be born to die. I believe that time for like minded communities is over. Because what's happening now is our sweep built silos of like minded all across the land. And we've gotten stronger and bigger and are like this. But the gaps between our community and other communities have gotten wider and deeper. And right now they're causing separation and conflict. And they're causing us to think we're writing somebody else's wrong. And they're causing us to yell at the top at the top level of our voices to say we want we need to be heard. But they're not listening to anybody else either. So they're asking for what they're not giving. It's time for the silos, the Melton to come down. It's time for us to mix in fields with like, unlike minded people, to listen to the opinions. How beautiful is it when when we're able to look at the same exact thing as being totally different? How curious would that make that makes me that I can sit with somebody and say, Well, how is it possible? Like, I want to know what you see not because I want to tell you what I see is better. But I want to know what you see, because we're looking at the same thing. And I don't see what you see. I want to see that beautiful young socialite, because all I see is the old hag, show me out to see that. Because then I have a broader perspective. Every I believe in a world where everything is possible. And the only reason something is impossible to me is because I don't see a way to make it possible. And the longer I sit with people who see the world the same exact way. Chances are never see a new way of seeing it. But as soon as I mixed with diversity, as soon as I mixed with people who see the world differently than me, who knows they might be giving me the idea, the vision, the thing to see that would get would be that missing piece that would make what I thought was impossible possible. And that's an exciting, beautiful world to live in. So what we have to do is, instead of seeing our differences, now, we have to realize we're made like a mosaic. We're many different colors, many different shapes, many different sizes, but our strength comes in holding each other in holding together with each other. Because the artistry we create together is much greater than the artistry we create alone. We grew up,
Ari Gronich 1:43:42
I just want to interrupt for a second. I want to add, and it's something that you talked about when we talked before is it's also shattered. Because those pieces that are put together in a mosaic come from shattering something.
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:44:01
Yeah. Yeah. And some of them don't, some of them are whole and vast, but some of them are shattered and broken. And and it's our brokenness, it's our shattered pneus it's those places that we're we're most ashamed of that when we just air the laundry and come together and say, Will you hold me You don't need to teach me You don't need to help me You don't need to change me. Will you just hold me and bring me into the into this beautiful artistry? That's called the mosaic and just let's be here for each other and have each other's back and take care for each other. Having to change or change or fix that we're the most the we're most vibrant in we're most beautiful, those mosaics are so much more beautiful than any one of the pieces on its own. And we all knew that we all grew up with this idea that united we stand divided we fall. We live in a world where it's divided now. Having from there to here. So I believe the way to get around it is really, like Bucky fuller said, we can't change the world with the thinking of the world that we currently have. We have to create a new modality, we have to create a new way of doing of thinking that will changes the whole way we do things. And the new way of thinking is most beautifully illustrated. Can I tell one more story? Absolutely. It's most beautifully illustrated by a homeless man I met in San Diego. I was walking down the streets of San Diego. And somehow I felt compelled to walk over to this man who was sitting where the sidewalk meets the building. He was leaning up against the building, sitting with his legs out on the sidewalk. And as I came walking up to him, he said, No, no, this is my spot, you can sit here, this is the only thing I have in the world. Don't come here, please just leave me alone. Don't die. Unless you want to give me money. Don't come here to go away, please go away. I'm not interested in talking to you. I don't want any I don't want anything from just go away. This is my spot. And I said, I'm sorry, that's not going to be it's not gonna happen. There's something about you, I want to know who you are. I just want to be able to sit with you and get to know you a little bit. And he said, I can't do it. I need to make money. And if you're here, I won't make money. I said how much would you make and a half an hour. He said I make $5 every half an hour, $10 an hour. And I said for 16 hours, I make $160 a day. And I need that money to take care of other homeless people who don't do not who aren't as good at what they do as I am. I took out my wallet and looked inside I saw a $50 bill.
And I said here I want to give this to do I have a half an hour that I can spend with you.
He said you're crazy man. And you can sit with me. I don't know what's going on. But you know, I only asked for $5 you gave me 50. So come and sit down what's so important that you want to know. And it took me a little while to crack his defenses. But as I sat with him, suddenly I saw him melting. He saw that I wasn't judging him and saw that I didn't want to hurt me saw that. And I said, I said Cory, if you had your chance, you sit here and watch millions of people, maybe 1000s of people walk by you every day. If you could stop them for a minute and put them in an auditorium. What would you say to them? What would you ask of them? And without missing a beat? He said, Danny, that's very easy. I would ask them to take 10 minutes out of the course of their life and go up to someone they don't know. And just ask them how they're doing and just listen to them. I said, Cory, that's beautiful. But why would why that of all the things you can ask for? Why would you ask that is? Well, you've told me lots of stories in the time we've sat together and let me tell you, but this story is real. It's my story. I hate being a homeless person. I'm so embarrassed and ashamed of what's happened to me in my life. I can't believe that I have to sit here on this. This quarter is Michael. And I dread it every day coming out sitting here. But what makes it even worse, is the people that combined me they don't treat me like a person. They treat me like a thing they would treat an animal better than they treat me. And so one day I was sitting here thinking like, here comes some boys and I just wanted to be happy and I said Hi boys How you doing? And they came up to me in a gang of boys and they kicked me in Punch Man. I didn't know if I was gonna live I laid on the on the ground on the ground bleeding and in pain all through my body. And while I was on the ground, people spit at me and yelled that means and and cursed at me and yelled obscenities to me. And I was I just thought okay, I don't I can't do anything. I can barely move. Now I'm since pain. And I just closed my eyes and fell asleep for a moment. And I was woken up by a man urinating on me. And I thought Enough is enough. Like I hate my life. And I'm not doing anything of value to people. People may look at the scorn in which they treat me. I want to go around. Danny, you don't know this. But the street right and back of this is a dark street. Nobody walks that street because everybody wants to street. Nobody ever goes on that street. And I decided that night when it became dark. I was going to go to that corner. I was going to take my life. Two minutes after I had that thought a man came up to me in a three piece suit. And he put his hand on my shoulder. He said how you doing brother? out of that a good time, sir. This is the wrong time to ask me I'm not doing well. Please just continue on your way. You can't do anything for me. I don't want anything from you. Just continue on your way. I don't want you to be here. I don't want anything on that. I don't want to talk to anybody. And he said there's no chance that's going to happen. He just said to me and he sat down next to me. And maybe it was the fact that he had a three piece suit on Maybe it was the fact that I thought he was important. But he said to me, tell me what's going on. I put my head on his shoulder and I just started to cry. Big crocodile tears poured down my face. And he said, It's okay, just cry. And he said, When you're ready, just tell me what you want to say. Danny and only took 10 minutes, or 10 minutes of sitting with him, I realized after that, I couldn't kill myself that night. An important man and a three piece suit had taken 10 minutes out of the course of his lifetime, to sit with me, a homeless man, a man that nobody thought was anybody. And he cared enough about me to just ask me how I was. He didn't try and fix me he didn't try and feed me and and try and change me and and try and give me a job. He didn't try to take me to a shelter. He didn't try and do anything. For me. All he did was Listen to me. I prayed that he would come back again, another day. Because I wanted him to know that at that, that's simple. 10 minutes, saved my life that day. But I've never seen him again. But I wish I could tell him he saved my life. Well, they have something called the butterfly effect. It's a butterfly flaps his wing in one clip part of the world. And there's just there's winds blowing another part of the world. That story touched me so deeply. That I vowed to myself that on every time and every podcast that I was on every show, and every talk that I would have given in every boardroom that I would go into, I would present people in that room the opportunity to do Korea's challenge. I would say to them, Take 10 minutes out of the course of your lifetime. And just listen, you would be
by now millions of people have heard quarries quarries offer. I wish I could tell Corey, that that's what's happened. But I've wanted that street corner many times he's not there anymore. I don't even know if he's still alive. But it doesn't almost doesn't matter. Because he's alive through that story. And so I want to ask the people listening here. Listen, do you have 10 minutes out of the course of your life, to just go up to another human being you don't know. And just sit with them and care enough about them to ask them how they are not as a salutation where they say find good, great, and you just carry on with your day. But where you actually care enough about them to say, I want to go behind that? Do you have the courage to sit with them and just listen to their response. You don't need to fix them, you don't need to help them, you don't need to change them, you don't need to make them something other than you just need to listen to him. To me, that's the new modality of the world that we're gonna live in a world where people care enough about each other to just hold the space for each other, to have the opportunity to share with these work with who they are, what they feel, what they think, how they how they how they think without being attacked, for it without being put down for it without being vandalized for what they believe. Because it's in the sharing of our belief systems, that we create the most beautiful mosaic that can ever be created. It's called the United States of America. It's called the United world. It's called the United Nations of this world. It's called the United galaxy. We were never meant to be alone. We were meant to be together. The understory the story that's in the spaces between the mosaic the book that I wrote, is that story. You mean the grout? Yes. Maybe the grout maybe the spaces?
Ari Gronich 1:53:48
Yeah. You know, one of my talents, and I talked about it in the book is butterfly effect. I also talked about the talents of seeing between the gaps. And you've you've mentioned that quite a bit today. At that was one of your your talents, seeing and reading and hearing the things that are not being said. And, you know,
today,
there's been a lot said, and I so appreciate having you on the show. I could talk to you for 10 hours, so I'm probably not going to hold you out that long. But how can people get a hold of you if they'd like to learn more work with you of any kind?
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:54:35
Thank you for your kind for kindly asking that. So my website is Daniel Bruce Levin.com, and I'm sure it'll be in the show notes. But just the spelling is like my name you see on down here, but it's Daniel Bruce Levin. And I really encourage people If you feel unheard, if you feel judged, if you feel like you don't have a person that you can go to that you can share who you are, if you don't even know who you are yourself. One of the beautiful things that happens when when we talk together, and when we do work together is what you end up feeling. You feel alive and invincible. When I got married to my wife, when I met my wife, she was 21 years younger than I, I was I lost my I lost money, all the money that I had in a business deal that went south. I had I had heart palpitations, and I wasn't healthy. And she was this beautiful woman and I was this old, sick, poor man. No. And I looked at her and she said, and she just said to me, I love you so much. And I said, I know why do you love me? And she said, I've never had anybody asked me why I love them before. I love you, because I love you. I love you for no reason. And for every reason. When she said that, to me, I felt invincible. It was the most beautiful thing. It was the love of my mom and dad that I've been looking for all my life that I now found in my partner. And I want to give that gift to other people. You know, in this world, we it's so easy for us to hate for no reason. I want to share with you the other side of that coin. it's even easier to love for no reason. What would happen if we love for no reason? What would happen if we cared for each other for no reason at all, there doesn't need to be a reason to love another person. We just love you because we love you. And when we come together as a mosaic, what I watch when I work with people, is they become happier they become they take more risks, they take more chances, their defenses come down. And sometimes they see themselves for the first time ever, because who they are coming from emerges. Because they're so used to seeing themselves with their silo painted around them. When that silo comes down, they can't believe how beautiful they are. They can't believe how much possibility exists when they just know who they are, and walk in that presence. It isn't the words we say it all the time that we've been talking, it's not the words that we say. It's in the presence that we carry into the words that we say.
Ari Gronich 1:57:50
Yeah, you know, it's funny. On that note, I'm gonna you know, and the call but
my
men's weekend with Justin Sterling. He used to say, it's not what we're saying. That means anything during this weekend, this was at the beginning his opening monologue. It's how we are when we're together. Yeah, that makes all the difference in the world. And I've always remembered that as
Unknown Speaker 1:58:29
a good
Ari Gronich 1:58:31
place to start. Yeah, you know, it's not so much the words, it's not so much the ideas, the concepts, the thoughts. Those are all subjective. It's how we are when we're together and how we make each other feel.
Unknown Speaker 1:58:46
And
Ari Gronich 1:58:48
so you have an livened. I've enjoyed your presence, your company, your words of wisdom, and all the ticks, you know, tips, tricks, techniques, and things that will help my audience, create a new tomorrow today and activate their vision for a better world. So thank you so much, Danny, I really appreciate you. And we're gonna end this call. But remember to like, subscribe, comment, review, do all those things that allow us to communicate with you so that we can have conversations that matter. And I look forward to engaging in in conversations about this conversation. So thank you so much, and we'll see you next time.
Daniel Bruce Levin 1:59:43
Thanks for having me.
Ari Gronich 1:59:45
Thank you for listening to this podcast. I appreciate all you do to create a new tomorrow for yourself and those around you. If you'd like to take this information further and are interested in joining a community of like minded people who are all passionate about activity Their vision for a better world. Go to the website, create a new tomorrow.com and find out how you can be part of making a bigger difference. I have a gift for you just for checking it out and look forward to seeing you take the leap and joining our private paid mastermind community. Until then, see you on the next episode.
