Your friends are not your friends. How to make real ones with Sahil Bloom

[00:00:00] Falling in love is very easy, growing in love is very, very hard. If you're miserable with $100,000, you're going to be miserable with a billion dollars.

[00:00:10] I can almost guarantee it. Say it again. The winter friends are the relationships that you really want to cultivate and build.

[00:00:16] Because those are the people that are going to be there throughout the different seasons of your life when things come and go, when things are great, when things are bad, those seasons that we all have.

[00:00:25] And those are the relationships that actually really need to be cultivated with depth. There's this beautiful poem that says,

[00:00:32] the key to life is to make the ordinary come alive and the extraordinary will take care of itself.

[00:00:41] So, Hill Bloom, welcome to Beyond.

[00:00:44] I'm so happy to be here finally, live and in the flesh.

[00:00:47] Finally, this is so cool.

[00:00:49] I know it's been a long time coming.

[00:00:51] Yeah, one of my favorite creators in general.

[00:00:55] What am I your favorite? Okay, hold on. I was going to say Twitter creators because I feel like that's your biggest platform and where people originally discovered you.

[00:01:02] But now you're everywhere.

[00:01:04] Yeah, I mean, Twitter is definitely like near and dear to my heart. All the changes and stuff, it's been fun to navigate.

[00:01:11] Yeah. And like everyone hemming and hawing about all the stuff that Elon's doing there. But Twitter is definitely my native platform.

[00:01:17] Is that the one you spend the most time on right now?

[00:01:20] I mean, writing is what I spend the most time on.

[00:01:23] So Twitter obviously fits straight into that. But I'd say I spend most time trying to think about video platforms now just because I think that video content, short form video in particular is the future of where everything's going and being able to connect with video.

[00:01:38] I just think like if my goal is trying to reach a billion people over the course of my life, say like pie in the sky, massive goal.

[00:01:47] You're not really going to do that through written content in this day and age.

[00:01:51] Like I think it's very, very difficult because attention spans are going like this.

[00:01:55] And then people are going to have to learn how to read.

[00:01:58] Yeah, not that many people are going to want to read longer form substantive content.

[00:02:02] How many people really read books? Like everyone flexes on how many books they read.

[00:02:06] And then you know what? And now there are apps that literally condense the books for you. So they'll just give you the takeaways.

[00:02:18] Not that I know anything about that.

[00:02:21] Yeah, I mean, and there's actually like maybe that's the best way to do it with some of these books.

[00:02:26] I mean, a lot of nonfiction books could have been a five page essay or a ten page essay.

[00:02:30] But the whole industry is built around it being 200 pages. Like when I went to go do my book deal, they want you to have like a very narrow single idea that you're going to expand into 200 pages.

[00:02:41] And I think the whole industry revolves around that because the agents want you to do that so that you don't like condense four books into one because they want to make more money off you.

[00:02:49] They want to make like a check on every single book that you then go and sell. So they want it to be a narrow idea that gets expanded into a full book.

[00:02:56] And the whole industry has been built around that. But as a result, it becomes a meme where people are like, oh, you know this book could have been an essay or a blog.

[00:03:04] And then people are annoying and bitching about it.

[00:03:06] Yeah, no totally. When I think about you, it's hard to put you in a category because obviously a lot of your stuff is personal growth.

[00:03:17] But when I do think about the content that you do put out, the word that comes to mind is perspective.

[00:03:25] Because a lot of times we process things in certain ways or we think about things in certain ways and you're like well here why don't you look at it like this.

[00:03:34] And it's very digestible and it's relatable to anybody. Like you don't, it's not a particular gender or a particular group, any particular political side.

[00:03:46] It's just like here, if you're a human being and you're living life, here's a way to look at the world a little bit differently. And in a way that can make it more meaningful.

[00:03:56] So that's how I look at you. But how do you look at you? And when you think about the impact that you want to make in the world.

[00:04:03] I think that's very fair. Have you heard the story of the blind men and the elephant?

[00:04:07] No, tell me.

[00:04:08] So six blind men are brought to observe an elephant that's brought into the town. The first one goes up to it and touches the ear and says to all of them that the elephant is like a fan.

[00:04:18] The next one goes and touches the trunk and says, oh, the elephant's like a rope. The next one touches the tail and says the elephant's like a snake.

[00:04:26] And they all go touch a different part of the elephant and then develop their entire perspective on what the elephant is on that narrow lens that they just viewed it through.

[00:04:33] And they're all partially correct about what the elephant is but also entirely wrong.

[00:04:38] And the whole point is our view of the world and everything around us is based on our tiny narrow perspective, what we've actually seen through our own eyes.

[00:04:48] But that's our entire world. And so having humility around that and realizing that the lens that we've seen the world through might actually not be the absolute truth.

[00:04:56] And that someone else has a very different perspective, not because they're ignorant or stupid or malicious. It might just be that they have different information. They have different data points that have been gathered.

[00:05:07] And to me as I go about my own life, that is very important to me is to like spread that level of humility and the ability to actually just hold two ideas at once in your mind.

[00:05:18] And so when I'm thinking about content, when I'm thinking about putting things out into the world, that is very central to it.

[00:05:23] I want to make sure that I'm much more focused on questions and frameworks and kind of ways to think about the world versus answers.

[00:05:31] Yeah, that makes sense.

[00:05:33] It seems that politically a lot of people feel like they do have the answers and we see that a lot especially on Twitter.

[00:05:41] I'm sure you've seen the arguments about a range of topics.

[00:05:46] When you look at that and you imagine young people getting sucked into this side, that side, this perspective on abortion, drag shows, whatever it is.

[00:06:01] What would you say to someone who's growing up on the internet and seeing what's happening?

[00:06:08] I think F. Scott Fitzgerald said that the test of first rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposing views in your mind at once.

[00:06:16] And I think we've as a society completely lost the ability to do that.

[00:06:21] People basically think unless you're taking a stand on something in the one direction and you're saying that the other side isn't idiot, that you are not like doing your duty as a human.

[00:06:31] And I think it's just crazy.

[00:06:33] To spend your whole life being really angered about whatever the latest thing is that everybody's talking about, whatever the new thing is that I'm supposed to be taking a stand on, that other people are taking a stand on,

[00:06:43] it's just bouncing from thing to thing and honestly it's all negativity.

[00:06:46] You're not taking a positive, warm, embracing stance on these things and opening up to other people and opening up to other ideas.

[00:06:54] What you're doing is you're just like pushing away anyone that doesn't agree with you living in your little echo chamber and our social media platforms basically propagate that because you see exactly what you want or you see the thing that's going to really anger you in order to get you to engage with it further.

[00:07:09] So I just, I mean, I think it's a really, really hard time to be a young adult to be growing up because everything is pushing you in that direction to want to act that way.

[00:07:18] And you have to actively fight it in order to actually push back against it.

[00:07:24] How do you fight that? And here's something I want to, I think, and I'm not 100% sure but your background is that you were an athlete, right?

[00:07:34] I feel like... Sort of an okay athlete.

[00:07:37] Oh yeah? No, I mean, I played baseball in college.

[00:07:41] Yeah. And that was like what you were known for initially.

[00:07:44] Okay. So I feel like something that I've noticed among people who have played team sports is that they don't get sucked into this stuff as much because they're active, they're in the real world and they know their sense of belonging doesn't...

[00:08:05] It doesn't come from needing to like... Yeah, you're trying to win but it's a different energy. I don't know how to explain it.

[00:08:17] Even when the game is over, you're still cool with the other team.

[00:08:23] Yeah, you've also gotten punched in the face enough.

[00:08:25] Like actually literally in a lot of people's cases but also metaphorically.

[00:08:30] I think a lot of issues in society are from people that have never been punched in the face and a luck it's solved by that.

[00:08:39] And like I say it metaphorically but also actually quite literally, I needed to get punched in the face.

[00:08:46] When I was in high school, I was like a classic high school douchebag. You thought too highly of myself, you know like just arrogant, like big fish in a small pond, you know thought I couldn't get knocked down all these things and I really needed to get punched in the face.

[00:09:00] And I did metaphorically and literally get punched in the face when I got to college and had different experiences and that's like a really important formative experience for a lot of people.

[00:09:10] But there are a lot of people out there who have literally never been punched in the face.

[00:09:14] And you see it in a lot of young people that like go into the workforce for the first time and they go start working and they think they should be the CEO

[00:09:20] and they get their first like piece of critical feedback that they've ever had in their life and they crumble and they're crying in a corner.

[00:09:27] And I mean like that as a broader societal trend is a really, really big issue.

[00:09:32] Like team sport athletes in general have had to get punched in the face, have had to be coachable, have had to learn that.

[00:09:39] And then the other piece is they've had to be around a lot of different type of people and learn how to get along in a cohesive way.

[00:09:46] And so like that is what society is right it's like a bunch of different people thrown into a pot like if you were an alien zooming down on the earth and you were looking at it,

[00:09:55] there was a self-park episode about this like a whole bunch of it's like a reality TV show, a bunch of different species and different races and all these things that have to co exist.

[00:10:05] And if you were to try to do that, like that's what a team is bringing together people from different backgrounds and situations and you need to drive towards a common goal which is like to win in that case.

[00:10:15] But in society it's like hopefully for us to all live with some level of cohesion and happiness and you know progress society forward.

[00:10:23] And team sport athletes not to do that people who haven't played on teams might actually just not have built that skill set.

[00:10:30] Do you think it's dangerous in work settings when people refer to it as a family?

[00:10:38] Yeah, I mean look I don't know. Like when I first when I started my first job I was working in finance there was no such thing as work life balance like we didn't that wasn't a thing it was like you work hard because this is how you're going to learn and you're going to grow from doing this.

[00:10:58] Were we a family like I had some friends that are my friends for life like I'm you know going on trips with a few of them still like we're super super close but that family was built through the fact that we were in the trenches together for like hundred hour weeks for years it wasn't that we like came in and we were like hey we're all family this is great.

[00:11:17] So I think you can cut both ways like I think I think the family thing if you just assume that you're a family on the basis of being in a place together that's not what a family is that's like saying that because you live with someone that you love them and that your your family with them but like you know this with relationships.

[00:11:35] You're not like just because you cohabitate with someone doesn't mean you love them or that you're growing in your relationship with them you might just they much to be a roommate like yeah I know I have a lot of friends who like live with their partner and they never see them and the only interaction they have is when they're like watching Netflix together and they're not growing in their relationship it anyway and so

[00:11:53] that's like yeah are you family because you're living together not I don't I don't think so if you're not growing in the relationship so I just think it's dangerous to assume that

[00:12:02] but you know co-workers or family and I also think it's dangerous to say that like you have to be for it to be valuable you can just go to work and punch the clock

[00:12:10] and that can be great if everyone's driving in the same direction.

[00:12:13] I want to talk about friendship because I've seen you talk about how not everyone is your real friend and I totally agree with you I don't think everyone is but online there seems to be a really heavy weight placed on improving our romantic relationships.

[00:12:33] I'd argue that our friendships are just as important because they sustain us through everything so what do you think actually defines what it means to be a good friend and to have a good friendship.

[00:12:47] So I think there are two types of friends there are summer friends and there are winter friends summer friends are the ones that are there for you when it's nice and warm and sunny the weather is great

[00:12:59] and everyone wants to be outside and it's all smiles winter friends are the ones who are there for you when it's cold and dark and most people in your life are summer friends and when winter comes they are not there and they never knew they never intended to be there they're planning to leave they weren't going to be around for you.

[00:13:17] The winter friends are the relationships that you really want to cultivate and build because those are the people that are going to be there throughout the different seasons of your life when things come and go when things are great when things are bad

[00:13:28] those seasons that we all have and those are the relationships that actually really need to be cultivated with death.

[00:13:34] That doesn't mean that you don't want summer friends sometimes your life is great and having summer friends is a great thing.

[00:13:39] They're fun.

[00:13:40] They're having people they're fun you can go and celebrate joy but don't make the mistake of thinking that person's going to be there for you don't rely on them in those situations when it starts to get dark because they're going to disappear.

[00:13:50] Okay I want to add something to that because the winter friends I think in certain cases can be dangerous too because some people love being around when shit hits the fan for you because they want to know that their life isn't the only one that's challenging and that you're suffering too.

[00:14:12] Sometimes people who are there for you in the winter are not there for you in the summer because they're not able to celebrate for you and be happy for you and see you win and watch you flourish.

[00:14:25] Some people have so much jealousy that they can't see you thrive.

[00:14:30] I like that. Like real shodden Freud.

[00:14:33] Yeah, I believe in that that's real.

[00:14:36] Yeah, like people who I think I forget who it was that said this I saw a clip of it and I thought it was fantastic maybe it was Robert Green.

[00:14:43] He said that like envious people when you say something to them bad that's happening in your life they'll react and say like oh how sad but they'll show like a tiny tiny hint of happiness right when you say it like something bad is happening you see like a little glimmer of happiness in their face when you say something bad.

[00:15:04] Similarly when you say something good they'll act all happy but you saw like a tiny hint of contempt hit their face and those people expose themselves and like you can actually say something to them to test the type of person they are to see what their reaction looks like like do they hesitate before the happiness

[00:15:20] do they hesitate before the sadness in the situation and you can expose the type of person they really are I thought that was like it was really really interesting and really powerful.

[00:15:29] It's true though you're right yeah no I think about it all the time by the way Robert Green is one of my favorite writers how cool I interviewed him during covid.

[00:15:39] I think he's one of the most important writers of our time and I'll tell you why because he really makes you see human nature for what it is have you read the laws of human nature no I think you of all people would find it fast if you read that book your write it down right it down

[00:15:58] yeah see here's the notebook you made fun of you made fun of it on the way and now I didn't make fun of it I was trying to take I was trying to take notes on you what's he doing that I need to be doing taking notes quite literally with a pen and paper.

[00:16:11] But yeah the laws of human nature because he really helps you understand people and how our human nature really dictates the way we are and things to notice in other people that you're around

[00:16:26] and how to evaluate and how to evaluate people and whether or not you know you should maintain the relationships that you have little things like that.

[00:16:35] For example on on narcissism he said that we're all narcissists on a spectrum the only difference is there are some people that are right here and they're actually evil narcissists who have absolutely no regard for anybody I think that distinction is important because of course we all largely think of ourselves.

[00:16:53] Another thing he said that was interesting to me and I'm curious what you have what you have to say about this he told me the best way to evaluate whether a romantic relationship is good is pay attention to the gifts that they give you because anybody could give you a bouquet of roses or a diamond necklace because they know that's you know the proper gift.

[00:17:21] But pay attention to the people who know the books that you read the music that you listen to things that you're interested in and who get you gifts based on that because they're actually paying attention and they care about what your hobbies are and your interest and they want to see you happy.

[00:17:39] I thought that was really interesting what's your take on that it's absolutely correct I mean it goes to a broader point that attraction has to go beyond the physical.

[00:17:50] There's this obsession especially when you're young with physical attraction you're like oh I'm so physically attracted to this person and that's great but that atrophies or that comes in waves or that will go at some point and so unless you're attracted to a person in all these other ways you can be attracted to their generosity to their spirit to their character the type of person they are their hobbies all these other areas there's all of these layers and different types of attraction that you can have to a person unless you have some of those other types.

[00:18:19] Whatever the relationship is bound to fail because physical attraction is just not enough to sustain a relationship over a long period of time.

[00:18:27] Yeah it's nice to hear you say that because I feel like a lot of especially young men and I'm sure I don't know if you see have you seen like red pill Twitter or they're like comparing women in the 30s.

[00:18:43] Yeah, okay to the it's yeah don't even get started on this.

[00:18:49] Is that like the whole thing of like the guy that like posted the video of the girl like talking to him and him like you know like did you see that was yeah that was one version of it but there but right now

[00:18:59] it's getting really popular to call Margot Robbie mid for being Barbie and it's just like bro you don't even get late.

[00:19:06] Did you see Aubrey Strowables a picture of the guy from South Park like the fat guy leaning back and then it just had the quote like Margot Robbie is mid and it was like the fat guy from South Park.

[00:19:17] Oh yeah I did see that I did see that that's so good so good but that's exactly what's happening totally nerds in their mom's basement who can't get laid who are about to get an AI girlfriend.

[00:19:29] A lot of AI girlfriend commenting about women's appearances.

[00:19:34] You got married really young pretty young yeah how old are you I was.

[00:19:39] 26 wow pretty yeah pretty young so well we've been dating since high school though keep in mind okay fair fair but still you would think you know.

[00:19:51] I don't know I want more experience or he wants to get out there and experience more women or whatever but you.

[00:19:58] High school sweetheart.

[00:20:00] It's made state in a relationship got married started a family yeah beautiful I mean it's a falling in love is very easy growing in love is very very hard what's the difference.

[00:20:15] Falling in love is like.

[00:20:17] The thing you see in the movies it's like the you know spinning around the room you know montage everything's flowery the honeymoon period like you're really falling for someone that is like a dime a dozen that thing happens so easily.

[00:20:29] But growing in love is about actually developing and growing through discomfort through painful periods through challenges over long periods of time over like different seasons of your life and the waves that come and go and the changes having kids you know being long distance all these different things

[00:20:45] things that my wife and I have experienced that has been like the growth in our love that has actually created the depth of connection that I think makes you just indestructible over long periods of time it's like if people focused more on the growing and less on the falling I think they would be a lot better off do you think you need the falling.

[00:21:06] Yeah I think there's something special about that there's nothing wrong with the falling it's just focusing only on that and not realizing that love then requires the discomfort in the growth I mean all all discomfort like all growth comes from discomfort right and so thinking that the falling is all that mattered and now OK I fall in love with this person everything's going to be great it was so beautiful when we start you know the honeymoon the Instagram photos the beautiful dinners the vacations all that stuff that's not really what what.

[00:21:34] That's not really what life is like might be for a short period of time but then life is mostly just sitting around doing nothing with someone and you need to love that you really need to fall in love with sitting around doing nothing with someone because that's what most of life that's what what 99% of your hours are going to be over the course of your life

[00:21:53] and that's a beautiful thing if you find someone that you're actually growing with that you're able to like crawl through the mud with in these different experiences of your life.

[00:22:01] And I just feel like my wife and I have done I mean we've been through all of these different seasons and by the time I was 26 we had already been through a ton of different seasons because I'd gone to college and we've been long distance and we had experienced a bunch of things so I had no doubt in my mind at that point until like was I young age wise absolutely but we were not young in terms of the growth we had experienced in our relationship.

[00:22:23] Wow that's beautiful something that you just said about how vacations and all of that stuff doesn't represent what your life is it's funny because social media makes it seem like those are the things but what you said reminded me of a quote actually from noval who said the quality of your life is what it is when you're doing nothing

[00:22:44] and we forget that because before you go to sleep at night if you're not happy then you being happy on a vacation doesn't mean shit.

[00:22:54] Victor Frankl said happiness cannot be pursued it must ensue and I always thought that was a really brilliant way of saying it like you cannot chase after happiness you cannot just like pursue happiness as an end because you'll never find it.

[00:23:11] It has to ensue from the things that you're doing in life from the growth that you're experiencing from the things that you are actually building in your existence around you and I always thought that that was just like that was a real aha moment for me as I thought about my own happiness in my life because we I like it was a tendency to just say like happiness is then goal of coming to chase it like I'm going to money's going to make me happy so let me go try to make a bunch of money like that's what I'm going to go do or like sex is going to make me happy so I'm going to chase a bunch of sex or whatever it is promotions titles status and I'm going to be able to do that.

[00:23:40] And then you get the thing and you're like well shit I'm still not happy because I was just chasing this thing it was a mirage it just disappears and reappears out on the horizon when you realize that it's actually internal happiness is an inside job it has to ensue from things that you are like things that you were the stillness you are creating the experiences of tiny amounts of joy on a daily basis of being able to just like embrace the present moment.

[00:24:04] That actually takes a lot of the pressure off yeah no it really does I think I think a big part of it is letting ordinary things bring you joy like literally just going outside it sounds so basic that gratitude stuff when I first heard it on my dude I am not.

[00:24:20] Pulling out a gratitude journal like I was not about it and then I realize like you know you go outside and then you feel the sun on your face or like.

[00:24:29] You know you're eating and you're like your I lost my taste when I got covid my taste and smell and when I finally got it back I wanted to cry like it that's how much joy I got from eating and you don't realize it and so it's these little ordinary thing I feel like really really happy people are able to extract joy from those things and that's the difference because we both know billionaires who are.

[00:24:54] In miserable right yeah.

[00:24:58] And if you're if you're miserable with.

[00:25:01] A hundred thousand dollars you're going to be miserable with a billion dollars I can almost guarantee it again.

[00:25:08] If you're miserable with a hundred thousand dollars you're going to be miserable with a billion dollars and why is that it's not going to change because the money doesn't change it if you're a miserable person you're going to be miserable no matter what the money is once you get above a certain level if you're miserable because you have no money and you don't have the means to.

[00:25:23] Provide shelter food care for your family that's a different type of misery but once you get beyond the level where you have those basic things provided if you are still miserable at that level something has to change internally the external thing is not going to make you less miserable at that point it's something internal that needs to change you need to go find a way to change that internal thing you can't chase an external thing to fix an internal thing.

[00:25:48] Oh absolutely so funny because you know I've been hanging around a lot of entrepreneurs since I met them on clubhouse and a lot of them can't wait to sell their company and do this and do that and don't get me wrong I love money too.

[00:26:07] But it does seem like the chase after money they're doing it because they think it's going to bring them happiness.

[00:26:17] What actually is what would you say to someone.

[00:26:21] I mean I think the whole thing the separation that you need to create is are you chasing money for money sake or are you chasing money because it is the scoreboard on the game you love to play and if it's the latter that's perfectly okay because then your day

[00:26:38] today is not actually about money it's about getting better at the game it's about like I'm going to get slightly smarter slightly better at how I'm playing this game the scoreboard of that game is money and I'm having a blast getting better at the game.

[00:26:51] I know a lot of entrepreneurs who are yet they want to sell their company for X million dollars or whatever the thing is but really it's about playing the game

[00:26:59] and getting better at the game and they're going to sell the company and then go start another one which makes no sense like I would go chill on a beach and people say that on the internet they're like I wouldn't be working if I had already made this money.

[00:27:10] The reality is the reason that person made that money is not because they were chasing money is because they were chasing the game they love the game of it like Jeff Bezos has no reason to go start a cup but he will he will continue to do entrepreneurial things a lot of these people I mean we have plenty of friends in common who have gone and started a thing made a bunch of money

[00:27:28] and then gone and started another thing and gone and worked like hundred hour weeks on this next thing it's because they love the game.

[00:27:35] And that's what makes it fun and that makes it fun then it's a totally different story but do you see how sports changes your mentality about everything I really feel like that's the common denominator between all of this you know I mean talk about a framework you know that's and I think if you you were an athlete first yeah I mean you have to it's it's all like everyone talks about this it's almost cliche it's all about it.

[00:27:57] It's almost cliche it's like process versus prize right like are you doing the thing on a daily basis because of what the summit looks like are you doing it because you're actually really enjoying the climb along the way and the things that you're getting to do on a daily basis the people that love those things that they're getting to do on a daily basis end up reaching the summit much more often.

[00:28:17] It's just the reality of it because they're like you're showing up with a lot of energy every day and if you're showing up with energy to the things you do good things happen.

[00:28:24] I personally just think that happiness comes from growth in whatever it is like I think stagnation is like where happiness goes to die and so whatever it is in my life like when people ask me why I get up early or why I do these weird things in my routine.

[00:28:40] Yeah whatever it is I'm doing like for me it's because these are things that I think are leading to growth in different areas of my life and that brings me happiness feeling like I'm growing brings me happiness it's not about making more money or about you know getting some accolade or whatever the thing is it's because I enjoy feeling like I'm getting better at something like if I can check the box at the end of a day that I felt like I got slightly smarter slightly better learn some new interesting thing talk to someone you know constantly

[00:29:10] and I got up with a friend and our relationship got a little deeper for whatever reason had a really cool conversation my wife about something that we appreciate connected with my son in some way like some tiny thing that I felt like I got better at.

[00:29:22] That's a day well served I mean that's an amazing day to me and if I can just stack days like that that seems like a great life that just seems like a great life.

[00:29:30] I'm happy to do that the rest of my life and you're winning the game exactly and that's how I feel yeah so I mean that like to me that's the model on.

[00:29:39] On money is like are you chasing money for money sake or you chasing money because you love the game of getting better at the money game.

[00:29:46] I feel like a lot of a lot of guys are chasing girl after girl after girl after girl

[00:29:56] instead of taking like the route you took do you see a lot of that.

[00:30:05] Yes I'm a we I mean I don't think that it's viable for everyone to have found what my wife and I found at a young age.

[00:30:14] I don't think so.

[00:30:15] I'm very lucky and I can't I mean you can't expect that everyone is going to have found those kind of things.

[00:30:22] I do think there are a lot of guys out there that are just chasing the wrong things.

[00:30:27] That's what that's what I wanted to get at because I think what you have and it's pretty evident to me since I've known you that you're in a happy marriage where you're both

[00:30:38] in a simple filled you're now apparent and to me I don't know I think that's the life and it's beautiful to see that you have that but then I also see living in L.A. something very different where you know I think people get married

[00:30:54] much later here and everybody it's not just men women are chasing you know other things too when they could be chasing or not chasing

[00:31:05] they could be looking for and growing a relationship that's healthier.

[00:31:11] So when you look at I guess our generation this city where do you think we've gone wrong?

[00:31:19] I think you said it earlier really well actually around like appreciating the ordinary in life one of the things there's this beautiful poem

[00:31:30] that says the key to life is to make the ordinary come alive and the extraordinary will take care of itself.

[00:31:37] And I always thought that that was a really really smart framing because it's just true in my experience that chasing the extraordinary and thinking that everything has to be extraordinary at all times is actually just a recipe for nothing to be extraordinary.

[00:31:49] You're going to go chase these like massive flashes and they don't really exist like they're all their fake right like they there's no texture to that stuff there's no friction in those kind of things

[00:31:59] and they just disappear that's like the Instagram moments right that's like the highlight real that people want to show about their life to the world.

[00:32:05] And that's not where you're going to find depth in real fulfillment it's in those ordinary things that you're able to come alive you know you're able to bring them alive by appreciating them and by being present in that moment.

[00:32:18] And I just think that I at a young age really just realized like what I wanted like I just I figured out what my like my version of enough and what I really want what I really find happiness and joy and on a daily basis.

[00:32:31] And realizing that like I'm not going to find that by getting like I don't I just don't feel the need to like flash a bunch of you know like girls people cars whatever all the things on Instagram to like to do what?

[00:32:47] Like what what I'm am I trying to like fill my own bucket like I feel great. I feel great on a daily basis and so I think a lot of that just comes from again it's like you're trying to fix something internal with something external and that does not work you can't do it until like if you don't feel happy internally and you think that like going and dating a bunch of you know a bunch of different women or getting a bunch of fancy cars or fancy memberships are like yachts or whatever it is is going to fix the thing like the leaky bucket that you have inside.

[00:33:16] It's not it's just not going to.

[00:33:19] I feel like a lot of people are addicted to something and I heard connection is the antidote to addiction and if you talk to people who are in AA or some type of program like that which by the way I learned so much from my friends who are sober and in these programs but they'll tell you that it's that they lean on these eggs and I'm going to do it.

[00:33:45] I'm going to do a lean on these external things and that's where the addiction develops it's because they lack connection in their lives and they don't know where to turn and of course there's a lot of trauma and stuff like that too but it's interesting to me because along with like you know making the ordinary exciting for yourself paying attention to the relationships that we do have I've heard you talk about your relationship with your parents how often you see them.

[00:34:13] I think about how many people complain about you know how hard of a childhood they have and I am I am put ties with them too but it seems like there's so much friction in a lot of the relationships that people have.

[00:34:27] Think about all the narcissism content that has been coming out of Instagram like how to spot a narcissist or how to you know how can you tell if you know if there are red flags and all this stuff it's like it's almost like we have to feel like we're on guard

[00:34:42] in every relationship that we're in and something's preventing us from connecting with each other it's it's a weird place to be in because I'm like you I care so much about my relationships whether it's people I'm working with or my friends or whatever but I do notice that I feel like people's guards are going up because they're you know they're so like well my parents did this and this person did that and you know I need a set of boundary so it's like where's the middle ground how do I look at that.

[00:35:11] The middle ground how are we supposed to cultivate these relationships a little better without being so scared I mean there's a balance between.

[00:35:22] Healing your past and.

[00:35:25] Being optimistic about the future that everyone needs to strike like I think therapy and.

[00:35:33] You know speaking to whether it's friends or a professional is really important for healing your past and for being able to come to terms with trauma you suffered or things from your past that have not been great at the same time I think you need to be able to control and have control over the direction of your future and not blame things from the past for what your future is going to look like there's this concept.

[00:35:54] To Buddhist concept called trying to remember so it's a concept from Buddhism called the two arrows theory which basically says that there are two arrows the first arrow is the bad thing that happens in your life you can't control that arrow that's like the pain and suffering of the negative event whatever it is the second arrow.

[00:36:13] The second arrow is how you respond to that it's your actual response to that bad thing that happened and you control that arrow and you control whether it hits you or not and whether you suffer from it and that theory to me has always stuck out in my mind because we actually do have control over our ability to perceive these situations whatever it is whatever is coming into our lives as horrible as a thing can be.

[00:36:36] It is happened to you still have control over how you're reacting to it and what the next thing is and that doesn't mean that we are empathetic to someone who has had to go through something horrible that we haven't maybe we can't.

[00:36:47] You know directly empathize with it but we can indirectly empathize but that person still has control over what the next step is like over whether they're going to make one good decision next or whether they're going to be optimistic about what the next day looks like.

[00:37:00] And you can control whether that pain continues with the second arrow or whether it doesn't yeah reminds me of that concept it's not your fault but it's your responsibility.

[00:37:11] And that always stuck out to me.

[00:37:13] I want to talk about your path that led you to where you are on now because I don't know if a lot of people like you know we see all over the internet but what's the story like where did you where did you start how did you realize like this is the thing.

[00:37:29] That you wanted to do and then.

[00:37:32] Grow a newsletter with half a million people I mean my.

[00:37:37] My journey was a lot of what we just talked about which was like I was chasing external things to fix the internal in or so when I talk about these things that's something important to point out like I'm not talking about something I read in a book like that was my life.

[00:37:50] And I in some ways hit rock bottom around it like I woke up on the floor one day and couldn't move I mean I had a full panic attack.

[00:37:57] This is like May of 2021 not that long ago basically feeling like I was just living someone else's life like I was going down the path of making a whole lot of money working in finance.

[00:38:07] Working with an amazing group of people people I loved and cared about on interesting things but basically thought that like making more and more money and getting to a certain number certain point

[00:38:18] was going to be what brought me happiness and what made me wealthy.

[00:38:23] And I basically like arrived one day I had all the things that I thought were gonna make me happy and I was very unhappy and I was looking around like I'm overweight I'm stressed you know my friendships were suffering because I wasn't spending time I wasn't present with those people I was barely seeing my parents who were getting older

[00:38:40] because I was living so far away from them felt like my relationship with my wife had suffered because I wasn't present I was constantly on email or stressed or anxious about something.

[00:38:48] And I just realized that something needed to change and that it wasn't gonna change for me unless I did something drastic.

[00:38:58] And right at that time was when you know basically within a 45 day period I left my job we sold our house in California and moved back to the East Coast to be closer to family.

[00:39:08] And so like made a whole bunch of big decisions in a very very short period of time I had started writing on Twitter a bit like about a year before that.

[00:39:18] And so I had grown a platform there but there was no money you know it was the whole like Twitter creator that wasn't a thing right I kind of was one of the first people that like really built like a native platform on Twitter that wasn't like a celebrity before Twitter before like when I started on Twitter

[00:39:35] to be big on Twitter you basically had to be famous from something else it was like you were an athlete or you were a celebrity and it was like there wasn't like a whole ton of native creators on Twitter as a platform.

[00:39:47] And so that existed on other platforms but it didn't yet on Twitter.

[00:39:50] And so there wasn't really like a playbook there wasn't like a pattern that I could follow and so what I figured was you know I haven't gone to business school maybe I'll go try this and if it sucks and I can't make any money and none of it works this was like my MBA when got an MBA of like trying to go build a business around myself in a personal brand whatever it is.

[00:40:13] Obviously now this these things have worked and I'm feeling quite good about what the two year MBA looked like because now we're about two years later but that was really the start of it.

[00:40:23] Yeah, it's crazy when you look at Twitter what Twitter like what Twitter was like when you started versus what it's sort of turning into what's your take do you like it.

[00:40:37] Yeah, Twitter basically didn't change like they didn't ship a single thing for like basically ten years like from the time it IPO until Elon Musk took over like there was no real changes to the platform network effects are beautiful things so the platform had continued to do well you know wasn't growing insanely fast but it was there was a nice like thriving thing there.

[00:40:57] I think I'm super optimistic with the future just because of the fact that I see them shipping new things and shipping new features and it feels much more creator forward to me now than it ever has before like you know they're starting to share ad revenue there.

[00:41:10] Do in the subscriptions which people seem to be making money off of like they're really doing things that make it feel like okay this is a place where they want native creators to actually continue to build platforms like the long form tweets you can kind of almost like share a full newsletter there like you can do a lot of things that makes it a more dynamic platform.

[00:41:27] That I'm quite excited about just in terms of my ability to reach people yeah but I've also seen you're reaching people on.

[00:41:33] I've seen your clips on TikTok and they're not always you posting them a lot of other accounts take them interesting I'll see it goes but it's good sometimes they tag you so that's nice times they don't.

[00:41:45] I don't have tick talk on my phone actually so I have I have guys that do the tick talk one for me because I think tick talk is like a Chinese espionage operation

[00:41:53] I don't want them like coming into my house on my phone so I have people that do the tick talk one for me so I'm actually I have no idea what goes on on my tick talk account other than that I send these guys videos and they post them Instagram I'm on a lot just because I think like the reach of short form video is incredible.

[00:42:09] It's the future and if you think like if your goal is to go reach an impact I mean if my goal is to impact a billion people over the next 30 40 years in my life,

[00:42:19] pie in the sky big goal that's not going to be through written content it has to be through video and so me going and doing that being able to go share video and have my ideas and thoughts and then being able to be reproduced by other people like to take the audio on an Instagram video

[00:42:34] and then reproduce into another video I had this video on Instagram go viral it's done I don't know 17 million views or something on an Instagram reel the audio of it has been used thousands of times now

[00:42:46] and someone has a video that's done like 20 million views with the audio of mine on theirs yeah it's unbelievable and so like that it's really cool to me because your ideas like you just think about how they're getting kind of spread around the world

[00:42:59] it's just absolutely astonishing to me the numbers I think it goes back to the elephant example that you gave where it's like you know here's your video in its original form

[00:43:11] and then here's someone else with their interpretation of your video and visuals from their life that they feel like your video represents and that's one person reacting to the elephant and then everyone else

[00:43:23] nice I like that that's good yeah so that's that's what it feels like to me and it's just so cool what you can do with one piece of content and how how much reach that one idea can have which is it's so I mean we quite literally are in the creator economy

[00:43:39] where it's like no matter what you do even like you don't have to be Sahil Bloom you can be a doctor a lawyer a chiropractor a writer like literally quite literally anything

[00:43:54] and you can go out there and make content based on whatever your crafter expertise is and then boom reach tons of people

[00:44:03] I mean it's the numbers of it are completely insane like if you just think a hundred years ago if you wanted to reach a million people like how how would you do that like you you would write a book I guess and it would take you it probably after you died

[00:44:19] that the book would have the reach of that yeah I can die first I can see it would take that long you would take that long for the print book to get like across the ocean on a boat and

[00:44:30] get like spread everywhere and now I can sit at my desk or like be on a walk with my son in the morning write something on my phone and get like 10 million views on it on Twitter

[00:44:42] immediately around the world like I can write a newsletter and have an 80 year old person in Russia responding to it just as much as like an 18 year old kid in Florida

[00:44:52] that is just bonkers mind blowing when you think about the reach of these things that you can do and it's been three years like I started doing this three years ago two years really like full time

[00:45:03] it's crazy to think about oh yeah it's so great I grew a page on Instagram to a hundred like 170 thousand followers just from curating tweets from Twitter

[00:45:18] bringing them to the page and then and then having people discuss the tweets in the comment section it was crazy what you're able to do

[00:45:27] and spark people to think and live slightly better lives and they previously were I mean like that's my whole thing with everything I'm doing is like

[00:45:35] if you can take one idea away from something I share that makes you live slightly better that's unbelievable to me

[00:45:42] and like relative to my prior career where all I felt like I was doing was like moving money around and trying to make some along the way

[00:45:49] if I can have an actual impact in someone's life and make money doing it like build a great life for my family doing that

[00:45:56] what more could I want?

[00:45:58] I feel the same way I feel that I feel that way in terms of like even the way I curate my guests like I know bringing you on is so valuable to other people

[00:46:08] because you address a lot of the things that people are struggling with a lot of the challenges that they have

[00:46:13] and then you have these frameworks and these ideas and things that have worked for you

[00:46:16] and it reminds me of this Mark Manson quote you know the guy who wrote the subtle art

[00:46:22] I love him

[00:46:23] yeah he's so great and I remember I was reading that book and he's like if you have a problem chances are

[00:46:31] you're not the only one and there's tons of people that are experiencing that too

[00:46:37] and it makes me think of like the whole mental health thing because that wasn't a thing like 10 years ago

[00:46:44] you know people are just starting to realize like hey you don't have to have a diagnosis

[00:46:48] to be suffering or to have a panic attack or any of these things like quite literally if you don't sleep

[00:46:56] if you don't get sunlight, if you don't move you'll get sick

[00:47:00] like there should be no stigma even if you do have a diagnosis

[00:47:04] but it made me think about like what if every person

[00:47:09] share the take away from something that helped them

[00:47:13] and everyone else is also out there looking for solutions

[00:47:17] you know what I mean if people just find each other

[00:47:20] I mean imagine that instead of fighting on the internet about like you know abortion

[00:47:26] I don't think anyone's going to win in those conversations

[00:47:29] I feel like I feel like the whole political war

[00:47:32] and that's why I think traditional media is being completely debunked

[00:47:38] and then podcasts like Joe Rogan are starting to rise in numbers

[00:47:43] I think people are starting to realize the smarter you get

[00:47:46] you realize like hey that system and you know news coverage and stuff like that

[00:47:52] is sucking the life out of me and making me fearful

[00:47:56] and making me worried about this thing or that thing that's affecting my life

[00:48:00] but here are all these people who are doing interviews

[00:48:03] and trying to find solutions for problems

[00:48:05] I mean that's really what I feel like Joe Rogan is doing and why he's succeeding

[00:48:09] and I know some people don't like him for whatever reasons

[00:48:12] but it's like if you listen to the interviews

[00:48:15] like he's quite literally a very curious person who does bring on people from both ends of the spectrum

[00:48:20] because he's just trying to figure out like okay well what's the answer

[00:48:23] you know so it's nice to see I feel like there's a shift in the way people are consuming information

[00:48:31] and as people get smarter they start realizing you know what

[00:48:35] maybe I should stop paying attention to this

[00:48:37] and start paying attention to people that are in the personal growth space

[00:48:41] or holistic medicine or functional medicine or something like that

[00:48:47] and I've been noticing that

[00:48:49] yeah it's like the over 10 window

[00:48:51] the concept of the over 10 window is like the idea that the window of acceptability

[00:48:57] exists at any point in time like the things that you can say that don't like draw in sane outrage

[00:49:02] and there's a window of it

[00:49:04] and like at times that window is very narrow

[00:49:06] and anything that you say on either side of that people go ballistic over

[00:49:10] but people like Joe Rogan people like Lex Friedman

[00:49:13] like people who are willing to kind of expand the realm of acceptability in those conversations

[00:49:19] they help slowly expand the over 10 window

[00:49:22] to where like we can have conversations around some of these things that are more you know on the edges

[00:49:27] without everyone going completely a you know ballistic over them

[00:49:30] and that's actually an important thing societally for us to have those conversations

[00:49:34] I don't always agree with what the person says

[00:49:37] but that's not the point. The point is that the conversation can happen

[00:49:40] and that we can have it in a balanced adult like manner

[00:49:44] rather than it being two people yelling at each other

[00:49:46] I mean Bill Ackman, the like you know well-known billionaire investor

[00:49:50] has been pretty vocal on Twitter recently

[00:49:54] talking about you know some of the different stuff that's come up around

[00:49:57] vaccination programs or you know whatever stuff on the Rogan podcast with RFK

[00:50:02] and all these different things and he's a very very balanced thinker

[00:50:06] people were outraged by him you know opening trying to like push the over 10 window

[00:50:12] boundary of like opening up the conversation to be you know

[00:50:15] having an adult like conversation about these things

[00:50:17] a science-backed adult like conversation around these things

[00:50:20] because it felt like it was on the edges of it

[00:50:23] and I just find it really interesting from the outside looking into see that

[00:50:27] because it's clear that there are certain things like that are expanding

[00:50:30] and contracting the over 10 window and the ability to have these discussions

[00:50:34] is really important like sometimes things that 50 years ago

[00:50:38] we thought were like mainstream are now considered radic people thought

[00:50:42] margarine was like super super healthy for you now it's horrific for you know

[00:50:46] people are like that is awful for you like canola oil whatever there were things

[00:50:49] they used to leech people in order to try to you know cure their illnesses

[00:50:53] they would literally put leeches on your body and that was like mainstream science

[00:50:56] and now it's not and so it's just funny to me that we always in the moment

[00:51:00] have things that we think are like purely established

[00:51:04] 100% true facts that 30 years from now

[00:51:08] we're going to look back on definitively and say we're completely ridiculous

[00:51:12] and we were completely wrong and insane for believing that

[00:51:16] yet in the moment no one's willing to acknowledge that

[00:51:19] no one's willing to question whether that's true or not

[00:51:21] we just yeah

[00:51:22] yeah here's my absolute truth and I'm a hundred percent right on it

[00:51:26] and like that's ridiculous arrogance that is ridiculous arrogance to think

[00:51:30] that anything you believe is absolute truth there are very few things that I believe

[00:51:34] that I think are absolute truth they're only the only things I really believe are

[00:51:38] absolute truth are things that like I control with my own heart like my love

[00:51:42] for my wife or my son or my parents like those things I'm like those are absolute

[00:51:46] truths of how I would act how I'd respond to things everything else

[00:51:50] the world is so freaking complex

[00:51:52] it's insane the number of variables all the different things that things I don't know

[00:51:56] the science I don't understand

[00:51:58] and so to have the arrogance to think that like anything I believe is the absolute truth

[00:52:02] and to not be willing to accept when there's new evidence when there's things that change

[00:52:06] I mean we literally make fun of politicians and call them flip floppers

[00:52:10] like that's a thing like flip floppers is a negative thing

[00:52:14] and really we should be loving and embracing people who are willing to change

[00:52:18] their mind in the face of new evidence that should be a great like we should really

[00:52:22] want that person to be president or to be our leadership someone that's willing to change

[00:52:26] their mind when new evidence comes to light that should be a sign of intelligence

[00:52:30] 100 percent I think Paul Graham

[00:52:32] wrote a tweet recently about how people from Ivy League schools

[00:52:40] aren't necessarily going to be the most successful or the best entrepreneurs

[00:52:46] because they ace all these tests and then they assume

[00:52:50] that because they were so good at test taking that there are no flaws

[00:52:54] and that they can do no wrong and they're not really prepared for

[00:52:58] what entrepreneurship brings on and its challenges which

[00:53:02] it's true it's the arrogance that's the elitism

[00:53:06] it makes me wonder our colleges really giving us the education

[00:53:10] that we need the education that equips us for the real world

[00:53:14] because I don't know that they do what do you think?

[00:53:16] Charles Darwin said it's not the most intelligent

[00:53:20] or the strongest that survive it's the most adaptable to change

[00:53:24] and I think that that's 100 percent true as it applies to our education system

[00:53:28] and the way that we think about training people

[00:53:30] where like when you get trained at an Ivy League school

[00:53:33] and this is coming from someone who went to Stanford by the way

[00:53:35] you're getting trained for like a very linear logical thing

[00:53:39] it's like you're going to be the strongest and the most intellectual

[00:53:42] and that's what you're getting trained for

[00:53:44] and you're going to be an amazing McKinsey employee

[00:53:46] Goldman Sachs employee like big company employee

[00:53:49] like you definitively if you've gone and ace tests at those places

[00:53:52] will be an incredible management consultant

[00:53:54] and that's a great life like you can build a great life doing that

[00:53:57] but I don't think you will definitively be a great entrepreneur

[00:54:01] by going to one of those places because you might not be adaptable to change

[00:54:04] and adaptability to change is literally like that has to be page 1

[00:54:09] of the entrepreneur playbook like what entrepreneur has built a 10 billion dollar business

[00:54:13] without having had near death experiences all on the way

[00:54:16] you just have to it's like it's literally part of it

[00:54:19] and you have to have been adaptable and been able to pivot

[00:54:21] and like everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth

[00:54:24] I'm like Tyson quote like you just have to have been able to do that

[00:54:27] and I don't think that those education institutions are inherently better

[00:54:32] at training you for adaptability

[00:54:34] adaptability comes from life like that's real life

[00:54:37] you can't go to a college to learn how to be adaptable

[00:54:40] I mean some of the best entrepreneurs I know have suffered severe traumas

[00:54:43] in their life in different ways that have made them like weirdly paranoid

[00:54:46] or really weirdly obsessed with certain things

[00:54:48] they're like weirdly wired in some way

[00:54:51] and that is a big part of what makes them successful

[00:54:53] it's not whether they went to Harvard or Pan or Berkeley

[00:54:57] or whatever versus like community college

[00:55:00] oh 100% but I do think that certain things can be taught

[00:55:05] you know obviously life hands you your own experiences

[00:55:10] but then think about like I don't know conflict resolution skills

[00:55:14] or like communicate I think about this stuff that like Chris Voss has taught me

[00:55:19] that has helped me so much in my communication in all arenas

[00:55:23] and nobody teaches us this in school

[00:55:26] and it makes me wonder

[00:55:29] if you had you personally had to create a curriculum

[00:55:34] and you have a kid now so I'm sure it's stuff you think about

[00:55:38] it's the hell right it's like what am I going to teach this kid

[00:55:41] and it's not always the parent

[00:55:43] the parents don't raise the child alone

[00:55:45] it's the school, the environment, the friendship groups

[00:55:48] that's why you gotta be careful but it's like

[00:55:51] how and what would you want taught to your child

[00:55:55] and how early?

[00:55:58] I think so much of it comes from just learning how to interact

[00:56:01] as a normal human being

[00:56:04] I mean frankly like I would want my whether they,

[00:56:07] whether my son is talented or not at sports

[00:56:10] playing team sports I think is one of the best training grounds for life

[00:56:13] that we can imagine we've talked about that

[00:56:16] like I just think there is something about having to build with a team

[00:56:19] and struggle and fail and be good and be bad

[00:56:22] and you know deal with different personalities

[00:56:24] like that you just cannot learn that anywhere else

[00:56:26] and like the failure and the resilience that has to come from it

[00:56:29] I think it's a huge part of it and then to your point

[00:56:32] I just think there are books you can read that will probably get you like

[00:56:35] 90% of the value probably more

[00:56:38] okay

[00:56:39] top five book record

[00:56:42] I mean I would like if I wanted my kid

[00:56:45] to become an entrepreneur

[00:56:48] I think I would have him read zero to one

[00:56:50] oh dear seal

[00:56:52] yeah I mean I like

[00:56:54] I pretty religiously read that once a year

[00:56:57] like I'm a big I'm a big believer in rereading books

[00:57:00] rather than just like feeling like I need to go read

[00:57:03] I used to like read 100 books and want to flex on it

[00:57:06] and tell everyone how impressive I was

[00:57:08] and reality was like it was BS

[00:57:10] but I zero to one is exceptional

[00:57:13] I think never split the differences in amazing book

[00:57:16] you know from a negotiation standpoint

[00:57:19] and then I'm a big believer in fiction

[00:57:21] like I think that fiction opens up your mind creatively

[00:57:24] in a way that is really important for your ability to think non-linearly

[00:57:28] like it goes back to the point I made about

[00:57:30] kids going to Ivy League schools and being like

[00:57:32] amazing linear thinkers for

[00:57:35] McKinsey or Goldman Sachs

[00:57:37] or frankly to be an employee at a startup

[00:57:39] like to really be able to think critically and drive through things

[00:57:42] and the world

[00:57:44] and companies need people like that I think that's great

[00:57:46] but amazing entrepreneurs like 10x entrepreneurs are non-linear thinkers

[00:57:51] they're thinking in different ways

[00:57:53] and fiction really does help with that like sci-fi

[00:57:55] I mean I sci-fi is my favorite book category

[00:57:57] reading like yeah yeah

[00:57:59] hit checkers guide to the galaxy is one of my favorite

[00:58:01] I love Andy weir so like project Hail Mary is one of the best books

[00:58:05] I think of all time personally think of all time

[00:58:07] I think it's amazing amazing book

[00:58:09] like if I could recommend a single book for anyone to read

[00:58:11] that hasn't read it project Hail Mary would be that book

[00:58:14] really yeah okay wow

[00:58:16] yeah I'll look into it

[00:58:17] yeah I'm kind of like a weird nerd at heart

[00:58:19] I can tell because every time I ask you a question

[00:58:22] you're like well there's this quote by Charles Darwin

[00:58:24] you know that's all from the notebook you know I just like carry this thing around me

[00:58:29] and when I see interesting stuff I end up grabbing it

[00:58:31] yeah I feel like I'm like that too a little bit

[00:58:34] but I just like screenshot it

[00:58:36] and then keep it in my phone

[00:58:37] yeah I find that writing things down

[00:58:39] that's how I end up remembering it

[00:58:41] okay like I've tried both like I've you know everyone

[00:58:44] tries to sell you like the hot new tool or whatever you can use

[00:58:48] to like completely change your life

[00:58:50] and all I have all of those I've tried all of them

[00:58:52] and nothing works better than my little like leather

[00:58:55] mold skin notebook because I just I mean it's in one side

[00:58:58] out the other like if I put something into notion

[00:59:00] it's somewhere in my notion

[00:59:02] whatever that has a million ideas

[00:59:04] that I'm never going to go and look back at again

[00:59:06] wow that's a really good tip

[00:59:08] yeah to write it down

[00:59:10] I just think I mean the first time you write it down

[00:59:12] like you if you write it down then you read it

[00:59:14] in there once you probably remember it

[00:59:16] okay that's such a good tip

[00:59:18] yeah so he'll do worry about your kid one day

[00:59:23] having an AI girlfriend

[00:59:25] no because you won't be allowed to

[00:59:28] no um so I was um you know I have an investment fund

[00:59:35] I have a small investment fund that I invest out of

[00:59:37] what's it called SRB Ventures

[00:59:39] it's my initials no fancy branding to it

[00:59:42] but small like $10 million fun

[00:59:44] I write like 100k checks and

[00:59:46] uh... or largely early state tech

[00:59:48] early stage technology companies

[00:59:50] obviously a ton of the stuff that I would see

[00:59:53] I actually didn't do much in the space

[00:59:55] but a ton of the stuff I would see in 2021

[00:59:58] was Web 3 and now a ton of the stuff that I see

[01:00:01] is AI and recently I've gotten pitched on

[01:00:05] a bunch of like basically AI girl you know

[01:00:08] they're like we're solving companionship

[01:00:10] but it's basically AI girlfriend apps

[01:00:13] um and I don't know what to think about that kind of stuff

[01:00:18] like you know it's all gets pitched as like

[01:00:21] her or that movie her

[01:00:23] um and having the like AI girlfriend in your life

[01:00:26] and I just when I look at it I feel like

[01:00:28] queasy and like it's really sad and dystopian

[01:00:31] for the future but can I see a world

[01:00:33] where like five ten years from now

[01:00:35] the over 10 window has expanded

[01:00:37] and that's like super normal

[01:00:39] I guess is it a world that I like really want to live in

[01:00:42] not really um and am I sad that my son's gonna

[01:00:46] grow up into a world where that's like really normal kind of

[01:00:49] but I don't know

[01:00:50] yeah you just we just got to keep our kids away from that

[01:00:53] would you have an AI boyfriend?

[01:00:54] never

[01:00:55] would you have like an AI friend

[01:00:58] that like knows how to meet you in the way

[01:01:01] like it

[01:01:02] I was talking to my wife about this here's the Genesis fit

[01:01:04] so I get off the phone with this kid

[01:01:06] who's like pitching this thing like

[01:01:08] you know

[01:01:09] AI girlfriend app and I'm talking to my wife about it

[01:01:12] because like you all oftentimes like pressure test some investment

[01:01:15] where they're in C like

[01:01:16] MI2 caught up in my bubble of like tech people

[01:01:19] that I talked about these things to get like

[01:01:21] a real perspective on it

[01:01:22] and so I'm talking to her about she's like

[01:01:24] oh weird whatever

[01:01:25] and then she's like well

[01:01:27] you know sometimes when I want to like

[01:01:30] vent about something like I'll talk to my mom

[01:01:33] so could you just have someone

[01:01:35] but sometimes my mom is annoying about it for whatever reason

[01:01:37] like could you just have someone that's kind of like

[01:01:39] your vent pal

[01:01:40] that meets you in the way that you need them to

[01:01:43] and like

[01:01:44] your wearables

[01:01:45] kind of like

[01:01:46] show your mood

[01:01:47] so the thing is like meeting you in the right way

[01:01:50] based on what your mood is in the moment

[01:01:52] will they like vent be like

[01:01:53] the best event pal that you could possibly have

[01:01:56] and my pushback is like

[01:01:58] but if you know it's not a human

[01:02:00] are you really going to want to

[01:02:01] or is it going to feel weird to you?

[01:02:03] like are you really going to want to vent

[01:02:04] with someone like that

[01:02:05] so basically it's a trained

[01:02:08] AI that responds to you in the way that you need it to

[01:02:12] in those moments where you're feeling emotional

[01:02:14] yeah

[01:02:15] here's something interesting

[01:02:16] I had Tom Bill you on the podcast

[01:02:18] and he told me that

[01:02:20] in moments where he's angry

[01:02:22] with his wife and he like displays anger

[01:02:25] he has a letter

[01:02:28] from him to himself

[01:02:30] that he

[01:02:31] he has given to her

[01:02:33] and every time he gets angry to that level

[01:02:36] he asked her to take it out

[01:02:38] and read it to him

[01:02:39] and it's something like

[01:02:40] hey Tom, it's me

[01:02:43] just so you know

[01:02:46] you love Lisa so much

[01:02:48] and your anger is nothing compared to the love you have for it

[01:02:51] something like that I'm paraphrasing

[01:02:53] and it just calms him down

[01:02:56] and gives him perspective in a moment

[01:02:58] where he's overtaken by emotion

[01:03:01] and the reason what you just said

[01:03:03] reminded me of this is I just thought

[01:03:05] okay well can you train an AI

[01:03:07] because you know what you need

[01:03:09] so can you train the thing

[01:03:11] to just maybe give you perspective or words

[01:03:13] I think the danger of it

[01:03:15] is will you become dependent on a machine

[01:03:19] and then avoid people

[01:03:22] yeah I just think the

[01:03:24] I hate it

[01:03:26] I just freaking

[01:03:27] I hate it

[01:03:28] I get like the world might be going

[01:03:29] I just hate it

[01:03:30] because I just think that so much of the human condition

[01:03:33] is about imperfection

[01:03:35] like that's what's awesome about the human condition

[01:03:37] is imperfection

[01:03:39] it's not like trying to make all these situations

[01:03:41] like that's what all this is trying to do

[01:03:43] it's like oh you're not feeling good

[01:03:44] let's try to make it perfect

[01:03:45] by having the perfect person

[01:03:46] meet you in that moment

[01:03:48] and the exact way that you need them to

[01:03:49] and like that's not what being human

[01:03:52] is

[01:03:53] being human is actually like the suffering

[01:03:56] and the experience

[01:03:57] and the growth that comes from that discomfort

[01:03:59] in that terrible moment

[01:04:00] and so stripping all of that away

[01:04:02] like ripping all of that friction out of our lives

[01:04:04] to try to make this like perfect little thing

[01:04:06] that meets us there

[01:04:07] feels to me

[01:04:08] like it just takes all these massive

[01:04:10] beautiful, crazy colors

[01:04:12] that exist currently in our life

[01:04:14] and just like turns it into this grey scale world

[01:04:17] that we're going to live into

[01:04:18] where it's just like

[01:04:19] okay everything is robotic

[01:04:21] and we're just meeting people

[01:04:22] in the exact way

[01:04:23] that they need to be

[01:04:24] and I'm going to have glasses on

[01:04:25] that show you in the exact way

[01:04:27] that I want you to look in this moment

[01:04:28] so that I feel embraced

[01:04:29] and I just like

[01:04:31] I hate that makes me feel

[01:04:32] queasy

[01:04:33] like I just think that imperfection

[01:04:35] is what we need to embrace

[01:04:37] like the friction that comes with that

[01:04:39] is part of what makes life

[01:04:40] actually have texture

[01:04:42] and worth living

[01:04:43] I agree

[01:04:45] however there's another side to that

[01:04:47] where it's like

[01:04:48] okay these are tools

[01:04:49] that'll help us increase

[01:04:51] our efficiency

[01:04:53] in the real world

[01:04:55] where it's like you look at chat gpt

[01:04:57] and it's like okay

[01:04:59] well it's doing all this work

[01:05:01] and writing for us

[01:05:02] so that we don't have to

[01:05:04] do all this research

[01:05:05] and so it's almost like

[01:05:07] saving you time

[01:05:08] so that you can go out there

[01:05:09] and be more human

[01:05:10] if you choose to use it that way

[01:05:12] the same way it's like

[01:05:13] am I going to do all these calculations

[01:05:14] in my head or am I going to use a calculator

[01:05:16] so it's like

[01:05:17] where's the line

[01:05:18] you know what I mean

[01:05:19] where is the line of like

[01:05:21] okay here's an acceptable

[01:05:23] amount and way

[01:05:25] to utilize these AI tools

[01:05:28] and here's where you've gone too far

[01:05:30] yeah but it's again

[01:05:31] it's like

[01:05:33] the internal problem is being

[01:05:35] band-aided over

[01:05:36] like if loneliness is such a big issue

[01:05:39] that we need a whole bunch of

[01:05:40] AI girlfriends

[01:05:41] which is

[01:05:42] we're in a loneliness epidemic

[01:05:43] it's proven

[01:05:44] there's tons of science

[01:05:45] data around it

[01:05:47] like we're in a friendship recession

[01:05:48] all of these things are happening

[01:05:49] that is a massive issue

[01:05:51] that needs to be addressed

[01:05:52] should it be addressed

[01:05:53] by an AI girlfriend

[01:05:54] or by fixing what the underlying

[01:05:56] issue is

[01:05:57] of us actually not feeling

[01:05:59] like we're able to connect

[01:06:00] with other humans

[01:06:01] like that is where I'm like

[01:06:03] fundamentally having an issue

[01:06:04] with it

[01:06:05] I just

[01:06:06] so much of like

[01:06:07] the beauty of relationships

[01:06:08] that I think about

[01:06:09] is by wrestling

[01:06:10] with these tensions

[01:06:11] of imperfections

[01:06:12] like I think about

[01:06:13] in my own relationship

[01:06:14] with my wife

[01:06:15] we have this thing

[01:06:16] of

[01:06:17] you know

[01:06:18] you talk about like

[01:06:19] meeting someone halfway

[01:06:20] like you know

[01:06:21] you're each giving 50

[01:06:22] you know 50%

[01:06:23] to kind of like

[01:06:24] have the 100%

[01:06:25] in your relationship.

[01:06:26] Well sometimes

[01:06:27] you're not going to be able

[01:06:28] to give your 50

[01:06:29] in a relationship

[01:06:30] because you're drained

[01:06:31] because things have

[01:06:32] hit you in the wrong way

[01:06:33] bad news at work

[01:06:34] family

[01:06:35] you're stressed

[01:06:36] whatever it is

[01:06:37] being able to communicate

[01:06:38] to the other person

[01:06:39] my wife being able to say to me

[01:06:40] hey I can only give 20 right now

[01:06:42] I need you to give 80

[01:06:44] in this moment

[01:06:45] like I need you

[01:06:46] to meet me further

[01:06:47] than halfway on this

[01:06:48] I need you to bring the energy

[01:06:49] to get us to the 100.

[01:06:50] Her being able to say that

[01:06:51] to me is like

[01:06:52] the beauty of our relationship

[01:06:53] and then me being able

[01:06:54] to say okay

[01:06:55] I'll do that

[01:06:56] I'll be there for you

[01:06:57] on the back end of it

[01:06:58] I might be drained

[01:06:59] and I'm going to need you

[01:07:00] to give me more

[01:07:01] on the back end of it.

[01:07:02] Wait, you know what I think

[01:07:03] and this just came

[01:07:04] to me right now

[01:07:05] as you're speaking

[01:07:06] because I'm you know

[01:07:08] I'm single

[01:07:09] a lot of my friends are single

[01:07:10] a lot of people

[01:07:11] in LA are single

[01:07:12] okay?

[01:07:13] I think the problem is

[01:07:15] that there's so much focus

[01:07:17] on attracting the opposite sex

[01:07:20] or whatever you're into

[01:07:22] and not enough focus

[01:07:23] on how can I be there

[01:07:24] and grow with this person

[01:07:25] and connect with this person

[01:07:26] because everything

[01:07:27] that you're telling me

[01:07:28] right now makes so much sense

[01:07:30] you're in a functional

[01:07:31] healthy, happy marriage

[01:07:32] and here are the things

[01:07:33] that you're doing

[01:07:34] and here are the ways

[01:07:35] that you guys each carry

[01:07:36] the load for each other

[01:07:38] you know

[01:07:39] and it's not always 50-50

[01:07:40] sometimes it's 80-20

[01:07:41] sometimes it's something else

[01:07:42] but you're willing

[01:07:43] to meet each other there

[01:07:45] whatever that is

[01:07:46] it's a part...

[01:07:47] it's a good team

[01:07:48] and what everyone around me

[01:07:50] is so focused on

[01:07:51] and I hear this so much

[01:07:52] it's like

[01:07:53] well why don't you be like this

[01:07:54] because guys like it

[01:07:55] when you do that

[01:07:56] or like well why don't you do this

[01:07:57] because guys are into it

[01:07:58] or like

[01:07:59] you know even me sometimes

[01:08:00] when I'm trying to like

[01:08:01] help out a guy friend

[01:08:02] it's like

[01:08:03] oh well

[01:08:04] I like it when a guy does this

[01:08:05] but it's not always

[01:08:07] about like how can you guys

[01:08:09] be there for each other

[01:08:10] I feel like we're in a world

[01:08:11] where we're constantly

[01:08:12] trying to figure out like

[01:08:13] okay well what is this other person

[01:08:14] attracted to

[01:08:15] so I could get them

[01:08:17] not who can I be

[01:08:18] in this relationship

[01:08:19] so that we can

[01:08:20] grow together

[01:08:21] and turn this into something

[01:08:22] and I feel like

[01:08:23] that's where

[01:08:24] an entire generation

[01:08:25] of self-help books

[01:08:27] and dating advice

[01:08:28] and courses has gone

[01:08:29] fucking wrong

[01:08:30] that's what I think

[01:08:31] I think you're absolutely right

[01:08:33] I mean the analog

[01:08:34] with content

[01:08:35] is people

[01:08:36] who say

[01:08:38] what does the audience want

[01:08:40] let me go do that for them

[01:08:41] versus people who say

[01:08:43] what do I really

[01:08:44] really care about

[01:08:45] and know about deeply

[01:08:46] that I'm going to create

[01:08:48] and let the audience

[01:08:49] come to that

[01:08:50] and get attracted to it

[01:08:51] whoever it is

[01:08:52] and who lasts

[01:08:53] of the two of those people

[01:08:54] like the person

[01:08:55] that just creates

[01:08:56] whatever the audience wants

[01:08:57] and does like

[01:08:58] here are the chat gbt

[01:08:59] things that will change your life

[01:09:00] versus the person

[01:09:01] that's creating

[01:09:02] really careful,

[01:09:03] methodical,

[01:09:04] thoughtful things

[01:09:05] over long periods of time

[01:09:06] maybe they're not all

[01:09:07] gonna go viral

[01:09:08] but they're creating things

[01:09:09] they actually care about

[01:09:10] and like it's the same thing

[01:09:11] with relationships

[01:09:12] like if you're just constantly

[01:09:13] saying what is this other person want

[01:09:15] so let me go do that

[01:09:16] I'm gonna go be the person

[01:09:17] that those other people want

[01:09:18] versus I'm gonna be me

[01:09:19] and I'm gonna be true to myself

[01:09:21] and my core values

[01:09:22] and who's gonna get attracted

[01:09:23] to me through that

[01:09:24] that's probably the person

[01:09:25] that I'm gonna want

[01:09:26] how do people

[01:09:27] take that advice

[01:09:28] be yourself

[01:09:30] because I swear

[01:09:32] some people don't even know

[01:09:33] what that is

[01:09:34] what does that mean

[01:09:35] if we're all trying to

[01:09:36] be what the world is

[01:09:37] if we're all trying to be

[01:09:38] what the world expects us to be

[01:09:39] and it's not just

[01:09:40] romantic relationships

[01:09:41] growing up as a kid

[01:09:43] your parents have these

[01:09:44] expectations of you

[01:09:46] and what they want you to be

[01:09:48] and the job that they want

[01:09:49] you to have

[01:09:50] and what it means

[01:09:51] to live a good life

[01:09:52] and you're under so much

[01:09:53] pressure to perform

[01:09:55] for other people

[01:09:56] from such a young age

[01:09:58] and then you're given this

[01:10:00] advice be yourself

[01:10:01] like how do you take that

[01:10:02] what does that mean

[01:10:03] what are the core values

[01:10:04] that you actually care about

[01:10:05] I mean like what

[01:10:07] the exercise I honestly

[01:10:08] went through was

[01:10:09] what do I want my life

[01:10:10] to look like when I'm 80?

[01:10:11] Was there an example of that

[01:10:12] like that you had

[01:10:14] in front of your face

[01:10:15] where you're just like

[01:10:16] this guy has it down

[01:10:18] that's the life I want.

[01:10:20] I actually do have

[01:10:21] a close, close family

[01:10:23] friend this guy

[01:10:24] his name is Hank

[01:10:26] and he's 98 now

[01:10:28] at the time he was

[01:10:29] like 95

[01:10:30] he's 98 years old

[01:10:31] and the reason

[01:10:32] it's not that

[01:10:34] and the reason he became

[01:10:35] that person

[01:10:36] for me in my mind

[01:10:37] was because on his 90th birthday

[01:10:39] he got asked what he wanted

[01:10:42] for his 90th birthday

[01:10:43] and he's like

[01:10:44] unbelievably cute old man

[01:10:46] beautiful cute wife

[01:10:48] who's like five years younger

[01:10:49] then she was a soap opera star

[01:10:51] and he was a Hollywood writer

[01:10:53] and so he's still very

[01:10:54] witty and smart

[01:10:55] on his 90th birthday

[01:10:56] they asked him

[01:10:57] what he wanted

[01:10:58] and he said he wanted

[01:10:59] to go see what all the

[01:11:00] geniuses at Harvard

[01:11:01] were learning about

[01:11:02] and my dad arranged

[01:11:03] for him to go

[01:11:04] to some classes

[01:11:05] and so at 90 years old

[01:11:06] he went and sat

[01:11:07] in the front row

[01:11:08] at a bunch of classes

[01:11:09] at Harvard

[01:11:10] asked questions

[01:11:11] in some astronomy class

[01:11:12] sat there took notes

[01:11:14] as a 90 year old

[01:11:15] there's absolutely no reason

[01:11:16] to do that

[01:11:17] he's got a bunch of grandchildren

[01:11:18] like he's super happy

[01:11:19] he's intellectually curious

[01:11:21] and he's doing all these things

[01:11:23] because he really enjoys

[01:11:24] it's like there's no end

[01:11:25] he's not going to make money

[01:11:26] off astronomy

[01:11:27] or whatever these things are

[01:11:28] it's because he's really passionate

[01:11:29] about it

[01:11:30] and I think about like

[01:11:31] the type of person

[01:11:32] I want to be

[01:11:33] it's that

[01:11:34] like I want to be

[01:11:35] intellectually engaged

[01:11:36] I want to be loving

[01:11:37] and caring in that way

[01:11:38] that people want to be around me

[01:11:39] but I really went through that exercise

[01:11:40] I said like

[01:11:41] 80

[01:11:42] what is my like

[01:11:43] ideal day look

[01:11:44] like at age

[01:11:45] 80

[01:11:46] and to me

[01:11:47] it was literally like

[01:11:48] wife by my side

[01:11:49] children there

[01:11:50] like chatting

[01:11:51] happy

[01:11:52] grandchildren

[01:11:53] like playing

[01:11:54] in a big yard

[01:11:55] friends coming over

[01:11:56] to have a big dinner with me

[01:11:58] and then

[01:11:59] you reverse engineer back

[01:12:00] from that

[01:12:01] like okay what does that

[01:12:02] actually mean

[01:12:03] in the present

[01:12:04] and that means

[01:12:05] you need to be taking actions

[01:12:06] that are conducive to that

[01:12:07] like if you want your wife

[01:12:08] sitting by your side

[01:12:09] at age 80

[01:12:10] what type of husband

[01:12:11] do you need to be today

[01:12:12] means you need to be

[01:12:13] the type of husband

[01:12:14] that she's going to want

[01:12:15] to be spending time

[01:12:16] with at age 80

[01:12:17] like if you want to have your kids

[01:12:18] still by your side

[01:12:19] at that age

[01:12:20] and excited to spend time

[01:12:21] with you

[01:12:22] it means you need to be

[01:12:23] the type of

[01:12:24] present

[01:12:25] caring, supportive

[01:12:26] father

[01:12:27] and 50 years

[01:12:28] grandchildren

[01:12:29] same thing

[01:12:30] friends that are going to come over

[01:12:31] and spend time with you

[01:12:32] means you need to be a loyal friend

[01:12:33] and be there for those people

[01:12:34] when they're going through

[01:12:35] challenging times

[01:12:36] and so to me

[01:12:37] that was like

[01:12:38] a powerful exercise

[01:12:39] of clarifying what my core values were

[01:12:41] like what were the core things

[01:12:42] that I needed to be caring about

[01:12:43] and focusing on in the present

[01:12:44] that were really true

[01:12:45] to who I was

[01:12:46] none of them had anything

[01:12:47] to do with money for me

[01:12:48] like sitting on a porch

[01:12:49] yeah maybe there's

[01:12:50] like some amount of money

[01:12:51] that's involved

[01:12:52] in having your own house

[01:12:53] in a yard

[01:12:54] but not much more than

[01:12:55] that I kind of could do that

[01:12:56] and so

[01:12:57] that was really

[01:12:58] really clarifying to me

[01:12:59] of like

[01:13:00] okay who am I

[01:13:01] like what do I really

[01:13:02] really care about in the present

[01:13:03] and what are the actions

[01:13:04] that I need to be taking on a daily basis

[01:13:06] that turn into that future

[01:13:08] I think a lot of people talk

[01:13:10] about regret

[01:13:11] very often

[01:13:12] I see that

[01:13:13] and I know you're not a big

[01:13:15] tick-tock fan

[01:13:16] but I did see this video

[01:13:17] on tick-tock ones

[01:13:18] where someone was talking

[01:13:20] about how

[01:13:21] when you're young

[01:13:24] you're like

[01:13:25] let's say you're a teenager

[01:13:26] and your mom or dad

[01:13:28] opens the door to your room

[01:13:30] and you're just so annoyed

[01:13:32] you're like

[01:13:33] oh I don't want to wake up

[01:13:34] get out of my room

[01:13:36] I'm not in the mood for this

[01:13:38] but if you imagine yourself

[01:13:39] as an 80-year-old

[01:13:41] who doesn't have

[01:13:42] your parents

[01:13:43] your parents aren't alive

[01:13:44] anymore

[01:13:45] looking back in that moment

[01:13:47] you would jump at the chance

[01:13:48] to go get breakfast

[01:13:49] or lunch with them

[01:13:50] and that changes everything

[01:13:52] so there must be something

[01:13:53] like looking at yourself

[01:13:55] when you're 80

[01:13:56] and figuring out

[01:13:57] what it is that you actually want

[01:13:59] I think it goes in both directions too

[01:14:01] mental time travel

[01:14:02] is a really powerful trick

[01:14:04] like zooming out

[01:14:05] and going back

[01:14:06] and thinking about just how amazed

[01:14:08] your younger self would be

[01:14:10] at where you are today

[01:14:11] is an incredible tool for gratitude

[01:14:13] there's so many things

[01:14:14] that you have now accomplished

[01:14:16] that you've just taken for granted

[01:14:17] you're like

[01:14:18] oh now I'm chasing the next thing

[01:14:20] until I'm not going to be happy

[01:14:21] and fulfilled

[01:14:22] but you're 22-year-old self

[01:14:24] you're 25-year-old self

[01:14:25] I mean my 30-year-old self

[01:14:27] would be blown away

[01:14:28] at some of the things I'm doing today

[01:14:29] that I'm not appreciating in the present

[01:14:31] so zooming out

[01:14:32] and actually appreciating that

[01:14:33] thinking about how much your younger self

[01:14:35] would have killed to be

[01:14:36] in the shoes that you're in today

[01:14:38] is an amazing thing

[01:14:39] and then similarly

[01:14:40] to your point

[01:14:41] going to the future

[01:14:42] and thinking about

[01:14:43] in the present

[01:14:44] what are those things

[01:14:45] that I'm taking for granted

[01:14:46] right now or that I'm trying to speed through

[01:14:48] that that person

[01:14:49] would just kill to have back

[01:14:51] I mean I was like

[01:14:52] I was on a walk

[01:14:53] with my son recently

[01:14:54] and I go for a walk

[01:14:56] with him every single morning

[01:14:57] he takes a nap usually

[01:14:58] and for whatever reason

[01:15:00] he was in a bad mood

[01:15:01] and he was screaming

[01:15:03] and we're like walking through this neighborhood

[01:15:05] it's kind of early in the morning

[01:15:06] and he's just screaming

[01:15:07] and I was starting to get frustrated

[01:15:09] and I could feel my blood pressure rising

[01:15:10] and not feeling good

[01:15:11] and I really thought about that

[01:15:12] I just thought about the fact

[01:15:14] that I'm feeling frustrated

[01:15:15] I want him to just be quiet

[01:15:16] I want to get out of this moment

[01:15:18] or fast forward through it

[01:15:19] but 10 years from now

[01:15:21] I would give anything

[01:15:22] to be back in this moment

[01:15:24] and to be able to appreciate

[01:15:25] this moment with him

[01:15:26] when he's a kid

[01:15:27] and so there are all these things

[01:15:28] that we try to fast forward through

[01:15:30] that we feel stressed around

[01:15:32] that we feel terrible

[01:15:34] that our older self

[01:15:35] doesn't even have to be 80

[01:15:37] it might be your 50-year-old self

[01:15:38] would literally give

[01:15:40] anything to go back

[01:15:42] and be in that moment

[01:15:43] Wow, that's so beautiful

[01:15:45] being a parent changes

[01:15:47] a lot of the wiring of your brain

[01:15:49] I will say

[01:15:50] In what way?

[01:15:51] I mean, everything for me

[01:15:53] I kind of

[01:15:55] I said this to a friend this morning

[01:15:57] that I was catching up with after a while

[01:15:59] I feel like my life actually began

[01:16:03] when my son was born

[01:16:04] in a lot of ways

[01:16:05] I don't feel like I had any sort of clarity

[01:16:07] around purpose

[01:16:08] or meaning

[01:16:09] and the things I was doing

[01:16:10] until he was born

[01:16:11] and I look back and think

[01:16:13] I had a hilarious level

[01:16:15] of like immaturity in my life

[01:16:19] and I don't even think I was particularly immature

[01:16:22] but when I think about

[01:16:24] the way my brain works today

[01:16:26] and the feeling of like

[01:16:28] knowing what I want to do

[01:16:29] and how I want to pursue it

[01:16:31] and the way that I feel

[01:16:32] it helps me cut through the noise

[01:16:34] on the things I'm going to do

[01:16:35] and the things I'm not going to do

[01:16:36] it's just like I'm on a completely different level now

[01:16:39] of focus

[01:16:40] and it doesn't mean I'm working

[01:16:41] it's not like working harder

[01:16:42] it's literally anything that comes in the door

[01:16:45] I have the easiest way to say yes or no to it

[01:16:47] because it's like

[01:16:48] what am I saying no to

[01:16:50] by saying yes to this

[01:16:51] if I take on this new thing

[01:16:52] that's literally just like time away from him

[01:16:54] and so it has to be some amazing opportunity

[01:16:57] or some amazing new thing

[01:16:59] that's going to provide me

[01:17:00] with a really rich experience

[01:17:01] in order for me to give up on that

[01:17:03] like coming on this podcast

[01:17:05] like coming on this podcast

[01:17:06] but like to the

[01:17:07] I'm here

[01:17:08] I'm literally like

[01:17:09] I'm here for a day

[01:17:10] and I'm taking a red eye home

[01:17:12] because I don't want to like

[01:17:13] miss all day Saturday with him

[01:17:14] so like

[01:17:15] I would much rather not sleep on Friday night

[01:17:17] on a red eye home

[01:17:18] than like

[01:17:19] take the day flight

[01:17:20] and have it be a pleasant flight

[01:17:21] watching movies

[01:17:22] and miss the whole day with them

[01:17:24] and so like

[01:17:25] there are these just tiny little things

[01:17:26] where

[01:17:27] the wiring of how you think

[01:17:29] about your world

[01:17:30] and like what you want to do

[01:17:31] and the legacy you want to leave

[01:17:33] it really really does change

[01:17:35] I'm also just hyper aware

[01:17:37] of the fact that

[01:17:38] there's this tiny window of time

[01:17:40] that I get with him

[01:17:41] when he is going to be

[01:17:42] this age,

[01:17:44] this connected with me

[01:17:46] and this central

[01:17:48] to our lives

[01:17:49] and I just don't want to miss it.

[01:17:51] How old is your son?

[01:17:52] He's just over a year.

[01:17:53] Okay, I was gonna ask you

[01:17:55] if you limit screen time

[01:17:56] but there's no way

[01:17:57] I could touch

[01:17:58] as a screen at that age.

[01:17:59] Yeah, I mean he like

[01:18:00] it's kind of fun

[01:18:01] so he doesn't have an iPad or anything like that.

[01:18:02] It's crazy how

[01:18:04] addictive like phones are

[01:18:06] like he's a baby right here

[01:18:07] he doesn't know how

[01:18:09] any of this stuff works.

[01:18:10] You put a phone in front of like

[01:18:11] maybe not three,

[01:18:13] a six-month-old

[01:18:14] they start swiping.

[01:18:15] Like they will touch a screen

[01:18:17] and immediately understand

[01:18:19] that like things move

[01:18:21] and they start just like

[01:18:23] swiping on a phone.

[01:18:24] It's really really crazy

[01:18:26] and now if he sees a phone

[01:18:28] around him he's like trying to grab it

[01:18:29] like the screen's lit up

[01:18:30] and he's trying to grab at it.

[01:18:31] It's really wild

[01:18:33] like the technology is just extremely

[01:18:35] fun.

[01:18:36] It's really fun now

[01:18:37] because he's old enough

[01:18:38] to like understand

[01:18:39] plots and things on screen

[01:18:41] so like he'll watch a movie

[01:18:42] with us,

[01:18:43] like we'll play like

[01:18:44] despicable me

[01:18:45] and he'll sit there

[01:18:46] and eat his dinner

[01:18:47] while we eat our dinner

[01:18:48] and like we're watching a movie

[01:18:49] and he kind of just is like

[01:18:50] sitting there and watching a movie

[01:18:51] with us like he's like

[01:18:52] part of the gang

[01:18:53] and that is really fun

[01:18:54] like you kind of get out

[01:18:55] of the baby stage

[01:18:56] and now there's like a real personality

[01:18:57] there and you feel like

[01:18:58] you see an actual human

[01:18:59] developing in front of your eyes.

[01:19:00] Oh my God, that's so cute.

[01:19:01] It's crazy.

[01:19:02] Yeah.

[01:19:03] How do you allocate your time

[01:19:05] being like a parent,

[01:19:07] a writer,

[01:19:09] a creator,

[01:19:10] a personality?

[01:19:11] Like you're just

[01:19:12] you're all these things.

[01:19:13] I basically have like

[01:19:15] one or two

[01:19:17] focus blocks of work a day.

[01:19:20] And the first one is

[01:19:23] from like five to seven

[01:19:24] thirty in the morning

[01:19:25] so it's before anyone's up.

[01:19:26] So you do the cold plunge?

[01:19:28] I do the cold plunge at four thirty.

[01:19:29] I get up at four thirty

[01:19:30] I do the cold plunge.

[01:19:31] Get my Dunkin' Donuts

[01:19:32] coffee and then I go sit down

[01:19:34] on my desk.

[01:19:35] And from five to seven thirty

[01:19:37] that's normally like my creative time.

[01:19:39] It's like whatever the thing is

[01:19:40] that I'm working on.

[01:19:41] So I'm working on my book now

[01:19:42] or newsletter

[01:19:43] whatever writing that I'm doing.

[01:19:45] That's like when my brain

[01:19:46] works most creatively

[01:19:47] is early in the morning.

[01:19:48] And my general goal is

[01:19:51] that if that's the only

[01:19:53] block of time that I work

[01:19:55] during the day,

[01:19:56] like if shit hits the fan,

[01:19:57] whatever things happen

[01:19:59] or I'm in you know,

[01:20:01] traveling, going and doing other things

[01:20:02] like that was still a productive day

[01:20:04] because I was really, really focused.

[01:20:05] And so I try to really nail that

[01:20:07] like ten out of ten times

[01:20:08] over and over again.

[01:20:10] But usually I'll sit down on my desk

[01:20:12] again in the afternoon

[01:20:13] and have kind of another block

[01:20:14] of work that's more like

[01:20:16] free focused on whatever.

[01:20:18] But I don't like...

[01:20:20] I don't have that many hours

[01:20:21] of work on a daily basis.

[01:20:23] I mean like a lot of my time

[01:20:24] has spent like thinking,

[01:20:25] reading, consuming things

[01:20:27] and that's not like sitting at my desk

[01:20:29] usually.

[01:20:30] That's like I'm kind of out and about.

[01:20:31] Okay, a better question.

[01:20:33] How do you consume?

[01:20:34] Because technically you could

[01:20:36] just go from app to apps

[01:20:38] scrolling like this.

[01:20:40] I mean I clearly see on certain apps

[01:20:42] you follow nobody.

[01:20:44] Yeah.

[01:20:45] So how is it that you're consuming?

[01:20:47] Yeah, I've tried not to get sucked

[01:20:49] into apps where I feel like

[01:20:50] I have an addictive personality.

[01:20:52] Instagram is one of those.

[01:20:54] I had like a bad relationship

[01:20:56] with Instagram when I was younger

[01:20:57] and then I deleted it

[01:20:58] and like didn't have it for three years

[01:21:00] for that reason.

[01:21:01] And so I've really tried to not

[01:21:03] get sucked back into the addictive side

[01:21:06] of what I feel like my personality

[01:21:07] is naturally wired there.

[01:21:09] Everything I consume is like analog.

[01:21:11] Like I try to...

[01:21:12] I mean I still like print things out

[01:21:14] and read them.

[01:21:15] Wow.

[01:21:16] I have a sauna at my house

[01:21:18] and I use it every night.

[01:21:19] And that to me is like my sacred

[01:21:21] tent.

[01:21:22] Like I'll go in there for 30 minutes

[01:21:23] and like read stuff that I wanted

[01:21:24] to read and that's like printed out

[01:21:26] pieces of paper.

[01:21:27] And I'll go and sit and read.

[01:21:29] But yeah, everything's pretty analog.

[01:21:32] Like I try not to read on the same screen

[01:21:35] where I would be like

[01:21:36] tempted to do other things

[01:21:38] because I just find that then

[01:21:39] I'm like a...

[01:21:40] I'm like a monkey.

[01:21:41] Like I just jump around

[01:21:42] to different things

[01:21:43] and I'm easily distracted.

[01:21:44] So I can't...

[01:21:45] I can't have like social media apps

[01:21:47] on the thing that I'm trying to read

[01:21:48] because I'll just pop it open whatever.

[01:21:50] So my iPad has no apps on it.

[01:21:52] I can read on there.

[01:21:53] And then analog like you know,

[01:21:55] printed out stuff.

[01:21:56] Books, whatever.

[01:21:57] And then if there's a quote you like

[01:21:59] you take out your...

[01:22:00] Paper notebook.

[01:22:01] Paper notebook.

[01:22:02] Write it down so that it's

[01:22:03] ingrained in your mind.

[01:22:04] Yeah, exactly.

[01:22:05] And then I'd write me

[01:22:06] and I'll go back

[01:22:07] and look at the notebook

[01:22:08] and like grab stuff for newsletters

[01:22:10] or whatever,

[01:22:11] think whatever things I'm writing.

[01:22:12] You know, it'll spark my ideas

[01:22:14] or I'll like send a text to someone

[01:22:16] to add it to whatever research

[01:22:18] shock him inner things

[01:22:19] that we're working on.

[01:22:20] Who are your favorite?

[01:22:21] I guess authors, content creators

[01:22:24] that are putting out stuff

[01:22:26] that really makes you think.

[01:22:28] Because you know,

[01:22:29] you're one of them to so many people.

[01:22:31] But then you also see

[01:22:32] I feel like Alex Tormozzi

[01:22:34] has gotten really popular recently.

[01:22:35] Cody Sanchez is another one,

[01:22:37] boring businesses.

[01:22:38] You know, whose content do you find yourself gravitating

[01:22:42] to a lot?

[01:22:43] I like both of them a lot.

[01:22:45] They're both friends of mine.

[01:22:46] People admire for different reasons

[01:22:48] and things that have their preferences

[01:22:50] and things that have their pursuing the world

[01:22:52] and what they're working.

[01:22:53] I mean, Alex,

[01:22:54] I spent time with recently

[01:22:55] and he was one of the people actually

[01:22:57] that brought me to the realization

[01:22:58] that like enjoying the game

[01:23:00] of making money is different

[01:23:01] than enjoying making money.

[01:23:03] Both of them I quite enjoy.

[01:23:06] I mean, people that I like on a consistent basis

[01:23:08] feel like I find myself reading

[01:23:10] are like the classics

[01:23:12] of the personal development category.

[01:23:15] Like I still love Tim Ferriss' stuff.

[01:23:17] I love Ryan Holiday's stuff.

[01:23:19] I love Shane Parish's stuff,

[01:23:21] which I feel like is really evergreen.

[01:23:22] Farnham Street.

[01:23:23] Yeah, he's great.

[01:23:24] He's fantastic,

[01:23:25] really smart, very kind person too.

[01:23:28] James Clear, we talked about.

[01:23:30] I think James is fantastic.

[01:23:32] Mark Manson.

[01:23:33] I really like Mark's old blogs actually.

[01:23:35] He used to write these

[01:23:37] like much longer form of pieces

[01:23:38] that were so freaking good.

[01:23:40] Yeah, I mean,

[01:23:42] I really, really like all those guys' stuff.

[01:23:44] There's this guy that writes more on Twitter

[01:23:46] named George Mack.

[01:23:48] Who has been writing some awesome threads

[01:23:51] on different trends that no one's talking about.

[01:23:54] That I've found really interesting recently.

[01:23:56] I really like Chris Williams in Modern Waste.

[01:23:58] Oh, yeah, he's great.

[01:23:59] Great, great, great stuff.

[01:24:01] And brings up again on over-ten window expanding stuff.

[01:24:04] I feel like he pushes the way I think a bit.

[01:24:06] So I really like all of those guys.

[01:24:08] Yeah.

[01:24:09] Yeah.

[01:24:11] Yeah.

[01:24:12] I like Alex Formozzi a lot.

[01:24:15] Was that a mastermind?

[01:24:17] I thought it was amazing.

[01:24:18] Oh, I interviewed her at a mastermind.

[01:24:19] She's incredible.

[01:24:20] She's incredible.

[01:24:21] I had dinner with the two of them.

[01:24:22] She's fantastic.

[01:24:23] Actually, I had never really seen his content or hers

[01:24:25] just because I'm not really like in the money game.

[01:24:28] Like I don't talk about money much.

[01:24:30] And I feel like most of his content is about making money.

[01:24:33] And so I had never really watched much of it or hers.

[01:24:35] And then I had dinner with them since then.

[01:24:37] I've been spending more time checking it all out.

[01:24:41] They're really a force.

[01:24:43] They're very, very different than my wife and I.

[01:24:44] Oh my God.

[01:24:45] It wouldn't be any more different than my wife and I,

[01:24:47] which I find fascinating.

[01:24:48] So it was fun for me having dinner with them.

[01:24:50] But they're really a force.

[01:24:52] Yeah.

[01:24:53] So I had dinner with them.

[01:24:54] My friend Eric Sue throws his masterminds.

[01:24:56] Oh yeah.

[01:24:57] And he, I moderated a panel with Layla Brilliant.

[01:25:01] And I remember sitting with them

[01:25:04] and every problem that I had, both of them were like,

[01:25:08] here's what you got to do.

[01:25:09] It's about efficiency.

[01:25:10] You got to do that.

[01:25:11] Like whether it was dating or anything else,

[01:25:13] it's like those two are crazy problem solvers.

[01:25:17] They're so good.

[01:25:18] And I do notice that their relationship is a little bit different

[01:25:21] than other relationships.

[01:25:22] But I love the way that he values her.

[01:25:26] Yeah.

[01:25:27] And I'll never forget at that particular mastermind

[01:25:30] where he was being interviewed.

[01:25:33] And he said something like, you know,

[01:25:36] a lot of guys come to me and they tell me,

[01:25:38] well, I want a wife who cooks and cleans and does laundry.

[01:25:43] And he goes to that, I say,

[01:25:46] you're talking about a $45,000 a year employee.

[01:25:49] If that's the bar that you have for the woman

[01:25:52] that you're going to spend the rest of your life with,

[01:25:54] then I don't know what to tell you.

[01:25:56] And it really made me think because the things

[01:26:00] that people are trained to value in their partner

[01:26:03] or that they think those things matter

[01:26:06] are not necessarily important.

[01:26:08] If you're talking about raising kids, that's one thing.

[01:26:10] I think a mother being present with a child is very important.

[01:26:14] But I think there are some things that are still present

[01:26:17] in society in terms of the way people choose their partners

[01:26:20] that are completely antiquated.

[01:26:22] And so it's nice to hear someone, especially a man like him,

[01:26:25] talk about women or his partner in the way that he does

[01:26:29] because it seems to be shifting the narrative.

[01:26:32] Like, you know, just to the story about how they met

[01:26:35] and when he was down on his luck

[01:26:37] and she's like, I would sleep under a bridge with you.

[01:26:40] You know, I think it's beautiful just the way

[01:26:42] that they put their relationship on display

[01:26:45] even though it is so different than these relationships

[01:26:47] that were used to, it feels more real to me.

[01:26:50] I completely agree.

[01:26:52] I mean, I think it expands the over-tune window again

[01:26:54] on these things and like the way that we can talk about it

[01:26:57] and the relationship they have and the strength around it

[01:26:59] and honestly just like how open they are

[01:27:03] about the fact that it's different

[01:27:05] and the approach that they've taken

[01:27:07] and like the partnership that they have

[01:27:09] and how focused on business they are

[01:27:11] and how they're driving so hard towards these things

[01:27:13] and how like they don't want kids actually

[01:27:15] and they're like embracing that.

[01:27:17] I think it's fantastic.

[01:27:19] I think so too. Cody too, by the way.

[01:27:21] Cody blows my mind.

[01:27:23] I tell everybody to follow her.

[01:27:25] Yeah.

[01:27:26] Because- She's a killer.

[01:27:27] Oh, Beast.

[01:27:28] I feel like again growing up in LA

[01:27:32] and all around the world,

[01:27:34] as women were taught to value beauty and youth so much

[01:27:38] and it's like you see the follower accounts

[01:27:40] on a lot of these models

[01:27:42] and that's great.

[01:27:43] Beauty has its own role

[01:27:45] in function and society.

[01:27:47] Fine.

[01:27:48] But I see someone like Cody

[01:27:50] and I'm like when I have a kid

[01:27:52] if they're on the screen all day

[01:27:54] that's who I want my kid following.

[01:27:56] You know what I mean?

[01:27:57] A girl who's like that, who's super,

[01:27:59] she's independent but she's also in a relationship

[01:28:01] and she has like her own frameworks

[01:28:03] for how she deals with conflict

[01:28:05] with her own husband

[01:28:06] and I'm just like,

[01:28:07] oh my god.

[01:28:08] Like what I'm seeing come out,

[01:28:10] especially out of the personal development

[01:28:13] in money space

[01:28:14] because I think that's like it's its own energy thing

[01:28:16] how you look at it.

[01:28:17] The game thing that you were talking about earlier.

[01:28:20] It's literally,

[01:28:21] it's all perspective

[01:28:23] and I think one of the beautiful things

[01:28:24] about the internet is

[01:28:25] you can literally-

[01:28:26] there is someone making content

[01:28:28] out there for the problem

[01:28:30] that you have

[01:28:31] and I think instead of trying to figure out

[01:28:33] what group you belong to

[01:28:34] or what political side

[01:28:35] you feel most connected to

[01:28:37] or anything like that,

[01:28:39] you should just be out there looking for people

[01:28:42] that have either solved the problem

[01:28:44] you're trying to solve

[01:28:45] or are trying to solve the one

[01:28:47] that you have

[01:28:48] or helping someone else

[01:28:49] with your own journey

[01:28:51] because we've all overcome stuff

[01:28:53] that we can help someone else with.

[01:28:54] And I think that's the beauty

[01:28:56] of what the internet can be

[01:28:57] instead of what it is right now

[01:28:59] which is like,

[01:29:00] of course you're incentivized

[01:29:01] to fight with people

[01:29:02] and this side versus that side

[01:29:03] and buy this product

[01:29:04] and this is going to make you feel hot

[01:29:07] or your tits are going to look nicer with this.

[01:29:09] It's like, come on.

[01:29:11] Yeah, I mean all of this has been built around-

[01:29:14] the entire consumer economy.

[01:29:17] We live in a capitalist society

[01:29:18] so everything is based on

[01:29:20] a simple model of consumerism

[01:29:23] which is like tell you that

[01:29:25] you're failing in some way

[01:29:27] and then here's the thing

[01:29:28] that will make you

[01:29:29] not for the low, low price

[01:29:31] of four easy payments

[01:29:32] of 17, 90, not.

[01:29:34] That's the entire model.

[01:29:35] It was infomercials in the past

[01:29:36] and now it's like

[01:29:37] whatever people are trying to sell you

[01:29:38] and that by the way

[01:29:40] is the reason that course creators

[01:29:42] have a negative connotation

[01:29:44] I think that's why people are like,

[01:29:45] oh you sell a course or whatever

[01:29:47] because basically

[01:29:48] that model was like,

[01:29:49] let me tell you why you're poor

[01:29:51] here's how to be rich

[01:29:52] flipping houses

[01:29:53] and I'm going to sell you a course now

[01:29:55] by the way on how to flip houses

[01:29:56] and the person that is selling that course

[01:29:58] is rich but not because they flip houses

[01:30:00] because they're selling you a course on flipping houses

[01:30:03] and so like that became

[01:30:04] this negative connotation around it

[01:30:06] I think the reason

[01:30:07] that someone like an Alex

[01:30:09] has been successful

[01:30:10] or Cody is like,

[01:30:12] they're not,

[01:30:13] I mean I don't know this for a fact

[01:30:15] but I don't think they're like

[01:30:17] selling you a solution

[01:30:18] they're just selling you knowledge

[01:30:19] right?

[01:30:20] They're giving it for free

[01:30:21] and so it's like

[01:30:22] if you want to go on YouTube

[01:30:24] or you want to go on Instagram

[01:30:26] or wherever,

[01:30:27] you can find all of this knowledge

[01:30:28] for free from them

[01:30:29] that they're just giving away

[01:30:30] and that is what I think is amazing

[01:30:32] it's like hey,

[01:30:33] I'm not telling you that

[01:30:34] you're not enough

[01:30:35] so that I can then sell you

[01:30:36] this like cream

[01:30:37] that's going to change your life

[01:30:39] and make you 20 years younger

[01:30:40] so that I can sell you

[01:30:41] this absapping belt

[01:30:42] that's going to make you

[01:30:43] have a six pack

[01:30:44] it's literally just like

[01:30:45] I'm going to give you the information

[01:30:46] around these things

[01:30:47] the knowledge, the insights

[01:30:48] that I've developed

[01:30:49] the hard earned wisdom

[01:30:50] whatever it is

[01:30:51] and you make of it what you will

[01:30:52] if you're not going to go

[01:30:53] at 99% of people

[01:30:54] probably goes in

[01:30:55] when you're out

[01:30:56] the other they don't act on it

[01:30:57] but the 1% that do

[01:30:58] will really change their life

[01:30:59] very legitimately

[01:31:00] change their life

[01:31:01] around all this stuff

[01:31:02] I'm just blown away

[01:31:03] by the energy these people have

[01:31:04] like I admire so much

[01:31:07] the amount of energy

[01:31:08] that like Alex,

[01:31:09] Layla, Cody

[01:31:10] have to go

[01:31:11] and like continue

[01:31:12] to do all these things

[01:31:13] I have so little energy

[01:31:15] relatives of these people

[01:31:16] like I can

[01:31:17] I'm just like

[01:31:18] I just don't want to do

[01:31:19] that many hours

[01:31:20] like I did the whole

[01:31:22] like working 100 hour

[01:31:24] weeks like I did

[01:31:25] I know I can do that

[01:31:26] but now I'm like

[01:31:27] ah do I really want to like

[01:31:29] work more and more

[01:31:30] or do I want to just like

[01:31:32] hang out and have you know

[01:31:33] a 1 p.m. pool day

[01:31:34] with my son

[01:31:35] like versus going

[01:31:36] and making more content

[01:31:37] The interesting thing is

[01:31:38] last time I talked to them

[01:31:41] Alex and Layla said

[01:31:43] that they didn't want kids

[01:31:45] and when I asked Layla

[01:31:46] she's like well

[01:31:47] we just both want to do

[01:31:48] really big shit

[01:31:49] so it's like there's no time

[01:31:50] for that

[01:31:51] so it goes back to what you were saying

[01:31:52] of like just know

[01:31:53] what you want to do

[01:31:54] and there's no

[01:31:55] and there's no one

[01:31:56] size fits all

[01:31:57] totally

[01:31:58] when I watch people

[01:31:59] again with the fighting thing

[01:32:01] oh we need to repopulate

[01:32:02] the earth and you know

[01:32:04] women need to have a child

[01:32:06] by this age

[01:32:07] and you need to do this

[01:32:08] like quite frankly

[01:32:09] not everybody's

[01:32:10] yeah mind your own damn business

[01:32:12] that's the thing that pisses me off

[01:32:13] honestly is like

[01:32:14] in every direction

[01:32:15] by the way on this

[01:32:16] like people are like

[01:32:17] oh everyone

[01:32:18] that's like an excessive

[01:32:19] optimizer isn't happy

[01:32:20] and like people

[01:32:21] that cold plunge

[01:32:22] aren't actually happy

[01:32:23] and then there's people

[01:32:24] that are like if you don't

[01:32:25] cold plunge, you're not

[01:32:26] happy or ripped

[01:32:27] or whatever

[01:32:28] and it's literally just like

[01:32:29] mind your own

[01:32:30] business

[01:32:31] like who cares

[01:32:33] if I'm happy

[01:32:34] or not doing

[01:32:35] just let me do me

[01:32:36] you do you

[01:32:37] like you go do your thing

[01:32:38] I'll do mine

[01:32:39] and we'll just do that

[01:32:41] and that's it

[01:32:42] totally felt we don't need to comment

[01:32:43] on what everyone else is doing

[01:32:44] or like don't

[01:32:45] on the other person

[01:32:46] or whatever

[01:32:47] just like

[01:32:48] I've never met a single

[01:32:49] happy person

[01:32:50] that feels the need to

[01:32:51] dunk on someone else

[01:32:52] like not a single one

[01:32:53] of those people

[01:32:54] is ever happy

[01:32:55] and so that's the funny

[01:32:56] thing about it

[01:32:57] like if you're writing an article

[01:32:58] about like

[01:32:59] oh excessive optimizers

[01:33:00] are like not happy

[01:33:01] you're actually not happy

[01:33:03] because like

[01:33:04] what you wouldn't feel

[01:33:05] the need to like

[01:33:06] go get likes

[01:33:07] by dunking on other people

[01:33:08] like you wouldn't

[01:33:09] you would be busy being happy

[01:33:10] like you don't see me

[01:33:11] dunking on people

[01:33:12] on the internet

[01:33:13] except peric but tell

[01:33:14] come on

[01:33:15] I haven't done that

[01:33:16] in a while actually

[01:33:17] we need to message him

[01:33:18] we need to bring that back

[01:33:19] we had a good

[01:33:20] feud going for a while

[01:33:21] but you don't see me doing that

[01:33:23] and the reason is

[01:33:24] because I'm freaking

[01:33:25] hanging out in the pool

[01:33:26] with my son at one of

[01:33:27] one of Wednesdays

[01:33:28] I'm very happy

[01:33:29] and I'm going

[01:33:30] and doing fun things

[01:33:31] but yeah I mean there's

[01:33:32] there is a price

[01:33:33] for anything you want

[01:33:34] to achieve in life

[01:33:35] and there's two aspects

[01:33:36] of the price

[01:33:37] there's the list price

[01:33:38] which is like

[01:33:39] the things you see

[01:33:40] that you're going to have

[01:33:41] to put into it

[01:33:42] that you know on the surface

[01:33:43] like the effort, the hours

[01:33:44] all those things

[01:33:45] and then there's

[01:33:46] the list price

[01:33:47] but then on top of that

[01:33:48] the trade-offs

[01:33:49] the things that you're giving up

[01:33:50] by pursuing that thing

[01:33:51] and the problem is

[01:33:52] most people

[01:33:53] only see the list price

[01:33:55] and they don't think

[01:33:56] about the real price

[01:33:57] of the thing.

[01:33:58] They haven't thought

[01:33:59] about all the trade-offs

[01:34:00] that they're going to have

[01:34:01] to make, the things

[01:34:02] they're going to miss

[01:34:03] in order to get

[01:34:04] the thing that they want

[01:34:05] in life

[01:34:06] and so they end up getting it

[01:34:07] but it was actually

[01:34:08] much more of a rip-off

[01:34:09] than they thought

[01:34:10] and so being aware

[01:34:11] of that and thinking

[01:34:12] about what is

[01:34:13] the real price

[01:34:14] of this thing

[01:34:15] they thought about that

[01:34:16] and have been really, really

[01:34:17] thoughtful about it

[01:34:18] and they know what it is

[01:34:19] and they've made that

[01:34:20] decision eyes wide open

[01:34:21] with all of the information

[01:34:22] out on the table

[01:34:23] in front of them

[01:34:24] I think that's amazing.

[01:34:25] I've done the exact same thing

[01:34:26] and led to a very

[01:34:27] different conclusion.

[01:34:28] I think that's amazing too

[01:34:29] and the world needs

[01:34:30] both types of people

[01:34:31] like I don't want

[01:34:32] to go build a billion

[01:34:33] dollar business

[01:34:34] and make a billion dollars.

[01:34:36] I just don't

[01:34:37] I want to do the things

[01:34:38] I'm doing.

[01:34:39] I'm having a blast.

[01:34:40] I don't feel like

[01:34:41] I need a whole ton

[01:34:42] more money than I have

[01:34:43] like this is great

[01:34:44] and I want the world

[01:34:45] to have people

[01:34:46] that are doing those things

[01:34:47] like I want the world

[01:34:48] to have Elon Musk's

[01:34:49] who have no work

[01:34:50] life balance

[01:34:51] and go send us to Mars.

[01:34:52] I want the world

[01:34:53] to have people

[01:34:54] like Alex and Leila

[01:34:55] who are building

[01:34:56] crazy things

[01:34:57] and educating tons of people

[01:34:58] because they have infinite

[01:34:59] energy to go

[01:35:00] and do it

[01:35:01] and they're willing

[01:35:02] to work super, super long hours.

[01:35:03] I think the world needs both.

[01:35:04] Yeah.

[01:35:05] I feel the same way

[01:35:06] I feel the same exact way

[01:35:07] about it.

[01:35:08] There is no one

[01:35:09] size fits all

[01:35:10] ever

[01:35:11] and for people to fight

[01:35:13] over it should be this way.

[01:35:14] It should be that way.

[01:35:15] In this day and age,

[01:35:17] blows my mind.

[01:35:18] Yeah.

[01:35:19] I mean, it makes my

[01:35:20] like I'm actually

[01:35:21] I feel like a little

[01:35:22] angry

[01:35:23] or even thinking about it.

[01:35:24] Like it honestly

[01:35:25] really bothers me.

[01:35:26] I just think it's so

[01:35:27] crazy just like

[01:35:28] do you?

[01:35:29] And just like don't worry

[01:35:30] about everybody else.

[01:35:31] Yeah.

[01:35:32] So Hill,

[01:35:33] I feel like

[01:35:34] you know obviously when

[01:35:35] you're a big

[01:35:36] creator,

[01:35:37] everyone gets dunked on

[01:35:38] because when you're doing well

[01:35:40] like you see

[01:35:42] you see the hate coming

[01:35:43] sometimes.

[01:35:44] And then there's times

[01:35:45] where it's like

[01:35:46] you quite literally

[01:35:47] get like soft

[01:35:49] canceled or whatever.

[01:35:50] How do you deal

[01:35:51] with these kinds of things

[01:35:52] because as

[01:35:53] more and more people

[01:35:54] become content creators,

[01:35:55] they're going to be

[01:35:56] experiencing it.

[01:35:57] I think the best advice

[01:36:00] I ever received was

[01:36:02] I guess there's two fold.

[01:36:04] One is don't read the comments,

[01:36:05] which is what every big

[01:36:06] content creator will tell you.

[01:36:07] I don't know that

[01:36:08] that's really

[01:36:09] conceivable

[01:36:11] especially as you're

[01:36:13] coming up like you want to

[01:36:14] read them because you're

[01:36:15] trying to engage and you're

[01:36:16] trying to do things.

[01:36:17] And so it's hard not

[01:36:18] to see the negativity.

[01:36:19] The best piece of advice

[01:36:21] is to default to empathy

[01:36:23] around anything that you hear

[01:36:25] negatively from people.

[01:36:26] And the meaning behind

[01:36:28] that is like

[01:36:29] it's what we said earlier.

[01:36:30] Happy people

[01:36:31] aren't dunking on

[01:36:32] other people on the internet.

[01:36:33] They're just not.

[01:36:34] They're off doing happy

[01:36:35] things.

[01:36:36] And so the people

[01:36:37] that are saying really

[01:36:38] mean or negative things

[01:36:39] to you,

[01:36:40] not the like good

[01:36:41] faith criticisms.

[01:36:42] There's a difference

[01:36:43] between good faith criticism

[01:36:44] of like a different perspective

[01:36:46] being shared and they don't agree

[01:36:48] with you on the thing.

[01:36:49] Versus the like

[01:36:50] FU, you know,

[01:36:51] go kill yourself,

[01:36:52] negative like

[01:36:54] bad faith negativity.

[01:36:55] The bad faith negativity

[01:36:57] you should default to empathy

[01:36:59] on because that person

[01:37:00] is not, that person

[01:37:01] is going through something bad

[01:37:02] in their life.

[01:37:03] They're not happy.

[01:37:04] They're something wrong.

[01:37:05] And that always

[01:37:07] helped me of just like

[01:37:08] okay, like I'm sitting here

[01:37:10] in my you know

[01:37:11] nice house.

[01:37:12] Like I'm happy, you know

[01:37:13] like in this great situation

[01:37:15] like things have gone pretty well.

[01:37:17] And the person

[01:37:18] who's doing that is probably

[01:37:19] not experiencing

[01:37:20] the same types of joy

[01:37:21] that I have in my life.

[01:37:22] And so for me

[01:37:23] to let that like

[01:37:24] ruin my day

[01:37:25] because someone said

[01:37:26] something negative to me seems silly

[01:37:27] rather than just like

[01:37:28] feeling a level of empathy

[01:37:29] for the person

[01:37:30] that has had to come

[01:37:31] and do that.

[01:37:32] Yeah, and you don't

[01:37:33] you never respond to that

[01:37:34] for you?

[01:37:35] I try not to just

[01:37:36] because like what's the point?

[01:37:37] It's like the line of like

[01:37:39] you never wrestle a pig

[01:37:41] in the mud because

[01:37:42] you get dirty and the

[01:37:43] pig gets happy.

[01:37:44] Yeah, that's like

[01:37:46] my model for dealing

[01:37:48] with these situations.

[01:37:49] Like someone yells at me

[01:37:50] on the internet.

[01:37:51] What value do I'm not

[01:37:52] going to win the argument?

[01:37:53] No one has ever

[01:37:54] won an argument

[01:37:55] on Twitter, like me

[01:37:56] going back and dunking

[01:37:57] on them.

[01:37:58] And the thing is it's hard

[01:37:59] for me to not.

[01:38:00] Because I played sports

[01:38:01] my whole life.

[01:38:02] Like I've been in locker rooms.

[01:38:03] I am built for this.

[01:38:04] Like I am built

[01:38:05] to come in and just destroy

[01:38:06] someone.

[01:38:07] And then I come over the top

[01:38:08] and like dunk on them

[01:38:09] really, really bad.

[01:38:10] But I don't.

[01:38:11] Because it's just again

[01:38:12] it's just never worth it.

[01:38:13] Yeah, I've seen some pretty good

[01:38:15] dunks on Twitter

[01:38:16] in my day.

[01:38:17] Yeah, and sometimes

[01:38:19] it's really engaging.

[01:38:21] Part of me wants to make a

[01:38:22] burner account where I can

[01:38:23] just like go in and

[01:38:24] dunk on people.

[01:38:25] But again, it's like

[01:38:26] there's too many things

[01:38:28] too little time.

[01:38:29] Oh yeah.

[01:38:30] What's your relationship

[01:38:31] like with your parents?

[01:38:32] Amazing now that I see

[01:38:34] them more.

[01:38:35] But what was it like

[01:38:36] growing up?

[01:38:37] Because you seem to be

[01:38:38] like a pretty

[01:38:39] wholesome person.

[01:38:40] I know it's like so

[01:38:41] rare now.

[01:38:42] I wasn't wholesome.

[01:38:43] I wasn't particularly

[01:38:44] wholesome growing up.

[01:38:45] I come from a mix

[01:38:47] race background.

[01:38:48] So my mom is Indian,

[01:38:49] grew up in India.

[01:38:50] My dad's white

[01:38:51] Jewish, grew up in the

[01:38:52] Bronx.

[01:38:53] And a lot of the

[01:38:55] like Indian cultural

[01:38:59] sort of like beliefs

[01:39:00] understandings.

[01:39:01] You know, thing like

[01:39:03] cultural values, etc.

[01:39:04] I felt like we're a big

[01:39:05] part of my upbringing.

[01:39:06] And that meant that

[01:39:07] like academics were

[01:39:08] extremely important in our

[01:39:09] household.

[01:39:10] I was the youngest of

[01:39:11] two.

[01:39:12] My older sister was

[01:39:13] like the golden child

[01:39:14] in a lot of ways.

[01:39:15] Like she was the

[01:39:16] academic star.

[01:39:17] I think she's still

[01:39:18] to this day.

[01:39:19] Has like the highest GPA

[01:39:20] ever in my high school.

[01:39:21] I was the like

[01:39:22] shithead, near-do-well,

[01:39:23] younger brother that

[01:39:24] would, you know,

[01:39:26] disappoint in whatever way

[01:39:27] you want to do.

[01:39:28] And that would, you know,

[01:39:30] disappoint in whatever way

[01:39:31] from an academic

[01:39:32] standpoint.

[01:39:33] And I realized I was pretty

[01:39:35] good at baseball

[01:39:36] in high school.

[01:39:37] And I kind of started

[01:39:39] putting all my energy into

[01:39:40] that really, I think to like

[01:39:41] carve my own identity.

[01:39:43] Because when you're a kid

[01:39:44] you're really just trying

[01:39:45] to figure out like

[01:39:46] where do you fit in?

[01:39:47] And I struggled to fit

[01:39:49] in academically because

[01:39:50] I wasn't living up

[01:39:51] to the standards

[01:39:52] that my sister had set.

[01:39:53] And so that placed some

[01:39:55] tension on my relationship

[01:39:56] with my mom

[01:39:57] in those teenage years

[01:39:58] because I wasn't like

[01:40:00] fitting into the box

[01:40:02] of what she thought

[01:40:03] I should have been

[01:40:04] fitting into.

[01:40:05] That obviously changed.

[01:40:06] I got a scholarship

[01:40:07] to go play at Stanford.

[01:40:08] She was so confused.

[01:40:09] The look on her face

[01:40:10] when I told her that I had

[01:40:11] gotten this scholarship

[01:40:12] to Stanford, she was like

[01:40:13] didn't know that

[01:40:14] like that was a thing.

[01:40:15] Like she didn't

[01:40:16] appreciate that I was

[01:40:17] actually quite good at baseball.

[01:40:18] It was like it was really,

[01:40:19] really funny.

[01:40:20] But that was a struggle.

[01:40:21] I mean just like identity-wise

[01:40:23] figuring out who you are

[01:40:24] at that age,

[01:40:25] I think is like the

[01:40:26] biggest challenge.

[01:40:27] And I was always

[01:40:29] close to my dad.

[01:40:30] I mean my dad and I

[01:40:31] were always close because

[01:40:32] baseball was always the

[01:40:33] thing that we kind of

[01:40:34] had a relationship

[01:40:35] grounded around.

[01:40:36] And the hardest part

[01:40:37] of my relationship

[01:40:38] with my dad was when

[01:40:39] baseball was taken away

[01:40:40] from him.

[01:40:41] I heard my shoulder

[01:40:42] my last year at Stanford.

[01:40:43] And I call,

[01:40:45] I had to call him

[01:40:48] to tell him.

[01:40:50] And that was really

[01:40:52] scary for me

[01:40:53] because so much of our

[01:40:55] relationship had been

[01:40:56] built around this sport.

[01:40:58] And I was really worried

[01:41:00] that he was going to be

[01:41:01] disappointed, feel let

[01:41:03] down.

[01:41:04] And I felt like

[01:41:06] our relationship

[01:41:08] would suffer because we

[01:41:09] no longer had this thing

[01:41:10] that was kind of at the core

[01:41:11] of what our relationship

[01:41:12] was built around.

[01:41:13] And I said, I kind of

[01:41:14] had him on the phone

[01:41:15] and I was tearing up

[01:41:16] and I said, you know,

[01:41:17] I'm sorry.

[01:41:18] And he said to me that

[01:41:19] you know, he said you

[01:41:20] have nothing to be

[01:41:21] sorry about.

[01:41:22] And I'm so excited

[01:41:24] to cheer for you

[01:41:25] and whatever is next

[01:41:26] in your life.

[01:41:27] And that, to me, has been

[01:41:29] like a central grounding

[01:41:31] foundation of how I want

[01:41:33] to be as a father.

[01:41:34] Because what he told me

[01:41:36] was that no matter

[01:41:37] what it was that I was

[01:41:38] doing and pursuing,

[01:41:39] he was going to be there

[01:41:40] to support me.

[01:41:41] And I think that

[01:41:42] that's all we really want

[01:41:43] from our parents

[01:41:44] is just to know

[01:41:45] that they're there,

[01:41:46] that they're in our

[01:41:47] corner to support us

[01:41:48] and whatever it is

[01:41:49] that we're doing.

[01:41:50] And as I think

[01:41:51] about my own relationship

[01:41:52] with my son and what I want

[01:41:53] him to know,

[01:41:54] that's what I want him

[01:41:55] to know.

[01:41:56] I want him to know

[01:41:57] that I'm going to be there

[01:41:58] to support him and whatever it is

[01:41:59] that he's doing that I'm

[01:42:00] going to be there cheering

[01:42:01] super loud in his corner

[01:42:02] for whatever it is.

[01:42:03] And it's funny but like,

[01:42:04] you know, my dad's

[01:42:05] almost 70 now.

[01:42:06] And he's still there

[01:42:07] cheering for me

[01:42:08] and whatever it is

[01:42:09] that I'm doing.

[01:42:10] Like he wants to edit

[01:42:11] things that I'm writing.

[01:42:12] Like I'm running a bunch

[01:42:13] now. Like he wants

[01:42:14] to be at the finish line

[01:42:15] of like races

[01:42:16] that I'm going and running.

[01:42:17] And like these are stupid

[01:42:18] silly things

[01:42:19] but they mean something.

[01:42:20] Like it really was

[01:42:21] core to the type of

[01:42:22] father that he wanted

[01:42:23] to be to me.

[01:42:24] And now to the type

[01:42:25] of father that I want

[01:42:26] to be to my son.

[01:42:27] And I think

[01:42:28] to the type of parent

[01:42:29] that a lot of people

[01:42:30] do want to be to their

[01:42:31] kids but don't know how.

[01:42:33] I think that,

[01:42:34] I think what you just said

[01:42:36] was so powerful because

[01:42:37] it's like,

[01:42:38] that's all anybody

[01:42:39] wants from their parents.

[01:42:40] It's just

[01:42:41] know that they're proud

[01:42:42] of you for whatever

[01:42:43] you're doing

[01:42:44] and then supporting you

[01:42:45] on whatever journey

[01:42:46] that is.

[01:42:47] Because I

[01:42:49] said this earlier

[01:42:50] that it's like

[01:42:51] a lot of people do feel

[01:42:52] like their parents

[01:42:53] just want them to take

[01:42:54] this one path

[01:42:55] and that's the only

[01:42:56] thing.

[01:42:57] And if you veer off

[01:42:58] of it, even though

[01:42:59] that's a more you

[01:43:00] thing or you decision,

[01:43:01] then you almost feel

[01:43:02] like you're

[01:43:03] betraying your parents.

[01:43:05] And it's like

[01:43:06] the biggest gift

[01:43:07] you can give your kid

[01:43:08] is to let them be

[01:43:09] themselves and then

[01:43:10] discover who that

[01:43:11] is.

[01:43:12] Yeah. And just to know

[01:43:13] an embrace

[01:43:14] that your identity changes

[01:43:16] over the course

[01:43:17] of your life.

[01:43:18] Like that's such a

[01:43:19] scary thing as a kid

[01:43:20] because your whole

[01:43:22] childhood you're like

[01:43:23] trying to figure out

[01:43:24] who you are.

[01:43:25] And then you decide

[01:43:26] on an identity,

[01:43:27] like really in your

[01:43:28] teenage years,

[01:43:29] you kind of figure out

[01:43:30] what type of person you are

[01:43:31] and it's kind

[01:43:32] of those formative

[01:43:33] years. And then for

[01:43:34] a lot of us,

[01:43:35] our identity ends up

[01:43:36] being grounded

[01:43:37] around a single thing.

[01:43:38] And like for an athlete,

[01:43:39] it's grounded

[01:43:40] around that single sport

[01:43:41] or if you were a nerd,

[01:43:42] it's grounded

[01:43:43] around your academic

[01:43:44] success.

[01:43:45] And the biggest

[01:43:46] challenge that you have

[01:43:47] in your life is that

[01:43:48] first time that

[01:43:49] that identity is

[01:43:50] questioned or taken

[01:43:51] away from you.

[01:43:52] For athletes,

[01:43:53] it comes whenever

[01:43:54] that sport is done.

[01:43:55] For someone

[01:43:56] that was an academic

[01:43:57] star, it might be when

[01:43:58] they experienced their

[01:43:59] first failure

[01:44:00] or they aren't

[01:44:01] succeeding as easily

[01:44:02] as they used to be.

[01:44:03] Whenever it is,

[01:44:04] that is the biggest

[01:44:05] challenge in your life

[01:44:06] because identity

[01:44:07] being stripped away

[01:44:08] from you,

[01:44:09] it feels like

[01:44:10] your whole world is

[01:44:11] crumbled down.

[01:44:12] Everything.

[01:44:13] I mean, like athletes

[01:44:14] sport is taken away

[01:44:15] from them.

[01:44:16] I've had teammates

[01:44:17] who have committed suicide

[01:44:18] because they weren't able

[01:44:19] to make the transition

[01:44:20] of their identity

[01:44:21] because their identity

[01:44:22] was taken away

[01:44:23] from them and that

[01:44:24] is so devastating

[01:44:25] and so powerful in your

[01:44:26] life in a negative way.

[01:44:27] And so as a parent,

[01:44:29] being there in that moment

[01:44:31] and being able

[01:44:32] to let that person

[01:44:33] know, let your child

[01:44:34] know

[01:44:35] that whatever their identity

[01:44:37] is next,

[01:44:38] they are going to be

[01:44:39] supportive of you

[01:44:40] during that.

[01:44:41] They are going to be

[01:44:42] there for you.

[01:44:43] They are going to be

[01:44:44] supportive of you

[01:44:45] on as you build that

[01:44:46] next identity.

[01:44:47] Build that next

[01:44:48] version of yourself.

[01:44:49] That I can't

[01:44:50] imagine a stronger

[01:44:51] form of support.

[01:44:52] I can't

[01:44:53] either.

[01:44:54] All right,

[01:44:55] you mentioned you had

[01:44:56] teammates who took

[01:44:57] their own lives.

[01:44:58] Yeah, I had a...

[01:45:01] this still makes me

[01:45:03] emotional.

[01:45:05] I had a teammate

[01:45:07] my last two years at

[01:45:09] Stanford named

[01:45:10] Zach Hofpower

[01:45:11] who he played

[01:45:13] football and baseball

[01:45:15] at Stanford.

[01:45:16] Super handsome,

[01:45:19] charismatic,

[01:45:21] like life of the locker

[01:45:23] room,

[01:45:24] funny personality,

[01:45:26] like always the quickest

[01:45:27] to make someone laugh,

[01:45:28] like the first person

[01:45:29] to start dancing crazy.

[01:45:31] I mean, everything

[01:45:32] on the surface,

[01:45:33] you were like,

[01:45:34] this is the happiest,

[01:45:35] most like,

[01:45:36] effervescent, incredible,

[01:45:37] present,

[01:45:38] charismatic kid.

[01:45:41] And

[01:45:43] COVID hit...

[01:45:45] this is post his

[01:45:46] Stanford career.

[01:45:47] He'd gone and played

[01:45:48] professional baseball

[01:45:49] for a couple of years.

[01:45:50] It hadn't worked out.

[01:45:51] He was back home.

[01:45:52] I think he was

[01:45:53] starting to coach high

[01:45:54] school football.

[01:45:55] And like a lot

[01:45:56] of people, I think

[01:45:57] was very lonely during

[01:45:59] COVID and didn't

[01:46:00] have people around him.

[01:46:02] And he had reached out

[01:46:03] to a bunch of us

[01:46:04] and kind of been open

[01:46:05] about struggles

[01:46:07] and things he

[01:46:08] was dealing with mentally

[01:46:09] and people had tried

[01:46:11] to help him, people had

[01:46:12] gone out,

[01:46:13] flown out there,

[01:46:14] spent time with him.

[01:46:15] And unfortunately,

[01:46:17] we lost him.

[01:46:19] During COVID, I think

[01:46:21] it was in 2020,

[01:46:23] it might have been in 2021.

[01:46:25] I mean, I still

[01:46:28] think about it a lot.

[01:46:29] I mean, I can't

[01:46:32] imagine the pain of

[01:46:33] a parent having to go

[01:46:34] through something like

[01:46:35] that with your son.

[01:46:36] But it's really, really

[01:46:37] sad to me that we

[01:46:38] weren't able to be

[01:46:39] there for him in a way

[01:46:41] to kind of pulling

[01:46:42] back from that.

[01:46:43] And I still have

[01:46:45] former teammates who are

[01:46:46] struggling with things

[01:46:47] now.

[01:46:48] And I think it has

[01:46:49] made all of us even

[01:46:50] more hyper aware

[01:46:51] of the need to be there

[01:46:52] for those people

[01:46:53] in those moments.

[01:46:54] You know, when people

[01:46:55] feel desperate when they're

[01:46:56] on the edge of these

[01:46:57] things.

[01:46:58] And wanting people

[01:46:59] to feel open and

[01:47:00] that they can come

[01:47:01] and connect with us

[01:47:02] even if they're

[01:47:03] not as close as we

[01:47:04] were when we were

[01:47:05] all in the locker rooms

[01:47:06] together.

[01:47:07] Also just a reminder

[01:47:09] that what you see on the

[01:47:10] surface with people is

[01:47:11] not what's going on

[01:47:12] inside.

[01:47:13] And that's a really

[01:47:14] important reminder, because

[01:47:15] there are a lot of people

[01:47:16] out there who put on a

[01:47:17] brave face, smiling, everything

[01:47:18] on the surface looks

[01:47:19] fine and they're not

[01:47:20] fine under the surface.

[01:47:21] And so being there

[01:47:22] for people no matter

[01:47:23] what, whether things

[01:47:24] seem like they're fine

[01:47:25] or not and making sure

[01:47:26] you have a

[01:47:27] little bit of

[01:47:29] a little bit of

[01:47:31] the same in the

[01:47:32] case, that they're

[01:47:33] not and making sure

[01:47:34] you asked the questions

[01:47:35] and that you let them

[01:47:36] know that you're there

[01:47:38] to talk, to listen,

[01:47:40] whatever it might be.

[01:47:41] Just to give them a hug

[01:47:42] is really, really

[01:47:43] important.

[01:47:44] I think so too.

[01:47:45] I'm sorry you went

[01:47:46] through that that he

[01:47:47] went.

[01:47:48] Yeah.

[01:47:49] I think he probably had

[01:47:50] CTE from football

[01:47:51] injuries, the

[01:47:52] from concussions, which

[01:47:55] is a horrible thing

[01:47:56] that a lot of football

[01:47:57] players are now being

[01:47:58] diagnosed with

[01:47:59] players are now being diagnosed as having had junior say, I was the famous one, the famous

[01:48:04] football player that had it and took his own life.

[01:48:08] But concussions in football are a devastating thing.

[01:48:12] And having a massive impact on the rest of their lives for a lot of these guys and really

[01:48:17] contributing to a lot of mental health issues.

[01:48:19] So I hope more research goes into that and they figured out.

[01:48:22] Yeah.

[01:48:23] I hope, man, I hope because it is loneliness epidemic but also, I don't know if you coined

[01:48:30] this term.

[01:48:31] I haven't heard it, friendship recession.

[01:48:34] I think that's so real.

[01:48:37] I think that's so real.

[01:48:38] I think that again people don't, they don't put enough time and attention into the friendships

[01:48:44] that they do have.

[01:48:46] And I think that, I think it's really important to learn how to set boundaries to preserve your

[01:48:51] relationship but sometimes I feel like those boundaries become walls and then that's

[01:48:56] where it becomes dangerous, where people feel like they don't want to reach out because

[01:49:00] they're burdening you.

[01:49:01] And I don't think friendship should ever feel like too much of a burden.

[01:49:05] And if it is, it's like, I don't know, suggest that there, I don't know what the answer

[01:49:13] is but I do feel like it's a struggle that a lot of people have and this story that

[01:49:18] you told it's so common.

[01:49:21] Yeah, I mean there's really three types of relationships.

[01:49:25] There are supportive relationships.

[01:49:27] There are demeaning or toxic relationships and then there's ambivalent relationships.

[01:49:33] It's easy to eliminate the demeaning or toxic people from your life because they're

[01:49:37] very clearly toxic demeaning bad for you.

[01:49:41] We eliminate them.

[01:49:42] We talk about eliminating those people a lot.

[01:49:44] You see that all over social media.

[01:49:46] So get away from the toxic people, get them out of your life.

[01:49:49] Very easy to do.

[01:49:50] It turns out scientifically ambivalent relationships are actually worse for your health than toxic

[01:49:57] relationships.

[01:49:58] There are now been studies that have shown that the impact of having someone with like

[01:50:04] mixed emotions around you has a higher blood pressure response in participants of these

[01:50:09] studies than being around toxic people.

[01:50:12] So being around people that make you feel both very negative and very positive is actually

[01:50:16] worse for your health, your stress, your anxiety all of these areas than being around people

[01:50:21] who are just toxic.

[01:50:22] And the reason is because around toxic people we put up a wall.

[01:50:26] We know that they're toxic and so we don't let them in.

[01:50:29] Ambivalent relationships are the people that are like sometimes nice to you.

[01:50:32] So you let down your guard.

[01:50:34] They get in and then they knife you and that hurts a whole lot more because you let down

[01:50:39] your guard.

[01:50:40] You let them get in close so that it's able to hurt you.

[01:50:43] So those are the really challenging relationships are the ambivalent ones, the ones that are

[01:50:48] like sometimes here or sometimes there and you don't know what version of the person you're

[01:50:52] going to get.

[01:50:53] They're not always supportive.

[01:50:54] They're not always demeaning.

[01:50:55] And so you're letting them in close to you where they can actually hurt more.

[01:50:58] So then is the thing that we're supposed to be looking for consistency?

[01:51:03] Yeah.

[01:51:05] Consistency is a love language.

[01:51:06] People who are consistent.

[01:51:08] I mean that like consistently solid, just like foundation person who you know is just

[01:51:13] there.

[01:51:14] And they might not be the like flashy, amazing, like so much fun but you know they're going

[01:51:20] to show up and be there for you.

[01:51:21] Like that is such a valuable person to have in your life.

[01:51:25] Just someone who's going to show up.

[01:51:26] I can't stand the swings.

[01:51:28] That like to me.

[01:51:29] I can't.

[01:51:30] I can't.

[01:51:31] The people that are like a roller coaster of a relationship, not even romantic.

[01:51:34] I'm talking friends.

[01:51:35] The people that are just like roller coasters of like sometimes they're hot on you, sometimes

[01:51:40] they're cold, sometimes they're giving you a lot, sometimes they're distant.

[01:51:44] That I just I cannot deal with and I know other people can't deal with that.

[01:51:47] It's painful.

[01:51:48] It's painful to be around people like that.

[01:51:50] Oh, I can't at all.

[01:51:52] And the fact that people stay when their friends are like that it's like it blows my mind.

[01:51:59] Yeah, just like again, it's.

[01:52:03] You get one short life and not a whole lot of time and not a whole lot of energy.

[01:52:08] And your energy gets increasingly limited over the course of your life because you're just

[01:52:11] going to be more and more tired, you know what?

[01:52:13] Less bandwidth to deal with these things.

[01:52:15] And so spending it with people that are just bringing you negativity or bringing you negative

[01:52:19] energy in your life, draining your energy in some way.

[01:52:22] I just don't know why people put up with it as much as they do.

[01:52:26] They shouldn't.

[01:52:27] Yeah.

[01:52:28] And it's hard sometimes.

[01:52:29] Sometimes it's a family member right like that's hard.

[01:52:30] If it's your parent or it's your spouse or it's like someone really close to you that

[01:52:34] is bringing draining your energy, bringing negative energy into your life.

[01:52:38] That's not an easy discussion.

[01:52:39] It's easy if it's like a second-order friend that you can kind of just distance yourself

[01:52:43] from like hey I'm just not going to hang out with that person.

[01:52:45] But if it's a parent or if it's a spouse or if it's a brother like that is very, very

[01:52:51] difficult.

[01:52:52] That's very real.

[01:52:53] You have to navigate it.

[01:52:55] Absolutely.

[01:52:56] I feel like I interrupt to do what we're using.

[01:52:58] No, no, no, no, it's 100%.

[01:53:00] It's like it's just, I constantly get that question because I talk about this stuff a lot

[01:53:04] of like well what do I do if it's my parent or my spouse or my sibling.

[01:53:08] I'm like there's no easy answers to that.

[01:53:11] There's not like some like you know magic pill you can take to get out of these things

[01:53:16] or to you know navigate them well.

[01:53:18] It's really, really difficult.

[01:53:19] Yeah but worth exploring and learning about in terms of navigating a relationship, especially

[01:53:26] if it's when you want to preserve.

[01:53:27] You got to learn how to communicate with people in a way that preserves that relationship.

[01:53:31] I mean there's a reason why a lot of people are happier after they get a divorce, right?

[01:53:38] Like if you're in a really negative or toxic relationship with someone and you know

[01:53:42] there was like this article and I think it was in the Atlantic this woman that went

[01:53:46] to her 30 year Harvard reunion and she shared like 30 lessons from her 30 year reunion

[01:53:51] and one of them was people that had gotten divorced were much happier after the divorce.

[01:53:57] And I mean there's a reason for that right like you remove this big negative energy in

[01:54:01] your life for whatever reason and you're going to be happier.

[01:54:05] Yeah absolutely.

[01:54:06] I know we talked about AI, I want to go to tech for a second because I feel like a lot

[01:54:12] of our mutual friends are in that world.

[01:54:15] I mean we met through Nikita.

[01:54:19] What's your relationship to like the tech world?

[01:54:21] You're investing what like how did you meet Nikita?

[01:54:25] How did you meet all these people?

[01:54:26] I mean I met all of them through Twitter because Twitter is like a tech hub.

[01:54:29] Yeah, yeah.

[01:54:30] Twitter's like a tech hub and so as I was growing on Twitter people like connected me to

[01:54:34] tech Twitter like there's a lot of people that were like oh you're like a tech guy and

[01:54:39] I've never worked in tech.

[01:54:40] I've never like spent time really in tech.

[01:54:42] I invest but I'm not like in tech and I don't know much about tech other than that I invest

[01:54:47] in things that I think are really interesting that have a bright future and people that

[01:54:51] I think are exceptional more importantly.

[01:54:54] But I became friends with a lot of these folks because I was sort of like in the scene

[01:54:58] quote unquote on Twitter and so like Nikita and a handful of others.

[01:55:02] I was in a group chat with and we've been you know on an off since like end of 2020

[01:55:08] I guess texting on an ongoing basis and now we've obviously all met in real life and

[01:55:14] spent time together and been friends but you know it's broadened my horizons for sure

[01:55:19] to thinking about different things.

[01:55:21] The different things that these guys are getting excited about it's just like most

[01:55:24] of it just like blows over my head and is crazy and amazing but it's been a lot of fun.

[01:55:29] Who are some of the coolest people you've met from Twitter?

[01:55:32] Oh man Bill Akman was a pretty cool one for me.

[01:55:39] This is really I mean Naval has talked about this in the past that like content is a form

[01:55:44] of leverage and that the Bill Akman situation was like the perfect case study of that because

[01:55:50] basically what happened was I was in India and I like woke up in the morning in India

[01:55:56] and had a bunch of texts from people being like oh this is cool like people sent me that

[01:56:00] Bill had retweeted one of my threads from November of 2021 and this is January 2023.

[01:56:07] So he retweeted like a 15 month old piece of content of mine that he said like a friend

[01:56:13] sent me this it's like full of wisdom really interesting and he retweeted it and I responded

[01:56:20] to his retweet and just said like thanks for sharing Bill with love to like get lunch in

[01:56:24] New York at some point on me.

[01:56:27] And he DMed me and was like yeah sure come by like come by anytime like here like here's

[01:56:31] my email to coordinate it and I did it and then I went in and got to have lunch with

[01:56:34] him and we jatted for a while and you know are now connected around interesting things

[01:56:39] and he was amazing by the way just like super thoughtful kind generous person with this

[01:56:42] time but that was incredible to me because it was something that I had written 15 months

[01:56:47] before that was still working for me out in the world like someone was sharing it with

[01:56:52] someone like that that then led to a connection that was really interesting.

[01:56:55] So that to me was just like a very very cool case study of how these things have tentacles

[01:57:01] that last way way beyond when you've actually gone and put them into the world.

[01:57:05] Yeah that's incredible I meant Navale because of because of you better mute him right?

[01:57:10] Yeah.

[01:57:11] Yeah he sat in front of the sun before.

[01:57:14] Not here yet but yeah I mean that changed everything for me.

[01:57:18] I feel like I met everyone in tech because of him because once he spoke at my event it

[01:57:23] was like a clubhouse themed event and he had message me on Twitter and was like hey you

[01:57:28] know I'm in town if anything cool is going on let me know and I was like well I'm having

[01:57:32] this event and he came and he was super cool and he told me beforehand that he didn't

[01:57:38] speak at events and then when he got there he met Chris Foss and he's like I love never

[01:57:43] split the difference and I was just like this nuts.

[01:57:47] It was really cool and then he sat next to me it was a clubhouse themed event and then

[01:57:53] all of the like content from it and photos came out because I had like the member of the

[01:57:57] moderator badges.

[01:57:58] Yeah.

[01:57:59] I had like those as pins and then I had the hand raising on sticks yeah and so it was it

[01:58:05] was clubhouse theme and so obviously Andreessen was major investor in clubhouse it got shared

[01:58:10] all over Andreessen and all over tech and then all these people who literally would not

[01:58:15] give me the time of day ever were like messaging me.

[01:58:19] All of a sudden.

[01:58:20] Oh yeah if you ever need a speaker at your next event I come to LA sometimes and I'm just

[01:58:27] like bro you've ignored me for years.

[01:58:30] Funny how that works right?

[01:58:31] Funny how that works but it's crazy what an opportunity you can give to someone if you

[01:58:37] do have leverage or a platform or if you're a big creator like that one thing can change

[01:58:42] someone's life.

[01:58:43] Chris Foss was also that person for me.

[01:58:44] I mean just the fact that he was at my event I think like you know no of all was like oh

[01:58:48] this is a little more serious or more more my vibe but he didn't know me before.

[01:58:52] He's just like oh wow like this is actually something cool that I would speak at so I don't

[01:58:57] know I just think giving people chances along your path and bringing people with you is such

[01:59:02] an important thing.

[01:59:04] It's changed my life.

[01:59:05] Yeah.

[01:59:06] The people that have done that for you like you've stood on the shoulders of them you

[01:59:11] know stand on the shoulders of giants like the Isaac Newton quote and then the thing is

[01:59:16] to pay it forward.

[01:59:17] Like now you're going to be in a position to do that you are in a position to do that

[01:59:20] and you will and you'll do that for someone else and then there'll be someone sitting

[01:59:23] here 10 years from now saying that like oh Nicole did this thing for me and that really

[01:59:27] helped to make it happen.

[01:59:28] Yeah and that's amazing like that's the coolest thing I can imagine around all of this

[01:59:33] stuff is to like be that set of shoulders for someone else in the future.

[01:59:37] Yeah I noticed with a lot of content creators especially at the beginning when I started

[01:59:42] this podcast you know there were some that I would reach out to and obviously like some

[01:59:47] of them are still on my list of who I want to interview in the future and right away

[01:59:53] it was either no response or you know can you send me some insights and analytics and

[01:59:59] some of the numbers and how your podcast is performing and I'd be like oh well it's

[02:00:03] new and whoever was managing the account would be like oh well he or she isn't doing podcasts

[02:00:12] of this calendar.

[02:00:13] Like I mean the audacity to even say something like that whatever we'll let that slide

[02:00:18] but it was really nice for me because I feel like a lot the content creators that do

[02:00:24] really really well actually give a lot of chances to people like you know you're you're

[02:00:29] following much bigger than mine.

[02:00:31] No voles following much bigger than mine.

[02:00:33] Chris Voss is was the same but everybody did did you know come on my show give me a chance

[02:00:38] even in the first season and it made all the difference.

[02:00:43] Yeah it's also just purely utilitarian viewpoint.

[02:00:49] It's very small minded to not go on something because you think it's small or below you

[02:00:55] in some way because like as I think about podcasts now with short form video being as important

[02:01:02] as it is.

[02:01:03] If you can go on a like if you're doing this podcast this has amazing we're in this

[02:01:06] very cool room there's incredible production value great cameras like cool background cool

[02:01:10] vibe the amount of content that you can get out of an episode like this whether or not

[02:01:15] the episode is big and whether or not the podcast is big is incredible like you can share

[02:01:19] a ton there'll be up there'll be probably 30 or 40 clips that come out of this that are

[02:01:23] awesome that are reaching people in different ways connecting with people hopefully adding

[02:01:26] value to their lives in some way and that is worth a ton like if you are a creator and

[02:01:32] you want to reach people and that's your goal that is that should be worth something to

[02:01:35] you.

[02:01:36] And so I like I think it's like almost like an IQ test that those people failed honestly

[02:01:39] because like if you don't realize the value that's outside of just the podcast distribution

[02:01:44] that you can get out of going and doing these things and like even just refining your

[02:01:47] ideas like when you sit down on someone smart and their pressure testing you on ideas

[02:01:51] and you're having a conversation with them and you're getting better at articulating

[02:01:54] them there's value in that too.

[02:01:56] And so I just think like again it's like a failed IQ test when you think really small

[02:02:00] around these things.

[02:02:01] Oh 100%.

[02:02:02] I think the perfect like case study for this is Gary Vee who I've known for years the

[02:02:07] guy doesn't get he's the goat yeah he does not care who you are you could there could be

[02:02:12] an athlete and a billionaire standing next to him and if he meets someone on the street

[02:02:18] once he's locked in with that person he's just there he's so present he'll talk to them

[02:02:23] for as long as they need until it's the next person and he won't even look back until

[02:02:27] he's done.

[02:02:28] He doesn't prioritize people in terms of them being this or that status or this level

[02:02:34] of wealth or this level of importance or fame he's just like this is a human being I can

[02:02:38] provide value if they need help you know my team can film this interaction and it'll

[02:02:42] help someone else too.

[02:02:44] And I think that's literally the game and if you're in the game and you really do care

[02:02:48] about people and you care about making an impact you'll give people a chance yeah like

[02:02:52] everyone is worth it.

[02:02:53] Why do you think he's gotten as far as it's gotten right?

[02:02:56] That's literally it.

[02:02:58] Yeah it creates it creates real outcomes.

[02:03:00] Yeah so yeah that's I love that about him.

[02:03:06] There's a question that I end every podcast episode with.

[02:03:10] I ask everybody because obviously everybody has so many different messages that they they

[02:03:16] want to share with the world but it's hard to prioritize which one is the most important

[02:03:21] so I came up with this scenario to help with that.

[02:03:25] So here's the scenario you're at the Oscars and you're nominated for let's say a documentary

[02:03:34] about the importance of family just talk about it.

[02:03:41] And they call out the nominees time to announce the winner they announce the winner and

[02:03:48] it's you.

[02:03:49] You walk up to this stage you think everybody who you need to think your wife your son

[02:03:55] if you have another kid that kid and then there's that 45 second to about one minute window

[02:04:03] where you can say anything that you want to say and it's going to be recorded there's

[02:04:09] going to be headlines it's going to be on Instagram TikTok you know Reels YouTube all

[02:04:15] over the place and it's going to be shared everywhere.

[02:04:20] What message is so important to you that you feel like most urgently needs to be shared

[02:04:26] that you would share in that time frame?

[02:04:29] It's not going to be 45 seconds.

[02:04:32] Never let your quest for more distract you from the beauty of enough.

[02:04:38] That's it.

[02:04:39] That's all I would say.

[02:04:40] I love that.

[02:04:41] We're on this constant chase for more and more and more all of our lives and we're constantly

[02:04:45] conditioned that we need more and that we have to do more and that we're not doing enough

[02:04:49] and all of that is a distraction from the beauty of finding your version and your definition

[02:04:56] of enough.

[02:04:57] So find that and never let the quest for more distract you from it.

[02:05:02] I love it.

[02:05:03] So, Hill thank you for coming on your the best.

[02:05:05] Thank you.