An interview with Zvi Band and Emily Rasowsky of Humans Are Good Foundation.

Emily

First things first...how are ya? 

Zvi

Honestly, I've never been more overwhelmed, stressed out yet absolutely full than any other time of my life. So overall, great.

Emily

That's awesome. I know you’ve been engaged with the idea and mission of helping people achieve a happier, more connected state of being. What drew you to this work? 

Zvi

I truly believe that right now we could have everything we ever want or need. But it's that feeling that we can’t, or that feeling that we aren't enough that causes so much pain and strife in the world. My particular avenue has been in exploring ways to deepen human connection. I truly believe now more than ever, we have the tools to be more deeply connected to everyone else in the world—more than ever before. But we're not, and we sit at home alone, watching Netflix and eating pizza and scrolling through pictures on internet. I feel there's a much better, brighter, and more connected world ahead of us if we do the work.

Emily

You’ve had great success building companies and products to support human connection. What was that first, “Aha!” where you're like, “Human connection is it. I want to dedicate my life to this.”?

Zvi

It wasn't necessarily like a single Aha moment. I'm a very big believer in this concept of Ikigai, finding the overlaps between what you're good at, what you can get paid for, what the world needs, and what you enjoy doing. As I mapped all that out and looked at my past, writing a book and building a CRM platform, I realized that what I'm here on earth to do is to build tools for human connection. I went through a very specific exercise after I sold my last company where I really tried to deeply understand what problem could I spend the next 10 years of my life solving. What problem needed the next 10 years of my life and what could I enjoy spending the next 10 years of my life on? It's very clear that human connection is one of the biggest missing pieces in the world. I feel if we solve that, if we help people build better relationships with not only the world around them and the people around them, but also themselves, the world will be a much better, brighter place, and all the other ills and issues we face in the world, I believe, will quickly get resolved.

Emily

At the foundation, we operate off of the mantra that humans are good but one of the things we hear a lot is that, well, humans aren't really that great. As someone who's dedicated their life to connecting humans and making humans feel that connection, what is your take on that? 

Zvi

I'm on Team Human also. I do truly believe that a single human means well and that they are truly good inside. It's when you introduce other humans that other things pop up. Am I good enough with this person? Is this person going to take my resources? Is this person going to kill me? Is this person a friend or a foe? These questions evoke a lot of ill behavior and can start to kind of put us on a path that’s not so great. I believe there are simple tools to find our way out of it, but I truly do truly believe that humans are innately good people.

Emily

And as you have gone on this path, there's obviously all these external factors to pull you from that idea, how have you overcome some of those things yourself? 

Zvi

A lot of what started me on this journey was how I was doing after I sold my last company. I had told myself two things—and I really kept them straightforward. One, what is the mountain I want to climb next, that's going to frankly be worth the struggle, the hell of building another company? Two, how can I make myself in better mental, physical, and spiritual shape? Because truly — and everyone around me kind of saw this and it really became exacerbated towards the end — I spent seven-and-a-half years of my life in survival mode. Literally waking up every day thinking, How do I survive? As I've reflected back on that, that was purely just the state of mind. I could have woken up every day with more abundance and gratitude and joy instead of scarcity and overwhelm and fear, which of course set me into a panic mode all the time. It had me reacting and easily triggered. 

I actually see this microcosm in some of my coaching clients. It’s so easy these days to wake up and look at the list of problems on your phone or list of problems in the world and feel a sense of overwhelm and scarcity and fear. As I realized, in hindsight, small simple tools can just make a huge difference. Not only did I make a huge investment in my own physical self, like losing 50 pounds over the course of a year, but I also started picking up a meditation practice, gratitude journaling, and just overall being more introspective. There are lots of different modalities that I've experimented with that like many people experiment with too but the core factor was the mental switch. The switch between ‘I have to do all these things’ to ‘I get to do all these things’.  Small little tricks like that have made a huge difference in my life.

Emily

So, if you were to give a younger version of yourself a piece of advice or information, what would you share?

Zvi

I remember literally staring at myself in the mirror a couple months ago and screaming this...I'd go back to 13 year old Zvi and grab him by the shoulders and say “Don't worry, you're gonna figure it out. Everything's gonna be great. Trust in yourself. You're gonna figure it out”. That line...that would have changed my life.

Emily

That's a good one. Would you say it was the mindset shift that was really key for you? Going through that process of changing the way you look at things? 

Zvi

The mantra or the mindset that I use more nowadays is to literally tell myself like everything is fine, you are exactly where you need to be. That makes a very big difference because I know that we're always pushed to be and need more. For example, at night when my daughter asks me to read another book with her and I instantly think ‘no, there's so many other things I need to do.’ I have to stop myself and say ‘Wait, Zvi, you're exactly where you need to be. You're reading a book with your daughter. Freaking read a book with your daughter.’’ Small little things like that help me rid myself of the feeling that I'm not enough or that there's something else I should be doing or seeking. Don’t get me wrong, climb mountains and everything like that. But don't feel that you need to climb the mountain in order to be worthy of anything.

Emily

So when you think about the future, how do you envision a better reality? Where do you think we're going?

Zvi

It's very easy to look at the news and feel that we are on the precipice of the world falling apart. Research has shown that humans are really good at extrapolating things negatively. Don’t get me wrong. I feel like humanity has very serious challenges ahead of us. But I truly believe that, within that, as part of that, we have at least the opportunity to move into what I believe is an age of belonging. Over the past 50-60 years, we've lived a very increasingly hyper-individualistic world to the point where it's toxic. Where we feel that life is just one giant popularity contest played with everyone else in the world at any one point in time. And it's all about us. How do I look better, be better, than everyone else around me? But truthfully, we are deeply social creatures so I truly believe that we have the opportunity to move into an age of belonging where what humanity craves and what we start fulfilling is: to be in community, to be in partnership with each other, and realize our collectivist future. We're not meant to be stuck alone with just our families on some Island somewhere. What we seek more than anything else is community.

Emily

What is a step that you think everyone could take to move us closer to this beautiful age of belonging?

Zvi

I believe that one of the most fundamental steps that people can take to move to this age of belonging is to realized that everyone around you, no matter how high and mighty they may be, now matter how well-connected they may seem, no matter how important or busy they may be, deep down everyone just wants to be loved and we don't get enough of that these days and we can always get more. So to me -- and we talk about this in my company Talk Social -- it’s important to be the one that makes the first move. We talk about this even in my coaching business. Just send someone a text message saying, Hey, just thinking of you hope all's well. Be the one to make that initiation. I have seen the most insane things coming from that one little text message to people. You get the most amazing responses because you might talk to someone who is having a bad day, or someone who hasn't been feeling themselves for months, etc. Unbridled love towards someone, as small and simple as a text message, can make the world a better place.

Emily 

I feel like you're the king of that. You're so good about the check in.

Zvi

And I'll be completely honest with you, Emily, and I thank you for that because I feel I suck at it. I do at least know that as much as I feel I suck at it and I'm bad at maintaining relationships and things like that, I still know that I'm better than 99% of people out there because, hey, at least I'm trying. At least I have overcome my fear of failure. Sometimes I just randomly pick up my phone and scroll up and down and send a random text message to someone, even if it’s just a little heart or something like that. That’s better than having never spoken to them in 10 years.

Emily 

That's right. Okay, so on that note, is there any last little nugget you would like to leave folks with? 

Zvi

Listen, I I very much believe in what you are doing. I could not be more excited to be a part of something that just brings a bit of optimism and connection to the world.