What if the stress you believe is driving your success is actually holding you back?

In this episode of The Ed Mylett Show, I sit down with New York Times bestselling author Yung Pueblo, also known as Diego Perez, for a powerful conversation about emotional healing, inner peace, and achieving more without living in constant tension. For years, I believed that worry and chaos were part of what made me successful.

Diego challenges that belief and explains why a calm mind can unlock greater creativity, clearer decisions, and a more powerful way to pursue your goals. You don’t have to choose between ambition and peace. Diego also shares the deeply personal story of growing up amid financial hardship, using drugs and alcohol to escape his emotions, and the night that nearly cost him his life.

What followed wasn’t an overnight transformation. It was a commitment to honesty, small daily changes, and eventually a meditation practice that changed his relationship with himself. We explore how to stop feeding anxious thoughts, become more present with the people you love, and recognize the difference between working through pain and repeatedly reliving it.

We also discuss his book, Journey: The Year That Changes Everything, and how daily reflection can help you move from reacting to life to living with intention. You don’t need to hit rock bottom to begin changing your life. You can start where you are.

IN THIS EPISODE, YOU’LL LEARN:

• What equanimity means—and why peace doesn’t require perfect circumstances

• How to experience difficult emotions without feeding the stories attached to them

• Why calmness can strengthen your ambition instead of weakening it 

• How childhood experiences can shape patterns of worry and tension

• Two practical ways to become more present with the people you love

• The difference between understanding your past and changing your response to it

• How silence and Vipassana meditation can cultivate awareness, non-reaction, and compassion

• How to recognize when to take action, practice patience, or change direction

• Why the labels you give yourself don’t have to define your future