316: Mastering Your Inner Narrative with Owen Fitzpatrick

Aoife O’Brien [00:00:11]:

Your beliefs about who you are and the world around you shape everything about you. They shape how you show up. They shape how you lead. They shape the decisions that you make. This is the Happier at Work podcast. I’m your host, Aoife O’Brien, and my guest today is Owen Fitzpatrick. Owen is a social psychologist, a keynote speaker, and one of the world’s foremost authorities on why people believe what they believe and what happens when organisations fail to take that seriously.

He’s the creator of belief leadership, and he is the author of the just released Inner Propaganda. In today’s episode, we talk about exactly that, the inner propaganda that you have going on, the stories that you’re telling yourself and other people about who you are and how you show up in the world, and how you can use those two year advantage to stop them getting in your way.

I do want to include a content warning here because we do talk about suicide. Some listeners may find it distressing, so I wanted to put the warning here and listen with care.

Aoife O’Brien [00:01:25]:

Owen, welcome to the Happier at Work podcast. I’m so delighted to have you as my guest today. I’m really excited for this conversation. I think it’s going to be a really good one. So we’re talking about beliefs and inner propaganda today. I love that term, inner propaganda. So maybe we’ll kind of talk about that in a second.

Aoife O’Brien [00:01:43]:

But you want to let listeners know, like, why is this stuff so important?

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:01:47]:

Well, first of all, thanks a million, Aoife. It’s really lovely to be on the podcast. I think it’s a terrific podcast and brings a lot of like value about, I think, really important topics for us. And so for me, why are beliefs so important? Well, beliefs back in the day actually made a huge difference to me, actually saved my life. And what I mean by that is I believed when I was a teenager, I was struggling with my mental health. I was depressed. I was actually suicidal for a while, and I believed that I needed to die. And then I had this experience where I was actually writing a note to my parents to apologize about what I was going to do.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:02:21]:

And during the course of that, something shifted. And after that experience, that was the last note I ever wrote in that way. And from that moment on, I believed I needed to live. And it wasn’t like I went from sad to happy, but it was a big fundamental shift, a change in what my beliefs were around that. And fundamentally what happened was I wrote a— from wherever, I don’t know, but I wrote a question. Um, which I, I think I’d said something along the lines of, I love my parents, so I love you both so, so much. And then I said, um, is this how much you love them? And that sentence, for whatever reason, affected me in a way that none of the, like, here’s why I should stay alive, here’s why I should die— like, all the logical reasoning didn’t work for me. And so this belief shifted and transformed.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:03:07]:

And the more I became obsessed with understanding that— I studied psychology— I was trying to figure out Why did my belief change in that moment? And I realized that logic is one of the things we go to whenever we think about changing someone’s mind, and it’s one of the least effective. It doesn’t mean that we don’t need logical reasoning and evidence. Of course we do, but they’re table stakes. What matters a lot more is how we make people feel. What matters a lot more is how we connect it to the identity of the person themselves. And this is where the notion of inner propaganda came from. It’s that inner propaganda is really the description I use to talk about how our brains make it feel like everything that we think is true. And I think this is a really crucial point, Aoife, for anyone in the corporate world today.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:03:52]:

There’s so much information out there. We’re overwhelmed constantly with information coming at us. But the beliefs that we form, the stories that we sell to ourselves, become the beliefs that we buy into. And these beliefs which, and a belief is just an idea we feel certain about. Those ideas we feel certain about dictate how we approach things, how we talk to other people, even what information we allow get to us, where our brains orient themselves. So what we focus on, and as a result of that, can impact internally what goes on for us, but also externally the culture of the organization as well. So for me, beliefs are so important. They’re everything.

Aoife O’Brien [00:04:30]:

I totally agree. I think they’re fundamental. I did have, you know, we talked about this before we started recording, but I did have a time Tiny part of thriving talent where I talked about our beliefs at work and why it’s important to actually acknowledge that these beliefs exist, and whether they are individual beliefs that are shaping the culture or whether we are being shaped by the other people around us. It’s important to at least acknowledge that we have beliefs. And I suppose for me, one of the questions when I and this is you know back eight eight years ago I think it was when I was doing my coaching qualification, I. didn’t— I got the concept of beliefs, but I didn’t fully understand how do we know what our beliefs actually are. And I think, you know, when I look back on that time, what I was trying to get to was how do we understand what the beliefs are that are holding us back in some way, that are limiting us? Because, and I think you used an analogy in the book, and I used an analogy in my book as well, in relation to the fish in water. It doesn’t know that it’s in water.

Aoife O’Brien [00:05:32]:

So how do we—

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:05:33]:

Yeah.

Aoife O’Brien [00:05:33]:

identify what the, what those beliefs that we’re, we’re holding are.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:05:38]:

So Nir Eyal, who wrote the book Beyond Belief, and he’s a colleague and friend, and he has a really nice description metaphor he uses where it’s like beliefs are like your face. And, you know, you can’t see your face. And why I like that in particular is because when you look in the mirror, that’s when you can see your face. And the same is true in terms of beliefs. And I’m not saying that you’ll see them when you look in the mirror, like literally, But the important element is to bring out a mirror of your thoughts and just ask yourself the following question, how sure am I of this particular idea? Because we all have ideas, right? And you have ideas that you’re not sure of, and then you have ideas that you’re sure of. And then there’s almost like a degree of difference between what you’re sure of and what you’re not. But it’s not like an on-off switch. It’s much more You know, you move in degrees of certainty.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:06:29]:

And so I think whenever we think about beliefs, that’s also a really useful way of thinking about them is that you don’t just have beliefs and then you have other things that are not beliefs. It’s always a continuum. You move from, I’m not sure, I’m not sure, I kind of maybe think I might be sure. And then eventually it goes into, let’s say, beliefs where I feel sure and then convictions where I’m absolutely certain, don’t even question me. And so the idea is that most of the thoughts we think, most of the things that hold us back internally, I’m not good enough, I’m this, I’m that and the other, all of those could be deemed as beliefs if we feel that this is true. Now, here’s the tricky piece. Whatever the way in which we feel is, that will largely influence what beliefs we call up at that moment in time. So in other words, if you’ve had a terrible day, let’s say both of you and me, we’re both dealing with the whole ups and downs of the publishing world.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:07:23]:

So as maybe you’ve experienced this too, Aoife, where one day you’re like, oh my goodness, I think this is amazing. This is going to be the best ever. Everything’s going to work out. And then you get a bit of bad news the following day and you’re like, this is the worst. This is such a waste of time. I’m never going to amount to anything. This is not going to be any good. And that’s very normal.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:07:42]:

And if anyone’s out there listening going, oh, it’s not normal, trust me, for most of us, it’s normal, right? Not all of us just write amazing books. and then just have them out there and everyone loves them, right? So that ups and— that up and down experience that we continuously go through, that sort of roller coaster of experiences that we find ourselves facing, what we have to be as good as possible at doing is understanding how we can effectively manage our own beliefs at that stage. Because when we feel we’re struggling with something, that will then call up the beliefs that says everything is working out poorly now. Whereas when things are going well, our beliefs are much more likely to go, I believe I can succeed now. So it’s not just that we have these beliefs in there. Some beliefs, no matter how you feel, they’ll be there. I believe I love my family. I believe that breathing is good.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:08:32]:

I believe drinking water is necessary. But there’s a lot of beliefs we hold that are more emotional beliefs. We believe it because we feel it’s true when we’re in that zone. And that happens with mental health. It happens in terms of decision-making. So it’s crucial we recognize that a belief isn’t just a thing. It’s a feeling, we feeling of certainty we have in an idea. And that feeling can change.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:08:54]:

And that’s what my job is to help folks to identify and then to change the beliefs that hold them back. And that means recognizing the feeling is where we begin.

Aoife O’Brien [00:09:05]:

I think that’s so, so interesting, because I haven’t heard it articulated in that way before. And I also love the idea that it’s, it’s not just We believe or we don’t believe. It’s actually a degree. It’s kind of a, maybe a 50% there, which I think gives, gives us a little bit more hope in terms of changing our own minds and changing other people’s minds. Starting on this idea of the feeling, like I can so resonate with that because like you say, if there’s, if you’re having a really great day, you’re like, wow, everything is going so well. But I think where the issues arise is when you’re having a terrible day, when one thing happens, when you get— and like, I’m thinking in, in my case, a rejection. Like, I’ve put together a proposal and then I hear back and they say they’re not going to go ahead with it.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:09:50]:

Mm-hmm.

Aoife O’Brien [00:09:51]:

Now I get into a spiral. I think, well, it’s all over now, and how many more people have rejected me recently? And you tell yourself all of these stories and you get these feelings, and that brings up more of those same feelings. to reinforce the belief that you’re not good enough or whatever it is that you’re telling yourself. So it’s something I can really resonate with and I’m sure a lot of people listening today can resonate with that as well.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:10:16]:

I think one thing to just go, like there’s research out there, there’s a concept called mood congruent cognition, which is that whenever we’re in a certain state of mind, that determines how we then go out and our brains find memories that are aligned with how we feel. So, to your point, Iva, when you’re anxious, when you’re uncertain, when you’re worried, when you’re depressed, when you’re fearful, your brain will find all of the reasons why you should be fearful because it’s able to more easily access those. And it’s almost like your brain tries to keep you in a stable state, tries to keep you in the same state. And that’s really the function of this is we need to keep this state running. And so, as a result of that, everything you think about the future, everything you think about the past, will then call up those things. What’s really crucial, or to me, what I’ve found to be a game changer when it comes to dealing with this, because I know exactly what you feel, and I’m the same way. I had a bad day yesterday from a book perspective, a bit of bad news came through, and nothing that I can do anything. Well, there’s stuff that can be done, but it’s still something that was a real bit of frustration more than anything.

Aoife O’Brien [00:11:26]:

Yeah.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:11:26]:

And in that moment, obviously, one of the most important things that I push myself to doing is focus on what you can control, accept what you can’t, and also look to what you can influence. And I’m pretty stellar with that. I’m pretty good with— I’m a very solution-oriented and agency-focused type of person. And that’s one of the most important mindsets I kind of share. But here’s the other piece that really makes a big difference for me. Whenever you’re in that zone, whenever you’re in that mood, whenever you find yourself spiraling, the first most important thing This is the whole reason for the term inner propaganda, is to recognize it is propaganda. It’s not a negative inner voice. It’s not the truth.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:12:01]:

It’s not my thoughts just. And I know you might, well, it is my thoughts, but by describing it for what it is, inner propaganda, this is a bunch of stuff that I can’t necessarily take to the bank. I can’t necessarily trust this. When you realize you can’t trust yourself, it actually helps you overall to start trusting yourself more. Because there’s 2 types of trust. There’s the trust that you— I trust myself overall. In other words, I believe in myself. This is the antidote to overcoming imposter syndrome.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:12:31]:

It’s your ability to go, you know what, I’m going to bet on myself, not because of what I’ve done already, not because of, you know, what I’m struggling with now, but because I know my potential. And I know that there’s lots of situations in the past where I struggled and I still managed to overcome. I still managed to be able to do it. So, I’m going to bet on myself. And that’s self-trust that we need, the self-trust that allows us to bounce back from adversity, allows us to become more, you know, as Nassim Nicholas Taleb would call, antifragile. That’s critical. But then on the flip side, I think we need to stop trusting our thoughts so much, right? There’s a great book called Don’t Believe Everything You Think, right? And it’s very good from a mindfulness and meditation point of view. One of the concepts that I love the most is the title, right, by Joseph Neugen.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:13:18]:

And the title of Don’t Believe Everything You Think, I think, resonates with so many people. And I think what’s really important is for us to be able to recognize when you’re going through that, when your brain is telling you all the spiraling stories about, oh my goodness, blah, it’s not to immediately go, okay, I’m going to be positive now. Oh, everything will work out. Because that voice gets drowned out, right?

Aoife O’Brien [00:13:40]:

Yeah.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:13:40]:

So, we can’t— we expect Tony Robbins is going to appear in our head and motivate us and stuff, and it just doesn’t always work out like that. So, what I think it really helped me is recognizing it’s like a radio show. It’s like if I ever turn on a podcast and the podcasts are talking politically about something that I’m like, that’s nonsense, I don’t agree with it. Well, just because it’s on doesn’t mean I have to believe it. Just because I hear it doesn’t mean I have to listen, right? I think a big part of it is recognizing what’s going on and then being able to take a step back and go, just because I’m hearing it doesn’t make it so.

Aoife O’Brien [00:14:12]:

Yeah. Yeah. I think the interesting thing that I took from that is the judgment piece. I got an early copy of your book and I enjoyed reading it, but one of the things that it prompted me to do was to go to ChatGPT and say, okay, if I want this new identity, if I want to evolve, if I want to look at what beliefs I have, and what beliefs can serve me, how can I do that? And one of the things it said is you need to learn to trust your own judgment more and not default to the judgment of other people, which I thought was really interesting. So this idea of like learning to trust yourself and to bet on yourself without defaulting always to what do other people think or what will other people think, I think is so important.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:14:54]:

And if you look at, that’s what Let Them, Mel Robbins’ book is largely about, right? right? I mean, there’s a reason it sold millions upon millions of copies is because it resonates with people. Because people say, let them. Like, this is the message that people need to get because I think we are so hijacked by everyone else’s perception. And I like to think about this antifragile identity. And this is based, like I said, on the concept of antifragile. But when something’s fragile, you subject it to adversity, it breaks apart. When something’s antifragile, It becomes stronger whenever you expose it to adversity. So we lift weights, it breaks down our muscle fibers, which in turn grow back bigger.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:15:33]:

This is something that’s antifragile. And so for me, this notion of an antifragile identity isn’t that you are always killing it and everything’s always going well for you. It isn’t that no one’s ever giving you any constructive or otherwise type feedback. It’s that this happens, but when it happens, it serves to make me better. And it means that I don’t have to just keep believing what I’ve believed forever. I can update my beliefs. There’s a concept from a couple of hundred years ago called Bayesian reasoning, named after a guy called Thomas Bayes, who created this theorem to be able to help us what he called update our priors. So, you go into a situation, instead of going, this is the truth, you go into a situation with, this is my prior, as in this is what I believe today, and then you update it with the evidence that is there.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:16:15]:

And that’s what pretty much is a big part of science and engineering today. It explains the formula used that a lot of people use in order to be able to create what they’ve created and the most amazing scientific discoveries. So, when you start to think like that, what it means is that whatever I believe today, great if it serves me. And I think a lot of times we fall into this trap where we ask ourselves the question, is this true? And when we’re, again, in the fields of science and engineering, That’s a great question because when we ask, is it true? It helps us to be able to make better predictions so that we can do things better. The problem is what is truth is something that is manufactured by the powers that be. So, in many ways, leaders of an organization are propagandists. And I don’t mean this in a nefarious or negative way. I mean that they’re propagandists in that they can determine how people perceive working in that organization.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:17:08]:

They can determine the identity people have.

Aoife O’Brien [00:17:10]:

Yeah.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:17:12]:

And so, if you’re a leader, one of the most important things to help people to become happier at work is to recognize what are the ways in which you can influence those people so that they can feel psychologically safe, so that they can feel excited and motivated and driven, and most importantly, engaged. Obviously, engagement’s taken a big hit. But once more, as a leader, we have the ability to influence. And the problem is often we don’t because we’re very informational focused. Here’s— let me tell you the strategy. Let me tell you what you need to do. Let me tell you the information.

Aoife O’Brien [00:17:40]:

Yeah.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:17:42]:

let me tell you that, accepting that everyone else is going to be as motivated as us, which just isn’t so. So I think there’s a mistake that we make where we fall into a trap of not recognizing the power of how you make people feel and the importance of identity. And I think once you get that, that really plays a large part in determining whether people will resonate with what you have to say.

Aoife O’Brien [00:18:04]:

So how do we do that? How do we shape people’s perception of themselves through feeling, especially in an organizational context? Because feelings are not something we talk an awful lot about at work. So how do we, how do we do that? Like, kind of talk me through if we’re trying to create an identity of a person who works in a specific place and make them feel a certain way so that they will perform better, so that they will feel more engaged in the work that they’re doing, so that they’ll have a bigger impact. Talk me through what we, what we can do.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:18:37]:

So I’ll just, I’ll move it back to you, Aoife. Right. So if you take Thriving Talent, right? The notion, the concept that you’re putting out into the world, which has been really successful. When you put across that message, my guess is when you wrote that book, you didn’t write a book that was just like, here’s the data, let me communicate this data. This is the data shows this. Now, you would have had data in, of course.

Aoife O’Brien [00:19:01]:

Yeah.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:19:01]:

Of course, there needs to be scientific rigor there. Absolutely. But you didn’t just create a dataset translated into everyday language so that people go, oh, it’s really important. Her message is really important. Why? Because she showed the dead. That’s not why the book resonated. That’s not why it was so impactful. From your perspective, we’d love to understand, why do you think the message resonated? Why do you think—

Aoife O’Brien [00:19:25]:

No doubt it’s stories. And that’s what people have come back and said to me. I can see myself in this. I can see myself as an individual. I can see myself as a leader. making these mistakes, doing these things that you talk about. So I’ve littered the entire book with personal stories as well as publicly known stories from big organizations, global organizations.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:19:48]:

And if you look at it like Amy Edmondson, an amazing thought leader that’s endorsed your book, her work in psychological safety. If you look at Mel Robbins, very different, not as academic as either If you look at Adam Grant, if you look at Brené Brown, these are people that are what I call belief leaders, not just thought leaders, but belief leaders, because they’re convincing people like Adam Grant the importance of thinking again, the importance of what it means to be original and the fact that sometimes procrastinating can have benefits. Givers do better than takers overall, but can actually do worse. Like all of these are ideas, but the main goal of those books is to convince people in such a way that people believe it. And so as a leader, we also have ideas. You might have an idea that says we need to embrace AI. It’s good to embrace AI, but you’re tackling a world or a group of people that are very much, number one, terrified it’ll take their job. Number two, skeptical over AI.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:20:45]:

Number three, had bad experiences with AI. Number four, you know, watched Terminator 2 too many times. So, you know, you’ve all of these myriad, you know, degrees of skepticism or anger or anguish. There was that example a few months ago where there was someone speaking at like a graduation ceremony and got booed every time she mentioned AI. So you’re talking about this world where just because I believe it doesn’t make it so. And this is what we call in psychology naive realism. It’s this belief that I know the truth, but Aoife, well, she’s buying the propaganda. She’s a sheep, right? And there’s this notion we do it about everything.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:21:22]:

It’s COVID. Oh my goodness, I can’t believe you believe in COVID. Oh my goodness, I can’t believe you don’t believe in COVID. It’s like, even if you’re right, it doesn’t matter because shaming a person has never once made the person turn around and go, you know what, I’ve been shamed, therefore I’m gonna change my mind. Most of the time it just makes people double down because we don’t want our identity to be harmed. And there’s a concept again called identity protective cognition where our brains try to protect our identity by maintaining it. And that’s where cognitive dissonance comes into play. this tension that exists whenever a belief challenges something we already believe is true.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:21:55]:

So we find a way to explain it. And our brains are notoriously good at using logic and using reason to rationalize what we want. And so what all of this means is that in order for us to be able to influence the way people feel, we need to start with things like stories, things like the feelings that we show up with, which are contagious, a concept called state or emotional contagion, where our feelings infect other people as well. We need to start to ask questions. If I say to you, what are the things you’re most grateful of? Your brain automatically— doesn’t matter what information you give me— your brain accesses those states and starts to feel those feelings as well. Even the framing I use, the language I use. If I say, what will happen if we don’t do this? Or, you know, what will we lose out on or miss out on if we don’t do this? Now all of a sudden I’m directing your attention through my language to impact the way in which you feel. So the choice of words we use, the way we show up, the stories we use, the questions we use are all things that a leader can do to impact the way in which people feel.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:23:00]:

And you don’t have to be Martin Luther King or Robert Emmet. Robert Emmet is, of course, a famous Irish historical figure who gave one of the most incredible speeches before he was you know, condemned to death. But you don’t have to be these great speakers to impact the way in which people feel. You just have to know that by me going into the right state, by asking the right question, by using the right story, by using the right language, I can impact how people feel. And we are living in a world where this is happening all the time. There’s hyperbole everywhere. There’s emotion language used all the time. The news do it.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:23:37]:

Social media does it, always trying to hook our attention. Politicians are notorious at it at the moment, especially. This is the world we live in, and we need to become really skilled so that we don’t find ourselves falling for others’ propaganda. We need to be able to take charge of our own.

Aoife O’Brien [00:23:56]:

How do we deal with the situation then when it is kind of an us and them? And I see that at work all the time as well. Like, you’ve created this sort of us and them culture. For me, it’s like it’s a toxic culture. But it’s sort of putting some groups on a pedestal, whether that’s the amount of power they have, the information they have access to, the level they’re at in the business, whatever it might be. Any thoughts on kind of how to address those things?

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:24:22]:

Yeah, I think Paul Bloom wrote a book called Against Empathy. And I think one of the things it points out is that we talk about the notion of empathy as being a very good thing. And it is. It’s one of the most important qualities that you need to bring to the table. It should be something that every organization and corporate culture values. Critical. And one of the arguments, let’s say, against, or one of the challenges is that whenever you empathize with someone, often it can make it so that the more you empathize with that person, the less you empathize with somebody else. So bonding with other members of a tribe make you part of that tribe.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:24:58]:

But by being part of that tribe, it automatically distances you from other tribes. And so one of the most important, I think, things we need to get better at is creating more of a collective sense of the identity that we find ourselves in. So Robert Cialdini actually talks about this in his book Influence. So Cialdini looks at the 7 principles of influence, right? And they initially were 6, like scarcity, social proof, liking, authority, reciprocity, and commitment consistency. But he came up with a 7th. And the 7th principle of influence was unity. And so one of the things he gave an example, I remember he gave an example to me. I interviewed him on the podcast years ago.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:25:35]:

And he gave an example where he asked a question and he said, he was saying, you know, where are you from? And I said, well, Ireland. And then he said, okay, so if I was talking to you and I was, let’s say I was Italian and you were Irish, you might classify yourself as being Irish and I’m Italian. Or we’re both Europeans. And so the labels that we use to describe whatever that this is determines it. So me and you, Aoife, we’re both Irish, so we are very much that way. But if you’re from a different part of Ireland than, let’s say, I am, we could easily divide ourselves in that way. So let’s say you’re from Kildare and I’m from Dublin, right? I go, I’m from Dublin, you’re from Kildare. Or even if we’re both from Dublin— where are you from, actually, Aoife?

Aoife O’Brien [00:26:16]:

I was going to say, Owen. So I am from Dublin. So we have that shared unity. But I believe if I’m right, you’re a Southsider. So therefore I can say there’s a divide there. I’m a Northsider, you’re a Southsider, and that’s a reason to— or a shared identity is Dublin or Ireland or Europe.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:26:34]:

Yes. And Southsider, Northsider. But let’s imagine you’re also a Southsider. Let’s imagine you’re from Terenure and I’m from Templeogue, right? Or you’re from, you know, Dun Laoghaire and I’m from Howth, right?

Aoife O’Brien [00:26:47]:

Anyway, it’s on the north side as well.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:26:49]:

Oh, it’s on the north side, right? But both on the coast, right? So we both have a beach, right? So if, uh, if, if we’re both from the same, uh, if we’re both right next to each other, once again, yeah, but I’m from Templeogue and you’re from Terenure. Now let’s imagine we’re both from Templeogue. Where are you from? Well, I’m from Orwell Park. Where are you from? I’m from, uh, you know, wherever, right? So Templeville Road, right? So, so now all of a sudden We can divide it and we can keep going all the way down. What school did you go to? Like, there’s all ways we can find commonalities. When I was in North Korea, I didn’t expect them to have anything in common with me, but they did. And so when I was in this situation, all the way over there, I found myself having conversations with people and they wouldn’t have heard of like some pop culture references that I was shocked at. And then other random ones they would, but I found a lot of commonality.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:27:41]:

They were sarcastic. They were fun. They had a great sense of humor. Because I was looking for it, I could find the commonalities. And I think that’s really what it comes down to, is that the way we categorize in the organization, and the best organizations cultivate a sort of a culture of categorization of we are all part of this organization together. And it doesn’t matter if you’re in risk or if you’re in the innovation area or if you’re in technology or if you’re in finance.

Aoife O’Brien [00:28:08]:

Yeah.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:28:09]:

the financial part of this firm, whatever, we’re all part of the same group. And I think making sure that people perceive themselves in this way, it matters a lot. I’ll give you one lastly quick example. In Rwanda, the genocide that occurred in 1994, and I went to Rwanda and interviewed, but the genocide that happened there was that the— there’s a big long history, but the Hutus basically went and massacred Up to a million, the estimates are, in a matter of 100 days or so, a million Tutsis and moderate Hutus as well that would not go along. So some Hutus died as well. But there was this divide between the Hutus and the Tutsis, which was really a very arbitrary definition. There’s some background to it, but pretty much it was very arbitrary, created by the Belgians in the early 20th century or so. And this notion of the Hutus versus the Tutsis, This is, like I said, an arbitrary definition.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:29:05]:

But when the genocide occurred, after that, when the government came back in and decided we will never have this happen again, now they’re not allowed to describe themselves as either. They’re all Rwandans. And I learned that from a guy that I was bringing the Emmanuel on a bus when I was on the way up to do a sort of a trek of a mountain. The two of us got talking and he shared some of the stuff about what happened to him. He had scars and stuff. It was horrific. And his family. And he said that, he explained, look, I’m not, you know, I’m not Hutu, I’m not Tutsi, I’m Rwandan.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:29:37]:

And that’s how they all describe themselves. And I think that powerful lesson is something that we can all take. It’s how we categorize ourselves. And it’s how we define ourselves. And we have control over that. And the more that we invite people to have the conversation, the more we can point out how we are all in this together.

Aoife O’Brien [00:29:55]:

I think it’s really powerful as well. And sometimes we weaponize those differences, you know, that we kind of say one is superior or like we being part of the in-group, we are superior and we kind of use that against other people, I think. And that’s something that really gets in the way.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:30:11]:

I think, yes. And I think even worse than that, I think we don’t just use it to be superior. I think we use it to say other people are a threat. I mean, that’s been used since the dawn of time. Very few people ever go to war by saying, we want to go to war, we want to invade. Most of the time it’s, we have to go to war. If we don’t, they’ll kill us, they’ll destroy. It’s always that as an excuse.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:30:32]:

It’s always the fear of the other. Even Hitler used it back in World War II. It’s like, if we don’t do it, they’ll take over and they’ll do it. And he used the fire in the Reichstag to be able to use that as an, oh, we have to now. Sure, look, Sure, look at what’s going on. So I think it’s the fear that we have of the other, and that’s a part of human psychology at a very deep level. And so it’s critical that we notice it when it’s going on in an organizational experience.

Aoife O’Brien [00:31:01]:

One of the other things, Owen, that really stood out in your book was this concept of fear of success. So it’s something I talk an awful lot about when I’m doing work with organizations on imposter syndrome. specifically. And it really resonated for me because I have had that experience. And I think back to, this is probably, I’m like counting the years, probably 20 years ago now, where I had the opportunity to be promoted. And I felt like if I got promoted, then it would mean that I was somehow different to my peers.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:31:33]:

Mm-hmm.

Aoife O’Brien [00:31:34]:

And it would cause disruption to the group dynamic that we had. And so I turned it down. So I would love to understand a little bit more from your perspective of what this idea of fearing success, because it sounds almost paradoxical, like who would— everyone wants to be successful. Why would we fear success?

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:31:53]:

I think the reality is a large part of it comes down to a sense of belonging, right? And both of us grew up in Ireland. And to me, Ireland’s the greatest country in the world with the best people in the world. But one of the The challenges that we have is this concept or idea of notions, right? Or of, who do you think you are? Oh, you think you’re big successful now, are you? And that attitude, it’s also known as the tall poppy syndrome in terms of Australia. In terms of Japan, it’s like there’s a saying that says the nail that sticks out the most will get hit the hardest. And so, in a lot of cultures around the world, there’s this concept. But one of the most important elements to it, I think, is to recognize that the fear of success comes from the belief about what success means. Not just your belief about what success means, but also those in the group that you belong, what they believe it means. And I think in order for you to be able to embrace success, it means you first of all have to reconcile yourself with what that actually means from the outside.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:32:51]:

In other words, the fact that you might get more jealousy, like the more you grow online, the more trolls come out and they’re, you know, the more people have a problem to say, the more people that are talking badly about you on the internet, probably that’s a really good sign. But it doesn’t feel good, right? Because they’re talking, but they’re talking about you. They’re not talking about anybody else. And it’s easy also to do that. So I think first of all, it means being ready for the fact that not everyone’s going to be happy. Some of your friends are not going to be as happy. We all know the fair-weather friends. They’re great whenever things are good, but when you’re struggling— and then, but we also have the opposite.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:33:26]:

We have friends that whenever you’re doing well, they’re not so happy. But when you’re like in the doldrums, they’re like, You can almost see them smile. And again, it doesn’t mean they’re bad people. This is all to do with their own insecurities, their own things to go on. And it doesn’t mean you should fire them as friends. But I think it’s important to realize when this happens, it will change your relationships. But be comfortable with figuring out how can I mitigate the negative impact this might have? How can I ensure I maintain relationships? And sometimes we can overdo it. Sometimes we can be too humble about it.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:33:59]:

you know, I’ve had quite a bit of success in different places, and whenever I’m talking to certain friends, I notice I drum it down and I’m like, ah, no, sure, it’s nothing, it’s nothing, it’s nothing. And then they find out from someone else how good, how big it actually is, and they say, why did you say it’s not? Like, it’s almost like I’m being deceptive in that way, which, you know, I think is something that we have to balance out in that way. But the other element then is, what does success mean for you? And it’s scary because once you’re successful, it means now you’re out there You’re going to be judged. And can you be successful again? Right? The book has gone well. What about the next one? Right? It’s always, you know, you’re only as good as the next thing that you do. So I think understanding that as well is changing the story you sell to yourself about what success means. Recognizing that true success, I believe, goes back to this antifragile piece, which is, you know, figuring out what is it that I’m doing right now? Is it— am I getting the results that I want to be getting? If not, what do I need to do to keep working on it, to keep improving, to keep moving forward? And I think that’s real success. Success isn’t, oh, I’ve sold a certain amount of copies of my book.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:35:01]:

Even if it feels that way, that’s not real success. Real success is this is going in the right direction and this is something that I’m getting, you know, a real positive experience from this journey, this experience. And I think when we redefine success to ourselves, we don’t have to be afraid. So in your situation back then, if you would’ve had a different perspective of it. You could have gone, right, I’m going to take on this, I’m going to figure out what it means from a relationship standpoint, but ultimately this is going to help me be better, do more, and challenge myself, right? One of my favorite quotes is by Rilke, and he says, you know, the purpose of life is to be defeated by greater and greater things. I love that quote because it implies that in order for you to move on with life, each dragon that you face has to be stronger than the last, which implies you’ve already overcome the one before. And to me, that’s kind of where I like to think.

Aoife O’Brien [00:35:55]:

I love that. So what I’m hearing is have a clear definition of what success means. And I think we tend to inherit these definitions of success societally. So a nice car, a big house, living in the city or living in the country or whatever it might be. And then we compare ourselves to those people who are around us. So I think if we fall into the trap of I have to have the big house and I have to have the nice car, then you have to keep up appearances because otherwise you’re gonna be ousted from that group and your whole identity is kind of wrapped up in this situation. Before we wrap things up, Owen, there is one area I would love to talk about, and it’s the idea of how culture shapes us in an organization. So we enter an organization and we have these preconceived beliefs, but how are we shaped by that organization and how do we in turn shape that organization to create the culture or to either challenge how things are done or to reinforce the culture that has already been created? In my book, I talk about this idea of a culture hangover when you’re coming from one organization and things are done very differently in the new place, whether it’s more individualistic in the old place or the new place, or just things like that that are—

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:37:13]:

Sure.

Aoife O’Brien [00:37:14]:

Things are done differently.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:37:16]:

I think the key is to— I always like to define culture in terms of stories and behaviors or rituals, right? So, all cultures can be broken down into the stories that we tell about what’s going on, the stories we tell about what’s important, the stories we tell about how we get treated, the stories we tell about what matters, the stories we tell about our mission. And then also the behaviors. What are the actions? You know, the weekly meetings, the daily meetings, how do people show up on call? How do people dress? How do people talk to each other? How do people email each other? How often? What’s the cadence of that? That is pretty much what makes up a culture. And so, the real trick is to understand how are people describing the culture to themselves? Like, the real trick to understanding what’s going on in the company is not what happens in the boardroom, it’s what happens in the corridors. It’s what people say after the meeting that will give you a sense as to what level of trust there is. And I think going back to the concept of psychological safety, which I know you talk about quite a lot, is this need that we have to be able to make sure that just turning around and saying, okay, we’ve got a new initiative. And I was helping out a company that had this before where they said, we want everyone to speak up. And then I would go around and go, how’s that going? And well, people aren’t speaking up.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:38:29]:

Then I would talk to people and be going, I’m not going to speak up. Sure. Last time I spoke up, this is what happened.

Aoife O’Brien [00:38:33]:

Yeah.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:38:34]:

And so you’re in this situation where you’re like, well, if it’s not reinforced, of course they’re not going to speak up. So we need to recognize that. What are the behaviors we need to engage in regularly? How do we incentivize those behaviors or reinforce those behaviors when they’re done the way we want? Like, you want them to give you feedback? Great. When they give you feedback, that’s the most important time. And then also the stories we tell. And this is not just sticking a poster on a wall with values. This is about giving story after story, example after example, of how we want things to go. So if you’re working with the sales or customer experience team, give them stories or examples of great customer experiences where a salesperson or customer experience rep helped that person to have an amazing experience.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:39:17]:

Give them the stories, give them examples, because the more that they know what it looks like, the more they’ll start to think in terms of that way. And that’s how propaganda works at its most benevolent. And that’s what can work in organizations too.

Aoife O’Brien [00:39:30]:

Love that. So, Eamonn, the question I ask everyone who comes on the podcast, what does being happier at work mean to you?

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:39:37]:

I think for me it means what we talked about a few moments ago, which is always looking to be able to ensure that I’m constantly growing and learning and developing. So being happier at work for me is I work a lot because I work for myself and I try to focus more on the things that give me life, like when I’m writing, Or when I’m speaking or I’m having great conversations with, with you. That’s the stuff that I love. The stuff that I don’t love is, you know, the administration stuff, the financial stuff, all that sort of stuff. So it’s both A, doing more of what I love to do, the behaviors that I love to do, but it’s also improving, working on getting better so that Owen today is better than Owen yesterday. And I’m not comparing myself to others around me. I’m just going, How can I get much better every single day? So at the end of it, the end of my career, whenever that happens, and I don’t have any plans on retiring at all, really, to be honest. I want to, you know, I want to die on stage to traumatize the entire audience.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:40:37]:

No, I’m joking. But I want to keep going, and I want to make sure that in 10 years, I’m 10 years better than I am today. That’s what drives me, and that’s what makes me happier at work.

Aoife O’Brien [00:40:48]:

Love that. And if people want to find out more about you, if they want to reach out and connect, and if they want to get their hands on the book, what’s the best way they could do that?

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:40:56]:

Sure. It’s innerpropaganda.com is where you can get a free masterclass and stuff by putting it in. It’s the information. It’s obviously on Amazon and Barnes Noble and whatnot. It’ll be available in Ireland and also the UK and more internationally in the beginning of October, I believe. But in the US, it’s already available and out there. innerpropaganda.com. I’ve also got ownfitspatria.com, which is more information about me and my speaking and all that.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:41:20]:

And I’ve got a podcast called Inner Propaganda, a newsletter called Inner Propaganda, going all in on the name. And I’m also on LinkedIn and Instagram and Facebook. So I would love if anyone wants to connect with me, would love to be connected. Thank you so much, Aoife.

Aoife O’Brien [00:41:34]:

Thank you, Owen. I really enjoyed this conversation. I think we could probably have gone on for a lot more and diving a bit deeper into all of that really important but interesting stuff as well. So thank you so much for your time today. I really appreciate it.

Owen Fitzpatrick [00:41:48]:

Cheers.

Aoife O’Brien [00:41:50]:

That was Owen Fitzpatrick talking about his new book, Inner Propaganda, at innerpropaganda.com. Definitely go and get your hands on a copy. I really, really enjoyed reading the book as well as having the conversation with Owen. Don’t forget to get involved in the conversation. Reach out to me on podcast@happieratwork.ie or drop a comment wherever you listen or get In the conversation on LinkedIn.