‘Third wheeling’ with Meghan and FaceTiming Madonna: Why Jay Shetty is Hollywood’s most talked-about podcaster

Exclusive: Jay Shetty is collecting stories. From FaceTiming Madonna to filming for Netflix with Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, to a 48-hour jaunt to Byron Bay to speak with Chris Hemsworth, it is clear that the hunt is going well.

For seven years, the British life coach has hosted On Purpose, one of the biggest podcasts in the world, with the goal of “making wisdom go viral”.

Along the way, he has written books, won awards, launched businesses and toured around the world. His newest live event, This Changes Everything, will land in Australia this November, exploring the four biggest decisions that shape our lives.

As we met over Zoom, I was armed with a question about how he manages to get so many big scoops from household names. Many of the people he speaks to on On Purpose are media veterans, constantly in the press whether by choice or not. They are media trained up to their eyeballs, but on On Purpose, those walls regularly come down. I mean, he got Madonna to do her first podcast interview.

He tells me his secret is simply seeing the human behind the title or the name, but it doesn’t take me long to figure that out for myself. As we speak, Shetty is warm, inviting and talks to me like we’re old friends. No wonder he’s Hollywood’s favourite guru.

That approach has created a life full of “woah” moments.

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“I love the fact that I live a life where I’m constantly pinching myself that I’m in the room with someone that I could only ever have dreamed of getting to know,” he told nine.com.au.

Naturally, the Queen of Pop is one of them.

“I remember speaking to Madonna’s manager, who’d said to me that she wanted to connect,” Shetty recalled, soon finding himself in regular contact with the superstar.

“We probably spoke on FaceTime once a month for three to four months before we did an interview and I just got to know her, she got to know me, and she really wanted to understand my and my spiritual background because that’s what she wanted to come and talk about. And it was just such a surreal experience, getting to FaceTime with her for that long.”

Eventually, the interview was secured – and resulted in a four-hour chat about her spirituality, 2023 health scare, family issues and everything in between. A pinch me moment, indeed.

Last year, Shetty appeared on season two of With Love, Meghan – the Duchess of Sussex’s Netflix series – with his wife of 10 years, plant-based cook Radhi Devlukia-Shetty.

“I felt like a third wheel on Meghan and my wife’s date,” Shetty joked. “I was not needed, I shouldn’t have been on the episode!”

Even if he thought so, filming for the glossy series was another one of those stories to add to his ever-growing list.

“It was such a fun day, we had a really good time. Everything you saw was exactly how it happened, we forgot the cameras were there,” he recalled.

“Meghan was an incredibly gracious and wonderful host. And yes, I think her and my wife really hit it off. It was beautiful.”

Shetty knows a thing or two about success. Not only is he himself a marker, but each week he sits across from others who are the tops in their fields, from the arts to wellness.

So, is there a secret to it?

“The myth is that the people who made it, the people who become successful, the people who are happy, they had a perfect plan, and it all went to plan and it just worked out for them,” he said.

“You don’t need a perfect plan. You just need to start taking action on a plan. And when you take steps on that plan, new steps appear, new pathways emerge, new opportunities present themselves to you, and certain doors will shut as well. 

“But that is the path, and so stop trying to wait till you have a perfect plan, a perfect idea, the perfect timing, the perfect moment. None of that exists. All that exists is you moving forward and letting the path appear before you.”

In November, Shetty will return to Australia for his second tour Down Under.

For This Changes Everything, the goal is to explore the four decisions that shape our lives: how we feel about ourselves, what we do for work, who we choose to love and finally, how we serve the world.

“I want you to come here, I want you to understand who you are and where you’re at, and recognise what you’re capable of, and I want you to leave this event making decisions, taking action, and actually seeing shifts in your life,” Shetty said.

“I’m going to be giving you the cheat sheet and all the secrets you want to go off and actually build that life, and feel excited about it.”

While the celebrity stories are unsurprisingly the ones Shetty is asked about the most (and he is happy to oblige), he said connecting directly with his audience at events like this is the most fulfilling part of his work.

To illustrate, he told me about Makayla Noble – a former champion cheerleader who at 16 had a tumbling accident that resulted in a severe spinal cord injury.

Shetty met Noble, who now uses a wheelchair, backstage on a tour stop last year.

“She was beaming. She was so vibrant and glowing, and she was telling me how much she loves my work.”

People like Noble inspired him “more than anyone in the world”.

“They’ve been through real pain, real stress, real pressure, and they’ve come out much stronger, and that is more motivating to me than anything else in the world.”

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When Shetty last toured Australia in 2023, it was his favourite stop.

“The highlight was the banter of everyone in Australia. Everyone is hilarious, the quick back-and-forth,” he said with a laugh.

“I would also say I’ve never met a more grateful audience. Whenever I was in Australia, any event I did, people would be thanking me. And I was like, ‘Wait, you’re thanking me for paying to come to my event?’ This is unbelievable! I was so moved by that gratitude, and I was so touched by that thankfulness that people in Australia had.”

Jay Shetty returns to Australia for Wanderlust for his show, This Changes Everything, in Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne this November. For tickets, visit the link here.