On Mindfulness - A Conversation (Paulo Coelho & Arianna Huffington) | DLD14

good morning let me talk about this book because I had the possibility of receiving a a proof Gally and I start reading first I start reading just can you hear me no I start reading because I was going to have a discussion here with Arianna and a lot of a sudden I started the boring yet so I strongly recommend you this both thrive that it is a unity story and her struggle and at the same time a lot of philosophy so I think I strongly recommend then it will be outta marks right thank you thank you Paola and of course Paulo Coelho is quoted in it we're going to take our seats in a minute but I just want to say what an honor it is to be sharing the stage with Paola I have been a huge fan and a huge admirer for so long he was born in Rio I was born in Athens very different lives he even ended up in jail I never did I'm still aspiring to that but we've come to some similar conclusions from very different perspectives that would like to discuss here with you so it's great to be with all of you here this is the sort of mecca of technology so I'm going to ask you to do something counterintuitive and this is to put your devices aside because there is something amazing about uni-tasking and being really present for 15 minutes which is what we have and we want to start by something that Joe said last night when he drank a toast to Hubert when he said that maybe one day robots will take over but they will never be able to replace the human heart and in a sense this is like an interlude this is a a group full of incredibly successful accomplished people surrounded by big and small data but our world is kind of swimming in data and drowning for wisdom people are connected 24/7 and burning out and stress out affecting their health their wisdom and these are themes that Paulo has explored for years at the forefront of these discussions that are now becoming mainstream Sao Paulo for you a constant theme has been the theme of transformation that there is always more in us that we can tap into and bring out that leads to our own transformation that leads to our own destiny talk to us about that I'd like to summarize it is is very complicated but once I saw an interview with Paul McCartney and the journalist asked him can you summarize the message of the Beatle people they love to ask you can you summarize the message of your books and it is a question that it is very complicated because you can't if you can summarize something you tweet but you don't write a book about it but Paul McCartney he was brilliant he said yes I can and he said that Jana there is one sentence in one of our songs that say all you need is love I think and then he summarized the message he summarized that everything we need you see Arianna here she created a platform for us to share and sharing is one of the most important things that we have love is sharing work is sharing everything is sharing that's why we have this tendency to share with devices and things like this but at the end of the day if you talk about politics if you talk about romance you only have four stories for to tell so the first story is a love story between two people the second story is a love story between three people the third one is the struggle for power and the fourth is a journey so if you read any news about politics any book whatever you are going somehow to read one of these four stories the thing is that there are many variations to just four stories and at the end we have a goal and our goal is to answer this question that again I tell you I don't ask myself this question but the question is what am I doing here we have to answer this question a tricky question very tricky question because there is no one survives talking to - Gino a scientist and he had an explanation of framework are you here J no no oh yeah he's there a framework and a methodology to answer this question but I said they don't believe in this answer because at the end of the day we don't know we have to respect the fact that we live in a mystery and recognize this mystery and the Greeks the other kings and the queens of mystery of respecting mystery so Anna I don't know if I can answer your question I know that I want to be here 100% when I'm here I'm here I'm looking to rebirth who had this fantastic idea of this shift that we're seeing now and in the end of the day we just do and we respect to what we are doing let me ask you a question what drove you to create the habit imposed me of course we have so for me what you said about sharing is what led me to the Huffington Post you know I felt the conversation was moving online and I wanted a platform that combined great journalism who is the opportunity for anybody with something interesting to say to say it but in the course of developing the Huffington Post and being kind of connected 24/7 I went through my own personal struggle that you know about from the book which led to my collapsing from exhaustion in 2007 breaking my cheekbone and getting 5 stitches on my right eye and that started me on my own journey story number four of discovering is that really what success is is it success to really be running out and undermining your health and that led me to this question that you're asking also in your new book manuscript found that accra equities what is a good life the Greek philosophers used to ask that all the time and our world has defined a good life in very simplistic terms as being successful in terms of two metrics money and power and I feel there is a third metric that you've been writing about which is the third metric that brings together our well-being our wisdom our capacity to wonder at the mystery of life and giving and when we introduce these elements back into our life our life is transformed I call it being transformed from struggle to grace so I see now this as the next journey of my life how do we make that part of the Huffington Post but also part of what we are all doing and you know what is interesting there is no trade-off between being productive and creative and tapping into the deeper part of ourselves on the contrary when we give ourselves that time we are more creative we are more productive in huge the alchemists in two weeks yeah that's right clearly it was coming from such a deep part of yourself Steve Jobs wrote and told his biographer Walter Isaacson that some of the deepest and most important insights that he had that led to the iconic Apple products came after Zen meditation so we are now at a turning point where a lot of these things which were seeing us on the margin even though clearly people who are longing for it I mean your book sold 65 million copies make no more more more shall I say 70 million Wow okay 170 million copies of a book that is ultimately about this journey of transformation that is phenomenal it shows for the longing that is out there and now a lot of the things that you wrote about in The Alchemist and you've been writing in all your books are now mainstream you now have CEOs coming out of the closet saying that they're meditating or they're bringing mindfulness practice into their lives you have Marc Benioff from Salesforce and Mark Bertolini from Aetna and all around the world so this is a very exciting time to be on this journey and for you having started it so many years ago how different does it feel I think that people are much more open to it but they try to hide they can give you again uzg know as example it's not that you know please Gino Gino lives in Hong Kong and he's a professor and he's trying to map the connection between the human body and the things that are invisible so we said now and start talking about his work my work and at the end of the day I said Gino but it is about spirituality and said yes but if I tell people in my life if I tell people that it is about spirituality I cannot I cannot go to some universities and start talking okay which I also respect you know because he has another vision I think we should not think that the spirituality is is a fertility can be summarizing something do what you have to do it's not about believing God is not about abstractions it is by living honoring your life every single minute every every moment of your life but then we have to hide because he's here and not because only because that's because people feel that they're stepping to a very so forums are in a very complicated area and then we start creating a lot of Mythology around spirituality and when at the end of the days just to live the present moment period and also because the confusion between organized religion and spirituality but now again if you look at the place of death in our life I think that's a great entry point I find it amazing that this is the one universal thing that connects all of humanity you know they only on the satirical magazine in the United States had a story recently and the headline was death rate holds firm at 100% so given that this is a reality isn't it amazing how I'm curious we are how many time we're spending integrating into our lives not in a morbid way you know and the Romans used to carve memento mori mmm on statues and the trees not out of morbidity but because it puts everything in perspective the theme of the conference's here is content and context well death provides context and I was recently at a friend's memorial and listening to the eulogy I thought to myself a huge E is completely different from a resume you know when you hear people eulogized you never hear you know George was amazing he increased market share by 1/3 or Mary you know she made SVP at the age of 35 you know the eulogies are almost about the other things the things that you write about the things that bring joy in life the things that touch our hearts poetry music smiles and yet we don't live our lives in terms of what ultimately our life is going to be about but you know why because people don't realize that there is a finishing line something called death you know so we spend most of her time either thinking about life how should we live her life or trying to do something to avoid this nightmare that sooner or later it will knock our door I can give you a very quick example two years ago I almost died so I went to see my heart for different reasons and I had to have a heart operation very quickly and then I had one night to think about my life and I said oh my god I'm here by my side with the woman that I love and that we married for 34 years with her be I did have a crazy thing in my life every single one you think I did you know from all drugs to or whatever a very tense sexual life as you may guess third I decided that I was going to fulfill my dream that it is to be a writer and it was nonsense nobody can make a living out of writing but I said I'm going to I'm going to write I'm not thinking about make a living and forth I succeed in what I was doing so meaning I'm not alone I can share I can well really she and I had a tablet by my side and I was reading I said oh the only thing that I would not to know if I died tomorrow because the doctor said you can die tomorrow is the end of the Syrian conflict that was two years ago I was real New York Times and I don't know how this is going to end if I die today still don't know how how the Syrian conflict we learned but in any case this is my real experience so accepting death as a companion Arianna someone who is sitting here look at you look at me and asking us to live at the present moment and give to this present moment a sense a reason you don't get to believe in God you just need to believe in life and but you need to believe in life if you believe in life then it is enough and this is what you do also yes know when you have your all the things you did in your life because I had 90% of your book it was someone who believes in life well it's also what you write in one of your books about what the Yaqui Indians consider death as an advisor and they asked there and they asked that you know how should I live my life it affects the choices we make and it also affects the way we react to things I love this conversation that you have between the Zen master and the samurai and I want to read you just one little part of it I love it the Zen master says now that is hell letting yourself be angered by silly things and then this the samurai asked him so what is heaven and he says in her that is heaven not reacting to silly provocations but if you look at our daily life so often we are upset by silly things we are reacting to silly provocations that's why in a sense you are a stoic philosopher I mean a lot of stoicism is about reaching what Marcus Aurelius called you know that inner Citadel that place in us which we all have you know it's a place of wisdom strength peace but most of the time we don't live there so how can we create paths to return there faster and faster and spend more time in that place you know area and I don't think it is a journey itself it is a moment a moment that you take a decision I will do this and it will be difficult the first day but then you try to grab the present moment as he strongly as you can and you have to be there with all your heart and with no way out from the moment that you are there for the moment that you are connected to yourself there will be a lot of distractions but little by little distractions will go away this is at least how I managed but I don't have a formula there are no formulas in the subject - there are no algorithms as I said there is no software so you have to talk to yourself again what I'm doing here I don't have the answer to this question but I want to be here and little by you know you adapt yourself to be at the present moment well what is exciting now is that the scientific findings have been extraordinary in the last few years around these realities you know whether it's Richard Davidson's work around compassion and well-being whether it's the neuroscientists work around the impact of mindfulness on creativity innovation well-being it shows that these things are real they can transform our lives and it doesn't matter what the entry point is I love that in your writing what they wake-up call is what that magical moment is it can be a wake-up call like mine when you collapse from exhaustion it can be a worse wake-up call when you get a health scare it can be a piece of poetry it can be it can be a time that you bring to the world and fall in love with it doesn't matter what the entry point is what matters is to be awake in our lives yes Massa Proust it was a Madeleine no so so Madeleine and he smelled so awakening moment it is there for us to recognize we have several D we don't recognize because we are to use it to arrives and and then life change it let me because we only have one minute and 24 seconds life is running fast so for example now we have ebooks new platforms and it's very difficult to separate the physical book from the ebooks this is something that I wanted to to see here and they are pricing the ebooks with the same price with physical books why because they think that if you price a new book for three dollars and the heart of the hard copies seven people are going to stop going to bookstores which is totally nonsense people who read physical books we read physical books forever people who read the electronic books they're a totally different way same thing happens twice so I'm fighting just when I think I'm fighting for for having my books I'm fighting oh I'm going to because there's a moment that you have to use your so-called power to do something that it is good and that you believe in so for today or from the end of January on my book my books will be prizes not zero zero but but 399 and then I make same shift you know used to continue to do to believe that life is a physical book when there is new platforms and at the end of the day the book is something that to a place and leaves you there alone is up to you to take our decision actually I completely agree with if there are people like me who will always love physical books and in fact if you try to create a space in your life which is free of technology I've tried to create that because it helps my sleep it helps my meditation I've made my bedroom for example a device free zone so I only read real books in bed so it doesn't matter how what the price differential is if you love the feeling of real books if you like underlining books and all those things you'll keep buying them and recognizing the new realities while loving you know the old realities whether it's books or anything is part of the hybrid future we are going into so since we are out of time I would just like to end by saying that the the very profound lesson that I took from The Alchemist when I read it many years ago and I carry with me in fact I have it laminated in my wallet it's too long to read but I want to give you the essence of it which is this shopkeeper sent his son to learn about the secret of happiness from the wisest men in the world and he wandered through the desert for 40 days and finally came upon a beautiful castle higher top of mountain it was there that the wise men lived but rather than finding a saintly man he found an amazing hive of activity tradesmen came and went people were conversing in the corners a small orchestra was playing soft music and there was a table covered with amazing food so the master told the boy to look around the palace and return in two hours but I asked you he said as you wander around carry the spoon with you without allowing the oil that drops of oil that are in the spoon spell the boy began climbing and descending the many stairways of the palace keeping his eyes fixed on the spoon after two hours he returned to the room where the wise man was so the wise man said did you see the Persian tapestries that are hanging in my dining hall did you see the garden that he took the Master Gardener 10 years to create did you notice the beautiful parchment sinhala in my library the boy was embarrassed and confessed that he had seen nothing because his only concern had been not to spill the oil that the wise men had entrusted to him then go back the master said and observe the marvels of the world so the boy went and when he returned the wisest of wise men said to him well there is only one piece of advice I can give you the secret of happiness is to see all the marvels of the world and never to forget that drops of oil on the spoon so in a sense everyone's here is right in the middle of the world seeing and living the marvels of the world and what we need is to remember that to all drops of oil on in the spoon which is basically our soul our heart whatever you want to call it what Archimedes my compatriot called the place from which we can stand and move the world so we can do both but if we do one without the other we pay a very very heavy and increasingly unsustainable price thank you so much

Channel: DLD Conference

Views: 61,441

Keywords: On Mindfulness - A Conversation, DLD, DLD14, Conference, Media, Content and Context, 2014, Germany, January, Munich, Arianna Huffington (Author), Paulo Coelho (Author)

Id: 2ttHsOjTLGw

Length: 27min 11sec (1631 seconds)

Published: Mon Jan 20 2014