Insights with Ben Chodor

Conversation with Jeff Gitterman (Beyond Success: Redefining the Meaning of Prosperity)

September 02, 2020 Ben Chodor/Jeff Gitterman Season 1 Episode 5
Insights with Ben Chodor
Conversation with Jeff Gitterman (Beyond Success: Redefining the Meaning of Prosperity)
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Show Notes Transcript

Ben talks to long-time friend Jeff Gitterman, author of Beyond Success: Redefining the Meaning of Prosperity.

Jeff is a financial advisor by profession who people call upon because their relationship to money is unhealthy but Jeff also helps them heal how they look at life in general—kind of "wealth management for the soul."

In Beyond Success, Jeff talks about his journey from having nothing to everything he'd ever wanted in the space of about two years, only to discover that success wasn't what he thought it was. Implicit in the statement "money can't buy you happiness" is the idea that something else will. Jeff found what that something was and shares with us his four pillars for true happiness. 

To learn more about Jeff Gitterman and Beyond Success, visit https://advisor.gittermanwealth.com/beyondsuccess/

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Ben Chodor :

Good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening, wherever you are. Welcome to our new - our show. I'm really excited about this. But there's a couple of things going on. This is my first time I've ever interviewed someone, not from a studio, not with any production, from my home in Soho, New York. So, bear with me, this is kind of weird for me to be sitting in a chair in my house, doing a broadcast, interviewing someone I've known for a really long time, but whose book, Beyond Success, is a must read for everyone. I can't wait to pass this out to our thousands of employees globally. But it's just a really great read. And like I said, none of the authors that I'm bringing on are talking about sales motivation, and you know, it's more about life and their experiences and how to, you know, manage in this crazy world. So without that, I'm going to bring Jeff on. Jeff, thank you so much for being on this broadcast. I am so excited to have you on. How are you today?

Jeff Gitterman :

I'm good. I'm good in this Groundhog Day world that we're living in these days. I don't know what day it is. What month?

Ben Chodor :

Yeah, I was just telling some of the good parts and the bad parts of what's going on - that you get to spend more time with your family and all that. But the weird part is working from home, which is something I've never really done; there's no beginning and middle and end to the day. And like you said, I have no idea if today's Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday, and it's just bizarre.

Jeff Gitterman :

Yeah. The days are just running into each other with no breaks. It seems a little crazy.

Ben Chodor :

So, let me ask you a question and in full disclosure to the entire audience watching - I met Jeff about 25 years ago. He was in an office with me. He was a friend of a friend. And then, as starting out in the wealth management business, working nights talking to people about how to invest, he said, "I have this passion of mentoring and speaking and I'm going to make it happen, and I'm going to do it". And speaking to him, I go, "Yeah, I could see it happening". But as a 20 something year old guy, do you really think that you know, 20 some odd years later, he's gonna write incredible, build an incredible company, and make it happen? It's just, it's an incredible success story.

Jeff Gitterman :

I can.

Ben Chodor :

Did you really think when you sat with me as a 20 something year old saying that everything you told me when we sat down has basically come true - did you really know it was gonna happen?

Jeff Gitterman :

You know, what I did know is that if I didn't have a plan that I tried to adhere to, I wouldn't go anywhere. I think that was my guiding principle back then. I just truly believe that I had to set the course. Otherwise, just going to meander around. There was no such thing as GPS back then. But I have I say it kind of reminds me that if you jump in your car and you don't put an address in your GPS it isn't going to take you any way. So it's this great technology, but you've got to set the destination. So I definitely did it.

Ben Chodor :

Did you get there faster? Longer? Was the road- There's no road that's exactly going to be straight anyway. It's like a wave. You don't know where it's gonna come to shore. But did it kind of go the way you expected it to go?

Jeff Gitterman :

No, definitely not. It was a meandering roller coaster versus a straight line, I would say definitely. But that's life, you know? I think what gets you through the meandering rollercoaster is if you have a course, and you've set a course. You know, otherwise, we always have these choices that we have to make, or at least it seems like we always have these choices that we have to make. And if you don't have some North Star that you're following, then those choices are extremely difficult at times because they're never like black and white. You know, choices in life are always incredibly gray. Without any hindsight, every choice is easy. But with any hindsight, it's gray.

Ben Chodor :

I love the North Star comment. Yeah.

Jeff Gitterman :

Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Ben Chodor :

Because my head of strategy, Sylvie Harton, has said from day one when we started this organization, North Star, every employee needs North Star, we need a North Star. You need a North Star. But I want to jump right into your book, right? I loved reading it, because I loved your journey. But here's a question I got - were you kicked out of the wealth management fraternity? Because you made a statement in the beginning of your book - "money won't buy you happiness". All right. So. Yeah, so where did that come from? And how true has that been?

Jeff Gitterman :

You know, I definitely made more money earlier on than I thought I would and I didn't grow up with much money at all I think the most money my dad ever made was probably $38,000 a year. And I remember hitting a point where I think I made that in a month and like, I just realized that I had this concept in my head that when I had X I would feel Y, and when I got X and I didn't feel Y, I started questioning the whole dynamic of you know, really our society's belief system that in order to be happy you have to get this or that. And I just realized that it wasn't true it because I got X, and I really wasn't any happier.

Ben Chodor :

So, let me ask you a question because this makes me think of my own life in a way. My dad never made a lot of money. My dad never was an overachiever. And it was the biggest motivator for me. So your dad when you're talking, like, was he one of your biggest motivators? Not because of his success, because of not because it was success? Because that's how it was for me.

Jeff Gitterman :

Yeah, my dad worked retail in the 70s. And you can recall what retail in the 70s was like we were going through a deep recession. And I mean, there were... I didn't really know much of this until later, because I was the younger sibling, but my older sister did tell me later on that there were weeks where they really didn't know if they were gonna be able to put food on the table. And I just saw his lack of control. And I realized that money, his job choices, were a great contributor to his lack of control. He also had a horrible attitude, but anyway, but I just didn't have that lack of control when I grew up,

Ben Chodor :

That's a whole other conversation and a whole other show because I think what motivates different successful individuals and their family and what they came from - I find it really fascinating. Hey, before we go, what was your first job you ever had?

Jeff Gitterman :

I worked at the... Well, I did have a paper route at about 10. But I worked at the Englishtown Flea Market selling children's clothing. That was the first steady job that I had, I would say, but my first job out of college was at Merrill Lynch. So I mean, I started at Merrill Lynch in 1986. Can't believe I'm saying that, but wow. It was a long time ago. Yeah.

Ben Chodor :

It is a long time ago. I used to deliver to Pennysaver, door to door. That was my Sunday first job. You talked about the new currency being attention - where attention goes energy flows. I kind of dig that. But why is attention, do you think, is our most valuable currency?

Jeff Gitterman :

You know, it's interesting that we wrote the book. I really started writing it back in like 2006 or '07, when I started thinking about writing it. And the Internet was really, you know, becoming a primary force in our personal lives and our working lives. And there were books that were starting to be written or articles at least or white papers, calling it the "Attention Economy". And I realized how much companies were willing to spend just to garner someone's attention, because they realized that if they can get your attention, they could ultimately drive what you spend your money on. And then when I started delving deeper, just into the roots of our monetary system and our economic system, you know, it really is about convincing a lot of people that they need a lot more than they really need in order to keep the momentum going. And it really dawned on me the connection between that and my own lack of fulfillment or happiness when I started making the kind of money that I thought I would. That it was really where we were putting our attention was the most critical piece.

Ben Chodor :

You know, let me ask you a question because I was literally just thinking about it. And it happened to be my theme for my video this week to my employees is what I've learned via COVID. You know? We're finding out during our lockdown staying at home, that we really need a lot less than we think we need. And really the most valuable commodity is interpersonal connection. Do you think when we come out of this, that the attitude is going to be a little bit different?

Jeff Gitterman :

I hope. I mean, I definitely have a lot of hope for that. Certainly, after World War Two, the Spanish Flu if you look back in history, we did come out of those major events, even 9/11, a little more kinder and gentler for a bit. And then we seem to lose that, unfortunately. I think if you don't get to the root of how our economic system works, and what we value, and you can't get a long course correction on that. And I think that's critically important. And you know, the work that I do around sustainable investing and climate change, it's really a drive to change what we think about use of capital for.

Ben Chodor :

I agree, and you're extremely passionate, and we're gonna get to that a little bit. But one of the key parts that I loved about the book is, what is the investment plan for our attention? You break it into like four pillars, can you share a little with the audience, not enough that they don't have to read the book, but enough that they understand where you're going with it?

Jeff Gitterman :

Yeah, sure. And I love acronyms to an annoying point. I named our principles Core because when I wrote the book, really the hot thing in gym workouts at that time, which was really new was working your core for working out from your core. And it really, to me, it was a good metaphor for how we can work on our minds as well. So I named it Core and it's connecting to source-owning your unique expression, redirecting your attention into the future, and expanding your awareness to include others. And very simply, I realized that if we didn't go back to the root or way our attention was wandering from and try to start at that point that we were never going to gain control over attention. So whether it was meditation or walking or physical activity, running, whatever we could do to try to still our wandering mind was critical to our ability to function well. And we go into that, obviously, in a lot of detail in the book. And I've been an avid meditator since I was 13 years old. But then, the second part of it is if we don't own our unique expression... You know, we defined in the book that when you align your unique creative expression in service to the world, that's when you're truly successful. And while we're all quite similar, we're all the same species, we basically I think, come here with a unique gift that we can contribute to the world. And I think that everyone has that. Unfortunately, a lot of people don't find it or it isn't nurtured in a lot of people, but I think if we work to really find what our passion is that usually within our passion, we could find our purpose. And that's really critical because, if it's not the destination, you know, if getting the million dollars, or the billion or the hundred thousand, if that doesn't cure and satisfy and fulfill, then it's the journey that does. I mean, it's quite simple. It's not the destination, it's the journey, certainly, thousands of years.

Ben Chodor :

I'm all about the journey. In fact, I end a lot of my broadcasts with my team is that I'm just excited I get to go on this journey with my team, right? That to me is one of the best parts of that - it's not where it ends up. And I think every facet of my career, the journey has been the best part of it. It's not the end, it's how we get there. In pillar one, you quote that dimension is really eye opening to me. The mind is a terrible master, but a wonderful servant. How do we reclaim our mind? Or how do we reclaim power over our mind?

Jeff Gitterman :

Yeah. So, you know, basically, we have random thoughts running through our head all day long. And the nature of the mind is to wander our attention across those random thoughts. And I always start in my classes when I've taught meditation in the past with: most people think they are their mind. They think the relationship between the conversation they're having in their head is really the essence of who they are. And I always ask people, well, then just for one minute, in the beginning of class, I don't want you to think anything. Not one thought. And it's odd - because I've been doing this a long time - but for most people, the fact that they can't do that and really no one can do that. If you take the next step from that, if you can't control those random thoughts, then why are you giving so much attention to them? And then when you start to study that irritation, you realize that your emotional state is constantly being battered around by whatever thoughts you happen to pay the most attention to. And the only thing I found that stills that, or regains control of that, is meditation. And it's not, you know, meditation is the perfect metaphor again for the journey, not the destination because you don't meditate to get anywere. You actually meditate to make the journey more enjoyable and to have more stability, emotional stability, especially throughout the journey.

Ben Chodor :

So if you missed one- How many days of meditation have you missed in the last, you know, you've been doing it since you were 13?

Jeff Gitterman :

I have four kids and I... For a long time from 13 on I meditated all the time, some days, I was meditating for hours. Now, I do, annually, a Silent Retreat for five days. But my mind, most part, and this is a guilty admittance - but for the most part, I don't meditate as much as I used to. But I did for years and years and years, meditated all the time. So I still try to find my moments and I've tried to go to activities, whether it's working out, I can practice meditation these days without sitting on the cushion, you know? So it's kind of like going to the gym. It depends on what you're doing the rest of the day. You can exercise all day, you could take the stairs rather than the elevator. You could park as far as you want in the parking lot and walk to the entrance of the store. So I try to practice meditation really, most of my day. I love that. Alright, but I got to digress for one second, though. You do a five day silent- You spend five days once a year, theoretically, you don't talk to anyone? Kind of like a monk and do you do that in private or you do that around your family? No, I actually do it at a Silent Retreat. I actually last year I hosted the five day Silent Retreat, and there's about 30 people. It was at a place called Peace Village in Haines Falls, New York; was a 300 acre, well, retreat, that is run by a spiritual organization called the Brahma Kumari, which I'm not a part of. So this is not a pitch. Beautiful spiritual organization run by a 103 year old woman, which she fell down with-

Ben Chodor :

Jeff is, does it get easier day three and four? Or by day four going into five, you're like, I can't wait to start talking again? Or is there? Like, how does it move?

Jeff Gitterman :

Most people, I'd say 80-90% of the group doesn't want to start talking again after the five days. About 5% have some kind of crisis. They tell you that you need to have a deep meditation practice or spiritual practice before you go, and some people don't and they wind up having a difficult time. But 90% of the people and last year, nobody had a difficult time. Some people came out of the gate wanting to talk incessantly. But the majority of people, including myself, really don't want to start talking again. I'll tell you the most wonderful thing about a silent retreat beyond meditation is that when you're around a lot of people that you don't know, so most of the people are strangers, and you can't talk to them, all the labels of how you define yourself drop away. Because the only connection you can have is through your eyes. So you actually leave with deeper connections and friendships than you typically make in the world of talking.

Ben Chodor :

Offline, I want to talk to you about this a little bit. But I want to get back into one of the things. I think I've played my whole career on my intuition or my gut, right? And the times that I haven't listened to my intuition have been the biggest mistakes in my entire career. So, you talk about intuition playing a big role in our creative expression. How can all of us better access our intuition? Or is it actually listen to our intuition?

Jeff Gitterman :

Yeah, you know, it's an interesting thing. We mostly listen outward. So we're listening either to our own conversation and dialogue in our head. And that dialogue is not the deepest aspect of ourselves. So it's actually in meditation, it's easier to start by listening to outside sounds, whether it's, you know, in nature, birds or anything to try to get the focus off of the stream of attention. And then once you do, you try to move to listening to the body. And the body really is where our intuition comes from. And it's typically from the God. And if you pay attention to the signals your body is sending the majority of time your body's telling you when something isn't right. There's an interesting thing- I mean, I hate to pick a dark subject, but I was watching Girl with the Dragon Tattoo this morning. But there's a line in the movie where the killer says to Daniel Craig, he said, "It's unbelievable that being discourteous is a bigger fear than actual death" or the crime that people so don't want to hurt other people's feelings that they actually when their intuition is screaming at them to run, if someone just lights them in politely, their complete intuition and I use that because it's a great example because your body knows. Your body's screaming at you to go the other way. And your mind right? Oh no the formalities of life call on me to have to accept the invitation to tea with a psychopath.

Ben Chodor :

Yep, the biggest mistakes I've made is when I didn't listen to my intuition. And I think I was 40 before I really believed in radical candor, or really telling someone what my intuition and what I'm feeling and being able to confront it. So when I read that in the book, and when I- It just, it just so hit home. And then one other pillar really killed me. I mean, in a good way. I consider like, I didn't actually do this, but I think I invented the word positivity, right? I am all about positivity. The glass is always half full. Tomorrow's always gonna be better. And I think maybe it's part of my upbringing, but in general, I truly believe that I want to pass that on, right? And, but you actually go, you know? So your third pillar is about the more we use positivity in the present, the more we change the future really resonated. it resonated with me. What is the best way to put this pillar into practice? How would you advise someone who's not Mr. Positivity or someone believes in it like I do, who came to and doesn't feel that way? How can they use that in their in your daily life?

Jeff Gitterman :

So it's interesting. In the book, we say to actually start with strangers, because there are currents of dramas that you run with the people that are closest to you. And changing your behavior initially with the people around you is usually actually met with resistance and not acceptance. So we tell people in the book that just start with the person at the supermarket. I mean, now's a perfect time, you know? you're dealing with people that are working at the supermarket under incredible stress right now so that we can continue to eat. But, you know, having kind words for people during the day, reaching out with the smile and thanking somebody regularly? I mean most of these people get treated all day like second class citizens by people that don't have to work those kinds of jobs. And so I try to go out of my way regularly to thank people that are serving me in that way, because I am grateful for it. And then it changes them and then it's like a ripple in a pond. I mean one will change of attitude that you trigger in someone else then they treat the next person online a little bit better who maybe goes home and treats the kid a little bit better and you don't know where it where it ends, really.

Ben Chodor :

You know, I totally agree. There's a saying - and I'm gonna totally mess this up - is "everyone dies twice in their life", right? They die the first time when they die and the second time they die when someone stops talking about them or stops remembering or doing something that they do. I try, I hope that the people that I work with or clients I work with, that one day down the road somewhere, some thing that I did you know, they remember. Something that I taught my kids, they find themselves doing again, when they have kids. It is, I think, the way you put it is so spot on. And it's why everyone, you got to read the book for a couple reasons. One, it's absolutely a great book. But, two, you can learn- How Jeff tells the story is really incredible. So I have two final questions for you. And I'm gonna let you go back to your family. If I interview again in 10 years, hopefully we'll see each other over the next 10 years, but if I interview you in 10 years from now, where do you think you're going to be in your life?

Jeff Gitterman :

You know, I'd like to be... I already am working a lot with the UN but I'd like to be a lot more active on climate initiatives, and I do as much as I can now. But I'd like to be involved at the biggest level possible and trying to influence how we use capital to stop the terrible damage we're doing to our planet. And not many people will know this later, but we are recording this on Earth Day, which I find quite beautiful. So today is Earth Day. We had a white paper in Forbes this afternoon on how to influence climate through your portfolios. So I hope to be ultimately known for that.

Ben Chodor :

I got to tell you something, Jeff. Already, I think you're known for ESG just what I've seen socially on what you're doing, you should check out not only the book but what Jeff's doing. Listen - at Intrado, we are, as an organization, really into ESG. We've added the carbon calculator. Every product that I sort of run, PR distribution, web hosting, streaming virtual events, I mean, everything is very carbon neutral. And we are so big believers that we're seeing it because we work with so many IR organizations, that ESG is such a hot topic for them. And no one has figured it out. And what you're doing with your TV stuff you're doing and what you're doing with the UN, I think it is so needed right now. When did you wake up? How did you even get involved with the UN? And then we'll wrap this up. And how do you- If you had to give someone advice, what should they think about if they believe in this? What should they do? How do they get the first step forward in it?

Jeff Gitterman :

Alright, two big questions. I'll try to answer quickly. I got involved with the UN initially really because I worked on a film called Planetary. It's a great film if the audience wants to check it out. There's two films - Overview Effect and Planetary. But Planetary was with Bill McKibben and Paul Hawken and Ron Garan the astronaut and they really opened my eyes up in 2014, to the issues around climate and that it affected all of us and the planet. I do believe that the pandemic that we're dealing with right now is kind of like an Early Warning System for climate change, because it's the first thing that we're dealing with it affects the entire globe. Without singling out any one. It's the borderless you know, crisis and so is climate change. So it just opened my eyes up. And I realized that if we don't start moving the capital markets to address the problem that governments and NGOs alone would not, or would never be able to solve it without the money in the capital markets. So that drove me that's been driving me.

Ben Chodor :

I love that.

Jeff Gitterman :

And then if people get started on it. You know, thankfully today, six years ago, there wasn't much but Paul Hawkins book Draw Down is probably the best starter on what you can do around sustainability and climate change. There's a good book by Bill McKibben, too, called Cradle to Cradle about how to create products that actually don't add to the trash and the recycling problems that we're having today in the world. So here's the last question for you, Jeff. So here's my final question. So can you make a promise to me? We don't go 20 years without talking again? Absolutely. I promise. Yeah.

Ben Chodor :

All right. I promise, too. You look amazing. Hopefully Jeff and I will get haircut soon. We were talking about that before we went on. And, Jeff, enjoy the family. Stay safe. Thank you so much. And just to remind everyone - incredible, incredible book. And I'm just flattered and honored. And I like to be able to say I knew you when, man. So that makes me feel really good.

Jeff Gitterman :

I'm gonna say that the new edition of the book has rocks on the front so people see a white cover with rocks. It's the same book. Just the newest edition.

Ben Chodor :

Okay.

Jeff Gitterman :

Just want to add that.

Ben Chodor :

We'll make sure we post. We'll post that in. Thank you so much, Jeff. Have a great day. And I really appreciate it and from me and everyone in the organization, have a great day. Transcribed by https://otter.ai