Greg Voisen
Hey, well welcome back to Inside Personal Growth. This is Greg Voisen, the host of Inside Personal Growth. And joining me from the Seattle Washington area is Soren Kaplan. And Soren was a guest on our podcast 11 years ago. And I will put a link to that one as well. So listeners know, but today it is Arne, how're you doing?

Soren Kaplan
I'm doing well. Nice to be here. Greg.

Greg Voisen
A, it's good to be with you. It's good to have you on the show. And for my listeners, it was leapfrogging Is that correct?

Soren Kaplan
That's right,

Greg Voisen
the prior book so we will put a link to that. Also, it's pretty easy to get to him. Just go to Soren s o r e n k p l a n.com. You can learn more about him His books, His speaking his media. I'm gonna let the listeners know a tad bit about you. Soren is an award winning author, former corporate executive founder of praxis.com, a columnist for Inc Magazine Psychology Today, an affiliate at the center of effective organizations the University of Southern California. He is an international keynote speaker and has professional development programs for 1000s of leaders around the world including Disney, NBC Universal, Visa, PayPal, Colgate Palmolive, Kimberly Clark, Medtronic, Roche, Hershey's Red Bull and many others. Business Insider and the thinker 50 have recognized Dr. Kaplan as one of the world's top management thought leaders and consultants. His works appeared at Harvard Business Review, Forbes Fast Company, CNBC and PR, strategy and leadership and the International handbook and innovation, and many other academic and popular business media. So we're gonna be talking with him today about his new book, and I'm gonna hold that book up, because I have it right here for my audience called experiential intelligence. Let's get a shot of that. And with my face, and the subtitle is harness the power of experience for personal and business breakthroughs. We'll put a link to Amazon, we'll put a link to his website as well. The cool thing about this book, too, is there's QR codes with little videos of him. And they're done very well. And I would encourage you, because you're not only going to be able to read the book, but then you're going to be able to get a little overview from Sauron himself. And those are there. They're well done. Soren. So thank you for that. I think that's an awesome way to go. So look, this book is a little bit of business, it's a little bit of personal growth, it's a little bit of psychology. It's a little bit of everything. But when you really roll it up, in the end, it's about how do we achieve or attain the successes that we want. And in the introduction, your book, you tell a personal story about your family life and how it impacted you. I'd love for you to relate your story for our listeners and the influence your childhood experience had on your adult behaviors, and why this story is so important to the topic of experiential intelligence. Because, look, you're saying all your experience, the sum totals of your experience are who you become and who you are. And some of them you may not like they're not serving. And some of them you may love. But so talk about your story and what our listeners can expect.

Soren Kaplan
Well, I grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area. And when I was three, my mother developed a mental illness. I was in a family that was very spiritual. And my parents had dropped out of Harvard, we had lived with rom Das, and who's also known as Richard Alpert for a little while, and then we bounced around the country and my father was working multiple jobs and rarely home. And by the time I was 15 years old, we had moved 16 times. So I had a lot of uncertainty in my life. And I think you could call it trauma. And I had to navigate a very difficult childhood. So that required later on down the line in my life for me to just do a lot of work on myself and kind of understand what was driving me some kind of subconsciously. And as I went through my own work, healing and development, I realized that a lot of the same things that traumatized me all So actually instilled some strengths and gifts at the same time. And things like being able to make decisions with very little data or be very flexible and pivot in new directions as things change and live with uncertainty in a way that allowed me to do some startups and help leaders change organizational culture, because I can see patterns and a lot of ambiguous data. And so my personal experiences gave me in my own development work gave me some insight, that then I was able to kind of marry on to a lot of the work experiences that I've had over time with the leaders from around the world. And I got some insights about how our experiences shape us, and how we can use them to learn, heal, grow, develop and achieve our goals.

Greg Voisen
Very well put, and, you know, it's not like people don't understand it, but frequently, they're not aware. So awareness, you know, Hey, your parents having lived with rom Das, and be here now, right? I actually interviewed him, and he's one of my podcasts. So I recognize that whole movement around Buddhism, and being here now, and not attaching to the outcome, and all of the kinds of things that were really kind of being taught in ashrams. And honestly, every one of them is good. It's I don't really see it as bad because a lot of it is really about how do I grow and develop? How do I be the best person I can be in this world? And you mentioned in the video, introduction to your first chapter, that in your opinion, experiential intelligence, is the missing key that we need to tap into to transform our lives. Can you define in the book, you give a definition of experiential intelligence, define what it is, and how this impacts our personal success in life.

Soren Kaplan
So experiential intelligence is really the combination of your mindsets, your abilities, and what you know how to do your know how your knowledge and skills and I think a simple example, I gave my personal story about kind of the things that I gained from difficult experiences. But I think that we all had experiences. It's just kind of our street smarts that we get over time, just through living life. A simple, easy example is, you know, if I asked you, Greg, what, how did you learn how to ride a bike? Was it your intellect? How much of your intellect was responsible for you learning how to ride a bike?

Greg Voisen
Probably very little. It was more my acuity my physical acuity. Yeah, like, I mean, because, you know, I ride a bike excessively now anyway. But when I was a kid, I remember the training wheels. I remember when my dad took off the training wheels as well, and how many times I fell. And so yeah, I do remember that experience.

Soren Kaplan
And so you learn to ride a bike, probably not by reading about it. But by trying it and doing it and having the training wheels and maybe taking off one of the training wheels being a little wobbly, and maybe falling over. And so eventually, you learned how to ride a bike, and you probably could get off that bike and get back on a year later and still know how to ride it. So it became part of who you are essentially, now. Yeah, and let's decipher that, because it's more than just knowing how to turn handlebars or brake. It's also higher order abilities around riding down the road and seeing a pothole and anticipating bumps and how to navigate or learning how to ride defensively in traffic. But it goes even beyond that, because what is a bike? Is it transportation, you can think about it like that. But it can also be a vehicle for social engagement and friendships and riding together or adventure, I ride a mountain bike. And so how your mindset around how you use it, or shapes how you might use it or think about using it. And so you've got multiple dimensions of what it means to ride a bike, as you hold it inside of you, your mindsets, abilities and your know how and so whatever those experiences are that we have in life, it they shape those three things. And I think the opportunity is to understand ourselves better in relation to what's important to us in relation to those three things that tie to the experiences that we've had.

Greg Voisen
Agreed. I mean, it's riding a bike much after you learn the initial step. It's very intuitive, right there. is, there's a lot of intuition in that, just like you were saying, the judgment calls you make about the potholes or riding in traffic or those kinds of things. And it becomes it starts to become like, you know, the mountain bike kind of second nature, right? So like, if there is, you just get on it, right it, you understand how to write it. And you don't always think about what the steps are, as a matter of fact, you hardly ever think about it, it's just there. So you mentioned that XQ provides a new lens from which to view what makes us who we are, and what makes our team in our organization, because your book is a business book is, as well. But it does talk about the individual having to find their way. Can you speak with the listeners about the three elements of experiential intelligence, because most of the listeners know Daniel Goleman. And they know the work of emotional intelligence. And then I had a lady on here talking about spiritual intelligence, that's another one. So there are a lot of these intelligences floating around there. And in your book, you actually take the Olympic rings and put them together rate of these intelligences but speak with the listeners about the three elements of x Q.

Soren Kaplan
We've known for a while or believed in our society, that our intellect is responsible for success in business. And I think in life to a certain extent, people have assumed that. And then we heard from Dan Goleman, about emotional intelligence in the 1990s, and recognize that our emotions, being in touch with them, and also being empathetic and understanding others’ emotions, and connecting to those is also a suspect success factor in relationships and leadership. And the world in the last 2025 years has become so disruptive, there's so much change, those two things really aren't enough to help us understand ourselves, nor what makes our teams tick. And our organizations work effectively. And so when I, when you think about what is it that can complement IQ and EQ, it's really your experiences that are those street smarts that we all have, that can complement those maybe innate gifts and to empathize. So that those three things come together and allow us to understand ourselves better, but then look at our teams and figure out if you're in an organization, what are the assets that everybody brings beyond just their brains and their empathy, but their life experience? Because maybe there's things that are untapped about just their life experience that we can learn from and leverage and use to achieve our goals.

Greg Voisen
Again, you know, well put it is true, that these experiences that we have, can shape who we are and can shape us for the better. Once you realize that, I think much is going on in the subconscious. You mentioned that earlier. And as long as somebody's working on that, and I know I introduced you to Dr. Brian Ullman, that ace things, adverse childhood experiences, you were talking about the fact that it was tough childhood to a certain degree for you in the introduction video to chapter two, and again, for my listeners, get the book and put your phone over the QR code. Go ahead and watch Soren. You speak about EQ, IQ and how this has been touted as the predictive indicator of our success? Yes, it has. You state that this is partially true, but that our x q is probably the biggest indicator of our success in life. If you would talk to the listeners about the three complementary intelligences, and how they work together, like the three intersecting rings of a circle.

Soren Kaplan
Yeah, the so those three dimensions, IQ, EQ and execute, I look at XQ as an experiential intelligence. I look at the as all three very complementary and intersecting. And so with that, though, I would say that you know, my example of riding the bike it you know, how much empathy do you need to learn how to ride a bike? How much intellect do you need to learn how to ride a bike, it's a lot about experience. And you can read books also, I mean, read books about it or technology or other books about how to do things. It's usually the experience of doing it. That embeds that way of being in use. So you really embrace it, this experiential learning, really. So when you look at your experiences and your experiences that you've had, you can look at what are the experiences that had the greatest impact on you, and how that shaped your mindsets, in your abilities in your know how. And when you look at those things, income concert with your IQ and your EQ, it gives you just a more holistic picture of what's making you tick. And maybe what you have to really access to achieve your goals or maybe what's making you tick and what might be able to work on as well to kind of take yourself to the next level.

Greg Voisen
You know, when it when you explore self, we all know that that's one of the largest areas where we can look as long as we're aware, in other words, so I come back to this thing of awareness. If you're not aware that what you're actually doing is not serving you, or it's not serving you for the highest and best good, you need to have this high level of awareness. So however you get there, whether it's meditation, or walks in the park, or, or you're going out on a jog or you're riding your bike, or you're contemplating any of those things are going to create a heightened sense of awareness, to give you time to think about your thinking. I remember saying this before, and there is a term for that. Thinking about your thinking. But the other thing is, I remember in spiritual psychology course, we used to say, you don't have to believe everything you think. Now, you know, because the reality is sometimes we have a thought, we think it again, it starts to become a belief. And everybody said, Oh, well those beliefs are permanent, think the beliefs are not permanent. In my humble opinion. It's something you carry with you to either protect yourself, because that's what you think you're doing in this hole is so true when working with teams, and working in business. So in chapter three, you speak about the psychology of experience and how these elements have influenced us. Can you speak with our listeners about creating greater awareness underline of our experiences and how to use our knowledge to make a significant shift in what we believe about our life. And also speak about how not being aware of these experiences affects our personal mental and physical health.

Soren Kaplan
Big question, let me give it a shot. You know how to go deep and I appreciate that.

Greg Voisen
It's okay, you can have a one sentence answer.

Soren Kaplan
Number 42 is the answer.

Greg Voisen
no, but it is a big question. I get it. And sometimes I compound them. But the reason I do that is I'm trying to get you to relate to my listeners that way. So I think it'll be a good one. I can't wait for the answer.

Soren Kaplan
It's, it's, you know, I've spent a lot of time trying to sort through all of that in my own personal life, and then try to articulate this as an approach or a model or a way to help others understand this, let me give it a shot. The things that happen in our lives, that we remember as our experiences, and we can remember them in our minds, but we can remember them in our bodies, there's a great book called The Body Keeps the Score, which is all about how trauma, wires us. I mean, it's based in neuroscience, how wired is us to have these physical reactions to things that happen in our lives that bring us back to that moment that that traumatic thing happened PTSD is that. And so these are big impacts that are kind of you could call them negative, they happen to us and they're traumatic. Now, you can also look at little impacts. Also that might be smaller things that add up over time. I know that with my mother's mental illness, I was embarrassed a lot to have friends over and to be in public with her. And I developed this fear of judgment. And so it wasn't like this one thing that happened, but it was a number of things over time. And that fear of judgment then got in my way of receiving feedback, has you know, I still work on it or getting feedback from my wife or even in a business context. That fear of judgment creates this. I call it a visceral memory because it's not a trauma. It's a small little thing. That gives me a memory of how it felt way back when and it gets it gets in my way of taking feedback that can be helpful to me. So that's my own personal example. So you've got these big impacts that are traumas you have these little impacts. And some of them can be positive and negative too. I mean, not it's not all negative, I have a big impact I traveled to India, when I was right out of college, I traveled alone for a couple of weeks, it totally blew my mind in a positive way. And I got in touch with the relativity of culture with spirituality and meditation. And that's a very positive, big impact. And it totally changed how I think just like the traumas impacted me and constricted how I thought or I had some self-limiting beliefs around it. So those are, you know, you have the positives and the negatives, the big and the little impacts. And those are all in are playing together to shape our mindsets. And then our also our abilities and our know how, based on what we decide to do with those things kind of more practically.

Greg Voisen
So, interestingly, you mentioned India, and I also remember you writing that that your parents followed was it Baba Ji,

Soren Kaplan
it made her Baba,

Greg Voisen
we made her Baba. Yeah, yeah. So did you go there with the intention of trying to kind of learn a little bit more about that culture that teaching? In those two weeks you were there? Whatever hour long you were there? What was the intention of that? Because it almost seems to me that I just made the connection because I remember reading about, you know, the guru.

Soren Kaplan
Well, let's, let's continue to go deep, Greg. So I did mention my parents were seekers. My mother was the daughter of a Methodist. My grandfather was a Methodist minister. And they were they were in India as missionaries. And she grew up in the Himalayas meditating with the monks. She met my dad who was let grew up in New York, they went, they both went to Harvard and then dropped out. That's when we went and lived with rom das for six months. And then that's where they met a guy named Danny, who was Daniel Goleman, who gave them a book from Mayor Baba, which then inspired them to travel around and eventually moved to California to be part of a group in Walnut Creek, California, where they have a community there. So I grew up in what was called the Sufi community, it was in the East Bay of the San Francisco Bay Area, and I got exposed to a lot of Eastern mysticism, spirituality. My father was a professor in the first accredited cut human consciousness program in the United States at John F. Kennedy University, where he was a dean. And so I grew up in an environment, which I resisted for a long time. And my gift from my father, for my college graduation was a trip to India. And so I get it, I ran with it. And I visited a lot of the sites that were important to Mayor Bob, His followers, and just also just absorbed the culture and I traveled it to various cities, but it was really a special experience for me, because I could connect to what had given my parents a lot of purpose for many years, and experiences a culture at the same time and a level of spirituality that I hadn't really been in touch with for myself, as well.

Greg Voisen
Now, as all this pans out, where do you stand spiritually? In other words, have you Have you followed Eastern traditions? Or have you shun them as a result of some of the pain associated with it? No,

Soren Kaplan
I don't Shun. I see common threads in many religions. Okay. in a positive light. I truly believe there's, you know, there's more than just me as a self, I don't really believe that I'm, you know, I'm kind of alone in the world and myself and not connected anything. I think there's a bigger picture out there. Yeah. And that a lot of what I'm writing about in experiential intelligence, is all about the experiences that we have that connect us that can maybe separate us but have opportunities for reconnecting us and that it's all kind of connected in some way that is hard to articulate. But if you're into meditation, and you are into active meditation and kind of mindfulness, I think that you can start to get in touch with that broader view that we're not just individual selves, but connected to something a little greater honor. Yeah, yeah.

Greg Voisen
I mean, whether you believe in reincarnation or not, whether you will leaving any of that or not the point is, if you give yourself the opportunity to explore whatever it is, I call it spirituality, some level of spirituality that there's something greater out there then you, I think that it's an opportunity for you to transform how you see the world, right. And you state that in the chapter on discovering x q, that our past is in our past, and we cannot change it. Agreed. But we can change how we view our personal history. How do we develop this experiential intelligence? On the three levels you discuss in this chapter? Because there's like, three levels mindsets, you know, you can go through it? Yeah.

Soren Kaplan
I don't think the experiential intelligence is rocket science. It's been around this concept, I didn't invent it. It was invented by a guy named Robert Sternberg, who was the past president of the American Psychological Association. So all that whole idea that our experiences give us intelligence, in some form, has been out there, it just hasn't really taken hold. And so when I think about how you develop it, it's pretty simple. Think about the experiences that have the greatest impact on you your most poignant experiences, especially maybe ones that bring up some kind of an emotional response. And as you do that, look at those experiences in terms of the messages that you might have taken away from them. What did I take away from that experience that is now a belief or an attitude that I have about myself, about other people or about the world, and understand that that's the really the simplest starting point, in terms of understanding your mindsets. What you can also do, though, is you can then say, based on those experiences, and the mindsets, perhaps, that I embraced, what have I done because of that? And that done means What did I How did I cope with it? What did I decide to do with my life? What How have I, you know, what hobbies did I decide to get into whatever it is, and look at the skills that you've got, and the knowledge that you've gained from it. But then extrapolate that that's your know how, and then extrapolate that into your abilities. So what are your the kind of competencies that you have, that you bring to the world. So you've got how you think your mindsets, you got your know how your knowledge and skills, and then you have your abilities, but those all stem from experiences. And really what we're talking about is like a little chart for columns, experiences, mindsets, abilities, and know how, and you just kind of fill it out. It doesn't have to be really complex.

Greg Voisen
No, and it isn't. And you give a graph or a chart in the book. And, you know, look, you're living an example of your experiences, look at what you're teaching people at a corporate level, individual level, whatever level and the experiences you had as a young adult, right. And it's truly is exceptional what you're doing, you're taking what may have been some trauma, and a lot of good times as well. And you're bringing it forward, and you're teaching people and I just want to acknowledge you for that, you know, it's like you're being vulnerable, as well. And in the process. Now that you have a chapter on identifying impacts, and you tell a bit about unpredictability of your mother's actions and behaviors. You mentioned it earlier. You mentioned her behavior, made you hyper alert. And I thought that was an interesting term. You speak if you would speak with the lizard about forecasting the past and finding the direct link between our past and how they influence us today. And if you would also talk about the impact chart template that's in the book. And just for my listeners, when you get the book, whether it's an e book or real book, it's on page 81.

Soren Kaplan
Sir Greg, my kind of pithy term that anyone can forecast your past basically means how do you look backwards so you can look forwards at what you want to have guide you into the future. So that's forecasting your past. And so my example that you mentioned around my hyper alertness. I didn't always know what my mother was thinking are going to do or if my father was going to even be home because he was just very focused on a lot of external pursuits. And so I was constantly trying to Understand and scan my environment, look at facial expressions with my mom and try to decipher what's going on. And when we were out in public, my mother at times would look like she was homeless, really. And I would be embarrassed. And I would be scanning other people to see if we were getting noticed on the street. What that allowed me to do was to, and I'm going to focus on the positive side of this, I'm really good at reading the room, when I'm facilitating a group of 100 leaders in a working work session, I'm good at bought looking at body language I, I have developed the ability to scan my environment and understand what's happening out there very quickly. So those coping mechanisms are triggers that I had because of practicing it so much. It's like the Malcolm Gladwell 10,000 Hour Rule. I did that a lot. And so those became assets for me. And those assets are tied to trauma. And they're the flip side of, you know, I had to really my mother passed away and I had to really get in touch with, what were those experiences that I had that were hard and get through those, but also what gifts did I get from the fact that she was my mother? And those are the things that I identified? And I've used and I also realize that I've been using them without really knowing it. And so how do I use them more? How do I articulate how they got developed to help other people?

Greg Voisen
Well, it's apparent that you're using them because you've written a book about it. And you explained it, you explain it very well in the book about how anybody that's the point, could either read this book, or just get in touch with their feelings a little bit more, and determine how those have been affecting them and the beliefs that they have around that as well. And in your chapter on decoding mindsets, you state that negative experiences are often the most influential. When it comes to instilling attitudes and beliefs that don't serve us well. The listeners would like to know where mindsets come from, and how to decode them. You talk about four types of identified, you know, identifiers on the mindset map in the book page like 97, again, for my listeners, but

Soren Kaplan
yeah, so the mindsets are kind of a hot topic these days, you look at what's coming out of Stanford University, Carol Dweck, and some of her work on growth mindsets. I think that and we've heard about concepts like self-limiting beliefs as well, those experiences that we have, and then what they communicate to us, I look at them as either communicating something that works for us, in terms of, you know, having a very positive experience, I went to India, and I got communicated to in a sense that in terms of how I internalized it, that there's relativity and how people go about life. And there's more than one way to look at something or do something that that was one thing I pulled took away from that. I look at that as a positive self-expanding belief. There's also though some of those self-limiting beliefs that can happen as well. So those are really two types of kind of positive and negative beliefs we might derive out of our experiences, which influences our mindsets. And so when I think about them, I have this tool, the mindset map. And so you can either look at your positive experiences, and the ones you're aware of. And, and then what that gave to you and I talked talking about positive affirmations is the things that you feel good about yourself, they're things that you think you're going to propel you forward and you know about them. And then you have the things that you might be unaware of that I look at as positive that you're unaware, and it's yourself expanding beliefs that just are under the surface, but they're really propelling you forward. Then you got the negative stuff. And you might be you're aware of it, it's your negative self-talk. It's like what you said, I have thoughts, but I don't have to believe them. Right. That's negative self-talk. And then the unaware stuff or under subconscious I would talked about as a self-limiting belief that is might be driving you or constraining you that that you're not necessarily aware of. And so it's really those four types of kind of aware unaware negative, positive little matrix, if you will.

Greg Voisen
Yeah, and I think underlying kind of underbed of all of this is, and I know my listeners have heard me say this, and they've heard other authors say it, but whatever you had this experience from, if it has eroded your belief in your enoughness, am I enough? You know, because many people are coming from, if the balance sheet had positive and negative on it, the balance sheet probably has more negative than it does positive about the beliefs that they have around being enough. Right. So, just from your standpoint, I mean, if you kind of distilled all this down and said, Well, is it really just about being enough? Well, in essence, many of the things that affect us, whether it's our father saying, Hey, you didn't get A's in college, and you know what you could have done better son? Or, Hey, you took that job, but really, you should have gone over here, whatever comment was said to you, that affected your psychology and your mental mindset around who you are. That's kind of what we're talking about. With emotional intelligence, right? I should say, not emotional intelligence. Sorry about that. With experiential intelligence, but emotional intelligence is in there, too. It's in there, too. All three of them. Right. All Connected? Yeah, for sure. Comment on this overall concept of enoughness?

Soren Kaplan
Well, I think that there's, I see that I've had that and see it in myself to certain extent, I think there's other things too, like, not just enoughness, but worthiness, yeah, my worthy of this attention, Am I worthy of the accomplishments that, you know, that I might be able to create, and if we don't believe in those things, they can hold us back. So we do things that reinforce the beliefs we hold, versus flipping those around to say, Oh, I am worthy, and I'm gonna go do this thing. And I'm gonna make it happen, or I am enough. And you look at this big trend, like an imposter syndrome, that that term has kind of come up, in a way, like, it's good to have a label for it. But it's also a little daunting that so many of us have that same experience. Like so many of us feel like imposters, I know I have many times in my life and often still do. And what are where is that coming from? It's coming from that deeper place. And so is that, you know, what is that and how do we get our arms around it, it came from somewhere, it came from our experiences typically, and how we internalize some things. It's psychology, it's neurology, it's sociology, it's our experiences, let's understand that deeper and then work with it.

Greg Voisen
And it is another thing too, for you to get anybody out there to be aware, and go to a level of discomfort that it takes to actually address it. Because frequently, there has to be some level flick, you're in pain, you're trying to get rid of the pain. And frequently, it means you doing something different than what you're doing now. To address it. And you know, the book is filled with opportunities for the readers to reevaluate their beliefs, their behaviors, their patterns, that most likely have been influenced them in their life experiences. What three takeaways would you want to leave with the listeners with that could influence their life positively, and are actionable immediately? In other words, hey, right now walking away from this podcast after 40 minutes. With Soren, what can I use?

Soren Kaplan
Well, I think first recognize we all have experiential intelligence. And it's simple to get started. And it doesn't have to be a difficult process or a painful process or an emotional one, we you can get started by just listing off here are the experiences that I've had. Here's what I took away from them in terms of my mindsets, my abilities, and my know how, and that gives you a snapshot of sort of what makes you. So that's step one, step two would be you can do that with and get feedback from other people. So that you can get some mirroring back to the accuracy of what you're seeing. And it can be the positive stuff or the negative stuff. But if you do that, you also start creating a dialogue with your partner, your team, whoever it is, that's meaningful to you, and oftentimes, they'll share too. And that cycle of vulnerability and insight and reflection will help everyone grow. Those are things you don't even need the book for it, you can just like have the conversation that you can get started super easy with that. The other thing is, if you are looking at if you're in business that sort of is a business book, even though it applies to education, and it applies to parenting, and it applies to like personal development. Let's say you're wanting to hire people, or you're in a team and you want to develop people, don't just look at what's listed on their resumes, try to understand their life experience that they're willing to share that demonstrate the assets that exist within your teams and organizations. So that you can really leverage all of that. And it can be positive stuff, you know, what life experiences have you had that shaped you in some positive way, you get all that on the table, you realize those are the competencies that your team has. And then you leverage those to achieve your goals. It again, doesn't have to be rocket science, it's very simple stuff. But it's those, it's a framework that's just been flying under the radar, and anyone can tap into it.

Greg Voisen
Well, there's value in it, especially for teams and accompany. And I think if somebody is evaluating somebody for employment, having questions on their questionnaire, or when they do the interviews, about hiring, about, you know, their experiential intelligence would be important. I mean, most companies are going to ask, what kind of experiences have you had? The question is, are you listening, and then reflecting on where those experiences can best be utilized with inside the organization, to either lift up a team, change the dynamic of a team, there's a lot of things that can happen when you do that. And that's the thing that you talked about a bit we didn't get too deep into. But you know, you said from your spiritual experience, and the way I'm gonna walk away from this is, it's like a tapestry. We're all interconnected. Right. So you did say that, and I think, especially when you're in a business, there's this big culture. And then there's subsets with teams inside that culture, doing things, we're accomplishing goals and our objectives. And as long as there's alignment, and it doesn't mean there can't be resistance, but that those experiences come together to create and or manifest something positive with inside the business, they're doing well. It's been a pleasure having you on inside personal growth. And again, for my listeners, go out and get a copy of this book, we'll have a link to Amazon again, the website is Soren, s-o-r-e-n-k-a-p-l-a-n.com. There, you can learn more about him. Also, you can download high resolution picture of him if you want, take it with you. You also can do this. You can look, you can contact him, and you can sign up for the newsletter. And I think what's really cool about this book that I don't find happening in many books, and I want to mention this is all the little videos that are about two minutes long in front of each chapter. You know, if all you did was get the book and snapshot it and go to those QR codes, and listen to those, you'd get the essence of the book. So Soren, thanks so much for being on. Thanks for being on Inside Personal Growth, sharing some of your wisdom and experiences with my listeners.

Soren Kaplan
Real pleasure, Greg. Thank you.