Classpass Founder: Quitting My 9-5 Led To A $1 Billion Business: Payal Kadakia | E141

Steven Bartlett 0:00 Could you do me a quick favor if you're listening to this? Please hit the follow or subscribe button. It helps more than you know, and we invite subscribers in every month to watch the show in person.

Payal Kadakia 0:08 I think society goes, success is get this job, get married, get a house. What does that do to you? It just really makes your life feel small. The founder of ClassPass.

Steven Bartlett 0:17 A monthly fitness program. A billion-dollar founder. Payal Idarkia.

Payal Kadakia 0:22 When I would watch my parents not really fit in, it sort of made me realize, maybe I don't fit in, and then be told I smelled or I didn't belong somewhere. Everyone wanted to box me into something, and I just refused to be boxed. I spent half a million dollars building a product that didn't work. Was I exhausted? Yes. Was I lonely? Yeah. I missed family things, I missed weddings. I- I was just not around. I have learned at this point, like, time means more to me than money. I want to make sure my priorities are more reflective of the human I want to be in my life. If you go towards purpose, I guarantee your life will be more fulfilling.

Steven Bartlett 0:59 Do you believe that everybody has a purpose beyond the nine to five?

Payal Kadakia 1:03 I do.

Steven Bartlett 1:04 How do you find it?

Payal Kadakia 1:05 So first of all ...

Steven Bartlett 1:07 So without further ado, I'm Steven Bartlett, and this is The Diary of a CEO: USA Edition. I hope nobody's listening, but if you are, then please keep this to yourself. Payal,

Steven Bartlett 1:26 when I read someone's story, one of the first questions I try and answer when I'm reading through their, especially their early years, is I'm trying to identify what it is that made them either an anomaly or hungry. I have a kind of a thesis that much of people's drive and their ambition, especially the people that I sit here with, comes from kind of, some kind of pain or trauma or early experience that molded them.

Payal Kadakia 1:48 Right.

Steven Bartlett 1:48 So my question to you is, what made you hungry?

Payal Kadakia 1:53 You know, when I was younger, I got to taste something that was so magical, which was dance. And it was this place in my life that it wasn't about the physicality of actually dancing. It was the ability to make other people feel through something that I did, and to be able to realize that as a human being, you can have that type of influence, power, connection to other people, and to feel that when you are four or five years old was just this magical experience for me that honestly nothing else in my life could compare to it, and once I uncovered that, I always wanted to feel that in anything I did, and I strived in all the work I did and all of, you know, the different careers I've had in my life and the different, you know, art I've done, I've strived always to go back to that intention of how do I give to others and make them feel something in their life? And that's really been this anchor for me and its purpose at the end of the day.

Steven Bartlett 3:03 And that started at five years old?

Payal Kadakia 3:05 Yeah. When I was really young.

Steven Bartlett 3:07 With a dance at a wedding?

Payal Kadakia 3:09 Yeah, it was just a random dance performance that for some reason I started dancing, and everyone started watching me, and I, it wasn't anything that was a, uh, structured performance by any means. It was very much just this organic thing that came out of me, and I really just loved it. And I realized actually in a, in a deeper way that the other part of the hunger came from when I danced and felt that feeling, I felt like the most authentic version of me, and I realized that I was in so many settings where I didn't always feel like I could be me. And whether that was, you know, being an Indian girl in the middle of a town where no one looked like me, or sometimes being with my Indian community but being in a town that where I was a cheerleader and I didn't fit in there, I realized that so many parts of me never felt whole, and I was always showing up with one little strand of me, one little strand of me there, here, and I felt when I performed and danced, especially Indian dance, I felt like the most whole version of who I was.

Steven Bartlett 4:15 The resistance you felt and the struggle you felt of bit- trying to, I guess, conform to two different communities at the same time, so tell me about trying to be an American in, in a town where there's, you know, 300 people at your school, and you're the only people of Indian heritage. How was that?

Payal Kadakia 4:34 I think one of the most interesting parts of it is so much of this comes from the parents, not really from the kids, and when I would watch my parents not really fit in, it sort of made me realize maybe I don't fit in. It was sort of this interesting way to look at my parents and know that they felt uncomfortable and then look at myself and be in different settings and realize, wait, I don't look like everyone else, and then be told I smelled or my food smelled or I didn't belong somewhere because my hair color was different, was just a very interesting place to be.

Steven Bartlett 5:10 Kids said that to you?

Payal Kadakia 5:11 Yeah. I rem- like, I mean, I talk about it in my book, but there were some, some really harsh moments, you know? And when you're young, you're, you're impressionable, right? Things can scar you for a very long time. And I think for me, the, the goodness was that I did have this place of dance that made me feel grounded and made me feel whole, because if I didn't have that, I think the trauma that I was probably going through by not fitting in would have just burned a hole so deep in me that I'm not sure how I would have been able to recover, but I had this light, right? And I think that's, you know, going back to what you were asking, it was the light that I saw that there is something beautiful out there for me to go and do for the world if I can just hang onto it and fight for it, and it was a fight for me to even hang onto whatever my identity was, right? I mean, we talk about our identities in, in all these labels, which I really don't love, like whether it's Indian-American CEO, whatever all these labels are. It was really just, I think my whole journey in my life-... was a fight to be myself in any setting and not have people tell me what to do. Right? I think we all struggle with that in our whole lives, and probably why I had to be a CEO, because I don't like (laughs) anyone telling me what to do.

Steven Bartlett 6:25 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 6:25 But it really stemmed because I think throughout my life everyone wanted to box me into something, and I just refused to be boxed.

Steven Bartlett 6:35 Did your parents want to box you into something?

Payal Kadakia 6:36 Of course. I mean, my parents, you know, they sacrificed everything to come to America. They obviously wanted my sister and I to have successful careers, which, you know, amounted to a few different industries, like be a doctor, a lawyer, engineer, or ... You know, and then the other part of it was get married, you know, obviously at like a normal age where you could cook for your (laughs) family and be a good wife. Right? These were sort of the, these were the expectations that were set in my life, and I think that's really the hardest part is when you are constantly brought in your life and saying that you need to live by the expectations of others. You end up either rebelling-

Steven Bartlett 7:18 Hmm.

Payal Kadakia 7:18 ... or you conform. And I always wanted to make my parents proud, so I knew I did what I felt was at the core part of the values, so for example, if it was getting education, I thought that was important too. I wasn't going to sit there and rebel from getting education. But there came a point in my career trajectory where I had to say, "Okay, like I have checked every box in this. Now I have to do it my way, with the way I really want to feel and not conform, and rebel." And I think that's really the whole formula of people knowing when to rebel and when to conform.

Steven Bartlett 7:52 You referenced that, um, you were looking for a different feeling after checking those boxes. What was the feeling you had when you were doing that job?

Payal Kadakia 8:00 I had trained myself my entire life to do well when people told me to hit this mark in my life. Right? I, and that's like, in a way, that's like how I developed the skills in my life to, to always propel myself and execute and make sure that, um, I was able to, you know, be responsible and move forward in everything I did. But, I felt no deep fire or passion or love towards it. Right? I wasn't jumping out of my bed to go (laughs) to my office to go and work-

Steven Bartlett 8:32 (laughs)

Payal Kadakia 8:32 ... for my clients. Right? I was doing what I had to because, you know, I knew it was, once again, expected of me.

Steven Bartlett 8:40 When you hear ... You must have friends that are living a, a life that is expected of them, and you can start to see as the, the years go on the consequence of living a life that is expected of you.

Payal Kadakia 8:50 Absolutely.

Steven Bartlett 8:50 So what would you say to those people? And what lessons have you learned about living a life expected of you?

Payal Kadakia 8:55 (laughs) I mean, that's not the way to have a fulfilled life. You can have a life, and you can probably check all the boxes and make your people proud in your life, but you're gonna be on the other side of it and feel empty. And that feeling of emptiness is the worst feeling anyone can ever have, and I think people come to it at different points in their life. They either come to it when they're 20 or they come to it when they're 50.

Steven Bartlett 9:18 Hmm.

Payal Kadakia 9:18 And that's because they haven't done the work to actually ask themselves, "What are the expectations you want for your own life?" And that's the problem. I think we're never taught that, right? No one's ever asked us what we want for our own lives, and I think society goes and tells us, "Okay, success is get this job. Success is get married, get a house, have kids." You know? And especially for women, it's even, I think, even a bit more of a closed road. And that, what does that do to you? It just really, it, it makes your life feel small. Right?

Steven Bartlett 9:51 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 9:51 Because it makes you feel like you can't get past it to go and live for your dreams, and ultimately, you know, and I've been there in my life where I have felt like the road has closed in, and it's left me feeling hopeless. And that's the worst place in the world to be, is feeling hopeless. The best thing you could do is feel like you can go and do anything, change the world, and I think the more you taste it, the more you want more of it in your life.

Steven Bartlett 10:18 At that phase in your life, were you battling somewhat with your north star, that light you referenced earlier, which was dancing, but also your, I guess, your nine-to-five?

Payal Kadakia 10:29 (laughs) Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 10:29 And I want ... Tell me about that battle and how dance ultimately ended up winning.

Payal Kadakia 10:34 I remember always having this bounce in my step. Like I would walk to work in the middle of New York City choreographing in my head, listening to the song I was performing. Like I, I, in a weird way, was like embodying this life that, of what I wanted to be. And then I would get to the office, and I would do my work, and you know, once again, like I, I love the Steve Martin quote of, "Be so good they can't ignore you." Like, whatever work I've, I do in my life, I will do 150% if I say yes. But, I knew that something was wrong. I never, I didn't want to live like that. I didn't want to feel like I was hiding so much of who I was. And as my nine-to-five, which by the way in consulting isn't a nine-to-five.

Steven Bartlett 11:15 Yeah. (laughs)

Payal Kadakia 11:15 You work like 80 hours a week. I mean, that was my life. And I, as I realized that if I wanted to commit to that career path, that that 80 was probably gonna go to 90, it was gonna go to 100, was going to be traveling, and I was going to have to say, "No," more and more to the thing I loved, I just realized I wasn't willing to make that trade-off. And I think that's sometimes the hardest thing people have to think about is what are you sacrificing, and what's the trade-off in your life that you're making? And I just wasn't willing to make it at that point, and I, uh, I had done so much in my life at that point where, um, I felt like I had achieved, according to everyone else, enough to start taking a little bit of a path to being rebellious. Right? And I think that's really when I started to do a lot of work to say, "What can I do to bring all parts of me to the table?"

Steven Bartlett 12:12 When you make that decision to leave Bain & Company-

Payal Kadakia 12:14 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 12:14 ... a managing, management consulting firm in New York-

Payal Kadakia 12:17 (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 12:17 ... was there like a, a series of catalytic sort of moments or pivotal moments near the end of your time there that made you think, "Oh, fuck this."

Payal Kadakia 12:24 (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 12:25 You know, like I, I, I read about a meeting you had-

Payal Kadakia 12:27 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 12:27 ... a performance review.

Payal Kadakia 12:29 Yeah. So, it's literally the opening-

Steven Bartlett 12:31 Is that- hmm.

Payal Kadakia 12:31 ... um, of my book. But, you know, a few, a few things happened, I would say. So, first of all, most people stay in consulting, like, at this, this job for about three years, and then you go off to business school. It's sort of the usual route people take. So, I was in my third year there. And a few people can kind of stay on and just continue there. I really wasn't interested in going to business school at the time. I wanted to live. I wanted to, like, be in New York City and feel the energy of it. And so, in my third, in my third year, I had a performance at, um, in the middle of Times Square for th- for this big, uh, unveiling of Aishwarya Rai's Madame Tussauds str- statue, which was an important thing. And Aishwarya Rai is one of my icons, especially as a dancer, and she's a huge Bollywood actress. And the week before, a client meeting gets scheduled at the same time as my performance. And I'm, you know ... My clients are big clients. These aren't, these are Fortune 500 companies. (laughs) These aren't small clients by any means, and, and we're meeting, like, the CEOs, you know, CFOs of the company. And, um, I remember talking to my boss saying, "Hey, you know what? I really want to go to the performance. I'm not, like, a big part of this meeting. Is it okay if I miss it?" And we talked about it really briefly. It wasn't a big deal. I didn't feel bad about it. I went to the performance, it went, it went well. A few months later, we're sitting down talking about, you know, review and she's, like, giving me feedback. And she says this thing to me which just triggered me, and it was, "Is this the job you really want? Like, I don't think that you want to be a consultant." And I took that in my heart as, "Oh my gosh, she doesn't think I'm good enough," right? And I just kind of went through how throughout my life, I've been taught to be type A, everyone tell me I've done a good job. And so my initial reaction to her saying that to me was, "I'm going to prove to you how good I am," right?

Steven Bartlett 14:18 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 14:18 That's like the natural type A reaction-

Steven Bartlett 14:20 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 14:20 ... is to say, "No, no, what do you mean? Like, I love this job. I really want to be here." And the more I started thinking about that, the more I realized she was right. I didn't want to be there. It was not the life I wanted. It was not the career I wanted. And that's when I decided to start looking at other jobs that would give me a bit more of the flexibility I wanted in my day-to-day, but still pay the bills.

Steven Bartlett 14:43 And that's when you moved over to MTV?

Payal Kadakia 14:44 I went to Warner Music Group.

Steven Bartlett 14:45 W- Warner, oh right, okay.

Payal Kadakia 14:47 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 14:47 Um, there's this really interesting balance that I see in you, like, which c- clearly shifts in your life, where you, you feel like you're a, um ... And correct me where I'm wrong here. But you're quite a good, like, conformist in terms of expectation, and then slowly rebellion starts to creep in. And it was just, just had me thinking about, like, the probably ... if there is a right balance of conformity and rebellion in our life, because conformity makes sense, you know, in some regards. You can't just be a total rebel.

Payal Kadakia 15:12 Right, right.

Steven Bartlett 15:13 You know, we'd all be living out in the desert or something.

Payal Kadakia 15:14 Right.

Steven Bartlett 15:15 But just the interesting balance I see in people like you, like me, of ... I mean, a lot of them start as kind of conformists or a little bit more people pleasing, especially first-generation immigrant families.

Payal Kadakia 15:24 Right.

Steven Bartlett 15:25 And then that fails them-

Payal Kadakia 15:27 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 15:28 ... in terms of fulfillment, happiness, mental health, and then that's where the rebellion starts to ...

Payal Kadakia 15:33 I think that's the key. It's, it's rebelling for the right reason.

Steven Bartlett 15:38 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 15:38 If that makes sense? I always believe that I was rebelling for purpose.

Steven Bartlett 15:43 Right.

Payal Kadakia 15:44 Right?

Steven Bartlett 15:44 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 15:44 And if you're rebelling for purpose-

Steven Bartlett 15:46 Hmm, it's a strong force.

Payal Kadakia 15:47 ... I think it's ... Exactly.

Steven Bartlett 15:49 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 15:49 It's justifiable, right?

Steven Bartlett 15:50 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 15:50 Dance wasn't something that was just, "Okay, Payal, go and do this because it's a hobby." Like, it, it was this place for me to bring together so much of my trauma actually from when I was younger. It was this place for me. And, and, you know, my dance company was this Indian American dance experience. And it was about me bringing together the Payal who got made fun of with the Payal who danced at her Indian festivals and bringing all of me together to say, "When the world doesn't want to accept the different parts of who I am, I'm going to show you what it can look like," right? Like, that's really a big part of what I realized in my journey, is when people have told me parts don't fit together, I find a way to put them together-

Steven Bartlett 16:31 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 16:31 ... and show you even a more beautiful experience, right?

Steven Bartlett 16:34 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 16:34 And I, I believe even ClassPass was really the epitome of that too in my life, is bringing parts of me together that I would never have been able to bring together in any other way. And, you know, I think so much of when we're rebelling, it's about fighting for something.

Steven Bartlett 16:50 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 16:50 I wasn't, I wasn't trying to rebel. I was fighting for my passion. I was fighting for my purpose. And I mean, isn't that what life should be about, is fighting for something like that?

Steven Bartlett 17:02 Amen. Amen. When you leave Bain & Company though, is there a part of you ... Because that expectation is, it's n- ... I mean, you never really-

Payal Kadakia 17:09 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 17:09 ... never really fully shake it, right? Is there a part of you that whispers in your ear and goes, "You failed," or ...

Payal Kadakia 17:15 Yeah. I mean, what was hard was all my colleagues, right, that at that point who had gone to Harvard- (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 17:21 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 17:21 ... gone to Stanford, you know. I was comparing myself to them, and I felt like I was taking a step back compared-

Steven Bartlett 17:29 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 17:29 ... to what they were doing. But one of the other important things I learned during this time, and I think this is an important part in- for all of us at any phase, especially when we're going through these transitional times, is I also embraced a new community, right? So, I obviously didn't just define myself by my Bain & MIT friends. I had this huge artistic dance community that was sort of like growing, this Indian American c- community that was sort of coming around me.

Steven Bartlett 17:54 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 17:54 And that made me feel whole in a different way. So instead of constantly being around people I felt less than, I went and found a community I belonged in, even though it wasn't the one that I would've, you know, naturally feel-

Steven Bartlett 18:08 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 18:08 ... f- felt inclined to go to. And I think that's another important thing, especially when we're exploring these decisions and identities, is, you know, back to the light thing. It's ... Sometimes it's not the people we think are gonna give us the light who give us the light. So find-

Steven Bartlett 18:21 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 18:21 ... that new community that makes you shine.

Steven Bartlett 18:24 It's such a unappreciated, um, point of resistance for people that are trying to make an adjustment in their life. I hear it so much. People say, "I want to leave a situation, but I'm scared of losing the community that comes with that situation." That could be a city, it could be a job, it could be a partner.

Payal Kadakia 18:40 Right, right.

Steven Bartlett 18:40 Sometimes your lives become so intertwined that you think, "Well if, I lose this partner, if I lose this job or whatever, then I'm going to lose all of these people," and that really keeps people ...... trapped.

Payal Kadakia 18:49 I agree with that. That's-

Steven Bartlett 18:50 Really keeps people trapped.

Payal Kadakia 18:50 ... a really good point. Yeah. P- I mean, and you can find new communities, you know?

Steven Bartlett 18:55 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 18:55 And I think you have to remember that the people you surround yourself with are your choice.

Steven Bartlett 18:59 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 18:59 Right? And I've had different communities show up for me at different times in my life, right? For me, it was the different communities that made me the entrepreneur I was.

Steven Bartlett 19:09 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 19:09 It was my business community that helped me build ClassPass, but it was also this girl who was going to ballet classes every single day-

Steven Bartlett 19:16 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 19:16 ... with my, with my dancer friends who also was thinking about the f- the classes that they-

Steven Bartlett 19:21 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 19:21 ... people need to take in their life. And it was that unique combination of my traits combined with the different experiences I was having-

Steven Bartlett 19:28 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 19:29 ... that enabled me to build what I did ultimately.

Steven Bartlett 19:31 You talk about, so you, you managed to get a, now, a job you consider to be more of a nine-to-five, where you've got time in the evenings to, to dance, and you end up setting up your own sort of dance company. Um, how'd you get to th- from there to that pivotal trip to San Francisco that introduced you to the world of tech?

Payal Kadakia 19:47 Yeah. So, in those two years when I was at Warner Music Group, I started tasting leadership and entrepreneurship, right? I started tasting this idea of what life could look like when I was living to my own drum beat, right? And we put on a few shows in New York City during that time that, honestly, like just were so well received from people. The, the momentum of that, the, the feeling I felt for, of my community's support, it made me just start feeling confidence in my ability to go after my dreams, right? And I think this is an important part of the journey that we also forget is that, it's the confidence in the small stuff that actually-

Steven Bartlett 20:25 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 20:25 ... builds the confidence towards the big stuff, right?

Steven Bartlett 20:28 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 20:28 'Cause it's not, it wasn't, okay, Payal just decided to go quit her job one day and start a company. It was this series of small steps, right? It was putting on a show for 150 people that went well, then putting on a show for 1,000 people that went well, then saying, "Oh wait, let me think about my life in a bigger way," and that's sort of where I was at that moment. So, I wanted to explore new career paths that I could take, and that's why I decided to go out to San Francisco, and it changed my life.

Steven Bartlett 20:55 The point you made about the way confidence is built I think-

Payal Kadakia 20:57 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 20:57 ... is so, so important because I think a lot of people think, they see people like you now, sat here, um, after all this, all you've achieved, and they think, "How do I get from where I am sat on this sofa, in this job that I'm in that I hate, to being her?" It seems like such a huge canyon I have to cross that it feels like you must be, uh-

Payal Kadakia 21:19 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 21:19 ... from another planet. So, uh, that f- f- when people see you at the finish line, it can sometimes be quite demotivating.

Payal Kadakia 21:24 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 21:24 It seems like so. But what you've just said there is, in fact, there's these small, it's a staircase, small, one tiny step at a time building, like, subjective evidence in yourself that you, you can do a little bit more than you thought.

Payal Kadakia 21:36 That keeps you going.

Steven Bartlett 21:36 And I'm curious as to what makes people like you take, take that small step. And it sounds like it's, you're just driven, th- this purpose is dragging you.

Payal Kadakia 21:45 Purpose, 100%.

Steven Bartlett 21:47 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 21:47 If, if I wasn't driven to make an impact in the world, I wouldn't do it. I mean, l- you know, the, you know, yes, like I could go and get a good job and do all of that and live, like, the expected life and be fine. But that's not fire, right? That's not me taking my hours of 5:00 to 10:00 PM-

Steven Bartlett 22:05 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 22:05 ... after work and reserving studio space and getting girls together or, you know, working till 2:00, 3:00 in the morning to make reservations for people to get to class. Like, that's a very different why, right? And I think that's why I go back always to, how do you find that why? Like, what is that light that your life is always about? And I think, you know, and I, I feel very blessed that I found something that made me feel a sense of service so young, because nothing compares to it, you know? No, no amount of money, no amount of like, you know, whatever, press, or-

Steven Bartlett 22:41 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 22:41 ... you know, any of that is ever going to compare to the feeling of touching somebody's life.

Steven Bartlett 22:48 So many people in my, like, again, in my DMs are like, "How do I find my why?"

Payal Kadakia 22:51 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 22:51 And, and it feels-

Payal Kadakia 22:52 Good question, good question.

Steven Bartlett 22:52 ... almost like a privilege, doesn't it-

Payal Kadakia 22:54 Absolutely.

Steven Bartlett 22:54 ... for people that have figured that out? And there's people, I don't know, that will be listening to this in the morning, washing the dishes, driving up and down the country in a delivery van, whatever it is, thinking, "I know I'm capable and deserving of more, but I just don't know what it is." I w- do you, do you believe that everybody has a, a w- a, a, a purpose beyond the nine-to-five?

Payal Kadakia 23:14 I do.

Steven Bartlett 23:14 Yeah?

Payal Kadakia 23:15 But-

Steven Bartlett 23:15 How, how do you find it?

Payal Kadakia 23:16 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 23:16 Where is it?

Payal Kadakia 23:16 I think at the end of the day, it's, it's already inside you. It's usually ourselves that are unwilling to listen to it, right? To ask yourself, what did you love when you were younger, right? What, when did you light up? What di- who are your role models and inspirations? What's that, what's that thing you look at for a second longer, right? Who's that person you wanna talk to for a few minutes more and why? There is something pulling you there, and you have to be willing to go down the path of exploring it and trying, trying it, right? And I think that's really the hardest thing is we put so many blocks on ourselves, right? And, and I get it. I mean, our society tells us this is the way to live. It, it does not tell you to live purposefully and to go and chase your dreams. I mean, that's not ... I mean, yes, we do in the Instagram world of life in quotes. I get that. But the structure of our life is not actually built that way, right? And, and like you just said, I mean, you compared it to the nine-to-five, which is about making money, right? And I think actually, and I, I have a whole chapter where I talk about money, because money is the most trapping thing. That's the reason people aren't, are- aren't willing to do it, 'cause usually you know it. I, and I always ask people this when they're like, "I don't know." If you had all the money in the world, what, how would you spend your day tomorrow? That's like-

Steven Bartlett 24:39 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 24:39 ... a very good way to start exploring w- what would I do without one of the biggest constraints, right, that are s- probably on my mind?

Steven Bartlett 24:45 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 24:45 What would truly...... make you, light you up, right? And it's not about, like, buying stuff, right? At the end of the day, like, and I mean, anyone who wins the lottery, like, you know that they can go buy stuff, but that's not fulfillment at the end of the day. It's, it's a sense of purpose, right? And I think people have to just get themselves in a place where they're trying new things. And it does honestly feel like a privilege. And that's part of also why I started ClassPass-

Steven Bartlett 25:08 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 25:08 ... was because I wanted people to s- in a way, live a life that I knew I was. I was sitting there when I was in my early 20s, and I would spend my, you know, weeks performing for a show. I'd perform on Saturday night, invite people to come and watch me dance. And I remember I felt like I had, like I said, like this pep to my life and my step and all of that. And I want everyone to have that. And I remember thinking, "Wait a second, like, you used to be an athlete. Like, you were training for the Olympics. Like, you were this amazing singer. And w- you now just show up and go to work all day and don't think about finding time to even explore these things?" So, my contribution to that was honestly creating ClassPass. That was, like, part of my very big inspiration for it was, "How can I give some of that to other people, to go and try something and potentially have that same enlightenment in their life?" So, you kind of get out of your path and your routine, and meet a teacher, right, that will inspire the growth in you-

Steven Bartlett 26:06 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 26:06 ... and that r- reflection in you, 'cause most of the times, the hardest thing to do is to ask yourself what you love in your own life.

Steven Bartlett 26:13 And how did you ... When was the moment ... 'Cause I- I read in, I read in your book, you know, there's certain pain points we encounter where we realize, "Okay, I can solve this problem, and the, the sort of my manifestation of the solution is, um, this app or this website." What was the problem that you encountered and when that made you think ClassPass is the solution?

Payal Kadakia 26:32 Yeah. So, I was, once again, training in ballet at the time. I- I, you know, I had my nine-to-five, but every day after work I would go and train in ballet. And I'd have my ballet clothes with me, and I'd been going to the same teacher for about six months at the time, and I wanted to try a new class. It was just, like, a very simple thing I wanted to do. I get onto, you know, my computer. I start browsing for this class. Two hours go by. It was just this terrible experience from a information standpoint, from, you know, not knowing what class to take, if it was, if it's, you know, close enough to me, what time it starts, how do I register? And that's when I started looking at other models that existed. So, there were things, you know, in the US like OpenTable-

Steven Bartlett 27:13 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 27:13 ... SeamlessWeb, that just made this type of information so accessible and so easy and convenient for a customer, um, that I started thinking, "What if I could do this for classes? And therefore get people to get an hour out of their life that was out of their routine to go and do something fun and exciting?" So, that was really where it started.

Steven Bartlett 27:33 Even that, you kind of glossed over that, but that's pretty extraordinary-

Payal Kadakia 27:35 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 27:35 ... because a lot of people encounter a problem, the, the issue you encountered trying to book that class, and they go, "Oh, fuck, the world is not n- not good enough." Or they think, they'll just think, "Oh, this is broken," and then they'll carry on with their lives.

Payal Kadakia 27:46 Oh, let me caveat that.

Steven Bartlett 27:47 Okay.

Payal Kadakia 27:47 So, I had come back from San Francisco-

Steven Bartlett 27:49 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 27:49 ... 36 hours before that, and when I was in San Francisco, I had met a bunch of entrepreneurs.

Steven Bartlett 27:54 Okay.

Payal Kadakia 27:54 And this was my first time ever meeting entrepreneurs, right? So, going back to even the whole trying new things conversation, it was really important for me to take that trip to SF. I had been sort of stuck in New York City. I had been living this, the crazy dance life, the crazy, you know, nine-to-five life, and I had no time for anything else. So, I was not trying new things, and I needed an epiphany. I needed something to change, because the two roads I wa- I was on, like, they were gonna crash at some point-

Steven Bartlett 28:18 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 28:19 ... and it wasn't going to work. And I decide to go on this trip, I met- meet a bunch of entrepreneurs, and I come back thinking, "What if I could be an entrepreneur? Let me give myself two weeks to think of an idea." That's literally the mindset-

Steven Bartlett 28:31 Really?

Payal Kadakia 28:31 ... I was in when I encountered that. So, 36 hours later, I happened to be searching for this ballet class. And that's, it was just, like, during this perfect period in my life. And honestly, like, this is when I sometimes think, like, "Does the universe make us do these things, because what are the chances of all that happening-

Steven Bartlett 28:49 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 28:49 ... at the same time?" But it did. And I really remember in that moment thinking, "I know I'm the right person to build this because of this background I have, the communities I've been in, around, the c- experiences I have." There's probably no one else who cares as much about dance who then also went to MIT and Bain.

Steven Bartlett 29:06 MIT, which is an amazing college for those that don't know.

Payal Kadakia 29:09 Mm-hmm. Right? And it was sort of this perfect combination of things that made me say, "I gotta do this," and I went for it.

Steven Bartlett 29:16 But, um, that is extraordinary because a lot of people will encounter things. I'll encounter things today. I might sit on a chair and be like, "This chair could be better," but then I'll carry on with my day. You know what I mean? And then I'll open the fridge and go, "This fridge could be-"

Payal Kadakia 29:26 Yeah, that's true.

Steven Bartlett 29:27 ... you know? (laughs)

Payal Kadakia 29:27 I know that, yeah.

Steven Bartlett 29:28 But th- th- that's, that feels like the pivotal moment, which a lot of people w- listening to this, they'll, they'll notice things. Maybe they don't even notice them, because there's something in when you start looking f- You know, in your case, you were actually kind of looking for a-

Payal Kadakia 29:39 A problem to solve.

Steven Bartlett 29:39 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 29:40 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 29:41 But it takes a certain character makeup to say, "I can be the one to solve this." Also, a little bit of delusion, if you look at the stats.

Payal Kadakia 29:49 It's fair. That's a very good point.

Steven Bartlett 29:50 (laughs)

Payal Kadakia 29:51 Um, I was definitely delusional (laughs) at the time in thinking that. But you know what it was? It was more of, "I wanna try-"

Steven Bartlett 29:57 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 29:58 "... to solve this problem."

Steven Bartlett 29:59 Regardless.

Payal Kadakia 29:59 Yeah. Because it felt so tied to everything I had done in my life. I had literally fought to dance up until ev- for every year of my life up until that point. Why not bring the fight to everyone else? Right? Like, that's how I felt. I was like, "I've already been doing this. Let's just go and, you know, make this happen." And, and by the way, like, I've also used my, you know, my left brain, which is, you know, my analytical side, to go and do the market research and I was able to raise money. Like, I, I definitely did this in the practical way too, and I was making sure that it wasn't just some crazy dream. I f- There was, there was substance to it, for sure.

Steven Bartlett 30:35 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 30:35 I mean, I wouldn't have been able to raise the capital I did. I got into an incubator. It was a good idea, right?

Steven Bartlett 30:41 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 30:41 In the way. And it was, once again, it stemmed from a really deep why in me, and that was the most important thing. I think that's, you know, when, you know, we, we can talk a little bit about-... the failures, and the points where the product didn't work. But I was never obsessed with getting a product to work, I was obsessed with solving a problem from day one. It's-

Steven Bartlett 30:59 Hmm.

Payal Kadakia 30:59 ... how do I get people to class and not make it so hard for people to get to class? Why is it important for people to go to class? Because then they can feel what I have in dance, in their life. It was just such a, like, an important mission for me that I could just never stop on it, and every day it fueled me because it was just so real for me to say, "I gave this to someone." And even today, like, you know, in... We've booked like 100 million hours of workouts at this point, you know? And when someone comes to me and is, and says to me, like, "I just went and worked out because of ClassPass," it brings me joy because that's an hour of their life that was like what dance is to me, right?

Steven Bartlett 31:37 Hmm.

Payal Kadakia 31:37 That I gave them out of their routine, or expectations, or the way society wants them to live that they did for themselves. And that is such a gift. And I think in my life, I knew fighting for that was always a win, whether it worked or not, right?

Steven Bartlett 31:52 But what if it didn't work?

Payal Kadakia 31:54 If it didn't work, I had a backup plan. I mean, when I say I had a backup plan, I mean I went through my finances, and my dad and I were very clear about how much money I had raise- or saved at that point to say, "I have three years to build this."

Steven Bartlett 32:06 Hmm.

Payal Kadakia 32:06 I had three years before I ran out of my own cash.

Steven Bartlett 32:09 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 32:09 And-

Steven Bartlett 32:09 And you'd been, 'cause you'd been a saver, as it says in the book.

Payal Kadakia 32:11 I had saved. And so that's the other thing is, you know, uh, because money can be the biggest hurdle in going after our dreams, and if you know you're a dreamer, and I think I always knew I was a dreamer. Whether I was gonna spend my money to build a company or buil- or put on a dance show, I knew I was always a dreamer. And so, I didn't care to spend money on the smaller things in my life, right?

Steven Bartlett 32:34 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 32:34 Like I just didn't. I didn't, like I said, I didn't travel. I barely went shopping. And by the way, these are decisions I made, right? I think it's so, so important. I'm not saying that because I want other people to do the same. It's, it's about you knowing and thinking about it in a very deliberate way of how you're spending your money, right? And I was building up a savings. I didn't know what I was gonna spend it on. But then when this idea came and I got to sit down, I had three years to go after running towards something.

Steven Bartlett 32:59 Were you scared at all?

Payal Kadakia 33:01 Um, I was excited. I, I mean, it, it was an adrenaline rush, you know? I mean, there were times where it was terrible and challenging and sucked, and, um, but I wasn't scared. If I was scared, I wouldn't have done it, you know? I think if my fear trumped my, my, uh, my confidence, I wouldn't have, I don't think I would've been able to m- to, uh, quit my job and go for it.

Steven Bartlett 33:26 When you quit your job and go for it at Warner, right?

Payal Kadakia 33:29 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 33:29 You have a meeting with the chairman. The chairman, you're 28 years old, he says something interesting to you, right? And I think this is, this is actually a, people say, uh, people will say to you, "Oh, they're in luck." But actually, it's very much the opposite, because he said that he would invest in you.

Payal Kadakia 33:42 Yeah. So, uh, I mean, uh, eh, this goes perfectly with the, what we were just talking about, is it's really, uh, the reason I didn't get scared is because more and more opportunities and doors just kept opening for me. It was almost like the universe just started guiding me in the most beautiful way towards, towards the mission, towards the purpose, towards the answer, in a way that I felt before I was blocking it.

Steven Bartlett 34:03 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 34:03 Right? So the second I decided to go after building this company, one of the biggest things I had to do was quit my job. And on the day I quit, I decided to write an email to people I had worked with in my company, some executives. And the vice chairman of Warner Music Group says, "Hey, come to my office. I'd love to hear what you're building." Go up to his office. Probably the second or third time I've ever met him in the two, three years I was there. Tell him about my idea. He says, "Great, I want to invest." Literally writes me a check for $10,000 and gives me an introduction into a big incubator that was in New York City. And I just remember thinking in my head, "This is, this was the scariest door I'd ever closed in my life, quitting my job, but I'm literally walking out at, out of here with a $10,000 check towards my next thing." It was-

Steven Bartlett 34:47 Why did, why did he give you that check, in your opinion?

Payal Kadakia 34:51 A few things. One, so he was a former Behney.

Steven Bartlett 34:56 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 34:56 So once again, reputation does follow you.

Steven Bartlett 34:58 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 34:58 Right? Like, 'cause this goes back to, like, everything I was talking about-

Steven Bartlett 35:00 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 35:00 ... in the sense of it's always important to do good work. Because if he had-

Steven Bartlett 35:04 That's what I was gonna say.

Payal Kadakia 35:04 ... ever heard-

Steven Bartlett 35:05 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 35:05 ... "Oh, Payal is not good..." I mean, he knew that I was a good worker no matter what I did. Even though I didn't, like I s- once again, love my job, I always did good, good work, and I know that I, I, that reputation followed me, and he knew that. And-

Steven Bartlett 35:17 We call that invisible PR around here.

Payal Kadakia 35:19 Yeah, there you go, right? It's-

Steven Bartlett 35:20 It follows you.

Payal Kadakia 35:20 It's so important.

Steven Bartlett 35:21 And it shows up when you-

Payal Kadakia 35:22 It shows up.

Steven Bartlett 35:22 ... yeah, years later.

Payal Kadakia 35:23 Right, e- exactly. And I think that was one of the big things. And then, I mean, two, this was also like an ecosystem where entrepreneurship was a thing. But, uh, I mean at the end of the day, he believed in me, right? And it was also because, uh, you know, and actually this is one of my favorite things that happened on the, the day I quit, is I would go and tell people, right? Especially people I had worked with who were much older than me that I was quitting my job. And here I was, 10, 15 years younger than most of them. And I remember everyone looking at me almost thinking to themselves like, "I wish I had the courage to do that."

Steven Bartlett 35:55 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 35:55 So I think you forget, like me quitting that day was such a s- a sign of courage in my capability.

Steven Bartlett 36:02 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 36:02 And I didn't even realize it at the moment, but being able to make such a bold decision at that age-

Steven Bartlett 36:08 28, yeah.

Payal Kadakia 36:09 ... was a huge thing for even my vice chairman to see, to say, "Wow, like, this girl is gonna go for it," right?

Steven Bartlett 36:15 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 36:15 And I mean, that was probably one of the first hard decisions (laughs) I had to make-

Steven Bartlett 36:18 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 36:19 ... in my life. I had to make so many more. But to sort of have that control over your life, your thoughts-

Steven Bartlett 36:25 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 36:25 ... your dreams is such an important way to live. And honestly, at the end of the day, to be a good leader, a good CEO, like, you need to be in control of your ship and in control of your life.

Steven Bartlett 36:36 I asked that question about why he invested because in my time at my company, I probably had just over 1,000 employees, and there was two occasions where someone said they were quitting-

Payal Kadakia 36:45 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 36:45 ... and they were leaving to start a business, and I went, "I'm gonna invest in your business." And it was purely based on one thing, which is exactly what you've described, which was...... and their invisible PR. They might not even have known that I knew-

Payal Kadakia 36:57 Right.

Steven Bartlett 36:58 ... but they were great.

Payal Kadakia 36:59 Right.

Steven Bartlett 37:00 They always did great work.

Payal Kadakia 37:01 It's why you have to always do good work. And it's-

Steven Bartlett 37:03 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 37:03 ... like, I, I mean, it's, it's such a... I, I, and I think in this day and age, people don't feel it as much.

Steven Bartlett 37:09 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 37:10 Even th- though it might be a job you don't love, uh, we all have to kind of, in a way, like, you have to earn your, earn your-

Steven Bartlett 37:16 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 37:16 ... what are, what is it called? Like, earn your marks?

Steven Bartlett 37:18 Stripes, yeah, yeah.

Payal Kadakia 37:19 Earn your stripes.

Steven Bartlett 37:19 Yeah, yeah. (laughs)

Payal Kadakia 37:19 (laughs) Um, earn your stripes, you know? And I think, I remember earning my stripes to, to take the leap for my dreams, whether that was in money, or skills, or... And I don't regret any of that, you know? And I think when people ask me, "How did you do it?" I spent a l- I mean, it goes back to the whole conforming or rebellious thing. I was earning my stripes, so then when I felt like I could leap, I had built the parachute in the plane.

Steven Bartlett 37:43 (laughs) Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 37:43 You know? Like, I, I wasn't taking a leap without anything around me. Like, I had built a great structure-

Steven Bartlett 37:49 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 37:49 ... that was going to then let me take the most rebellious of leaps, what, that came towards the mission, right? I didn't have to, like, rebuild all the stuff that was about my life and, like, worrying about money. And this is also an important thing, is like, when you are starting a company, if I'm worrying about paying my bills, right? And if I'm worrying about, like, "Do I have the skills?" then I'm not worried or I'm not worrying about the most important thing, which is, "Can I get someone to class?" Right? Like-

Steven Bartlett 38:12 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 38:13 ... the number one thing for me to focus on was my business, not anything that was going on outside of that. And that's why I think it's setting ourselves up to succeed when we are leaders, when we are entrepreneurs, to be in a place where we're not worried about the peripheral-

Steven Bartlett 38:27 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 38:28 ... constraints in our life, we're able to focus on the most important thing at hand is so important for us to do. It's g- it's what's gonna make us more impactful in being able to actually solve the most important thing.

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Steven Bartlett 40:18 Let's go to the start, then, of this, the, the ClassPass journey, 'cause I'm really compelled by... You know, much of the reason I started this podcast was because I wanted to shine a light on the tough times in business. And I know when you're starting a business, especially a business in tech, um, it can be, uh, really, really difficult, 'cause you're-

Payal Kadakia 40:36 Mm-hmm.

Steven Bartlett 40:36 ... sort of jockeying and pivoting to find product-market fit and to figure out, like, what your customers want and-

Payal Kadakia 40:41 Hardest thing, yeah.

Steven Bartlett 40:42 ... how to deliver it. And I read that when I was reading about your journey, when, you know, you started, um, you quit your job in 2011, and then you go through a long phase of trying to figure out how to get people to use this thing, how to market it, and all that nightmare. T- talk to me about that nightmare.

Payal Kadakia 40:58 (sighs) So we went into the market with a very clear product idea, and it was a replica of what had ha- worked in another industry, so OpenTable which allows you to book restaurant reservations. It seemed like the right parallel to what we were doing, go on, search for classes. But what I didn't realize was that there was a very big missing part in it, and I'm, I mean, I'll spare everyone, like, the little details of it, but everyone has to eat, everyone does not have to work out, right?

Steven Bartlett 41:27 (laughs)

Payal Kadakia 41:27 It was... And working out usually is something scary for people-

Steven Bartlett 41:31 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 41:32 ... and it's more of an aspirational thing. It's not something that you have to do every single day. So they were sort of on different planes of people's psychology, which really became the biggest bottleneck to what ended up happening, because we spent a year, we spent half a million dollars building a product that didn't work. And, um, even though I had all this momentum, like I was saying, all these beautiful doors were opening for me, and they were, and I had a lot of great, you know, what I now call false signals of success, like followers, press-

Steven Bartlett 42:01 Oh, gosh.

Payal Kadakia 42:01 We ended up on the cover of Inc. Magazine without launching a product. And all these things made me feel like I was succeeding, right? Because this is what success looked like to everyone else. And then I launched my product, and no one went to class. It was li- it was... And no one bought a class. No one was transacting. It was crickets. It was just a really... It was, this was the hardest probably f- few months of the entire trajectory, because I, I had never really faced failure in my life. I mean, going back to everything I just told you, I had, I had sort of done things well. And I, and I tried to make sure that this would go well, right? By doing everything that I knew how to, how to, which was, let's get the press, let's build a beautiful product, let's, you know, get as many email addresses as possible. It, those were, like, the obvious things that seem-

Steven Bartlett 42:49 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 42:49 ... you know, you do when you're building a company. But I'd forgot to really ask myself if I was solving the problem I set out to. And I...... really think back to that moment, and even though it was the hardest, that moment is the reason I became a real entrepreneur. Like I don't think I was an entrepreneur before that day. I was excited about d- solving something, but the day I failed was the day I became an entrepreneur, because that was the day I really had to think deeper about creating something in the world that didn't exist. And I think it's so easy to follow the blueprints of everyone else and realize that entrepreneurship is actually about having no plan and having, you know, not following anyone else's ideas of what success is. It's about figuring out what, you know, what is it to solve your mission or your, you know, your business model that you're going after, and that woke me up. And it- it was a- a month or two period where we were trying to be comfortable, like it was this comfortable place we were in because we had raised money, we had just come out of Techstars, but, I mean, it was not going well, and I knew we were gonna run out of cash if, like, we didn't, you know, figure out something in the next few months. And, um, we just ... I remember like after a few- few weeks of it, we sent this email literally telling people to go to class for free, thinking, you know, "Okay, like, this is gonna work." Okay, we're- we're literally paying for the classes. People have to go, and still no one went, and that's when I realized we had just gone the wrong direction and I needed to, like, circle back up. I needed to break what we had built, just think a whole new way, reenergize my team around going ab- about solving this problem in a completely new way, not worrying about what we had done, but worrying about where we're going to go. And that flipped everything. And I have been there now so many times where I've been okay with throwing away our past. I mean, people don't know this, um, but ClassPass has changed its name three times. It wasn't called ClassPass. I mean, even w- this time I'm talking about, it was called something else, and I've thrown away names, like I've thrown away product ideas. Like we've throw- we've thrown away st- a lot of stuff. We've changed our pricing, our plans, and it's because it's not about that, right? It's about solving the problem in the world and moving towards that and your mission.

Steven Bartlett 45:07 So many entrepreneurs, though ... and this is probably the mistake I made when I was 18 and started my first little tech company, was, um, they get romantic about their initial hypothesis being correct.

Payal Kadakia 45:17 Exactly.

Steven Bartlett 45:18 So it's like you've got this square-shaped thing and you're just trying to force it into this triangle, because like your ego, and there's so much relying on it, and you know the one way, uh, you know you're running out of cash, and you just ... maybe that's why I just push harder. And then all these vanity metrics can be kind of confusing. "Oh, we've got lots of traffic-"

Payal Kadakia 45:34 False signals of success.

Steven Bartlett 45:35 "... though." (laughs)

Payal Kadakia 45:35 Yes, yeah.

Steven Bartlett 45:36 No one's buying anything, but we've got traffic.

Payal Kadakia 45:37 Absolutely.

Steven Bartlett 45:38 And, you know, as you just said, like, "I'm on a magazine." (laughs) But then certain entrepreneurs, I think, that have the humility to say, "In fact, it's not about being r- me- my hypothesis being right. It's about creating a product/market fit."

Payal Kadakia 45:50 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 45:50 You know? And, uh, what was the moment when you started to get closer to that product/market fit?

Payal Kadakia 45:53 Yeah. And- and to ... You know, one of the things I love saying about that is to be, uh, mission obsessed, not product obsessed, and I learned that through that journey.

Steven Bartlett 46:02 Amen.

Payal Kadakia 46:02 But, um, you know, we started then putting this discovery pass out there. So what we did learn is that, you know, we started finally actually going and talking to a lot of the studio owners and talking to customers. I think the ... one of the things that happens in tech sometimes is you sit behind the tech.

Steven Bartlett 46:16 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 46:16 That you d-

Steven Bartlett 46:17 Oh, yeah.

Payal Kadakia 46:17 You don't, like, go and-

Steven Bartlett 46:20 Use the f- ... Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Payal Kadakia 46:20 ... talk to real people. Right? And it was funny 'cause I was in a tech incubator, so we showed up, we were working from like 6:00 AM to 10:00 PM every night, but sitting in an office. We weren't actually going to class and talking to studio owners and all of that. So once we started flipping that, we started realizing that, you know, a lot of the studio owners, they were offering a free class for people who were new, they wanted new people in the door, and then customers, you know, knew about all these places but they had fear, so we were like, "How do we break the fear?" And so we started building this product, our second product, which also doesn't exist anymore. It was called The Passport, and it was a discovery pass where you could go and try, uh, 10 different classes for 30 days. So you could go to like a spin class Monday-

Steven Bartlett 47:00 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 47:00 ... a pole dancing class Tuesday-

Steven Bartlett 47:01 (laughs)

Payal Kadakia 47:01 ... dance class Wednesday. You can kind of ... You know, it was like sort of this way for people, for $50, to go and explore. This is sort of when we started realizing the whole love of variety that people had when it came to working out and classes, which was the magic of what we actually discovered in our second mistake of a product, is that people loved variety. They wanted to really go and try new things. It's what motivated them. They didn't want to do the same workout every single day.

Steven Bartlett 47:25 How did you learn that?

Payal Kadakia 47:27 We-

Steven Bartlett 47:27 The variety point?

Payal Kadakia 47:27 Well, people started going and ... Like they started loving this pass, right? They started loving-

Steven Bartlett 47:31 Right, getting a passport.

Payal Kadakia 47:31 ... the 30-day pass, and then they s- try- they tried to actually buy it over and over again for the next month.

Steven Bartlett 47:38 Ah, genius.

Payal Kadakia 47:38 And you weren't allowed to, 'cause it was like a one-month product and we had literally got in these classes for no money. It was very much a do this for a month and then you're gonna go find your favorite studio and buy a pass there. We thought it was lead-gen for the studio owners-

Steven Bartlett 47:52 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 47:52 ... but it ended up not being that at all. People literally were obsessed with the variety, wanted to do it every single month and not stop, and that's when we started thinking about, "What if we become a subscription?" We weren't a subscription at the time. It was just this one- one product. And we then started experimenting with this idea of a class pass. (laughs) It wasn't even ClassPass at the time. It was A Class Pass. And, uh, we launched it to about 50 customers in June of 2013, and, um, they loved it the next month. It just kind of kept doubling, and then it was exponential growth, and it just ... I mean, the sales of that took over our other products, and we just knew that the monthly subscription was the way to go and that that was the way that this model was going to work moving forward.

Steven Bartlett 48:34 And that's two years in, right?

Payal Kadakia 48:35 Three years in.

Steven Bartlett 48:36 Three years in.

Payal Kadakia 48:37 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 48:37 So three years of stumbling around. (laughs)

Payal Kadakia 48:39 I mean, I went to San Francisco in, uh, in July of 2010, and this is-

Steven Bartlett 48:43 Oh, wow.

Payal Kadakia 48:44 ... June of 2013, so three years.

Steven Bartlett 48:47 Wow. One of the quotes from your book is that, um, uh, about failure being a data point not an end point.

Payal Kadakia 48:52 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 48:52 And I- I really think that is ... I wish someone had said that to me when I was 18, 'cause, um, I saw failure as a-

Payal Kadakia 48:58 Right.

Steven Bartlett 48:58 ... testament of my inadequacy or something-

Payal Kadakia 49:00 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 49:00 ... as opposed to something I should be listening to. And that's, uh, uh, sort of a testament to your journey. And then, you know, through out- throughout that- that period, though, I think we've-How is your- as a founder, something, again, founders don't talk about a lot, how is your mental health?

Payal Kadakia 49:13 Ugh.

Steven Bartlett 49:13 'Cause I know there's sacrifice there.

Payal Kadakia 49:15 Um, let's see. Uh, a few things, I would say. Um, I mean, I sacrificed a lot, especially in those three years where we were trying to get the product right and it wasn't working. I mean, I missed, I missed family things, I missed weddings. I, I was just not around, right? I mean, I was literally at work all day long. And if someone on my team needed me, I, I gave my 150% to my company. So I felt fulfilled because I was doing something I loved. Was I exhausted? Yes. Was I lonely? Yeah. I mean, I thankfully, like, lived with a roommate who is one of my, like, closest, dearest friends still today. But she was the only person I would see outside of people at work. You know, it was, I was living in this, like, closed circuit world. And I don't, I, I don't mind that, like, as somebody who has been on a mission before, like, has created dance shows where there, you know, you, there is this, like, intensity that happens-

Steven Bartlett 50:13 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 50:13 ... for two weeks, and you go really, really intense, you know? The, the thing though with the dance show is, though, it ends at some point.

Steven Bartlett 50:19 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 50:19 Like, you have the show, and it's over. The thing I didn't know, didn't realize about this one is, you know, it's, it's a marathon, not a sprint. Like, the dance shows can be a sprint, and that definitely got to me. And I, you know, one of the reasons I even developed this entire goal setting method was because three years in, so right when I was at this point where I realized ClassPass was gonna take off, I mean, it felt, like, amazing, right? I had spent, like, three years. I was so focused. I'd literally, like, probably not talked to anyone in my life, and I found myself alone for the holidays. My sister was away. My parents were in India. And I was about to, like, literally be by myself on Christmas, and it was one of those moments for me ... I always hated the holidays, um, as an entrepreneur because it was the one, like it was the time in my life where I couldn't work through my, like, my loneliness or through, work through any of my issues.

Steven Bartlett 51:07 Hmm.

Payal Kadakia 51:07 It was like the one time where everyone would go and do things with other people-

Steven Bartlett 51:11 (laughs)

Payal Kadakia 51:11 ... and I would be that person who would finally have to realize that I was by myself, right? Because I wasn't cultivating relationships at that point in my life. I didn't have time to. And so it was a wake-up call. And kind of going back to, you know, my mom may have been pestering me about it for the years before, at that point in my life, I just started realizing, wait a second, like, I knew ClassPass was gonna take off. Like, I just knew. We, I mean, we only had, we had less than 1,000 customers, but I had, I had caught lightning in a bottle. Like, it was the, it was so magical. I knew it was gonna take over the world. Like, it was one of those moments as an entrepreneur I could breathe. But I looked at everything else, and I'm like, "Everything else is a mess." My health was a mess. I could barely work out, which was crazy for me. I wasn't dancing. I was, like, I was single. I, you know, I had a few good friends, but I felt like I, I, like, hadn't been there for them. And that's when I started really doing this goal setting because I'm like, "I need to have a bit more ... I want to make sure my priorities are more reflective of the human I want to be in my

Payal Kadakia 52:06 life."

Steven Bartlett 52:07 And how, in like a practical sense, in terms of a time allocation sense, did you get from that place to living more in line with those values of connection, community, love, and health?

Payal Kadakia 52:17 So I, you know, I, I'll, I'll, the details of like what-

Steven Bartlett 52:20 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 52:20 ... I did on that session the first time I did it are in the book, but I will say this. So in the next six months, uh, after I started doing that, I literally met my husband a month later.

Steven Bartlett 52:31 Really?

Payal Kadakia 52:31 Yes.

Steven Bartlett 52:32 Wow.

Payal Kadakia 52:32 I decided to do a huge dance show at Alvin Ailey six months later, and I sold out 1,000, uh, 1,000 seats at that. So I got to do a huge performance. So-

Steven Bartlett 52:42 You're gonna sell so many books just by saying you found a husband.

Payal Kadakia 52:45 I know.

Steven Bartlett 52:45 Buy, buy something there. (laughs)

Payal Kadakia 52:46 It's like, it's really crazy. But I literally changed my perspective around love and what I wanted, and I met my husband a month later, which was crazy. And I also, you know, I set goals around what I wanted to do with ClassPass. I set goals around my health and how I wanted to live and work out on a daily basis. And I did all those things. And I remember, this is always my favorite moment, six months later, I was flying home on a plane. And when I first did this goal setting method, I had written it on a Post-It note 'cause I was on a plane. And I was on, I was on another plane ride 'cause I was always traveling. And I took it out, and I looked at it, and I had done everything on my dream list.

Steven Bartlett 53:25 Hmm.

Payal Kadakia 53:25 You know? And sometimes just writing down those dreams is the most important thing. But it was just such an important moment because I felt more, I don't, I don't want to say the word balanced because that has so many, you know, wrong intentions with it. But I felt that I was very clear about my priorities, and I went towards them. And I missed things too, but I didn't feel guilty about them. And I just felt so proud of myself for saying, "Here's what I want to do in my life, and I'm gonna go and do it," and accomplishing it, not just obviously professionally but personally as well.

Steven Bartlett 54:00 Mm-hmm. There's like an overarching theme here in your, in your journey, where the minute you become intentional about something-

Payal Kadakia 54:06 Yeah, things work out.

Steven Bartlett 54:06 ... as you described it, the doors open.

Payal Kadakia 54:09 It's true. It's so true.

Steven Bartlett 54:10 Do you, do you believe in that manifestation, or-

Payal Kadakia 54:11 100%. And it goes back to the, you saying, you know, we were talking about having a why. I think when you don't have a why, you go aimlessly, and you, you know, I think you start living life thinking that you want money, thinking you want to be famous, thinking you want power, and instead of thinking about, like, love and passion and purpose. And whenever I have made decisions that are about the former and not the latter, I've never been led in the right, in the right direction. And you know, if that's something people can take away from this, like, I think is one of, it's one of the most important points is if you go towards purpose, even if you are rebelling, right, and even if you might be pissing a few people off, I guarantee your life will be more fulfilling.

Steven Bartlett 54:57 What were you like as an entrepreneur, as a, as a leader and as a, a manager of people?

Payal Kadakia 55:01 I would say I was very much ... I had a lot of positive energy. I, I'm, I'm a small human, but I, I show up with all of me. Um, I...Um, I expect a lot of people, I think because people have always expected a lot from me. So, I'm sort of a, when- when you start working with me, I can very quickly tell if someone's going to, like, sink or swim, you know, because I don't tell you a lot, but I, like, let you go, because I think to me that's what I've had to do is just kind of ... I don't want to put a lot of boxes on you. I want you to just show me what you can be at your highest potential, and I think, like, that's sort of ... I liked giving people that room to be free and then allowing me to see what their capability is versus me saying, "You need to be your best in this box that I'm giving you."

Steven Bartlett 55:47 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 55:47 Uh, and I've- I've found really great talent in that way. Um, I've had to learn how to, like, hire for my strengths and weaknesses. You know, I think, um, that's probably the hardest- the hardest parts when your company grows is you do everything in the beginning, and then you have to learn to let go, and, um, I've definitely learned that building a tribe around you of great people is the only way to succeed.

Steven Bartlett 56:13 You struggled to delegate, right? In the early days?

Payal Kadakia 56:15 Um, I've gotten better at it. I've got- I've- I've realized that there is no other way to success and to build big things and great things in the world without being able to delegate, so I've become much better at it in my life, and it's the only way I- I can do what is my magical thing, right? And I've- I think I've put a lot of thought into that is, "What part of this company is- is something that only I know I can do," right?

Steven Bartlett 56:40 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 56:40 Everything else that I know someone else can do, I shouldn't be doing.

Steven Bartlett 56:43 Is that why you delegated the role of CEO to-

Payal Kadakia 56:46 Yes, absolutely.

Steven Bartlett 56:47 ... 2017?

Payal Kadakia 56:47 At some point, a CEO title becomes a lot of, you know, managing investors, managing team, doing press, and I was like, "This is not what I want to be doing with my time." I want to be solving the problem. I want to be in with my customers, working on, like, interesting concepts, not spending my day in a bunch of meetings that, you know, didn't feel inspiring. So, I think, like, you know, and everyone's set up differently. You have to know how you work. That's another big thing is- is learning the insights of what motivates you. Like, it's- it's the work you do and why you do it that ends up really mattering, right? In any job you're in. And I remember there was a point where I remember being so just disheartened and not wanting to show up to build my own company, and I'm like, "What is going on?" It was because I hated the work I was doing, and- and I loved, obviously, my company, but I hated the actual work that I had to do. And so I had to figure out a way to get past that.

Steven Bartlett 57:40 When was that?

Payal Kadakia 57:40 It was, like, 2000 and, like, 16, 17. I mean, we were launching, like, around the world. It was so intense. It was, you know, I mean, it was magical. Like I said, it was incredible to build that, but I remember, like I said, I was showing up every day dealing with, like, HR issues, legal issues, like, needing to talk to my investors. I wasn't, like, around my customers, and I wasn't going to class and around my product, you know? And that's what really fuels me as an entrepreneur and a founder.

Steven Bartlett 58:06 Did you have email dread? Like, I used to d- at one point, I remember when my company was getting big, because there was lots of chaos in my company, there was all kinds of cash flow issues, I used to, like, dread opening my emails. I was like, "Oh, it's gonna be some other bullshit from, like, an investor or some other thing, like a contract."

Payal Kadakia 58:19 Yeah, I mean, I- I definitely- I wanted to make sure that I had more to look forward to, and I'd- I think there came a point where I was looking forward to less and less, right?

Steven Bartlett 58:29 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 58:30 And I think it goes back to what I was saying about I didn't want my whole day to be like, "Ugh. Okay, there's, like, another competitor. Okay, we need to worry about this now." I didn't want my days to be about worrying. I wanted my days to be about dreaming, right? And by the way, you have to, obviously, as a leader of any of this, it comes with a responsibility, right? So, it's not that- it's not that I didn't have to worry about those things. There were certain parts of it that I knew I had to worry about and n- needed to be in my radar, but I knew there were certain things where I'm like, "I can hire someone to really work on this and fix this." (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 58:58 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 58:58 "It doesn't need to take up my time and energy," and that's really where- where the combination is, or where the decision lies.

Steven Bartlett 59:05 So, all of that passion, all of that love driven by this really deep intrinsic why, why did you step away from ClassPass?

Payal Kadakia 59:12 You know, I think at some point, and this happens, I think, for so many founders, I mean, it had been a decade of my life solving this problem, which, of course, I'm so deeply passionate about. And, you know, I think the earliest days were when we did the most legwork in actually, like, figuring out the product, you know, the product nuances that were going to actually, like, unleash the behavior. I think it just got bigger, you know? For me, I think there are other things I want to do in the world, and there's probably other problems in the world I still need to go and solve, and it's on me to unleash myself to be able to face them, so I can move forward towards them and have them even come into my periphery. I think if you're kind of s- stuck in the past, you don't even welcome the doors, right?

Steven Bartlett 59:55 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 59:55 That are- are- that you need to go through to- to reach your future, and I know for me, my- my future is waiting for me, you know? And it's on me to sit there and walk through the door and go- go towards it.

Steven Bartlett 1:00:07 And was there- was there a feeling of, like, a loss of love?

Payal Kadakia 1:00:10 Yeah, I mean, it's a bittersweet moment, you know? It was, um ... it's super bittersweet, right? To- I- I always say this (laughs) like, the- the- the hardest day was when I stopped getting my- my ClassPass email. I mean, thi- like, it was insane.

Steven Bartlett 1:00:23 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 1:00:23 I've had this email for- for years.

Steven Bartlett 1:00:25 Oh, shit.

Payal Kadakia 1:00:25 It was, like, my main inbox. And, um, you know, it was- it was definitely a sense of loss. I mean, I think it's, you know, uh, eh, for ... it's like having a child and watching your child get married, right?

Steven Bartlett 1:00:38 Yeah. (laughs)

Payal Kadakia 1:00:38 But it's also being able to say, like, "They're okay." I- I did all I could to get them to this point and being proud of that, and that's really where I'm at.

Steven Bartlett 1:00:48 I remember the- when I resigned from my company, it went public, and I said to the company, I said, "I'm gonna resign, but I have one caveat." They were like, "What is it?" I was like, "I want to keep my email." (laughs)

Payal Kadakia 1:00:57 Oh, you didn't use either?

Steven Bartlett 1:00:58 I still got my email. (laughs) I still have my email.

Payal Kadakia 1:01:01 I, you know, and it- it's funny (laughs) you say that. I think I didn't, going back to the whole ... uh, it would just been more noise, right?

Steven Bartlett 1:01:08 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 1:01:08 For me?

Steven Bartlett 1:01:08 True. You're right, yeah.

Payal Kadakia 1:01:09 You know? And so-

Steven Bartlett 1:01:10 I don't check it. (laughs)

Payal Kadakia 1:01:11 Yeah. No, I figured you, yeah, you probably don't.

Steven Bartlett 1:01:13 (laughs)

Payal Kadakia 1:01:13 Could you imagine if you did?

Steven Bartlett 1:01:15 Yeah.

Payal Kadakia 1:01:15 (laughs) I just think it was- it was a nice break for me. I actually remember creating a new email address, and it was like, "No mail."

Steven Bartlett 1:01:22 Yeah. (laughs)

Payal Kadakia 1:01:22 And I'm like, "What?" You know?It's interesting because it started making me realize, like, what do I want to fill that part of my life up with? You know?

Steven Bartlett 1:01:30 What's the answer?

Payal Kadakia 1:01:30 What's the answer to that? I'm- I'm sort of in the middle of it still, but, you know, obviously, lots of dance. You know? I think I probably have a few more big problems in the world to solve. You know? I'm- I'm only 39. You know? i- it's interesting because I'm young. You know? My mom and I always talk about this too, and she's like, "It's interesting 'cause..." Yeah, like, I could retire, but n- there's no part of me that would ever think about that, you know? But it's an interesting... It's a great place to be.

Steven Bartlett 1:01:58 The valuation of C- ClassPass at sale is probably confidential, as it tends to be, but, um, I know that in 2020, in the Series E round, it was valued at over a billion. That's a lot of money.

Payal Kadakia 1:02:08 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 1:02:09 How does that change things for you?

Payal Kadakia 1:02:11 Um, well, you know, it... We haven't exited, so, like-

Steven Bartlett 1:02:14 Right.

Payal Kadakia 1:02:14 ... the company hasn't been- been sold yet, so it's still private. But, um-

Steven Bartlett 1:02:18 W- w- was your stake acquired or was... Your- your stake is still in the company?

Payal Kadakia 1:02:20 My stake is still in the company.

Steven Bartlett 1:02:21 Okay, fine.

Payal Kadakia 1:02:21 Yeah, so it's not fully, you know, fully there. But, you know, I think these... And here's the thing. The reason why that was such an important moment was because of what it really, the message it sent for women, especially and me being, you know, an Indian woman. Like, that was actually the most important part of it. I don't think, as an entrepreneur, you should run towards numbers like that 'cause what- what you should run towards is making an impact, right?

Steven Bartlett 1:02:44 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 1:02:44 The 100 million hours of people's lives is actually much more impactful to my business and society than hitting that billion-dollar valuation. But in my case, I think it's different because I know what that represents to so many other girls out there who can look at something and say, "Wow, if she can do it, maybe I can too." And that, to me, is a really important part

Payal Kadakia 1:03:07 of it.

Steven Bartlett 1:03:07 And that wave of press whenever- whenever someone becomes a unicorn is tremendous, right?

Payal Kadakia 1:03:11 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 1:03:11 And that will reach so, so many young women all over the world, and entrepreneurs. Your partner, your- your son, completely other part of your life. Nick-

Payal Kadakia 1:03:19 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 1:03:19 ... and Zayn?

Payal Kadakia 1:03:20 Yep. Nick and Zayn.

Steven Bartlett 1:03:21 How's that been? You know? You talk about the obsession you've had building ClassPass. Um, entrepreneurs always struggle and tend to struggle in managing their romantic relationships in the other part of their life. What advice have you got for me on maintaining a good romantic relationship and family whilst also striving to big- build big dreams?

Payal Kadakia 1:03:39 Yeah, and I- I'll be honest. I think we're all always still learning in the process of it. But I think one of the biggest things I learned is, and this goes along with s- a lot of the advice I had with my parents, is bring them along on the journey. Nick was with me through so much of it. I mean, when we went to go launch London, um... I- I always actually love this story, is me, one of, uh, my co-founder, and m- one of my, uh, sales- sales girls came- came with me, and so did Nick. And we got to go try out about 30 studios in- in London in about five days, and Nick just went and did some of them too. Like, it was amazing. We all just went and worked out, and he was sort of, like, checking out studios because we, before we put anything on the platform, we wanted to make sure they were vetted studios. And this was, like I said, it was, like, six, seven years ago, so there wasn't that much, that many reviews on studios.

Steven Bartlett 1:04:28 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 1:04:28 And, um, yeah. Like, I mean, he would come to Australia with me, come to London with me, and he was just a big part of the process, you know? And I think that's so awesome that we got to live... Like, he got to live the dream with me, and I think that was a really nice part of it. I think, as we've had a kid, we've just had to become very clear on priorities, right? And he is an inc-... He's a partner at a law firm. He's e-... You know, one of the youngest partners at his law firm. It's insane what he's been able to accomplish in his career. So we have to just always be very, very communicative on what we both want, right? In setting goals, and, "Hey, like, what do we want to accomplish this year in terms of our lives?" Right? The same way I think about it personally, we have to think about it in terms of what our family wants to do. Whether it's, like, school, whether it's traveling, right? What do we want to make sure we both do as a family unit combined with, you know, our jobs and our ambition, you know? And I think it's so important, especially for women, to surround themselves with partners and people who will constantly help them stay ambitious in their life, because it's one of the hardest things.

Steven Bartlett 1:05:34 What if there's conflict between when you think about what the family wants to do and what Payal wants to do a- as... in terms of your ambitions, and then his ambitions with his career?

Payal Kadakia 1:05:43 You have to talk it out and come up with a plan. You know? I... To me, a plan is the most important thing. And sometimes there is conflict, but you have to try new things. Similar to pivoting, right, and iterating, like, on a company. You sometime... Both people have to be flexible to be like, "Okay. Well, like, if this current situation isn't working, we're gonna try something new." Right? "Okay. Like, you want this. I want this. What if we try a combination of this for six months? What if we..." You just have to be flexible and adaptable. I think the biggest mistake is not doing anything-

Steven Bartlett 1:06:11 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 1:06:12 ... and staying sort of stagnant in a place where someone's uncomfortable or someone's not happy-

Steven Bartlett 1:06:17 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 1:06:17 ... and not helping the other person, right? At the end of the day, Nick being happy in his life is gonna make him the best husband to me and the best dad, and me being happy in my life is gonna make me the best mom and best wife to him, right? And we both know that. So it's about saying, "What does happiness look like to both... to- to us individually, but then us together as a family?"

Steven Bartlett 1:06:38 Your journey has weaved an up, down, left, right, all of it. It's been a tremendous rollercoaster with so many highs and lows, and everything in between. You spoke earlier about the importance mentorship has played in your life. Have you ever been to therapy?

Steven Bartlett 1:06:53 Has that-

Payal Kadakia 1:06:54 Have I ever been to therapy? Um, I did a little bit of therapy actually at the beginning of last year. Um, you know, it was... I had a baby, by the way, six weeks before the pandemic, and then, like, my company came to a- a halt. It was just a really crazy time, so I had just gone to therapy to just start talking to somebody because I didn't even know how to make sense of so much of where my mental state was at that point. I hadn't seen people. I'd literally been a mom for a year living at home, right?

Steven Bartlett 1:07:25 Mm-hmm.

Payal Kadakia 1:07:25 It was just an... My life was so different than it... what it looked like... pre-pandemic at that point. And so I, yeah, I have, and I, I mean, I recommend it to anyone. It's- it's sort of like a fitness instructor-

Steven Bartlett 1:07:36 Hmm.

Payal Kadakia 1:07:36 ... who works on your body. You need to work on your mind sometimes and see, you know, what your roadblocks are, right? We know them, like, "Oh my God, I feel, I don't feel strong with my left arm." Like how do you get that stronger?

Steven Bartlett 1:07:45 Hmm.

Payal Kadakia 1:07:45 We sometimes have blocks like that too.

Steven Bartlett 1:07:47 And it sometimes, uh, for me, it's been like sometimes there'll be a feeling which I can't ... which, where you just know you're out of orientation or something's not right. And I think the pandemic did that to a lot of us, which was-

Payal Kadakia 1:07:57 Yeah.

Steven Bartlett 1:07:57 ... destabilized our, us in many, many ways. Um, your journey is- is phenomenal. It's really, really phenomenal, and you're a really phenomenal person for so many reasons.

Payal Kadakia 1:08:05 Thank you. Appreciate it.

Steven Bartlett 1:08:05 One of the reasons why is just, you're just this, from like the minute you walked into this room, you're just this, like-

Payal Kadakia 1:08:10 (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 1:08:10 ... ray of sunshine.

Payal Kadakia 1:08:11 Oh, thank you.

Steven Bartlett 1:08:12 And that's why I think I asked the question about, like, therapy and your hard moments in particular because you have, you have just a- an unbelievable smile and you have such an, it, f- uh, you, I'm like, "Is this person always this-"

Payal Kadakia 1:08:22 This... (laughs)

Steven Bartlett 1:08:22 "... this (laughs) media?"

Payal Kadakia 1:08:23 It, you know, but it goes down to I've always believed there's the light, right? Like, I think