SMARTMARRIAGES 2FILM TRANSCRIPT

DVD

Tony: Emotion is created by motion, but I’ll tell you very quickly, there are two factors, that are leverage points to instantly change someone’s emotion and I know you recognize this as professionals because you’ve seen it and you’ve done it. All I’m going to do is give you a label for it, so maybe you can become more conscience about using it more often.

Two ways we change, one we just demonstrated. We want to change any behavior, any results of someone’s getting, you got to change their behavior. So you want to change a relationship, ultimately we got to change the behavior. It’s not enough to change what people are thinking, is it? You got to change what they’re doing. If you’re going to change their behavior you’ve got to understand something. Very often we like to generalize and say this person is a bitchy person or this person is a kind person, but kind people can be bitchy and bitchy people can be kind. True or false?

So how people behave is not based on their ability. What people can do is amazing. What they will do is usually disappointing. And it has nothing to do with their ability. It’s simply the state that they’re in, at that moment in time. Now we develop habits of state and that creates habits of behavior and habits of results and habits of life. Now interestingly enough, how many of you have ever done something yourself, where you did something and after you did it, you thought, “Oh, I can’t believe I said that, I can’t believe I did that, that was so stupid”, who’s ever done this here? Say aye.

Audience: Aye.

Tony: How many of you have ever done something after you did it, you're like, “That was me.” You don’t how you did it, but you impressed the heck out of yourself. How many of you have ever done this? Say aye.

Audience: Yes.

Tony: Now you’re the same person, one situation you sound like an idiot, the other one, you sound brilliant. You’re the same person, what’s the difference? The state you’re in.

So, if we want to change behavior we got to change the state of that relationship, the state of those individuals. Does that make sense to you? Because you know, you can see it , all of you have lots of different ways of changing state, but the two primary ways to change state, number one, is a radical change in physiology and that’s the one I see used least by therapists and it’s the most powerful. When you change physiology, you change everything. And women, and men, at an unconscious level, if not conscious are powerfully attuned to even the most minute change in a person’s physiology. Because when you’re talking about human communication, it isn’t words, we all know that.

In fact research done 20 years ago, at USC, found that words were the smallest part of actually changing what someone thinks or feels. In other words, when two people are communicating back and forth, words represented what they found was 7% of human communication, meaning words play only 7% of the difference of getting someone to change what they’re thinking and feeling. They were the smallest part. As you can probably guess, what influences much more than words is voice qualities, voice cues, tone, tempo, volume, timbre. All these things, we all know it’s not so much what you say, as it is how you say it. Now it’s interesting, so if you say to somebody, I love you (screaming), you got all the right words, but the voice doesn’t match and so that’s the real communication.

And then the third part of communication, that most of us don’t realize that affects our state, is the biggest one of all, which is physiology. Voice is 38%, words are 7%, according to research; 55% is physiology, which is a fancy word for how you use your physical body. Your posture, you’re breathing pattern, the muscular tension in your body or relaxation, pattern around your eyes, all of these things communicate much more than the words or even the voice quality.

You can say, I love you (softly) and we all know that doesn’t mean I love you, even though we have the word and the tone down. Or if somebody looks at you and says, “I hate you, I do, I hate you.” Does that mean I hate you? Yes or no. No, so the body communicates much more than this. And the body, is the

trigger for state. See, and if, you know if somebody says, “Alright, I’m going to do it, I’m going to do it, I’m going to go on that diet, I’m going to change my relationship, and I’m going to do it, I am.” You aren’t doing squat. Right? But if you make a radical change in physiology, you change the state and from that state, people can behave differently and get different results.

So this is one of the things you want to be looking for, I believe, and one of the ways if you watch our films, that will take somebody who is suicidal or you’ll take somebody who is in a position where they hate their partner and all of a sudden a few minutes or seconds later they’re laughing hysterically. It’s the use of physiology.

The second way to change state is changing focus. And this is what most of us, in the therapeutic field have focused our lives on – changing focus. Because whatever you focus on, you feel. So if you’re supposed to meet your husband or wife at 7 o’clock p.m. at a restaurant and you get there at 7:00 and they’re not there, what are you feeling? Tell me, your feeling? Say it out loud, what are you feeling? Pissed off already? It’s only 7:00. I had one person say worried and one person said pissed off, ok good.

Let’s say it’s now 7:30, you’re supposed to meet him at 7:00 and you’ve been there since 7:00, they’ve not called and they’ve not shown up. Now what are you feeling? Really pissed off, ok. Really worried, ok good. Now it’s 8:30 p.m., you’ve been there since 7:00, they’ve not called, they’ve not shown up, now what are you feeling? This woman says full, I’m not waiting for the bastard. Ok, good. Now, question, the person who’s angry versus the person who’s worried; they’re experiencing the exact same event, but it doesn’t have the same meaning. Because they’re both focusing on something, remember those three decisions, what do you focus on? What does it mean? What are you going to do?

People are making those three decisions every moment they’re alive. So the person who is pissed off, what are they focusing on? What’s the meaning they’re giving it? “They did it again”, they don’t care is the meaning. “They’re probably around screwing around with someone else.” And by the way, if you picture that in your mind, is it real to you when you picture it? Yes or no. And is the upset going to be there? Even if it isn’t

true, you’re going to be upset, because what you focus on you feel. Focus equals feeling. Focus equals reality to the individual even though it’s not reality in actuality. The minute you focus on it, it’s real to you.

Who here has ever been totally upset with someone because maybe a friend told you this person said something or did something to try and harm you, and you thought at first, no they finally convinced you, and you thought about it and you were so upset and then later on you found out, like an idiot, that they really didn’t do it. How many of you had this experience? But at the point you were focusing on it, it totally upset you. Focus equals reality, that’s why changing focus is so critical.

The person who’s worried, what are they focusing on? What’s the meaning they’re giving it? What are they probably picturing in their mind? They were in a what? An accident, and if you focus on that, feel that, now this person’s worried. When the person finally shows up, are these two people going to treat them the same way? No way. One is going to treat them in a way that makes them never want to come back again. The other is going to treat them very differently and it has nothing to do with the event.

So it’s not the event, it’s not the partner; it’s the focus and physiology. It’s the meaning that you pull out of those things. That’s what controls it all. So you change the focus, you change the person’s state, you change it in a heartbeat, you shift it as much as you want to. Can a person change someone else’s state just by their body alone? Yes or no. Can you change people’s state by your energy alone? Yes or no.

Some of you aren’t very convinced, what if they introduced me and they said, “Here he is, the author of ‘Unlimited Power’, ‘Awaken the giant within’, Mr. Anthony Robbins.” And I walked in like this. (Music)

Good evening. I’m Anthony Robbins and you’re not. I’m here tonight to share with you how you can have more passion in your relationship and over the next 17 hours of this seminar. “Kill him!” How many have been around somebody, you just want to just shake him, how many of you had this happen? Say, aye. Maybe it’s time you did. You got to change their physiology is you want to change their state.

If you change physiology and focus you can change anything, anyone, anyhow. Now one of the ways that we lock into a certain physiology and we lock into a certain experience of focus is language and that will be the third element, that’s the wild card. Because people have phrases, as you all know, that they use that fire off emotion. See if I come along here and say to you, if I want to change the meaning of something, I’ve got three ways to change the meaning. I can change your physiology which will change it completely. I can change your focus which will change it or I can change the language which gives it the meaning.

Because when something happens, it’s pure experience, but the minute you put words to it, it now has put in a cookie cutter of word that you use habitually and that produces emotion. So if your habit is like, my mother used to always, for years, all I heard her talk about was being humiliated. Because that was the word she used for everything unpleasant. So she thinks something someone else would call unpleasant, “I’m humiliated by this”, and so she would be. Because the habit of language produces the word you attach to your experience becomes your experience bio-chemically.

So if I come along and I say it’s you, “John, you’re mistaken, about what you just said.” How does that feel if somebody says you’re mistaken? What if I said “John, you’re wrong”? Hmmm. How many, a little biochemical change in that one? What if said, “John, you’re lying”? Whoa this [1:13:01]. One word and we changes biochemistry. Now what’s interesting is, we have favorite words we use a lot, and much of our emotion comes from the language, it’s the physiology, the pattern of focus and the pattern of language. And it’s not just one word; we have phrases that we use over and over again. I called them incantations or incantations, depending on the focus, same spelling, different emphasis. Right?

I’ll give you an example, when you were a kid, did you ever have somebody like your Mom or Dad, you’re at dinner, you’re sitting down at the kitchen table eating, you don’t want to get up. And your Mom or dad says, “Go get me the salt.” And you’re honest answer is, “I don’t know where it is.” Convenient, but true. And they say, “It’s in the kitchen, go get me the salt.” And you say, “oh fine, I don’t know where the salt is, I don’t know where the salt is”, you walk in, “I don’t’ know where the salt is”, you open the cupboard, you look up and down, “I don’t

know where the salt is”, you look, “it’s not here.” Your mother and father says, “It’s on the second shelf.” “I don’t’ know where the salt is”, you really look. “I don’t know where the salt...it’s not here.”

They come right beside you, they reach right in front of your face and they go, “what is this?” How many of you have had one of these experiences? Say, aye.

Audience: Aye.

Tony: Now question, did your eyes see the salt? Yes, you’re eyes did see the salt, but you’re brain wouldn’t allow you to perceive it because it doesn’t want to turn you into a liar with yourself. And most of us know that’s called a sketoma, right? A blind spot.

Well people have hypnotized themselves into not seen what’s in front of them all the time, by the language pattern they have. And you see this in couples all the time, don’t you? They keep saying things. Somebody said a long time ago, say a lie big enough, loud enough, long enough and sooner or later the people will believe you. Who said that? Hitler. Also, anybody in a relationship that’s messed up basically said that.

Isn’t it true? Because they start telling some of these stories and they use this language and pretty soon they attach it to that person, and that person becomes that through the filter they’re using. That’s their focus, that’s their language, they go into a state like that and the relationship starts to crumble.

So another way of using language is questions. All day long, we’re thinking. What is thinking? How do you know when you’re thinking? What do you do when you thinking? I’m here to tell you, thinking is nothing but the process of asking and answering questions. When I realized that it changed my life. Now if you just said, “That’s true” or “That’s not true” or “I don’t know if I believe that,” then you had to ask a question subconsciously like, “Is it true? Do I believe it?” We’re always asking and answering questions, that’s all thinking is. But the problem is this, we have habitual questions. And guess what, ask and you shall what? If you ask lousy questions you get a lousy…answer. “How come this always happens to me?” It doesn’t always happen to you, but your brain’s like a computer it’s going to come up with an answer. So if you have a pre-

supposition like “Why does this always happen to me,” the brain goes “’Cause you’re an idiot, you deserve it!”

The most common question I get from people trying to lose weight that they ask all the time, that don’t lose weight, is “How come I can never lose weight?” That’s what they ask all the time. Could they lose weight? Yes, but if you keep asking how come you can never lose weight the brain has got to come up with an answer, it goes, “’Cause you’re a pig!” Ask a lousy question, get a lousy… ask a great question, get a great answer. Change someone’s life by the questions that they ask.

So I’m always looking at these three elements. I say, that a relationship is based on emotion, but emotion is based on meaning. And when something happens, what it means…what you focus on what it means, is going to shape what you do, because the meaning produces the emotion, and meaning is shaped by three things – physiology, focus, and language. You shift those three things you can change whatever something means and when you change what it means it changes the emotion – in a heartbeat.

Now, if you want to make that shift, those are the things that we look for. Let me just briefly give you a couple of principles, that are part of what we teach in the ‘Ultimate Relationship Program’, and to me they are really fundamental and basic, but you’d be surprised how many people get upset sometimes when we talk about these or want to argue with these. So if you want to I’m all up for argument if you want or we can just play with the demonstrations of them.

But here’s what I suggest to you. If relationship is emotion and emotion comes from meaning, and meaning comes from our psychology, then the only way to change our lives is bring something to it that’s new. And I would suggest to you that first thing is energy. If you don’t bring energy to it, things mean something very different when you are exhausted than when you are strong.

And here’s what’s interesting. You might say “I don’t have any more energy, I’m exhausted. I’ve got three children and I’m working two jobs and doing all these things,” but that is a standard. Other people working their tail off, two jobs, three jobs, and they’re still happy, they’re still grateful, they’re still

loving, yes or no? So it’s a lie that you don’t have the energy. It’s a standard.

The only way to change a relationship long term is raise the standards that each individual holds themselves to, not their partner. That’s how the game changes. Now you can’t do that unless you hold yourself to one. You can’t get them to have more energy unless you bring in more energy into the session. That’s what it comes down to.

I’m going to give you four really simple principles, very quickly here. And we’ll kind of dig in a little bit to show what these things really mean, so they’re not just surface. The first principle we believe above all else, if you’re going to be effective in creating a, not just a relationship that works. That relationship works, all you do is have to have enough things in common. Because what makes a relationship work, is things in common. The sense of certainty, that’s what makes a relationship work. What makes a relationship passionate is uncertainty. Very different things, differences are what make a relationship passionate.

So we’re going to talk about these things. But the first skill that can get you past that base is really basic. What we tell people is, if you want to transform your relationship so there’s love and passion, the first thing you’ve got to have above anything else, is heartfelt understanding and appreciation of your partner. That doesn’t sound like a major breakthrough, does it? Heartfelt understanding, not ‘headful’ understanding – heartfelt. And real appreciation.

Now how do you take a skill like that, because it is a skill, because this person is different than you, they think different than you. To really enter their world, you’ve got to be able to understand that person. How do you really do that? There’s only one way to make that work and that’s by discipline. So we teach seven skills and ten disciplines. They complement each other.

If you’ve got the skill of being able to have heartfelt understanding, but you don’t apply it, that skill is worthless. So the discipline that makes it work is really simple, you must put your partner first. Any relationship I’ve seen over the last 20 years of actually studying in depth the relationships of people who have been together 20, 30, 40 years and they have love

and passion, what you will never miss, never; where there is really love and passion, not a couple that have been together, anybody can stay together, and tolerate each other. I’m not talking about that. I’m talking about people that have love and passion. You will always find their number one priority is their partner, not themselves. There is no exception and looking at it for 20 years. This is a law.

Now, some people say, “I’m not going to put my partner first. I put them first and they didn’t put me first.” Love is not a trade, what did we say earlier? If you really love somebody, what will you do for them? What? Anything. But people have forgotten this in relationship. People tell me all the time, “you know, in the beginning it was so romantic and beautiful, loving, and I don’t know what happened, it’s just the years, I guess.” It has nothing to do with the years. Your aren’t doing what you did in the beginning or you’d have it the same today.

Tell me how it was in the beginning. You’ll say, “He won’t do this, he won’t do that.” In the beginning, what would you do for your partner? And they go, “anything.” Would you take out the trash? “Happily.” Would you do this? “Anyway.” Now what happens? “You take out the trash.” Oh that really makes somebody feel really connected.

See, if you did what you did in the beginning, you’d be putting your partner first. And if you put your partner first and you really hold it at that level, that’s the standard for yourself, why is there put him first? I mean, their needs, their desires, their hopes, their dreams, their feeling loved. If you really do that completely, people are scared to death, what if they do that and they don’t reciprocate? If you really do it for months and years, and they don’t reciprocate, you’re going to be a better person and you can make a better decision on who to be with.

But not giving it under the guise of trading will only make you weak. I really believe there’s four levels of love and in any relationship, if you look for these, you’ll know what the problem is in the relationship.

Level one is baby love. Baby love is the kind of love that a baby gives. What kind of love does a baby give? People say babies are so loving, bullshit; they’re not loving at all. They’re loving only when you give them what they want. That’s not love. They get angry if they don’t get what they want, they scream, they

yell, even smack their mothers sometimes, don’t they? If they’re not getting what they want, when? Now. Now, unfortunately some people are 40 and they still have this level of love. And that’s the real problem in the relationship.

Level two of love, person’s playing it at two-dimensional level of love is horse trading. Horse trading is, “Ok, I’ll do this for you, but I’ve got a plan for what I’m going to get on my side.” And there are two kinds of horse trading. There’s conscience horse trading and there’s unconscious. Some people can’t allow themselves to see the horse trading because it wouldn’t match their identity. “I’m not here to trade, I’m not here giving to get”, but they are. And the way you know is, they give and they give and they give and when they come to see you what do they say? I gave him or I gave her, what? Everything, everything except what they needed. Otherwise, you’d have a great relationship. You gave what you wanted to give. And besides, why are you so pissed off? If it was love, it wouldn’t have been a trade.

Another word for horse trading is, that’s very gentle, whoring. Because what does a whore do, I use that word very deliberately to jar you. What does a whore do? They only love you as long as you pay them. And payment, it doesn’t just come in money. If you’re in a relationship where you’re giving to get at any level, it isn’t real love and so even if you get love, you’ll never feel good about yourself because you know you traded for it. And any relationship when they’re playing at level two, you’ll always find dysfunction.

Level three, is you give love because it’s who you are. You love because it’s what you’re made for. You love because you know that’s God’s greatest gift. And you give that love without hesitancy, without hold back, and when you do, you feel alive because even if they don’t reciprocate it, you can’t not feel what you’ve given. And someone who’s giving love because it’s who they are, they have the most dynamic relationships. Even if they are the wrong person and someone uses it, they’ll move on, they’ll eventually, water seeks its own level, they’ll attract it, they’ll find it, they’ll connect it or they’ll ignite it in someone who is selfish. Because after a while that person starts to feel love and they begin to let go of their fear that they’re not enough and they give back.

And the fourth level of love, it’s rare, but we’ve all experienced it at times. And by the way, we all go to all four of these levels, don’t we? I’ve been a selfish bastard plenty of times in my life but the question is, where is your center of gravity? Where do you live most of the time today? So no one just lives in one level. But there is a center; I wouldn’t say the fourth level is my center. But I’ve had experiences in it and I know you have too.

And that fourth level is where you love even those that try to hurt you. That’s like, you know, the Dali Lama, I mean, an amazing man, regardless of one’s religious beliefs, anybody who can truly experience losing your country, having your family killed and then still pray for these Chinese soldiers, not like they’re lower than you, like pray for these poor sinners, but pray for their hearts to open so they don’t have to experience this pain anymore, which is what he really does.

That’s an amazing level of love. Gandhi had that love. Every person has that love at times. I’ll tell you where you’ve all experienced it. If you have children, you’ve experienced it. How many know what I’m talking about here? When you love someone, even though they hurt you, and you didn’t give up on them, did you? Right? That’s level four of love. If you have a level four love with your spouse, you’re going to have an unbelievable love affair. No matter how much conversations about who took out the trash, who did this, or who said what, or who ignored who, who did whatever, if you’re playing level three or level four that relationship’s going to flourish. Or you’re going to find out that’s the wrong person, but you’ll find that out not by holding back.

The only pain people ever experience is from holding back their love. That’s where it always comes from. Playing a game, because if you hold it back, now what you’re doing is you’re playing a game, it’s a trade. And even if you get someone to do what you want, or now they pay more attention or they give you more love or they do what you want them to do, you know you’ve manipulated it so at some level you can never be happy. You can’t be happy with them, you can’t be happy with yourself. And so it’s a game that’s not winnable.

So our first principle is put your lover first. If you’re not doing that, here’s how you know. If you’re pissed off about something they didn’t do for you, you’re not putting them first. And if you can hold that principle and catch yourself, and we get couples

that catch this, it is remarkable what happens. Getting them to buy into it is the hardest part in the beginning, as you might guess. “I’m not going to put them first”, ok great, let’s look what the alternative is. If you don’t put them first, where is this relationship going to go? “Well, I want them to put me first, first.” Ok, ok that’s really great.

So the bottom line is getting leadership. But that’s, that’s the art of what you and I have to do with these couples. But this is the principle you get them to and then the standard after they learn it; you can take every painful experience they’ve ever had, everything they’re going to complain about and you’ll see it’s where they’re pissed about something they’re not getting. They’re not focused on what they’re giving, if focused on the giving, it solves the problem, almost instantly.

And ironically, if someone really does this, they give and they give and they give, even the hardest customers start to melt, don’t they? Even people who are jerks, start to melt because there’s a point where reciprocation is so large, it’s built into our unconscious. As a culture, we only survive because of reciprocation. Because we’ve all been taught if somebody does something for you, you kind of owe them. And even selfish people after a period of time feel pressure inside to balance this out.

But more importantly, it will penetrate their fear. Because if you look at it, there are two fears all human beings have. What fears have stopped you in the past? You tell me. Rejection, failure, not being good enough, pain, loneliness, success. How many of you have the fear of failure? Raise your hand, I’m curious. Hmmm. How many of you also have the fear of success? You’re screwed. If you fear failure and success, what the hell are you going to do, right?

But seriously, here’s what I’ve learned with three million people, I’ll just get up here, and you say, why don’t you do something and you’ll tell me and I’ll dig, and I’ll dig, and I’ll dig, and you get to fear, after fear, after fear, but all roads lead to wrong. The two fears all human beings have, I can tell you to beyond the shadow of doubt, are these.

Number one, that we’re not enough, everyone has the fear that they’re not enough. And I don’t mean in this moment you have that fear, I mean in some context. Who here has ever felt not

enough physically, attractive enough, smart enough, emotionally strong enough, something enough, rich enough, poor enough, whatever, how many have ever felt this? Say, aye.

Audience: Aye.

Tony: It’s never going to go away. I may go away for a time, you don’t feel it right now, but that is built into the human nervous system. And I’ll tell you why. It has nothing to do with a certain moment in your life and how your parents treated you and where it was, it has to do with human beings how we’re raised as creatures as a species.

Here’s what it is, all creatures on earth are raised in a different way. But one thing that’s unique about human beings, is we have the longest period of vulnerability or dependence upon another being for our survival of any creatures on earth except primates. Most animals when they’re born, some of them don’t even have a parent there. Right, the egg hatches, there is no parent; you’re on your own bud. What do you got? Well, God or Mother Nature whatever you believe, has given them something to survive, maybe it’s the shell, maybe it’s camouflage, maybe it’s teeth, maybe it’s, you know claws, something to help them survive.

Now other animals are born and there is a mother or father and they’re born dependent. And that mother or father goes out and takes care of them. That bird, the little baby bird, the mother goes out and feeds them but after a few weeks, get your butt out there and fly. Right?

If a baby, a human baby is born in the forest, without their parents, are they going to survive? Yes or no. No way in a million years, why? Because our competitive advantage is love. We don’t have the scissors, the teeth, the claws, we don’t have the camouflage, we survive by each other. What is love? When someone will put your needs ahead of theirs and so God has provided that everyone in this room survived, we survived because someone loved you, someone put their needs behind yours for quite a period of time.

Now in order to insure that as species, we’ll survive, each mother, fathers get this too, but each mother gets filled with something called oxytocin, which makes that mother love this baby even though he looks like a lizard when he‘s born. The father goes, “it’s a lizard!” And the mother goes, “Don’t you

dare say that to our child!” Who here has ever met a mother, who didn’t think their baby, was beautiful? The kid is toothless, fat, drooling, pooping and it’s all perfect. Right? Most perfect thing, green poop, “Oh, green poop, love you baby.” It’s unbelievable. He’s fat and he’s loved. Try it out when you’re 50 and see if it works out well for you. Right? He farts anywhere he wants. And everybody thinks it’s beautiful.

What do you got to do to be loved when you’re a baby? What do you got to do? Come on, what do you got to do? Nothing! Nada! Squat! So the world is your oyster and you can have anything and you are alive because everyone loves you. Whatever your wants o needs are, go before theirs. However, there is a day when the oxytocin wears off, and that day is hell to pay. Because on that day, what happens? Suddenly you do the same behavior you used to get love for, and somebody yells at you or smacks you, or worst of all, ignores you. That’s the scariest one. And that moment, fear entered your body. That’s the day you figured out you had to do something to be worthy of connection and love. That’s the day when you had to do anything.

So maybe you cried but no one came this time, and so now you tried to crawl and all of a sudden you start to crawl and all of a sudden somebody, “Look! Look, Mary’s crawling! Everybody came, everybody comes, oh my God, Mary is crawling.” And you got all this love and connection and in that moment, an achiever was born. Because the rest of their life they’re trying to do something to be successful enough so that people pay attention and give them the love that they want, to be significant enough.

Or maybe you tried to crawl and it didn’t work and you fell off the edge and you smacked your head and you’re really hurting and you got a blood curdling scream, and the mother recognizes the difference. So suddenly she runs to take care of you and you got all this love and connection by being hurt. It doesn’t take too many times for the brain to wire up, getting pain equals getting love. And some of these people are 50 and they still have a problem every time they talk to their friends, every time they’ve always got a problem, they’ve always got a pain, because that’s the way to get connection and love.

Learned it long ago, been doing it for a lifetime. Some people no one’s paying attention, they go, “brrrr” make a noise and somebody starts to crack up, “brrrr” and they crack up, you link it up, a comedian’s born.

I’m obviously grossly generalizing, exaggerating, but not by much. Some people, nobody comes so then they try to figure out how to get attention by pleasing, doing any kind of pleasing. What would you need? What would you like? What do you need? What does anybody need? They spend their life pleasing, so they can feel they’re enough to get love.

Some people don’t get anything, so then they get pissed and angry and they break something, become destructive, till they finally get attention. If you don’t give a baby attention for doing something good, will they do something bad to get your attention? Yes or no.

Adults are just big babies. Most people are still emotionally about five years old. Psychologically, they might be different but emotionally there they are. And you see it every day when you work with couples, don’t you? So you got to understand what the reality is. There’s a pattern that they’ve learned, a pattern to try to overcome this fear. Because they’re deeper fear is if I’m not enough, that’s the first fear, the deeper fear is I won’t be loved. So I have to be enough, skinny enough, strong enough, smart enough and you know strong enough, something enough, so I can have that.

So here’s the question, what’s your pattern? Are you smart enough, empathetic enough, pleasing enough, achieve enough, strong enough, what’s your pattern? It’s hard to find other’s patterns if you don’t know your own. And I’m sure you don’t just have one. But, we develop primary ways to do this, don’t we? And if you could understand it, it helps you to understand the person. Because how can you have heartfelt understanding, if you don’t even understand yourself?

By the way, feeling not enough, worthless, and unloved, is psychological, spiritual death. There’s nothing more scary. It’s a life of meaninglessness. And when you have no sense of meaning, that you are worthless and you are unloved, you have nothing. So we develop defense mechanisms for this. I call them breaker switches. Breaker switches are the beliefs we develop about why things are the way they are. It’s not that I’m not smart and strong enough, it’s because the world is screwed up, it’s because of ADD, it’s because my spouse is messed up, because my mother did this, because I was raped when I was 12. All those things may be true but none of them have to do with the fact of how you are right now.

You’re just scared, everybody is. So if we can get rid of the story, I always tell people the only thing keeping people from having what they want in their relationship is the story they keep telling themselves about why they can’t have it. You keep telling a story pretty soon you tell it loud enough, long enough you begin to believe it. It’s an incantation. You want to change your life, change the story. You want to change somebody else’s life change the story about that relationship, you can change anything.

So these two fears, these twin towers of not being enough and feeling like that you won’t be loved and then the beliefs systems we develop so that we don’t have to feel like we’re going to die inside, that something else is what keeps us from being able to have what we want. So how do you deal with these fears, since they are never going to go away? The answer is you’ve got to dance with them. It’s an energy that never goes away; you’ve got to learn how to use that energy. Can I have a strong guy as an example? I need to borrow a volunteer, anybody at all. Ok, come on up here, give him a hand.

Audience: (Applauds)

Tony: And, when you go to do this, let’s pretend for a moment, why don’t you come on this side, I want you to grab my wrist, with both your hands really tight, no my wrist, not my arm, down here at the wrist, tight. Squeeze tight. And I’m going to try and get away, don’t let me get away. Don’t let me get away.

Now, I’m bigger than he is, but if I try to get away, don’t let go, if I try to get away, could he break my wrist? Yes or no. Yes or no. Of course he can. Why? Because he’s got leverage on the angle. Now, take me someplace. Don’t let go of the wrist, hang on, take me someplace, take me someplace. (Music)

Ok, now, notice the more effort he puts out as he grabs me like this, that’s like fear grabbing you, if I fight it, don’t let go, that fear doesn’t go away, it just gets stronger. Pretend it’s not there, it gets stronger. If he takes me someplace and I just go with him, nothing’s going to happen to hurt us, everything is fine. Better yet if he grabs me tight by the wrist, tight, instead of fighting with it, what I do is this, I’m afraid, I’m not enough, I won’t be loved whatever it is. Instead of pretending it’s not there, fighting it, I could do this, don’t let go, I could go, “I agree with you”, as soon as I’m beside him, I can say, “I can see

it from your point of your fear. Yeah, I’m a human being; I’m starting to feel this fear, I’m not enough, I’m not loved.” And if I look at it from another way, I can take it for a dance. Give him a hand, thank you very much.

Now, that’s akedo, an akedo move, and akedo, when someone brings your energy at you, to attack you, instead of fighting and getting hard, you get soft and you look at it as a gift. Their energy is a gift, “Oh, a punch.” And you turn, you take and use it. Akedo is a great metaphor, for what has to happen with fear. We’ve got to learn how to use it, not pretend it’s not there, not fake that it’s not there, not make a shift or fight with it but know it’s there.

Now if we can get couples to know it, by the way who has these two fears, that they’re not enough and they won’t be loved. Who has them? Come on, who has them? Everyone. Because it’s the way you’re raised, not by your parents, not by that moment, everybody has that moment when oxytocin wears off, baby, you have to do something to be worthy of love. And that day fear enters your body.

So everybody has it and where, my dear friends, where does this fear come up more intensely than in an intimate relationship? Nowhere. Why? Because there, who has more power to make you feel like you’re not enough, than someone you’ve opened your soul to. See people are not afraid without their kids, most people want safe love; they go for their kid’s love. Why? Because they know their kids are going to love them. Why? Because they’re totally dependent upon them, they have no choice. Someday they may not act so loving. But people don’t think about that when having children.

I can’t tell you how many women get in a relationship, I’m sure you know, because you’re in the same industry I am, and they think having a child, now they’re going to have this love, it’s certain love that they’re after. But it doesn’t provide it. It’s not the same as the aliveness that comes from love and passion. It’s a beautiful, beautiful thing, I love my children. But it cannot compare, and it never will be. And I don’t want them to have any illusion that it will either, otherwise you’ll perpetrate that to the next generation. And that’s what happens.

So, two fears, if we’re going to break through those fears, we’ve got to shift our energy. We’re saying the first principal here is

that we’ve got to have heartfelt understanding and the test of that or the discipline that makes that real, not just some mental skill, is that you can measure that you truly are putting your partner, your lover first. And the reason you’re doing that is because if you love somebody you will do…

Audience: Anything.

Tony: …for them. And if you know that’s true, then you don’t want to be someone who just demands love like a baby, not someone who trades for like it like a whore, but somebody who gives it because it’s who you are. And/or gives it even when it hurts, now that doesn’t mean, you let someone continue to harm you. The Dalai Lama isn’t sitting there letting people try to kill him, he left, but he still has love. And when we hit level three and four, we have an extraordinary life. What keeps us in that, is fear.

What are the two fears? Number one, that I’m not enough. And if I’m not enough then I won’t be…

Audience: Loved.

Tony: Is that fear ever going to go away? Yes or no.

Audience: No.

Tony: Who has that fear?

Audience: Everybody.

Tony: Everybody, the only secret is, learn how to use it instead of letting it use you because it is energy. Dance with it, acknowledge it and move on, not try and pretend it’s not there, denial lying to yourself won’t change anything. Fighting with it will just engage your mind. You got to step out of it.

What’s the second principle that compliments the first? Give your partner what they really need. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard that phrase, you’ve heard too, “I gave him or her…” what, what do they always say? Everything. Bull, if you gave them everything, they would want to be with you. You gave them everything except what they needed. And you clearly didn’t know what they need.

Now if you know everyone’s deepest fear, is that they’re not enough and they won’t be loved, then the antidote to this, the

discipline of truly giving a partner what they need, giving your lover what they need, is to love them no matter what. Now, this is a really controversial one for some people. I’ve had people get pissed at me, “what do you mean love them no matter what? They’re going to abuse me, and love them?” I’m not saying stay with them, if they’re going to be abusive.

But if someone knows, no matter what that you’re going to love them, then they’ll keep testing it. But if they really get that over and over again, there will be a day it sinks in and is the most magic day of a relationships life. And I remember one time I was with my wife and we were driving and my wife had motion sickness for most of her life. So when I met her, I had all these cars, I was a car guy and suddenly I was on the right hand side of like a Hummer in this little seat and she’s driving and hitting things usually and then she would explain to me that, it’s cause the car was too wide. It had nothing to do with her driving; it was the car was too wide.

So I remember we were on a freeway and we’re driving along and we’re coming down this curve, and my wife likes speed. So she starts going really fast, I’m like, “slow down, slow down.” And she, and then it was just like, she got this little thing, if you tell her what to do, she’s got to do the opposite. So she started speeding up more and I was, my slow down, was, I was concerned because she has smacked things, she’s done things, her visual perception is not the highest skills that she has in her nervous system.

And so, I’m looking at this thing and she’s not judging right and I’m thinking we’re going to go off the edge and sure enough we start shimmying right near the edge where we’re going to go off, and we would literally be off the side of this off ramp and smash down the freeway and we just barely make it. But I am so angry, I want to kill her, then she, I’m trying to protect her and us, and she completely ignored me and I got somewhat upset.

And so I expressed it with full intensity, which only made her more pissed and more strong. It was like these two people butting heads. So by the time we got to the airport, and I am more than sharing how I feel, and she’s like, “don’t say anything in public”, see that’s her rule, don’t do it in public. So I’m going to violate the hell out of that rule. She violated my

rule so I’m going to violate your rules. And so we’re getting all upset.

Long story short, I was still upset, I mean, so upset because I felt like I couldn’t trust her. Because I’m trying to do something, looking out for her life and she’s not going to listen to me, that violated trust. When trust and respect get violated, you got a real problem. And everybody has different rules for those, right? So mine may seem like nothing to you but they meant a lot to me and everybody has their own rules.

So I was feeling like I can’t do my job as a man, to take care of her because she won’t listen to me, she’s going to actually do the opposite and be stupid. And I couldn’t get over it, we got on the big plane and I was still animated and I felt this anger inside which was really just hurt that she wouldn’t listen, that I can’t make the difference that I couldn’t trust in the future. All these meanings you’re making up. By the way, when you get those meanings you can’t trust somebody, boy, that’s a big one, isn’t it? And I did that all over because she drove fast in the lane.

And I couldn’t get over it until one moment, which I’ll never forget, when Sage turned to me and she looked at me, and she said, “you’re not knowing who I am”, she goes, “I know I got this pattern, I just sped up and you know, it’s not what you think it is.” She said just, “I want you to know one thing.” She said, “look at my eyes”, and I’m looking at her and she said, “I’ll never get out of the car.” I said, “what?” She said, “I’ll never get out of the car”, she says, “is there ever…” that’s my metaphor, she said, “If I ever, no matter what’s happened in the time we’ve been together, have I ever pulled my love away from you? Ever?” I was like, “no.” She goes, “I never will.” She said, “my love is not a trade, my love is not going to be taken from you, you can trust me at the deepest level.” And I remember just looking in her eyes and she pierced me with her eyes and I just started to cry.

Because I’ve never been in a relationship, where someone would love no matter what. And I knew that, it wasn’t just what she said, it’s what we’d been already through. That was true, and that reestablished the trust, beyond trust. It made me feel like wow. Because the ultimate need, giving your partner what they need, the ultimate need is love. But with that they also need some certainty that that love will last.

And most people are afraid, that the minute they do something, that the other person doesn’t like, doesn’t match their rules, they’re going to take their love away. That’s the deepest fear. So, if you can go to, where number one, you have heartfelt understanding, you put your partner first. But number two, you give your partner what they really need, you love them no matter what, you can melt any relationship. I don’t care who it is or know where it is. It takes consistency of demonstrating because people don’t believe because they are so scared. They are scared their love is going to be taken away. They are scared that I am going to do something that now you won’t perceive me as enough and then you won’t love me. And so most people shut down, and as they shut down, that makes the other partner scared and it starts turning into a real challenge.

So if you can have a heartfelt understanding and it gives people what they need, maybe you should know what they are. And when I say, know what they are, I mean know what their needs are. And I’ll tell you that the tool that I’ve evolved, that’s helped me to do that more than anything else is understanding three forces of destiny. Three things I want to have you leave with, here tonight, real quickly.

Number one thing is, you got to know what someone’s motive is. What I mean by that is why do people do what they do? Yes, we know that people feel the way they feel because of the meaning and the meaning comes from the way they use their body, what they focus on and language. But why do people do what they do? That’s been my obsession for 30 years. So I can tell you over those 30 years it’s become very clear that there are six human needs. Let me give them to you real quick, and then we will apply them with you in a relationship.

Need number one is the need for certainty. Every human being has a need to feel certain. Certain that you can avoid pain, certain that you can be comfortable at the most basic of level. Certain you are can have pleasure would be ideal, but we need a minimum certainty we can avoid pain. In fact that need for certainty is the survival instinct. Because if we can’t avoid pain, we are going to continue to have pain, continuing with that pain equals damage. Continued damage equals death.

So certainty is a fundamental need structure for everyone. It’s not a goal, it’s not a desire. It’s not based on your upbringing. It’s in the nervous system of every human being. And if you doubt this and how important this is, I want you to try something for a moment.

Think of a time in your life when you felt like there was a lack of certainty about something that really mattered to you. Like you weren’t certain about your career or your economics or about your health or the health of someone you love or about your love, whether somebody really loved you or not. How many can remember a time when you had enormous uncertainty about something like this? Say, aye.

What else could you focus on when this was going on? How much did it mess your mind up? It becomes your total focus. I was doing a seminar, I remember one time, in Switzerland and we had a room with, I don’t know, a couple of thousand people. And we were jumping and leaping generating energy in the room and the floor started going up and down about two feet, literally the floor wavering like this, and all of a sudden everybody stopped. No one was listening to what I said. No one was listening to anything. When that floor…maybe to have certainty that the floor was going to stand up, there was just no way they were going to listen or hear anything else.

Certainty is the most basic human need, and in a relationship, do people need certainty? Yes or no. When they have a lack of certainty it makes them crazy at a basic level. Everyone has this need for certainty. The only difference in people is two things. There are six needs, which one you place first determines the direction of your life. If certainty is the number one thing someone is looking for in a relationship, you can predict how that relationship is going to be. It’s going to be dead.

Because if you can get a relationship certain enough, think about this. If you know what’s going to happen, when it’s going to happen, how it’s going to happen, every moment of your life, in the beginning you would feel really powerful, wouldn’t it? But after a while what emotion would you start to feel. You know what’s going to happen, when it’s going to happen, how it’s going to happen with a person, what do you start to feel? Bored out of your mind.

That’s why God, in her infinite wisdom gave us a second human need and that need is uncertainty. We have a need for uncertainty. We have a need for challenge, to feel alive. In fact variety is the what of life? The spice of life. How many of you in this room love surprises? Raise your hand and say, aye.

Audience: Aye.

Tony: Bull. You like the surprises you want. The surprises you don’t want, you call problems. Bet you need them too don’t you? See we need certainty and yet we need uncertainty. Now the difference in people, I said was two-fold. Number one is which need do you hold as number one and number two. I call those the driving force. If you are trying to get certainty you are going to head in one direction. If you are trying to get uncertainty or variety, you are heading in a totally different direction, and direction ultimately leads to a destination or a destiny for that relationship, for that life, for anything. Is that predictable? You bet.

The second difference in people is how they get that certainty or uncertainty. See some people get certainty by working harder at something. They work hard so they can master something and then they are certain, that gives them confidence, they feel certain. Some people get certainty by lowering their expectation. “It will never work. It never does. All the good ones are gone”, right? “It’s not going to happen.” And so what happens is, by lowering their expectation they don’t achieve anything, but at least they are certain. And certainty is a need.

In fact, hear me now. People will violate their own values to meet their needs. Who here has ever lied even though you are an honest person? Raise your hand, say, aye. Why did you lie? Because you perceived that by lying you will meet one or more of these six human needs, I promise you. Certainty is only one of them.

So it’s very, very important to understand, how do they get certainty. Some people get certainty by doing the same thing over and over again. If I can have the same rituals, I have a certainty. Some people have certainty by God. They have faith. You know what, I don’t know why this has happened but I trust God is always guiding me, it will lead to something better. And they get certainty.

Somebody gets certainty by their past. I don’t know how I am going to turn this around but I’ve always figured out in the past, I will figure it out again. Some people get certainty by just being as negative as possible, again another way of lowering expectations.

Somebody gets certainty by smoking a cigarette or by eating a lot of food because when you are stressed out, what do most people do. They stop breathing. They get shallow breath. I take a deep breath from my cigarette and blow it out nice and slow, shhhh! Totally changed my physiology, I am killing myself but I am comfortable. Right? Because it does, it changes physiology.

Same thing when you eat too much food, goes into your stomach, all the blood goes in there, and now you start breathing in your abdomen again. All of a sudden you are less stressed. So millions of ways to get certainty. The only question is, are you getting it in productive ways, empowering ways, neutral or disempowering?

If I come along here and I say…Sir, what’s your name? Mark? Mark, I like you to lose 30 pounds by tomorrow morning at 9 am, and if you do, I have $30 million cash, I’ve put into an escrow account for you. Can you do it? No. Boy! What a limited thinker Mark is? Is this an obtainable goal? Yes or no.

Audience: Yes.

Tony: Sure, it is. Cut off the head, cut off the legs and we can get him there. It’s an obtainable goal but it’s not a sustainable goal. Most people meet their needs in a way that’s obtainable, it works in the moment but long-term it’s destructive. And so, are you doing destructive, empowering or disempowering?

How about uncertainty? How could you get uncertainty? You can get it by eating because variety is just a state change. You can get it by drugs, alcohol and by the way when people take alcohol or they take that drug, does it work? You bet it does, they are certain it works and it totally changes their state and gives them variety. It meets both.

How many of you have ever rented a movie that you have already seen? How many have ever done this, raise your hand? Get a life. I have done it too. Why would we rent a movie we

have already seen? Because you are certain it’s good, because you have seen it before and you’re hoping it’s been long enough, you forgot enough, there’d be variety. So it meets both needs. So while they look like they are opposing, or a paradox between certainty and uncertainty, there is ways for them to complement.

In a relationship though, what makes things feel alive in the beginning? What makes it so sexy and playful and fun and exciting and juicy? Certainty or uncertainty? That’s right and people have so much uncertainty, they love the feeling but they want to be certain they can hang on to it. So then what they do is try to control their partner so that there are no uncertainties and of course, it kills all the joy.

I can’t tell you how many famous people I have dealt with who are very good people, women. Especially today women, even more so today, it’s amazing, who have unbelievably high strict moral values and they are cheating on their husband. And they come to me in therapy to talk to me about this privately and they are angry with themselves, they are beating themselves up, but they are still doing it.

Why would a person who has these values and beliefs that says I am moral, I am honest, I would never cheat on anybody, cheat on her husband? And so I dig in and I say to her, why don’t you leave him and go with this guy then? Just as a test. They always, “Oh no, no, I wouldn’t want to do that.” “Well, why not?” “Oh, I don’t know.”

So then I start checking out these needs. I say, “Ok, tell me, with this person that you have, this person that you have this passion with, how certain are you that they love you that they will be there for you forever?” “I am not.” “How uncertain are you like you never know what’s going to happen next with them?” “Oh, yeah.” Well, I say zero to ten, they go, “variety, ten. Certainty, I don't know, four.”

How certain are you, your husband loves you? “Oh, ten.” How much variety? “Minus two.” See people meet…this woman would be meeting some of her needs with her natural relationship, their husband. She meets other needs with this other person. It doesn’t end with variety though. This is the big one that’s coming next.

Number three. The third human need - significance. They need to feel special, important, unique. Who has that need by the way? Everybody and whenever you come in to a couple and there is an upset, I guarantee you, even though they talk about love, there is also significance issue here. They don’t feel important. They don’t feel unique, they don’t feel special. How many agree with me on this? Raise your hand and say, aye. Everybody needs this. The only difference in people is whether it’s number one, two, three, four, five on their list of importance. But everybody needs it. And the only difference in people also is how they get it.

Some people get significance by dressing up, so that people notice them, by using their sexual energy. Some people get significance by achieving things. Some people get significance by putting earrings and tattoos in locations none of us want to talk about. Some people get significance by being significantly pissed off all the time, so people notice them.

The fastest way to get significance most people use is having a problem. Because you have to pay attention to me or you have no heart. I have this big problem and it’s not my fault. I have this problem, it’s this thing that was done to me. And so we can have certainty with a problem because it’s – we know it. And we get significance with a problem and plus you can look at that problem from so many angles, they have variety.

Now let me tell you something. Hear me on this now. Thirty years, I can tell you this beyond a shadow of doubt. Any time somebody links in their head, that thinking something, believing something, doing something, feeling something meets at least three of their needs, they become addicted to that thought, that feeling, that behavior. I don’t care who it is. Anytime they link up in their head, that by doing this, thinking this, feeling this, acting this way, I meet at least three of these needs it becomes an addiction. I’ll tell you the fastest way to get significance without a lot of money or education is violence. You’re walking along and I suddenly come out of the barrio or the hood and I put a gun to your head. On a zero to ten, how significant am I in your life? Where am I, come on? Ten. And how certain am I, that you are going to respond to me? Zero to ten. Ten. Plus there is variety because every time, it’s different. Who knows what’s going to happen?

Violence is an addiction. It’s been in all of mankind’s history and always will be until we’ve a consciousness change because it’s a fast way to meet needs, unfortunately. So you can get significance by being more generous. You can get significance by having a child. Some people try to have a kid so they can have a significant life and the baby shows up and they don’t feel so significant. Interesting things occur, if you try to meet these needs. You can find them in neutral ways, positive or negative.

Fourth human need, the need for connection and love. For connection and love, who needs to feel deep feelings like connection and love, who? Everybody. Now most people settle for connection because, love is too scary. Because if I open myself to love, I’m completely vulnerable, oh my God. Now that person has the power to make me feel like I am not significant, you know, but I am not loved. I might as well feel dead. So most people settle for connection, because it’s safer. But then they miss out on the juice of life.

How can you get connection and love? Millions of ways. You can have connections through a great conversation with girlfriends, boyfriends, you know, friends. You can get connection by prayer, connecting with God. You can get connection in so many different ways; by making love, by an interesting conversation. You can have it, if nothing else works to get connection and love, get a dog. Don’t get a cat, get a dog. Cats are independent but a dog, you leave for five minutes, come back with a newspaper, it’s like you have been gone for 6 months, they’re so excited to see you.

Anybody can get connection and love. Again the only way is do you do a neutral, negative or positive. Number one way people get connection and love in our culture today, have a problem. A really big problem that’s not your fault. It’s your parents, it’s your past, it’s your this, because I got a problem and you don’t pay attention then you’re heartless. And besides that, people don’t like hearing how happy and successful you are. They don’t like that shit. You talk about that, you are full of crap, you are egotistic. But if you talk of your problems, “hey, I understand.”

There is total connection with problems for most people. And have you ever seen two people arguing over whose problem is bigger, “Oh you think, you’ve got problems? Let me tell you about my problem?” They connect with problems and they

argue over whose is more significant. Everyone finds a way to meet these four needs. I don’t care who they are, even if they have to lie to themselves, even if they work 20 hours a day. Even if they have the split personalities, everyone finds a way to meet these needs at some level. The only question is, zero to ten how high. And again do you get in a way that’s obtainable or sustainable, a way that supports or costs you through time.

These are the needs of the personality. The final two needs though are where fulfillment comes from. Most people are not fulfilled. Number five is, you must grow. If you don’t grow, you what? We all know it. What makes people happy? Progress. We must grow. And number six, we must contribute beyond ourselves.

Nobody. I don’t care who it is, I have got a client who made $500 million in one day in the 1980’s when that was a lot of money. Can’t live on that, but it gives you a good start; $500 million in a day. He literally called the stock market, when the stock market crashed in the 80’s, hour by hour, a day in advance. President Reagan called him and asked, what to do. He made $500 million cash, not in stock, cash. Half a billion and then went on to make no money for the next four years.

It was like the guys that go to the moon. You know, they go to the moon and they walk on the moon. You look back and see that picture of the earth that we’ve all seen. But they saw it for real hanging in the sky. They came back, had a ticker-tape parade in New York City. They shook the President’s hand. Now what the hell do you do after you’ve been to the moon. Anybody know what happened to their lives? Total depression. Many became alcoholics, some got addicted to drugs because they thought the only way to have adventure was to walk on the moon. They forgot how to find adventure in a smile.

See, that sense of life that’s only about you, is why people don’t feel alive. And in relationships, it’s a disease of selfishness. Life’s not about ‘me’, it’s about ‘we’. And when people feel like they’ve done something, and they contribute to someone in some way that’s real, you all know because you picked this profession, it makes you feel alive doesn’t it. There is no feeling like it. But to be able to contribute something you got to grow.

So I told you these six needs for a very important reason. Let’s do a little test right now. And here’s what I want you to do. I

want you to think of something that you love to do, that you could do that’s relatively effortless for you, meaning a lot of other people would see it’s like work, but for you, you love to do it. You could do it for hours. Maybe you could think of a task, or something you like to engage in, that not everybody would love, but for you, you love it. You could do it for hours. How many thinking of something like that? Raise your hand.

Great now I want to give you a little test and you’ll see whether these needs are just some mathematical formula or a bunch of words, or whether they actually influence all human behavior. So lets look at you.

Think of this thing you really love to do. And tell me on a scale from zero to ten, first of all, how certain are you that you can do this well or that you are going to enjoy doing this, on a zero to ten. Zero is not at all, ten is to absolute. Give me a number. Shout it out loud, go.

Audience: Ten.

Tony: Say it again.

Audience: Ten.

Tony: Raise your hand if it’s ten. Keep your hand up, look around the room. 90% of the room. Raise your hand if it’s nine. Raise your hand if it’s eight. Raise your hand if it’s seven. Six. Five or below. So you’ll see 95% of the room, it’s at ten. Then you got another chunk of nine, eight, seven. When I get down to six or five, it’s two or three people. Because if you really love something, it meets your need for certainty at a high level. Six or above. Or it meets some of the other needs. But certainty is the base one.

Now think of this thing you love to do and tell me, does this give you a sense of variety that doing this is going to be fun, it’s going to be different. That you are going to enjoy from the variety perspective. Zero to ten, where would you rate it? Say it out loud, go.

Audience: Ten.

Tony: Say it again.

Audience: Ten.

Tony: Raise your hand if it’s ten. Look around the room. Raise your hand if it’s nine. Eight. Seven. Six or below. Again very few. When you are doing this do you feel like you got a special skill or ability or you can do it incredibly well or you feel unique? Where would you rate it zero to ten? Say it loud, go.

Audience: Ten.

Tony: Say it again.

Audience: Ten.

Tony: Raise your hand if it’s ten. Look around. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six or below. Fantastic. How about, think about gauging this task. Do you feel a sense of connection with yourself or God or other people, that when you are doing this you just feel connected? Zero to ten, where would you rate it? Yell it out loud, go.

Audience: Ten.

Tony: Yeah, raise your hand if it’s ten. Look around the room. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six or below. So now, of these four, at the basic level most of you’ve met these at a very high level already. That’s why you love it. How about growing? How many of you, when you think about doing this, you feel like you are always growing or getting better or finding a way to do it. Zero to ten, go.

Audience: Ten.

Tony: Raise your hand if it’s ten. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six or below. How about a sense of contribution that doing this feels like you’re contributing in some way, to people, yourself, or the world, or God or your family or something of that nature that there is a sense of contribution that comes out of this to some extent. Give me a score of zero to ten for you.

Audience: Ten.

Tony: Raise your hand if it’s ten. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six or below. Now, how many of you met at least three of these needs at six or above? Let me see, a show of hands. How many met about four of these at six or above? Five of these at six or above? Six of these at six or above?

How many met these at seven, eight or above or full for at least four or five of these? Then it’s not hard to figure out why you do

it. It isn’t because you are so disciplined, it’s because it meets your needs. And the way you wired it, the way you perceive it, the way you focus and the meaning you give it, makes you feel it certain and it makes you feel like there is variety, that it’s significant, there is connection. Now it may not be all six but you meet at least three at a very high level. And most of you are meeting more than three, that’s why you love it because it fills you up.

See, when you really love someone or when you love what you do, it’s just another way of saying, all your needs are being met. When you love someone time disappears. When you love what you are doing, time disappears. What else disappears? You disappear. It’s not about you anymore. You don’t need anything else. You are in the experience. Well, that’s what happens when your needs are met.

Now let’s look at the opposite. So you can test this for yourself. Think of something you hate to do or you put off as much as possible or if you could afford it you’d pay someone else to do. How many of you can think of a task like this, raise your hand? No problem on this one, huh? Great. Now I want you to think how much this meets your need for certainty. I want you to tell me in a scale from minus ten to plus ten. How much positive certainty you have that you are going to enjoy doing this, that it’s going to make you feel strong and you feel effective. Give me a score of minus ten to plus ten. What is it? go. Say it again. How many said a minus number? Keep your hands up, look around the room. 95% of the room said a minus number.

Now, think about positive variety. When you think about engaging in this activity, you don't like to do, how much positive variety do you get, in a sense that it’s going to be unique and different and fun, each time? Minus ten to plus ten, give me a score. Say it out loud. Raise your hand, if you had a minus score. So you can see, of course it doesn’t meet these needs. How about significance? Think about this task and engaging it.

How about you feel, how it makes you feel significant, unique and special to engage in this task? Plus ten if it totally does, minus ten if not at all. Give me the number, nice and loud. Say it again. How many are at a minus number. Let me see a show of hands. Think about, how much connection and love you feel

when you’re engaged in this task? What’s the score? Plus ten to minus ten, give me a score.

Audience: Minus Ten.

Tony: Ah, you said that one strong, say it again.

Audience: Minus Ten.

Speaker: Minus Ten. How many got minus…below minus category? Let me see a show of hands. Virtually everybody. How about not that if you did do this, you’d grow, but that you associate growth to doing this? Like you know you’re going to grow and enjoy it. Give me a score of plus ten to minus ten, go. How many are minus category? And finally, that this is a huge contribution, that doing this makes you feel like you are contributing in a significant way to those you love or to others. Give me a score of minus ten to plus ten. Say it again. How many are minus category? Now how many of you found that you had needs here, that when you think about this task, your perception of it’s meaning does not meet three of your needs at six or above. How many found the opposite, it met many of your needs in minus category, let me see a show of hands. So that’s why you don’t like it.

Now here’s what’s interesting. In any relationship or any activity you could love it, if you change one or two things; your perception or your procedure. So I’ll give you an example. Who here hates to clean house? Raise your hands, hates to clean house. Make some noise, if you hate to clean house, ladies and gentlemen.

Audience: (Screaming)

Tony: Me too, watch this. Who here, loves to clean house? Raise your hand. Loves to clean house, look at this. People with clean house. Ok, yes ma’am, right here in the blue, would you stand up? Give her a hand, she loves to clean house, give her a hand.

Audience: (Applauds)

Tony: What’s your name ma’am?

Molly: Molly.

Tony: Hi, Molly. Where are you from?

Molly: Kansas City.

Tony: Ok. Molly, tell me something. You love cleaning house?

Molly: I do.

Tony: You do. Ok, then tell me, on a scale from zero to ten, how much positive certainty do you have that you can do it well, that you are going to enjoy it? Zero to ten, where would you put it?

Molly: Nine.

Tony: Nine, ok. How do you get certainty from cleaning house?

Molly: I do it a lot.

Tony: I do it a lot.

Molly: I do it often.

Tony: And do you do it well?

Molly: Yes.

Tony: Yes. So she has certainty because there is consistency to it, and it’s there, at a nine. How much positive variety can you get from cleaning your house?

Molly: Ten.

Tony: Ten. Variety from cleaning your house?

Molly: Yes.

Tony: How the hell do you do that? What do you focus on?

Molly: It depends on how many Margaritas I’ve had, before I get off the bucket.

Tony: Notice, what did I say? Change your perception or your procedure. Margaritas, and cleaning your house feels so good. How do you get variety besides Margaritas? Seriously. Because you do, don’t you.

Molly: Yes.

Tony: How else do you do it?

Molly: You start in a different room.

Tony: You start what?

Molly: In a different room.

Tony: You start in a different room. One woman said to me, I have five children. Trust me, there is plenty of variety. You never know what you’re going to find. How significant do you feel cleaning your house and making it really clean?

Molly: Oh, ten.

Tony: How do you get significance from cleaning your house?

Molly: I love my house.

Tony: You love your house. And how do you feel when you know it’s really clean like that, and you made it that way?

Molly: Oh, wow.

Tony: Wow. Right?

Molly: Yeah.

Tony: Cleanliness is next to godliness or…?

Molly: Yes, Catholic, yes.

Tony: Yes.

Molly: The Pope is very happy when I clean my house.

Tony: And how much connection or love do you feel with yourself, or with your family, or with others when you are cleaning? Zero to ten, seriously.

Molly: Three.

Tony: Three. So she doesn’t feel as much connection. How much growth do you feel, when you’re doing this?

Molly: Five.

Tony: Five. How much sense of a contribution, when you are doing this?

Molly: Six.

Tony: So, she meets certainty, variety and significance, the others so, so. Now I interviewed a woman who just worships cleaning

house and she said to me, “I have certainty because I know I do it so well, nobody cleans house like I do.” Variety; she said, “I got five kids, you never what you are going to find. Different house, I put on different music, I listen to tapes and that’s how I got to know you. I listened to your tapes while I was cleaning my house. I am always doing something different, it’s never the same.” Changed her procedure than most people, and her perception.

Significance; she goes, “I feel like a ten. Because again nobody cleans house like I do. I mean most people’s houses are ugly and dirty, they don’t take care of it, they don’t pride in. I do. Ten.” Connection and love, she said, “Twenty.” How do you feel connection and love when you are cleaning house? She goes, “I pray for my children while I am ironing their clothes.” She goes, “it’s my time. It’s my time to connect with God, it’s my time to connect with my children. It’s my time to pray.” She loves it.

Growth, she said, “Ten.” She goes, “because I am always figuring new ways to do it. Do it faster, do it better, do it different.” Contribution, “Twenty.” She goes, “when my family comes home, and the house is that clean, I just feel like, man I have given them a gift they don’t have to worry about.”

It has nothing to do with reality. It’s your perception or your procedure. If you find someone else who loves it, they are doing it in a different way, that’s procedure or they are focusing on something different, that’s perception. Same thing is true in every relationship. In every relationship, there is a score for each of these. When the relationship is not going well, the score is going down. Give her a big hand, thank you very much.

Molly: Thank you.

Tony: Here’s where the game gets very interesting. So what are the six needs? Number one, nice and loud, is.

Audience: Certainty.

Tony: Number two is?

Audience: Uncertainty.

Tony: Number three is?

Audience: Significance.

Tony: Number four is?

Audience: Connection.

Tony: Connection and love. Those first four needs are the needs of the personality. Everybody needs them at some level. But the final needs that make people fulfilled, there is number five they must feel like they are…

Audience: Growing.

Tony: And number six they must feel like they are…

Audience: Contributing.

Tony: Contributing beyond their self. A relationship missing five and six is always in trouble; just only question is to what level of intensity. Now interestingly enough, if we look at these, here is what shapes your life the most. Number one, which of these two needs are number one and two for you, and which in terms you value? If you are looking for significance most out of a relationship, you are not going to have the same amount of love. If you are looking for love, you are going to have a different relationship.

Trying to get certainty, it’s a very different relationship. Trying to get variety, it’s a very different relationship. Everybody wants all six, but we all have learned to value one or two. Everybody wants love, but operationally, some people have to have certainty before they open up and have that love. And that makes all the difference in a relationship.

So here is my first question for you. Look at yourself first. Which of these six needs have you learned to value most at number one, and number two? Not in your heart, in your heart everybody wants love. But the way you’ve lived, operationally, and jot it down. Jot it down, right now. Which of these needs, which of these needs have you made number one and which have you made number two? What’s been at the top of your list, of how you lived your life?

And once you write down which one’s number one and number two, the way you’ve lived, answer a question for yourself. What challenge would this create in a relationship, if I value this as number one? What challenges would that create? What

problems would it create? Which needs have you valued most at the top of your list in the way you’ve lived, again not what you want, but the way you lived? Is it certainty, uncertainty, significance, connection and love, growth or contribution? And then what challenges can you predict would occur, if any, by valuing those needs first?

Where has it created challenges for you in the past? And then if you would, turn to a partner and tell them which two needs have you valued most and what impact has that had for you. Go ahead, right now, real quick. Just share it with a partner besides you here. Go for it.

Ok, finish up. Let’s take a little sampling, who can share? I’m curious. What have been your top two needs and what’s the impact that you can see it’s had on a relationship? Yes, let’s have a big hand for this gentleman, yes sir. Give him a hand ladies and gentlemen. Oh, give him some energy for God sake’s. What’s your name sir, where you from?

Mike: Mike baker, Tony. From Denver.

Tony: From Denver. So tell us, which of these two needs have you made at the top in the way you’ve lived, not necessarily what you felt, what you’ve lived.

Mike: Significance, and love and connection.

Tony: And then love and connection. So by putting significance first, how has that impacted your relationships?

Mike: Well, It’s with…my wife Suzan right here; I’ve always said it’s always variety before, when I’ve done…

Tony: You’ve always what?

Mike: I always had thought it was variety before, but when I was being honest with myself for a moment, I really found it was significance. And how it’s impacted it is, I put unfair expectations on Suzan of how I want her to be, because I deserve who I…Everything I’ve done and given her, I want her to do or lose weight, and so it puts this weird thing, going on, It’s not my intent but, I think it’s been my focus.

Tony: First of all, give him a hand for the honesty, that’s fantastic. And so, what you’ve got to get underneath this is, if you can see

the consequence, if love was number one, how would you behave differently?

Mike: I wouldn’t expect her to lose weight or, I mean, specifically this thing we have going on right now is, I want her to be lighter, which she is.

Tony: Yes.

Mike: And I know that…internally I know that it’s not what I want, but it’s what I communicate to her.

Tony: What’s ironic is if the relationship changes, where someone feels like it’s expected, how many of you, for example, have had times where you wanted to give somebody a gift as an example as a metaphor, and they found out they expected it, and it took all the joy out of it, almost made you not want to give it, how many have had this experience? Say, aye. Well, what’s ironic is, in the dynamic in a relationship like this, almost always, when a person feels completely loved, then they have a desire to create a change. It actually changes the dynamic almost immediately, but when it’s expected, it’s something that becomes resented, or pushed away or frustrated. And ironically, that experience you’re trying to get from her, that she gives to you, and gives you that significance, really just comes from underneath, not feeling that you’re enough.

I have to be significant, she’s got to be significant, I’ve got to feel significant, and yet all of us in a relationship, any relationship starts to pale when someone feels like something else is more important than you are. Whether it’s the kids, whether it’s the business, when a couple feels like they’re not as important, oh you can count on problems. Because we have the need for significance.

But making it number one, crushes a relationship. So once you to become conscience of it, the awareness of it is breaking that pattern and thinking ok, “the most significant thing on earth is love. And if I can feel her love, if I can love her and feel her love”, that’s a very different game, and developing that pattern is a habit, that’s some of the things that we teach. Give him a hand. Thank you very much.

Somebody else. Yes ma’am. Give her a hand. Oh come on, give it up for her.

Audience: (Applauds)

Tony: What’s your name ma’am, where’re you from?

Lucille: I’m Lucille McDaniel, I’m from Abilene, Texas.

Tony: Alright. What needs have you made at the top?

Lucille: Growth was number one and contribution was number two.

Tony: Wonderful. What do you do?

Lucille: I’m a social worker. (Laughs)

Tony: Is she in alignment with those needs? Very nice. How has that affected your relationship, though?

Lucille: I feel, that I challenge other people in my relationships.

Tony: Yes.

Lucille: They feel challenged by my need to grow.

Tony: Yes. And is that good, bad, indifferent?

Lucille: It’s good for some. The people that I keep.

Tony: The people that you keep. Alright, you have a little list, I see. Alright, give her a hand. Thank you very much.

Audience: (Applauds)

Tony: Question, how many of you, your number one need, that you’ve been going for is certainty? Raise your hand. Keep your hands up. How many of you it’s uncertainty or variety that you have been pursuing most? How many of you had significance, that you’ve been pursuing most? And notice how dominant this one is. And it’s because we have the need, because we don’t feel like we’re enough so we try to get in relationship. How many in love is the number one thing you’ve really been pursuing? How many it’s been growth for you? How many contribution?

And contribution would be natural in a group like this also because, contribution is a safe way to get love. Because if I’m contributing, I’m always giving, and giving, and giving to you, I’m not asking for anything in return, so you tend to love me. If I was demanding it or expecting it, you wouldn’t do it. So that’s another strategy for doing it.

So first step, is really just being aware. Now here’s what’s really more interesting. Once you know what someone’s need structures are, what most people do is they don’t meet that need. If you talk to a couple, I do this all the time, or a man’s thinking of leaving his wife and I’ll say to him, “Ok, tell me on a zero to ten, how much certainty do you have that she really loves you?” And he might say. six or a seven. How much variety do you have in your relationship, surprise; and he’ll say, minus two. How significant do you feel to her? He said, “A three.” How much, you know, do you feel a connection and love? He’ll say a five. How much do you feel like you’re growing? “Two.” How much do you feel like she’s contributing, or contributing to her? “Four.”

At this level, he’s barely meeting his needs at any level. So he’ll tell me, “you know, I’m thinking of leaving”, and I’ll say, “Well before you do that, let’s just check out how many of her needs you’re meeting.” And I’ll say so, even if she’s not there, I’ll say, “now, I want you to step into her body and tell me on a zero to ten, how much certainty does she have you are there for her no matter what and love her?” And you’ll see his face go… and I said, “be honest”, and he’ll go, two. How much variety do you create for her in this relationship zero to ten? How much sense of surprise, that when she knows, she comes to you, she never knows what’s going to happen? He goes, “minus one.” How significant do you make her feel at this stage in the relationship? “Three.” How much love and connection do you feel like you give her? “Oh, four, five.” How much growth? “Two.” Contribution? “Two.”

So I said before your run off to someone else, let me just explain something to you. To run off to the next sunset, where you’re going to bump into somebody else, who in the beginning, you’ll meet each other’s needs because it will be new, and then very quickly you’ll drift right back into this. You have missed the very first principal - put your lover first. You’re not doing that at all, you’re not meeting any of her needs and you’re wondering why yours aren’t met. So before you go and run off to try and find the next person, and you got a daughter here you ‘re going to be leaving, which is the only reason you haven’t left, you’ve got to figure out, hey, how do you practice just these two principals? How do I truly have heartfelt understanding of what my partner needs by putting them first?

And how do I give them what they really need? Which is love, no matter what.

If you establish those two principals, forget all the rest of them, you can transform any relationship. So then you say, what would you do to create more variety? What would you do? And you’d come up with a procedure, a plan, a strategy and all of a sudden people get excited because they start to feel like, “Oh my God, I could really light them up”, and I say, you go home, and I can tell you this for sure. I have never met anyone who said, “Oh my God, in my relationship with my husband or my wife, I am so certain he loves me, she loves me, I mean it’s unbelievable. Plus we have so much variety and never know what we’re going to do together, it’s so exciting. And I feel like the most important person in their life man, ten. And we have so much connection and love, we’re growing and we’re contributing together. Man, I just got to leave this person.”

Audience: (Laughs)

Tony: It ain’t going to happen. If you meet two of a person’s needs, you have a friend or an acquaintance. You meet three; you got a deep love. You meet four, five or six, you have a love slave. See, it’s a fact how it works, it’s how it works. In my relationship with my wife the last nine years, I can tell you, on a certainty scale it’s a hundred. At a variety scale, she’s crazy and I’m a bit crazy so it’s, it’s off the charts.

On a significant scale, there is nothing more important to me, than my wife, nothing on earth, nothing. Zero to ten – it’s off the charts. I feel the same for her. Connection of love, the same way. When all those needs are met, you’re crazy for each other, you don’t want to be apart, you’re not looking for time with girlfriends or so you can go out to the bar, do something like that, because you’re so fulfilled. If someone’s looking to leave and be somewhere else without you, outside necessity, it’s because more of their needs are being met there. If someone is cheating in a relationship, as horrible as that may be, it takes two to tango. I hear people all the time and they make the other person wrong and I say listen, I agree their behavior is wrong. But their behavior is motivated by the fact that their needs aren’t being met.

People will violate their own values to meet their needs. The honest person who cheats because why, I say leave your

husband then. Just to test her. “No, no, no.” Because with him, she has certainty, with a boyfriend she has variety. With a boyfriend she feels significant. She doesn’t feel significant to her husband but feels loved by him. So to of her needs, certainty and love, get met by her husband, and variety and significance, being met by the lover. And then she beats herself up, and is angry at herself, and pissed at herself but her needs still pull her. You never get rid of the needs. You find a better way to meet them.

And any couple can meet all six of them, but it’s pretty hard to win the game of life or the game of relationship when you don’t know even what the target is. And most people have no idea what the target is. You take these six needs and make them a target and you start asking them directly where they are zero to ten and you make them be responsible and tell you what the other couple…what their partner is feeling from their perspective, and you’ll learn a lot and so will they, real quick.

And it’s not hard to repair these things, because then all the strategies you already know, the strategies you’ve been learning here all weekend, the strategies that are Chloe teaches, or that I teach, and then they become theirs. So I wanted tonight, to give you the target. I’ll give you one more piece, whether you hit the target or not, is based on your belief systems.

How do you know if you’re loved? How do you know if somebody really loves you? How do you know if somebody’s offended you or not? You have rules. Some people say, “If you love me, then you’ll never raise your voice.” Who’s heard this one before? Yes, and so somebody with a passion would say, “you’re crazy; I raise my voice because I love you. If I didn’t love you, I wouldn’t raise my voice because I wouldn’t care.” They go, “see you don’t love me.” Because what is a belief? A belief is nothing but a feeling of certainty, about what something means. If you say, “I believe I’m intelligent.” You’re saying, “Tony I feel certain I’m intelligent.” You believe…”I believe I’m sexy”, then you’re saying, “I feel certain I’m sexy.”

And when people feel certain based on a rule in their head, they respond. So I’ll give you a quick example. If we know what the needs are that someone’s trying to reach, the only difference in people besides where they place them, is their belief about how to meet them.

Osama Bin Laden, what would you say would be his top need structure? Which one? Say it nice and loud, go. Say it nice and loud, go. How many say it’s significance? Raise your hand. There’s no question. Why he’s one of what? Seventeen, twenty-seven children, twenty-two, what is it? I’ve forgotten now, how many is it? Fifty-three children, his father had. Fifty-three children. So he had rich, he had riches beyond compare, but money didn’t give him significance because he was nobody to his father.

So he tried to find a way, and he eventually found it through the certainty of his religion, but guess what, he wasn’t that religious. When he went to Afghanistan, if you study his history and he had money and he gave the money to these people, suddenly he was significant. He was a hero, he was scared to death, he couldn’t even pull out or shoot a bullet. Scared to death in battle, but out of a need for significance it grew, and grew, and grew and grew.

Now, you know what’s interesting? He has a need for significance, so do the firemen, who went into the World Trade Center, who knew they would never come out. The only difference is, one’s belief is, the way to be significant is to kill people, the other ones belief is, the way to be significant is to die saving someone.

So its people’s needs, and their beliefs about how to meet those needs, that control their lives. The controlling force of your life is which needs and the beliefs.