How Platonic Love Can Revolutionize Leadership And Workplace Connection With Noah Ullman

What if platonic love in the workplace wasn’t taboo—but transformational? In this episode, we sit down with Noah Ullman, a former marketing leader at Microsoft turned purpose-driven consultant, who’s on a mission to help organizations doing good… do even better. Noah is diving deep into the ancient wisdom of love—yes, love—and exploring how dimensional, platonic love can radically shift the cultures of the places we work. He unpacks how self-love, agape, and authentic connection can lead to more compassionate, resilient, and human-centered leadership. Get ready for a heart-opening, soul-expanding conversation that might just change how you lead—and love—at work.

—

Watch the episode here

Listen to the podcast here

How Platonic Love Can Revolutionize Leadership And Workplace Connection With Noah Ullman

Love As A Leadership Practice

Our guest is on an incredible journey. Noah Ullman has transformed from a marketing leader at Microsoft and Keep America Beautiful to helping organizations doing good do even better. Noah is currently exploring the practice of dimensionalizing Platonic love with organizational cultures. What an honor to speak with someone who is normalizing love in the workplace with such impact.

He breaks this down across many facets for any leader to embrace the possibilities that come with putting this common language and the way of being into practice. The space he is creating accepts and welcomes others in fully with heart and soul. This is what we need right now in the world, where people want to see value in matter. As you expand with us to to live your possible, you will learn to love it, too. Enjoy the show.

Noah, welcome to the show. How are you doing?

I’m doing great, Darrin. Thanks for having me.

It’s great to see you. We met in 2024. I think it was a speaking event, one of those Sip Sessions with Brent Robertson. It’s always a mind-blowing event and discussion. We had a little bit of a debrief. We talked about some things in a bar and had a couple of beverages. You left me thinking about some things that I haven’t thought about too deeply, because I feel like you’re one of those people who don’t just like to surf at the top of a conversation.

It seems like when you get onto something, you inquire, you’re curious, and you dig in. I remember we were talking about this thing called love, and you blew my mind then. Welcome back. I can’t wait to see what we’re going to talk about. I’m curious, before we get diving in here, what’s on your mind? What’s got your attention?

Thanks. I want to start by saying it’s nice to hear you say that because I feel like my approach is very generalist. I feel like I’m a mile wide and an inch deep on many things, but when I do set my hooks into something, I’m naturally curious, and I like to dig deep into it. Love is one of these things that’s been blowing my mind for a couple of years, like a deep dive into love and the different forms of love. We could talk about that. I hope we do, but you asked what’s on my mind right now.

There are two things I’ve been chewing on. One of them is finding the right balance between being happy with what you have, which can lead to complacency, and ambition. I’ve historically had a lot of ambition in my life, and it’s caused me to strive and strive and always want more and more. Over the last several months, I’ve come off the gas a little bit, assessed my life, and recognized that I’m in a pretty good spot. I’m living the life I want to live. There’s comfort. I have good people around me.

My relationships needed some work, and because I’ve been able to change my focus, that’s been incredibly fulfilling and rewarding. I’m trying to rebalance with ambition and striving again to use this as a platform for growth. That’s one thing I’ve been working on. That balance between complacency or happiness and ambition is something I’ve been thinking about for a long time.

The other thing I’ve been thinking about, and it came from a conversation I had, is that I’m going to need to get into the love stuff a little bit here now. The love thing started with an exploration of the ancient Greek understanding of love. I’m sure we’ll talk about this more, but the general premise is that in The Symposium, Plato wrote about Socrates having a conversation with a number of his peers talking about love. What was interesting to me about that is that the ancient Greeks understood different forms of love. As modern Americans or Westerners, when we think about love, we think about romantic love, but of course, there’s this whole body called Platonic love.

I wrote that off as non-romantic love, but it’s way more complicated than that and much more layered and nuanced. There’s deep friendship, which is a form of love. There’s love of the divine or nature, love of something greater than yourself, which is known as agape. There’s self-love. There’s honor and commitment, which is a form of love, and a handful more that helped me frame this broader understanding of love.

What I’ve been thinking about this week is that the exploration of love changed my life in a number of ways, but the main way it changed my life was that it gave me a better way to understand philautia, which is self-love because I don’t feel about myself the way I feel about my romantic partners. I don’t feel about myself the way I feel about my kids. I was having a hard time calling that love, but by opening up all these definitions, it gave me a different framework, a different language, and a different understanding of what self-love could be.

It has been an exciting realization. I’m working on including agape, which is this love of something greater than yourself, into self-love. The essence of each of us is this connection to something greater than ourselves. It’s been creating this interesting, for lack of a better term, although it’s pretty accurate, heartwarming feeling inside of me to fill my self-love with this greater love of the universe, the divine. That’s a hell of a way to start a show, but that’s what I’m thinking about. That’s it.

Embracing Connection & Letting Go Of Ego

You said you’re only an inch deep. Come on. This is pretty deep already. I love it. Let’s go here because it’s fascinating to me. Let’s think about self-love. Describe that a little bit more, and how you’re getting more comfortable with that. What are you noticing?

I think that self-love is rooted in self-acceptance, self-compassion, and being kind to yourself, which is interesting because part of my fuel for ambition was kicking myself in the ass and saying, “I should have done better. I want more.” Maybe doing comparisons to others and striving for some external achievements or recognition, external validation rather than internal validation. For me, self-love is like self-kindness.

Looking back from this perspective, it’s shocking to me that I wasn’t able to manifest that for the first half of my life. It’s become very clear the damage that has been done to me and the relationships and people around me by operating that way with an edge of anger, self-disgust, frustration, and a feeling of less than or never enough that I’ve learned to release. It’s been an incredible change for me.

How did that show up when you’re going through that? You’re saying it wasn’t maybe perceived or received as so positive, maybe to others, or was that all internal?

It expressed itself externally for sure. For me, it expressed itself with this entrenched defensive posture. I relied on speed and intelligence, trying to be smart, which sometimes came across as cutting or hurtful because I was protecting myself. I was defending myself. I felt like I was not on solid ground. Now that I know what that solid ground feels like, it allows me to slow down and be more contemplative and try to appreciate the other person’s perspective more, rather than a threat.

It’s something to accept as a data point, for lack of a better term, and then understand a little bit more about where that person is coming from, without the need to feel like I need to cover up and protect myself all the time. The covering up and protecting myself is sometimes expressed as lashing out, so that was not a positive way to engage with others.

You said protect yourself a couple of times there, too. I’m curious, what are you protecting yourself from?

I think it’s the protection of ego. It’s the protection of external perception. For me, when I was lacking that foundation of self-acceptance, external validation became the way that I measured myself. It was important for me to prop that up as much as I could.

I get that. It’s almost like that output was almost like your shield or your guard to say, “I’m here. I’m important. I matter,” or something. As you said, your ego. I think that’s interesting.

I hadn’t thought of this before, but this conversation is making me think of something my dad used to say to me a lot as a kid. He said, “It’s better to be thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt,” so I think that was part of it. It was something that was ingrained in me when I was young.

Thanks for sharing that, and thanks for sharing and being open here. It’s so important for us to shed what we know about ourselves and be able to find that inner self, that level of joy that’s there. Otherwise, we’re hiding it. As you said, we’re not only protecting our ego, we’re protecting and hiding the joy and that love that’s inside of us, that self-love component. You connect it to something greater. What comes first, self-love or connecting to this greater meaning that you talked about earlier?

That’s a great question. I think that it’s possible to connect to something greater. I’ve had that feeling. I’m not a traditionally religious person. I consider myself a spiritual person, and I have a strong and deep connection to nature. I’ve been moved in my life in various ways through this sensation of being connected to something greater, agape, but it becomes much stronger, more stable, deeper, and more meaningful when I can accept it fully without having to question myself in the equation, accept myself in the equation, and then accept the greater thing.

I want to add to something you said about protecting yourself. The other thing that I did was that, rather than just being myself, natural, and open, I was performative in many cases. I was trying to behave, act, and say things that I thought other people would appreciate and enjoy, or give them a specific impression of me. I am trying to stop doing that.

Was that disingenuous? Is that where you’re going with it, or what do you mean by that?

I don’t know if it’s disingenuous. I think that people respond to different situations in ways that they think are appropriate. I don’t know if I’d use disingenuous. I might use manipulative. I was trying to control the situation and the environment for a very, if not conscious, subconscious desired outcome rather than being completely open to wherever the conversation or interaction may go.

Did you sense that others who got that were being manipulated, or did they feel a certain way from that?

I think this was a well-trained behavior, and I used it for a very long time. I used it successfully. In most settings, professional settings and casual social settings, I was skilled at doing that, again, subconsciously. It wasn’t intentional or Machiavellian. Those closest to me felt it and knew it, and in some cases, it became intolerable.

I appreciate you sharing that. Let’s go back to the greater love, the greater purpose. Even with a spiritual connection in a way, does it matter what it is or what’s important about it for someone? I share that perspective, meaning being able to connect out in the world in a different capacity makes it a lot easier to connect with our inner self, that level of whatever brings us that feeling that makes us feel connected and special, whatever word we wanted to find it, love, happiness, whatever. In your mind, in the research, and your experiences, it sounds like you had a couple of moments that moved you, maybe there’s an example, but does it matter what it is, or could it be anything? How would you think about that?

For me, that sensation does not come from cognition. That sensation comes from a feeling, and it’s almost an overwhelming feeling of being connected. I think for religious people, it’s something that they would describe as God. For those who aren’t religious, I’m reminded of Carl Sagan saying, “We are all stardust.” We are all connected. We are all made from the same material. We are all orbiting a star, hurdling through space at unimaginable speed. We are all made up of energy that cannot be created or destroyed. Scientifically, we are connected, but as we go through life in our individual bodies, we have a sense of separation of self and other that is real.

In some sense, it’s a certain physical reality. You and I are separate people, but we’re connected through the air we breathe, through the sunshine that shines on the planet, through the foods that we eat, through all the things. I do believe that when people are together in person in a room, and maybe this happens at a distance, too, there’s an energy exchange that happens that creates a bond and a connection.

When people are together in person in a room, there's an energy exchange that creates a bond and a connection. Share on X

That’s so interesting. I don’t know if you have something that you would make as a statement or as a reminder to yourself. I’ll give you what I mean. You see the logo for Live Your Possible, and there’s a one-eyed smile on the lid. That’s a logo that I had this amazing experience with my daughter, where we saw this on the back of a lid. I recognized I wasn’t present. I was upside down. I wasn’t seeing life the way I needed to. Once we turned that logo or that one-eyed smile upside down, my daughter and I lit up.

I knew at that moment that’s what I wanted to do for the rest of my life for every person that I met. I have the slogan in my mind every time I meet someone. I want to see the light that’s inside of you. I want to see it come out. I want you to see and be enlightened by that light that’s inside of us because I don’t think a lot of us feel like we have it. To me, that’s supernatural in a way of trying to connect people in my own intentions of my purpose in life, to not let things get in the way that we’ve been told or we were shown, or subconsciously, like you’re talking about, we would do the way we’re performing in a certain way versus being a freaking good human.

Slowing Down To See, Feel, & Listen Deeply

I don’t know if you have your own little tagline. I see these smiles when I smile at everything in the world. I’ve seen thousands of them at this point. It brings me joy every time and a reminder of how small we are, as you said, and how we’re all unique and different, like that smile is. I’m curious. Is there something that comes to mind for you?

I don’t have a touchstone like that. I think that’s a good idea. I’m going to think about that and see if I can give myself a reference that I can grab onto. When I’m struggling with something, I’m reminded of something I heard on a podcast by a Yale professor. Dr. Laurie Santos started a class called The Happiness Lab, and it was super successful. She’s made a podcast out of it. One of the things that she says is that your mind is not your friend. When I am feeling like my thoughts are counterproductive, I make a conscious effort to separate those thoughts, be critical about what I’m thinking or what thoughts are coming to me, and take a pause for a moment to understand how they feel.

That also goes along the lines of another relatively recent discovery that although intelligence is in our mind, I think there’s a lot of wisdom in the body. Our body knows things, feels things, and stores things that make the mind-body connection real to me. I’ve been giving feelings more, if not equal, weight to thoughts, which is something I discovered in my 50s, which seems crazy to me. We’ve been taught, especially as men, to shut our feelings down, unless they’re aggressive feelings. Aggressive feelings are celebrated by the culture. It’s the softer feelings and those feelings of connection, empathy, understanding, and sympathy that are important. They’re always there, but I shut them out for years and years.

What have you started to notice with this whole thing with your feelings? What have you noticed in your life?

It’s slowed me down a little bit, which is interesting. It’s given me the ability to not just get in touch with my own feelings but have a better understanding of the way somebody else may be feeling and how they’re communicating those feelings. The slowing down thing is big for me because, as I was saying earlier, my MO before was to be quick and sharp-tongued and react before I understood what I was feeling and what was going on in the room.

The slowing down and taking a pause has been interesting for me and not easy because sometimes, it feels like I’m not contributing to a meeting the way that I would normally. I’m listening better, that’s for sure. I’m listening with my whole body. I’m listening with my ears, of course, but I’m getting visual cues. I’m sensing different kinds of feelings and energies in the room. I don’t think I would have had that ability without slowing down.

Slowing down is allowing you to see, notice, feel, and create this space. We both know Brent Robertson well. I work with Brent on Be Generative. We often talk about how this space is where it allows us for language. It allows us to see things differently, noticing, feeling, accepting the words you’ve been talking about, and being able to receive them. The lack of space, how do you receive anything?

There’s an old saying, maybe ancient Chinese wisdom, that there’s no room in a full cup. If your cup is full, if you are full of knowledge, ego, or whatever, there’s no room to take in anything else. You can’t engage with others or learn anything.

I love that you said that because I want to jump on that. As you said, you are listening more. You’re taking in more versus, it sounds like in the past, you were maybe guiding or using your word, manipulating, or telling people what they should know, versus maybe you’re looking at, seeing, and listening to other people to see what they know. I’d love to hear. Do you feel like your perspective is enriching? Do you feel like your heart and soul are expanding as a result of your listening these days?

Yeah, without a doubt, listening to myself, listening to others, and listening to the environment and things that are going on around me. I’ve learned it’s hard to listen when you’re making noise. It’s important to quiet down a little bit. I come from a corporate background, and I’m sensitive to sounding hippy-dippy about this stuff. One of the things I’m trying to figure out is how to land what I feel is a very valuable perspective in a way that Corporate America can accept it and consume it.

One of the things that I’ve been doing the last few years is I have a regular meditation process or practice, and what that is getting quiet, quieting yourself down, finding a quiet space, quieting your thoughts, quieting your body, being open and receptive, and listening to everything around. I believe that when people talk about enlightenment, it is to a level of success I’ve yet to achieve, but you quiet yourself down so much that you feel the connection to the universe, which would probably feel amazing.

Bringing Love Into The Workplace: Beyond Fear, Building Connection & Commitment

There’s this energy. It lights you up. You’re going down this path of connection. As you said, we’re all intertwined and intersected in many different ways, regardless of where we come from or what we look like. It’s pretty interesting that we don’t accept it per se at the surface because we’re so busy doing things. We’re so busy working or getting to that next level, some of the things you talked about earlier in your career in life. You said something about how you’re trying to make this more acceptable in the workplace and organizations. We haven’t said a lot about the word love. I know one of those things. Can you say love in the workplace? How are you getting this to be more acceptable or embraced in organizations?

That’s a great question. Love is a challenging word, and it’s a challenging word because the English word for love doesn’t fully encompass everything that love entails. It’s loaded in our culture. Love is the most powerful human emotion that we have, and it’s incredibly underutilized and experienced in organizations. I think that’s because our assumption of love is that it’s always romantic. It’s also because we’ve trivialized the word in a lot of ways. We say things like, “I love Snickers. Love your customers,” or something else. We throw the word away, and we use it as marketing copy.

Many people find it difficult to say in the most important moments. It’s a challenging word. I think it’s a challenging word because it’s so misunderstood. One of the things I’ve used to help create perspective on love for business is that a lot of businesses and organizations think love is soft or weak. The counter I have to that is that love is the reason why soldiers go to war. Soldiers are willing to lay down their lives for the love of their country. They’re willing to put themselves in front of bullets for the love of their fellow soldiers in a foxhole. That’s love expressed in some bond, which could be this feeling of honor and commitment, or it could be something else, but it’s definitely love.

What’s interesting about love is that our bodies understand the different forms of love. When we are engaged with a romantic partner, our bodies release adrenaline, dopamine, and a cocktail of other chemicals. When a mother or father is holding their child, their bodies release oxytocin. Different chemical sets that our bodies express completely differently, but we have one word for this feeling. It’s complicated. I try to break it down into its sub-components. I do talk about honor, commitment, belonging, joy, and trust, which are all different components of love.

All those elements are pretty important in the workplace.

Critically important in the workplace. I think it’s a huge disadvantage that they’re not wrapped up in or encompassed by the idea of love. On their own, they’re important, but brought together, all of a sudden, they make sense. If a leader goes into an environment, a workplace, in the typical way, there’s a lot of carrot and stick, and the carrot is often extrinsic rewards. It’s the opportunity for a bonus, it’s a salary, it’s perks, it’s whatever. The stick is fear, of doing something wrong, of being called out, of being reprimanded in some way.

If the leader goes into the organization fueled by love, they create bonds within their organization where the employees care about each other, they get self-love and fulfillment from doing good work, and they’re all feeling a positive energy and connection to the organization and wanting it to succeed. A lot of things start to happen naturally without any need for fear-based management or pressure-based systems, which almost always break. It’s a very difficult thing for leaders to do because it’s going out on a limb a little bit. It feels vulnerable, but there’s so much positive energy, power, and support in that approach.

Very quickly, it’s recognized that the results are outstanding, and it’s a self-reinforcing model. We now have an organization where people are expressing Platonic love, care for others in the organization, and everything starts to work better. There’s less competition. Things are less siloed. Customer interaction is immediately improved. All these things happen that every business wants and needs without having to wave the big stick.

When you think about the fear-based approach in that example, who is it serving?

I think the fear-based approach serves structure. People conform to culture and adopt the behaviors to avoid the fear, to avoid the punishment. If I do these things this way, I don’t need to be afraid. Rather than giving people the agency to behave in ways that benefit the greater good without fear of retribution.

That’s more of the love-based approach model. What does that open up? You can go a little bit deeper on that. What else could that open up in that model versus the fear-based model?

I think the biggest change there is that people want to come to work. They look forward to Monday mornings. They are looking forward to being in an environment where they have an opportunity to contribute a part of themselves, to partner with colleagues who are all working towards the same goal and the greater good, celebrate, share success together, and be resilient in tough times together.

It creates these bonds externally, which are fueled coming from a positive place internally, rather than an internal competition, siloing, backstabbing, or feeling like in order for me to look good in the workplace, somebody else needs to look bad. The performance attributes and the rewards become intrinsic rather than extrinsic. Extrinsic rewards will get compliance, but they rarely get top performance.

I think some leaders, over time, have been told not to get too close to the people. The environment you’re talking about is the place where I thrive. I’ve talked to a lot of different leaders and organizations that are embracing this service leadership impact, focused, greater good, people first, culture drives success, mindset, and approach, which you’re diving into here.

Building Trust & Culture Through Compassionate Leadership

How do we redesign what we’ve been taught or told to do? We’ve been mirroring maybe our predecessors on how to lead. What are we leading in the fear-based versus what we are leading to when we think about belonging and trusting, all these amazing things, where people feel like they’re doing something for the greater good? That feels so amazing to me. How do we help leaders start to practice this differently?

I think you said it. Culture is the key to everything. Culture is simply values plus behavior. It’s important for the organization to get clear on the values that are important to that organization. More importantly, that behavior has to be modeled. That behavior needs to be the example, and that’s hard to do. I can tie this back to my earlier comments about my own personal growth and journey. You need to feel like you’re on very solid footing to be vulnerable with some of your actions and behaviors. That requires a level of self-love that is often difficult for leaders.

Culture is everything—it's simply values plus behavior. That’s why it’s essential for organizations to define the values that matter most. Share on X

It’s a very interesting thing that most people assume that love is exclusively a positive thing, but Socrates said that love is neutral. It can be both for good and for bad. In leadership, an abundance of misdirected self-love becomes narcissism. We see that a lot in our celebrity leaders. I’m not going to name any names, but I think a few people came to mind. They get the clear impression that they believe that their word is law. The place would not survive without them. They are the reason for all of their success, and everyone is riding their coattails.

That’s self-love taken to an extreme, which is distorted and gets wrapped up in ego. One of the things I look out for when I’m working with business leaders is that for this approach to work, that has to be released, or at least recognized and reformatted to a self-love that’s less ego-driven and more compassionate.

I think the fear-based approach is narcissistic. It’s just is. It’s of the past, and it’s about your own promotion, your own compensation. It’s not about the greater of the teams. We all have these moments where we’re in command and control. There’s an environment where we have to figure out something so urgent. Our survival is based on it. Aside from that, most of the time, as leaders, we need to step in differently.

As you’re talking about love, self-love, to the other love, loving others, taking care of them, connecting that to this greater good, tell us a little bit more about that other love as we’re listening and looking into that relationship of respecting and admiring what other people are bringing. I’m curious about what research you’ve uncovered there. Maybe you’ve already covered it.

Let’s use that example that you highlighted. Let’s say there’s some major crisis, and it’s up at the C-Suite in the organization. The leader calls the team together and says, “We have a huge problem. It is existential, and we need to fix it.” That leader then could say, “This is how we’re going to do it.” That one idea gets pushed out, and then other people figure out how to tactically execute on whatever strategy that leader comes up with, or that leader could be more humble and open and say, “This is how I see the problem. Do you agree? Do you disagree? Are we seeing this problem in the same way? I’m open to hearing all of your possible solutions. Let’s talk about it.”

That way, if nothing else, rather than getting one potential approach on the table, you’re going to get several potential approaches on the table that then, as the leader, you can evaluate for whatever you think is the best approach. You may have a personal bias and decide to go with your idea, but you also may hear something that you didn’t think of, and it’s better than what you were going to do in the first place. At a minimum, you get more from your people when they feel like they are free to express their thoughts and feelings, especially in a high-stress, important situation, than being ego-driven and doing it all on your own, because then it’s just you.

I love how you’re connecting this to be it’s a form of love without saying love. You didn’t say the word. It’s a way of being as a leader.

When I first started down this exploration, Jan Ryde, who runs a 150-year-old family business that started out making saddles. Now, they make the most luxurious mattresses on the planet. These mattresses cost as much as a car. I’m not kidding. They’re insanely expensive. The company is called Hästens. He wrote a book called When Business Is Love. He repeated many times that we are human beings. We’re not human doings.

Just being, being present, aware, and open, feeling comfortable expressing yourself, listening to others, taking a pause, and slowing down is a form of love. It makes people feel safe. It makes people feel secure. It makes people feel valued and supported. All of those things are what you would want in a life partner. These are all things that anybody can do for free. The most amazing thing about all this and love in particular, as powerful as love is as a resource, it’s also infinitely abundant, which is striking to me. I cannot think of any other resource that is so powerful and so valuable that it is limitless. You have children. You mentioned your daughter. Did you love your wife any less when you had your daughter?

No, but differently.

It’s just expanded. I have two children, and my love expanded. I did realize that when my kids arrived. How does this love keep expanding? It’s an amazing thing, but that’s applicable everywhere. Again, it cost me nothing. I think it’s a net positive to express that, to share that, and to feel that. It makes me better for the life of me, Darrin. I cannot figure out why we don’t operate this way, but I’m working hard to try and change it.

Expansive is so beautiful because it’s abundantly clear to me what’s available when we open ourselves up to it. You’re right. I have a son who’s eighteen and a daughter who’s turning seventeen. I love them to pieces. People would often say, “I only have so much love in my heart.” As you’ve said, it’s so expansive if we allow it to be and connect to it. It’s interesting that you talked about some of those leaders. We think about the world media. We think about what people are talking about and how people are more isolated than ever, even though we’re more connected like we are right now, but we’re more in our own silos. It’s so interesting because it has polarized all of us, and we’re separating from each other. We’re not connecting to this level of abundance.

It’s almost like we’re trying to hide the fact that we have love. We don’t share it. We don’t look for sameness and difference at the same time while connecting to something so incredible, like love, or our very being on this planet. The way you described it was so perfect. I know you’re working on it. What are you noticing? What are you seeing that helps people open their eyes and their hearts to help them serve the world in a better way, because it’s going to serve them?

I’ve been pretty surprised. My first client was a hard-nosed aerospace engineering firm. I reached out to the CEO of this organization because I was looking for what we started this conversation about how do I bring the word love into business. I’m like, “You’re an engineer. You’re in aerospace. There’s nothing soft about what you guys do. It’s life and death, making sure that the parts and systems that you make are flawless. There’s no room for error. What room would love have in that organization?” Once I got in there, I was able to present and communicate a non-emotional perspective of love.

We’ve talked about some of these different forms of love. Love is not necessarily romantic. Passion is something that businesses can use to get people motivated, to inspire innovation and ideas, and that extra oomph that everybody needs. It does not need to be romantic passion. The bonds of friendship, the bonds of commitment, the bonds of honor, and the bonds of family, in some cases, are very applicable. When you can break it down into the components and you get a little bit further away from the hallmark idea of love, it becomes obvious. This conversation that we’re having becomes obvious.

Love isn't necessarily romantic passion. It is something business can truly harness to motivate people and inspire innovation and new ideas. Share on X

This is a powerful force that I’m underutilizing in my organization. It simply makes sense to try to bring it in. We work together to bring it in. A very specific example, one of the exercises I did in that initial presentation was to go through the six different forms of love that I’m working with and have the group close their eyes and think of a time where they felt deep passion, agape, self-love, or whatever it is. I was expecting to get a real thumbs down on that experience because it was soft, mushy, and hippy-dippy as anything I did in that presentation. The feedback I got was, “I enjoyed that. It helped me to have a moment to feel something, to get in touch with my emotions.”

Another example is that before I even launched this practice, I was working on my presentation, and I had an opportunity to share it with an organization. They do security guard staffing, not soft, hippy-dippy stuff. They deal with tough people in difficult situations a lot. Again, no margin for error. You hire a security guard, they better do their job. I gave the pitch over Zoom, and the person who set it up for me was an ex-colleague from Microsoft. He called me up later that day, and he said, “Noah, I’ve got to tell you. After your presentation, we had a little round table. I brought in pizzas for the team, and half the team was in tears.”

They never felt like they could express themselves at work before. You opened up these emotions that made people feel more complete and more human in the workspace. That’s when I knew I was onto something. If a 30-minute presentation can bring half the room to tears, that’s something I’m going to keep working on.

Yes, it’s needed. Have you ever heard this poem called I Love You More?

No.

Dia Seltenreich is this author of a poem called, I love you more. I will send it to you. I think you’re going to love it because it talks a bit about the journey of a person about letting your guard down, letting your ego go away, and removing the limiting beliefs. This other person is continuing to remind that other person that we’re going to continue to do that until you say to yourself that you love yourself. It’s beautiful.

That sounds beautiful. Please do send it.

I’ve read that into one of our leadership programs, and all of us were crying because we could see ourselves, we could see our children, and we could see other people we love or maybe loved with relationships that have passed. You see yourself in so many different capacities. When you think about our identity, how we’re sourced, and how we show up, we have to ask ourselves. I love what you’re doing. You’re creating the space to listen to how you’re showing up. What’s serving you? What’s feeding you? What’s fueling you? As you’re talking about being energetic, you’re taking a look at that.

It’s so important. I love that because that’s going to allow you to see how you’re coming across to people now. I think you’re noticing a difference in how you’re impacting the world, but also how you’re receiving the world, too. You’re receiving what you got, that great sense of feedback from folks who got emotional at work. That’s pretty cool. My traditional thinking was you’re not allowed to be emotional at work, but now I get it. No, we should be. We did great.

I think what’s interesting to me is that, this is going to not sound great, but I’m going to go to a very hard-nosed technical approach, in order to extract the most from our employees in an age of AI, we have to double down and invest in what makes people human because that’s the value that we’re bringing to the table. AI consumes more information and can process it faster. It’s getting to be a pretty damn good writer. It’s doing creative work. It’s making videos. It’s creating logos. It’s doing a lot of things that we assumed were human skills. In light of that, as humans are going to partner with AI in the workplace, the thing that humans can do and will do that AI will never ever do is they will feel. They will have emotions.

We have to double down and invest in what makes people human, because that’s the true value we bring to the table. Share on X

If we’re restricting, shutting down, or simply not encouraging and creating safe spaces for people to get in touch with and express their emotions, again, in a professional way, it has to be socially appropriate, but there are definite ways to connect with our emotional systems and our somatic wisdom that brings incredible value to anything that we do. In a world where the workplace is shifting dramatically, I think now is the time. It’s too bad we didn’t do it sooner, but if we don’t do it now, we’re going to be no better than AI that’s not as good. We’re not going to compete with AI on AI’s terms. We need to lean into the things that make us human.

Embracing Emotion & Love In The Workplace

I think these pauses, these levels of inquiries, we like to talk about provocations to get us to think and create the language, that’s what AI is doing, too. It’s all about the questions we’re asking and our willingness to learn from what we’re listening to, if we started there, asked a little bit differently, and opened up our minds and eyes. When we met and we talked that one night, you were scratching your head, saying, “Is there a new word, a new term, I should use in place of love?” I don’t know if that resonates with you. Has that come about? Have you created a new term or some type of way to express this, or is that minimizing it by trying to come up with a new term? Where are you at with it?

I think I’m careful about the term love because it’s loaded. I’m calling this practice now leadership with heart. I’m leaning into the idea of love without using the word, but that also leans into the idea of using more than your mind to be an effective leader.

One of my previous guests, Mindi Cox from O.C. Tanner, is an incredible human being. They have a tagline that’s helping people thrive in the workplace. When I first met her and her organization, I was like, “Who’s thinking of that because that’s phenomenal? Does that exist? That exists not only in their company, but that’s their tagline for the world.” She showed me you can lead with love and still manage an organization with kindness, but being direct at times when you need to be direct at times.

That’s about how you say something, because sometimes, we use the word love punch. We’ve got to let someone know that, wait a minute, how you showed up there wasn’t what I expected. First of all, check to make sure that these individuals, “Is everything okay? We noticed you’re different,” or maybe, “How you came across there wasn’t what we’ve heard in the past,” and are caring enough to get curious about what’s there.

Based on what that response is, be able to help that person to go forward, unless something has happened and they’re not wanting to be there anymore, what have you. However, she’s taught me and opened my eyes to using the word love a bit more. What’s funny is I always choose a word of the year for the purpose as my guide, and this year is love for me. I couldn’t be more thrilled about the fact that we’re having this conversation.

Tough love is a thing, too. I have yet to find a situation that I would not and don’t make better decisions from a perspective of love and caring. It’s a universal truth. Some of these decisions are not easy. Some are hard. Some of them are difficult. Some of them may not be received well. They’re hard for other people to hear or experience, but when it comes from a place of love, deep caring, understanding, sympathy, and empathy, it’s warmer. It’s not cold, and it doesn’t need to be cold. We are dealing with people. We should treat people with dignity and respect at all times, even in the toughest times.

It comes to mind as you’re speaking to that. It’s limitless. It’s expansive. There’s an abundance of all this if we want to, and we can create it based on how we’re serving it up. We’ve done a nice job talking through these different layers. I think we could dive into the other ones in depth. I want to shift a little bit to ask you a bit. How did you get here? You’ve mentioned a few things. What got you here? Were there some a-ha moments? Were there some elements that hit you in the head? Did you get some love punches? What happened?

I was dating a woman who sent me an article about the ancient Greek forms of love. It was new to me. I didn’t understand that word had such breadth. I pretty quickly reassessed it with my personal life. I realized that throughout my career, I’ve mostly been in marketing, biz dev, sales, and then leadership. A marketer’s job is to change behaviors at scale. In order to do that, marketers often use emotions as a lever, desire, wanting more, whatever it is. Love is the most powerful emotion that we have. Why are marketers not understanding the scope of this word and often trivializing it?

I realized that this goes way beyond marketing. This is about business culture. Why are organizations not embodying this broader understanding of love as a motive force for good, for profit, for positive energy, for customer engagement, and innovation? That’s what started this whole thing. I then decided to break it down. Plato writes about love in a number of different places. Some people say that there are four Greek loves. Some people would say there are seven or nine. I’ve settled on six. What I did then was I did a deep exploration of each of those different types of love and how they can apply to business. That gave me a good framework, a foundation to work with, an understanding of these different forms of love, and how to apply them to organizations of all types and sizes.

It’s feeling self-love by helping other organizations find this level of love that they could build within their organizations, it seems.

I have an ulterior motive. My ulterior motive is that I believe that business is the most effective behavior change tool that exists for human behavior. Business tells us what we want, how to behave, what we should strive for, how to dress, and what to eat. Business is driving at least a suggestion of all of those things, of how humans interact with each other. My ulterior motive here, my end goal, is that if I can inject love into business and have that grow and expand outward into the markets that they serve, I believe it’s perhaps one of the most effective ways to change the world, create more love, make emotions more acceptable in the workplace, and make love the human operating system rather than fear.

It’s so calming to hear you speak about this and the way you’re truly lighting up. As I mentioned, it’s great to see people light up and the true love they want to put out in the world and have an impact on the world. The way you’re doing it gives me a peaceful feeling. Thank you. It’s calming. The fact that someone like yourself and others are trying to make this impact, we need it more than ever. As you said, it’s incredible.

That’s a huge compliment, Darrin. Thank you.

Finding Joy In The Journey & Self-Love

I appreciate that. You deserve it. It’s huge. It’s expansive. Maybe you’ve already shared the response to this question. I love asking people. What brings you joy, and what does that look like?

Two thoughts came to mind. One of them is that a-ha moments bring me incredible joy. When I feel like I’ve seen something for the first time, or I see something from a new perspective that lights up my brain, that comes with a lot of joy. The other thing that’s been bringing me joy is that I’ve been intentionally working on finding joy in the simplest things. I mentioned to you earlier. I live on a sailboat. Even through the winter, I made it a point to watch every sunset.

I take a pause out of my day to admire this incredible spectacle we get for free every single day, which is beautiful, awe-inspiring, and fills me with joy. Springtime, flowers blooming, all the little things, I think, are important, too. Because I’ve been able to slow down a little bit and get out of my head a little bit, I’ve grown to have a much deeper appreciation for the simple things in life.

Appreciation. Love it. Every sunset, what a good mantra to live by, right there. That’s another day to be appreciative of and another day to make an impact by the next day. I appreciate it. I love that. What comes to mind a bit there, too, as what you were saying earlier about your first thing that was on your mind, that balance of slowing down, it feels like you’re striking the right balance to me. While you’re achieving and making the impact much greater, it’s less about yourself, gaining the beauty and awareness of what’s in front of you, and slowing down to see what’s there.

That’s out of your control. All of it’s out of your control. Where in the past, maybe you thought that’s where you were getting joy from, but it’s in those moments that you’re reaching out to the world and serving it up differently or noticing it differently. Noticing what people are saying and doing differently is bringing you a level of joy, and that’s out of your control. That level of balance, to me, I feel like you’re on your path.

I feel like I’m getting back to it. The first 30 to 35 years of my life, maybe 40, were all fueled by ambition, striving, extrinsic recognition, and reward. The last few years, the pendulum swung way in the other direction, and I’ve gotten very introspective, slowed down, been fortunate enough, and also made some real sacrifices to take that time for myself. Felt a little selfish, but I needed it. Now, I’m feeling a little more grounded in that position. I’m swinging the pendulum back the other way. I’ll find the balance. I’m not quite there yet, but thank you for saying so.

That’s fair. A lot of the research I’ve done related to happiness, I’ve done a ton, but it’s a sense of understanding that greater sense of being, what we’re connecting to. A lot of that is what we’re doing and being part of how we’re showing up, how we’re wired, but also the actions and behaviors of how we’re looking at all that, and then observing what that means. Is that serving us? Is it serving others? Is it a combination?

Happiness, the whole term, find joy in the journey, and it sounds aha and woohoo, but that’s true. It’s not about the job promotion. It’s not about your title. It’s not about how much you make. It’s not about the house or the sailboat you live on or how big it is. If you find that level of joy on the journey and you make that impact that’s greater than yourself, to me, that’s pure love and joy connected together, which I’m trying to live and be that way. I’m still working on it myself. One more question for you. This show is called Live Your Possible. I love getting interpretations from my guests. What does “live your possible” mean to you? Maybe you have a tip or two along the way, but how would you define it? What’s its meaning to you?

I’m a little reluctant to say this, but I feel like I’m doing that right now. Living on a sailboat has always been my dream. It was my retirement plan, and life circumstances came up in a way where I was able to execute on that sooner than retirement. I’m living it now, and I’m loving it. Part of that comes with self-reliance, a freedom I’m enjoying, and a connection to nature, which I’m also enjoying. Darrin, I don’t want to end the show without saying this because you mentioned it. One of the things I love about sailing is that the journey is the destination. It’s about getting from A to B. If I want to get from A to B fast, I’d drive or have a powerboat. Sailing is about the journey, and I would love to have you come out and go for a sail where we can experience the journey together.

I would appreciate that and hang out, even experiencing nature together, see what comes up, what shows up. I appreciate that invitation. Thank you. That made my day, aside from this conversation alone. That sense of freedom, too. I love that sense of being out on the water that you mentioned about the sense of freedom. One more thing that struck me is that you said, sometimes it sounds selfish, but we need to love ourselves first. We need to be able to understand what that looks like and be able to navigate that.

I think it came to me as you’re talking about the sailing component. It’s that if we don’t trust ourselves, how do we trust the world? If we don’t love ourselves, how do we love the world? It does start with each of us. I don’t know if there’s anything else you want to add before we end here, but is there anything else you’d want to add related to that or anything else?

I want to emphasize that and build on it. I’m pretty sure it was a Richard Branson post, but I’ve since heard other people say that in order to make an impact in the world, you should think in concentric circles. The first circle is self. You need to get yourself sorted out, so you have a foundation to work from. The next circle is friends, family, and those close to you, then maybe it’s a business, then maybe it’s your community, then maybe it’s your country, and then maybe it’s the world. This is coming from Richard Branson, who’s done all of that. That was his model. He started with himself.

I’m a big fan of his. I think that comes across in all of his public interactions. He carries a very healthy model of philautia, self-love. I see it on his face. I’ve never met the man, public persona. It doesn’t seem to come with a lot of ego, but it comes with confidence and understanding. He knows he’s making a big contribution. He knows he takes big risks. He knows he’s been rewarded handsomely for all of it, but he does that in a way that seems so healthy and balanced to me, as opposed to some of the other celebrity leaders that may come to mind.

I am a fan of his as well and support how he’s celebrating life and including people along the way with him. He’s not doing it by himself and recognizes that. Any final thoughts before we depart here?

Thank you. This was a great conversation. Again, this is a conversation that felt like a continuation of our first conversation. I’m surprised neither one of us has an adult beverage in front of us, but it is early in the day. Thank you. It was very natural and flowing. I heard myself say some things that I’m going to think about. You said a handful of things I’m going to digest and think about quite a bit. For me, my favorite part of the human experience is sharing thoughts, ideas, and things that inspire others to create more thoughts and ideas.

I’m inspired by your work and your willingness to share your vulnerability with all of us on this show. I admire what you’re doing. I love you, man. Maybe I can say that, right? Is that okay in today’s world?

You can say that. Absolutely.

I appreciate the invitation, and I’ll take you up on it. Cheers to you.

Great. Thanks, Darrin. Be well.

Important Links

• Keep America Beautiful
• Noah Ullman on LinkedIn
• Brent Robertson on LinkedIn
• The Symposium
• The Happiness Lab with Dr. Laurie Santos | Podcast
• Be Generative
• When Business Is Love
• Mindi Cox on LinkedIn
• Richard Branson on LinkedIn

 

About Noah Ullman

Noah Ullman is a global business strategist, serial entrepreneur, inventor, and Microsoft veteran with a track record of driving sustainable growth across technology, consumer products, and nonprofit sectors.

He has launched multiple ventures, served as Chief Marketing Officer of a national nonprofit, and currently sits on the board of World Neighbors, a 75-year-old NGO with global impact.

Today, Noah advises organizations on building human-centered cultures that align performance with purpose. His work helps leaders foster connection, clarity, and measurable impact, driving business results through cultural transformation.