John R. Miles

And it's interesting because if you look at the work of

Palliative care people like Bronnie Ware or even scientists who've studied tons of lives, what they all come back to is that most people end up living the life that they feel they should and they end up settling instead of living the life that they could, which is one where they flourish in all aspects of it.

Why do you think it is that so few people find that fullness?

I think it's a really important aspect that you cover throughout the book and really uses the foundation.

I remember I was an executive at Lowe's Home Improvement.

I was a VP at the time and

I was on the staff of the CIO and I had four fantastic peers, all of them extremely talented themselves, but we had a lot of infighting amongst us.

And I remember one day our boss, Steve Stone, comes into this conference room where we would have our weekly meetings.

He was not a person who would really get aggravated.

He was a person who used intellect, but I remember him just slamming his fist

on the table and said that we have the opportunity to do so much, but there are three letters that are getting in the way of us achieving greatness.

And he said it was ego.

And at the time, I was in my early 30s, and I didn't really understand the enormity of what he was talking about.

But you really do a good job of connecting ego with self-centeredness.

Could you talk a little bit more about it?

And out of those three things, which one do you think is the hardest for most people to undertake in their lives?

One other thing that I really liked as you opened the book was you made the statement that the quality of your life is based on three elements, your inner world of thoughts and feelings, your frame of reference, mindset, and your relationships.

And I think those three things are fantastic.

I wanted to ask you about a fourth one that I would probably include that you didn't.

And I feel...