Ideas in the Wild: Barry Magliarditi On How To Transform Our Lives By Healing One Critical Relationship
The biggest lesson that I gained going through this journey is vulnerability. At the end of that process of writing the book, I felt liberated. I felt this sense of freedom that, for the first time in my life, I was no longer hiding. I no longer had to worry about what people might say or what people might think because I was fully connected and in love with all of me. The thoughts and beliefs of others could no longer affect me. I really felt that I broke through this barrier of self-belief or self-worth through owning all of my experiences.
When Barry Magliarditi was 18, he was an absolute mess. Every area of his life was circling the drain. Drug use, petty crime, depression…he felt completely worthless and alone.
But if Barry can grow from there to where he is now — living his dream life in Bali, owning multimillion-dollar companies, spending his days surfing, working when he wants, feeling amazing and blessed every day — then we can too. The truth is that a fulfilling and rich life (in every sense) begins with the relationship we have with ourselves.
Years ago, Barry started healing that relationship, connecting with his heart, and learning to be guided by his intuition. With each practice, his happiness and success expanded. He shares how he did it in his new book, Sex, Drugs, and Radical Self-Expression. I recently caught up with Barry to learn more about the journey he’s been on while writing this book.
What happened that made you decide to author the book? What was the exact moment when you realized these ideas needed to get out there?
The first book was written when I got to a position where I felt I’d finally achieved success and was willing to stake a flag in the ground, so to speak, and share that methodology with the world. The second book was very different, especially after writing the first one. I realized I’d shifted so far away from the business platform for a long time.
When I first decided to coach business owners, it was because I felt that I could justify a return on investment. When I coached them on mindset, psychology, and spirituality, it allowed them to get better results in their business, which allowed them to achieve greater profits and income, which allowed me to justify the fees that I was charging so many ways.
When I started business coaching, I didn’t necessarily believe in myself or believe in my worth. Yet the clients who achieved the greatest results, it was because I was coaching them on a blend of psychology and spirituality into real-world, practical uses. So after I wrote my first book, I had shifted a lot within myself and realized in many ways it was almost the end of a chapter in my life. What kept coming back to me is this deeper connection to what I’d always known to be true, which is the power of this integrated approach to psychology and spirituality.
That’s what lead me to write the second book. It was a deep intuition that this was going to be the next chapter of my life. This was the next part of my journey in sharing with people these fundamental principles and practices that were allowing me to live the life I wanted to live.
So many people on social media share their highlight reel, yet I knew that the highlight reel was not the actuality of what was happening in their life. Their behind-the-scenes footage wasn’t being shared. Yet for years I compared my behind-the-scenes footage to people’s highlight reels and used that as a way to sabotage myself — to make myself feel that I wasn’t good enough, that I didn’t belong, that I wasn’t loved, and that I wasn’t worthy of success. I wanted to shine a light and bring more authenticity to this connected world of social media.
What’s the biggest lesson you’ve learned going through the journey you share in the book?
It’s something I learned in a workshop I went through and first applied with my staff. I started sharing vulnerably with my staff how I was feeling, the thoughts that I was having, and what was coming up for me. It created this amazing result where all of a sudden my staff started to share with one another things that they were experiencing and things that they’ve never shared before with their parents, their family, their friends, or their loved ones.
As a culture, we started to become closer connected, which then, in turn, improved the performance and profitability of my companies. I then started taking this one step further. In my new relationship at that time with my now fiancé, Kate, what if I shared with her my deepest, darkest vulnerabilities? One of two things is going to happen. She’s either going to break up with me, but at least I’m going to save myself months (if not years) of investing in a relationship that was never truly going to work out. Or she’s going to actually love all of who I am and it’s going to bring us close together — and that’s what ended up happening.
Through me sharing my vulnerability and the deepest, darkest parts of me, it allowed her to see all of me and love all of me. More than that, it actually gave her permission to share some of her stuff — much of which she’d never shared before — which in turn brought us close together.
The biggest lesson that I gained going through this journey is vulnerability. At the end of that process of writing the book, I felt liberated. I felt this sense of freedom that, for the first time in my life, I was no longer hiding. I no longer had to worry about what people might say or what people might think because I was fully connected and in love with all of me. The thoughts and beliefs of others could no longer affect me. I really felt that I broke through this barrier of self-belief or self-worth through owning all of my experiences.
How will you apply this lesson in your life moving forward?
I take this lesson into anything. Anytime I see conflict arise in my own life or anyone else’s life — be it friends, clients, or business associates — I know that 99% of the time it’s because of some area of their life where they’re not experiencing vulnerability. There is some area of their life where they’re not sharing congruently and truthfully all of who they are.
I see this in my kids whenever there’s emotional anger or frustration coming through. It’s because they’re suppressing some part of themselves. They’re not being authentic and true to that emotion that’s wanting to be birthed through them.
Thank you so much for sharing these important insights. We wish you continued success and good health!
