Author: The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish

  • #192 David Segal: Yearly Planning, Daily Action

    AI transcript
    0:00:00 There is no shortcut for the work, period.
    0:00:05 There’s no magic pill.
    0:00:07 There’s no magic elixir.
    0:00:09 It’s about habits.
    0:00:10 You have to do things even when you don’t want to do them.
    0:00:13 You have to get up and go for that run
    0:00:16 even though you don’t want to.
    0:00:17 I mean, it’s really easy when you’ve had 10 hours of sleep
    0:00:20 and the sun is shining and it’s warm outside.
    0:00:24 It’s really easy to go for that run
    0:00:26 or put on that smile or whatever it is.
    0:00:28 Like, you know, that’s where it’s easy.
    0:00:31 Where it’s hard is it’s when you had six hours of sleep
    0:00:34 and you’re not feeling great and you’re feeling sluggish
    0:00:37 and that’s actually when you need to do it.
    0:00:39 Welcome to The Knowledge Project,
    0:00:57 a podcast about mastering the best
    0:00:59 of what other people have already figured out
    0:01:01 so you can apply their insights to your life.
    0:01:04 I’m your host, Shane Parrish.
    0:01:06 A quick favor to ask before we start.
    0:01:08 Most people listening on Apple Podcasts or Spotify
    0:01:11 haven’t yet hit the follow button.
    0:01:13 If you can hit the follow button now, I would appreciate it.
    0:01:16 The more people who follow this show,
    0:01:17 the better the guests we can get.
    0:01:19 Thank you and enjoy the conversation.
    0:01:22 If you’d like access to the episode
    0:01:23 before everyone else, my thoughts and reflections
    0:01:26 at the end of episodes.
    0:01:28 Member only episodes, hand edited transcripts
    0:01:31 or you just wanna support the show you love,
    0:01:32 join at fs.blog/membership.
    0:01:35 Check out the show notes for a link.
    0:01:38 Today, my guest is David Siegel.
    0:01:40 David started David’s Tea and grew it
    0:01:42 to over 200 million in annual sales before stepping away.
    0:01:46 David and I first met in the summer of 2020 on a lake
    0:01:49 and quickly realized we had a lot in common.
    0:01:51 We started running together a few times a week,
    0:01:54 chatting about business and life.
    0:01:56 Those runs helped me during COVID more than he could now.
    0:02:00 Many people like to dream about what they would do
    0:02:02 if they didn’t need the money.
    0:02:04 And for Dave, the answer was to start Fire Belly Tea
    0:02:07 with his good friend Harley Finkelstein.
    0:02:09 However, as you’ll hear, he’s doing a few things differently
    0:02:12 than he did at David’s Tea.
    0:02:14 We discussed the lowest point in his life
    0:02:16 and how he overcame it.
    0:02:17 Starting and growing a business to 200 million,
    0:02:20 the emptiness he felt after walking away from David’s Tea
    0:02:25 and then watching it flounder, starting Fire Belly Tea
    0:02:29 and what he’s doing differently and so much more.
    0:02:32 Before I met Dave, I wasn’t really a tea drinker.
    0:02:35 I mean, I dabbled occasionally with tea bags
    0:02:38 you find in grocery stores,
    0:02:39 but never really found it tasted that great.
    0:02:42 In fact, I remember telling him it always tasted a bit
    0:02:45 like there was some faint chemicals in it.
    0:02:47 And I remember where we were.
    0:02:48 We were right under a bridge and he stopped and he looked at me
    0:02:51 and he just sort of like grabbed my shoulder
    0:02:53 and stopped me from running.
    0:02:54 And he said, “You’ve been drinking the wrong tea, my friend.”
    0:02:57 And it turns out what I was tasting
    0:02:59 was a combination of poor quality tea, preservatives
    0:03:03 and additives that are in most teas.
    0:03:05 The next day, there was a slew of tea on my doorstep
    0:03:08 and I’ve been drinking it ever since.
    0:03:10 In fact, my kids and I now make a pot of Fire Belly’s
    0:03:14 after dinner mint nearly every night as we wind down.
    0:03:17 Not only does it help them sleep better,
    0:03:19 but it’s a great ritual for us to connect
    0:03:22 and chat a little bit about the day.
    0:03:24 You’ll walk away from this conversation inspired
    0:03:26 by Dave’s stories, learning a lot about the real messiness
    0:03:30 of running a business in the weeds
    0:03:32 and wanting to try some Fire Belly.
    0:03:34 To that end, Dave was kind enough to offer all FS listeners
    0:03:38 15% off all orders at Fire Belly.
    0:03:40 Just go to firebellyt.com
    0:03:43 and use the discount code Shane15.
    0:03:46 It’s time to listen and learn.
    0:03:49 (upbeat music)
    0:03:52 Some of my favorite brands are on Shopify,
    0:03:58 including Gymshark, Allbirds, Outway Sox and Aeropress.
    0:04:03 (bell dings)
    0:04:04 Shopify is the global commerce platform
    0:04:06 that helps you sell at every stage of your business.
    0:04:08 It doesn’t matter if you just have an idea
    0:04:11 or already operate a multi-million dollar company,
    0:04:14 Shopify is there to help you grow every step of the way
    0:04:17 because businesses that grow, grow with Shopify.
    0:04:20 What I love about Shopify is that
    0:04:23 it’s like you have a multi-billion dollar tech team
    0:04:26 working just for you from day one.
    0:04:28 If you’re just starting,
    0:04:29 this means you can go from idea to store in a few minutes,
    0:04:31 but it also means if you’re an existing company,
    0:04:34 you can save money and time.
    0:04:36 If you’ve ever checked out from a store
    0:04:38 and thought that was so easy,
    0:04:40 chances are it was shop pay,
    0:04:42 which is the internet’s best converting checkout
    0:04:45 up to 36% better
    0:04:47 compared to other leading commerce platforms.
    0:04:50 Go to shopify.com/shane now to grow your business
    0:04:54 no matter what stage you’re in.
    0:04:56 (bell dings)
    0:04:59 – I wanna start with,
    0:05:00 what’s the biggest lesson you’ve learned
    0:05:02 over the past year and why?
    0:05:04 – Really that entrepreneurship is in many ways
    0:05:08 a personal journey disguised as a business pursuit.
    0:05:12 And what I mean by that is so much of it
    0:05:14 is managing your own psychology.
    0:05:16 You know, everybody talks about playing the long game, right?
    0:05:19 But it’s easier said than done.
    0:05:21 There’s so many swings to the game
    0:05:23 when you’re building businesses.
    0:05:25 There’s, the lows are so low.
    0:05:27 The highs are so high as well.
    0:05:29 And it’s learning how to be able to tolerate those lows.
    0:05:33 So I started this podcast with Harley Finkelstein’s
    0:05:36 president of Shopify, a really good friend of both of ours.
    0:05:39 We interview these, we’re both Jewish,
    0:05:41 and we interview these old Jewish guys
    0:05:42 who don’t have a social media presence.
    0:05:45 They’re all of them are over 70.
    0:05:47 And they’ve had these incredible careers
    0:05:48 and had enormous impact, not just building businesses
    0:05:51 and becoming incredibly successful,
    0:05:54 but also in giving back to their communities
    0:05:55 and their philanthropic efforts.
    0:05:58 And podcast called Big Shot.
    0:06:00 And they talk about the swings, the ups,
    0:06:02 the downs of their career, but it’s in montages, right?
    0:06:04 Like it’s, like watching a Hollywood movie,
    0:06:08 you know, something that is actually two minutes
    0:06:10 is actually five to 10 years.
    0:06:12 And it feels like a lot longer when you’re in it, living it.
    0:06:16 And so I really, over the past year,
    0:06:19 have really put a lot of emphasis
    0:06:21 in trying to manage my own psychology
    0:06:23 and get better at when I have a crappy day
    0:06:26 or a crappy week or a crappy month,
    0:06:28 not having an action bias or making big decisions
    0:06:32 or just being able to kind of broaden my scope
    0:06:35 and my perspective and look at it over the course of time
    0:06:39 and really try and only make major evaluations
    0:06:41 when I’m in a good place mentally
    0:06:43 and only on a more, a longer period of time,
    0:06:47 maybe once a year to sort of take stock of where I am
    0:06:50 versus where I would like to be.
    0:06:52 Yeah, and be able to take a broader lens
    0:06:55 and not feel the lows as much as I sometimes do.
    0:07:00 Or the highs.
    0:07:00 I mean, it’s hard not to feel the highs, right?
    0:07:02 ‘Cause it feels so good.
    0:07:03 So it’s nice to celebrate,
    0:07:05 but you celebrate with the high five
    0:07:07 and then you go back to work.
    0:07:08 – How do you learn how to do that though?
    0:07:09 Like managing your psychology.
    0:07:11 That’s such an important journey for every entrepreneur,
    0:07:14 for every person.
    0:07:16 But nobody really teaches us how to go about doing that.
    0:07:18 – No, we don’t talk about that at all.
    0:07:21 Certainly not in school, right?
    0:07:22 Look, I mean, it’s really hard to do.
    0:07:23 I’d love to sit here and tell you that I’ve mastered it.
    0:07:25 And I’d like to think I’ve gotten better at it.
    0:07:28 I think taking care of yourself matters.
    0:07:31 One of the reasons I love tea so much
    0:07:33 is I think it plays into that lifestyle.
    0:07:34 It’s in a world where there’s so many highlight reels
    0:07:39 and different products that will make you think
    0:07:42 you’re gonna walk through walls and promise you the moon.
    0:07:45 Tea is this product that has been around
    0:07:47 as old as the hills.
    0:07:48 I mean, it’s been part of humanity for so long.
    0:07:51 It’s drank in regions of the world
    0:07:53 where people live the longest.
    0:07:54 It’s been studied for decades, not years,
    0:07:57 but decades by some of the top institutions in the world.
    0:08:00 And I like the connection tea gives me to history
    0:08:04 and not only the feeling that it gives me,
    0:08:06 you know, a great green tea
    0:08:07 or a great herbal tea in the evening,
    0:08:09 but I think that’s part of being able to manage your psychology
    0:08:12 is routines and rituals.
    0:08:15 I think another piece of it for me is mindfulness
    0:08:18 and meditation has played a big role in my life.
    0:08:20 I’ve been doing it now for well over five years.
    0:08:23 I do it consistently.
    0:08:25 And it really, it makes a huge difference.
    0:08:27 It calms my nervous system down.
    0:08:29 It allows me to get a bit of distance.
    0:08:31 I mean, it’s remarkable what 10 minutes of breathing can do.
    0:08:34 Yeah, and I exercise a lot and I try and take care of myself.
    0:08:38 And I try to have a good time, you know, life short.
    0:08:40 And I think it’s important to celebrate Friday nights.
    0:08:44 I like to remind myself just how much I have
    0:08:47 and how lucky I am and really, really take in,
    0:08:51 really appreciate my life and take in all the good in my life.
    0:08:56 I think that’s really important.
    0:08:57 You know, when Monday comes around, it’s like war, right?
    0:09:01 You’re in the trenches, you know, you’re driving hard.
    0:09:03 You’re driving with a sense of urgency.
    0:09:05 I’m trying to build. I’m trying to build companies.
    0:09:07 My wife will always say like, isn’t there something good going on?
    0:09:09 And it’s like, well, there is just the good comes on Friday night.
    0:09:13 And when I’m in the moment and I’m trying to build,
    0:09:17 I need to focus on how to improve.
    0:09:19 And so I become hyper critical of myself.
    0:09:22 I sort of let that sense of urgency take over
    0:09:24 and let the feeling of we’re not doing enough set in.
    0:09:28 And then within reason, try to temper that so that, you know,
    0:09:31 you don’t come off too strong with your team around you
    0:09:33 and you don’t end up trying to move something forward
    0:09:37 that frankly just needs time in order to progress.
    0:09:40 Sometimes that’s the case, right?
    0:09:41 Sometimes the best action is no action.
    0:09:43 But then Friday nights, it’s really important, I think,
    0:09:45 to sit back, enjoy, smile, you know, give your kids a kiss,
    0:09:51 you know, think about how fortunate we are
    0:09:54 and really appreciate your life.
    0:09:56 You step back and step away.
    0:09:58 I have a saying that you sort of reminded me of
    0:10:01 when you were talking, which is a lack of patience,
    0:10:03 changes the outcome.
    0:10:05 And sometimes when you try to get something faster
    0:10:07 than it naturally should happen,
    0:10:08 you actually end up in a worse place.
    0:10:11 Absolutely. I mean, certainly in businesses that I’m building,
    0:10:15 I like to truly measure progress on an annual basis.
    0:10:18 I think that’s the time to do it.
    0:10:20 Did you get better this year versus last year?
    0:10:23 Did the business grow this year versus last year?
    0:10:26 You may not be at the place you want to be,
    0:10:28 but did you progress?
    0:10:29 And I’ve been in situations where I had to say no.
    0:10:32 You didn’t progress.
    0:10:33 And I was in a business early in my career
    0:10:35 where I had to, you know, wave the white flag and say I failed.
    0:10:39 Talk to me about the annual thing versus daily.
    0:10:42 How do you use that?
    0:10:43 You do action daily.
    0:10:45 How do you set that and sort of measure progress
    0:10:48 and consistency while keeping your eye
    0:10:51 on the annual sort of timeframe?
    0:10:53 When you’re building a business, the amount of decisions
    0:10:57 you have to make is coming at you a mile a minute.
    0:11:00 It can be like trying to drink through a fire hose.
    0:11:02 I think you develop an intuitive sense of it.
    0:11:06 I don’t know that I consciously sit there
    0:11:09 and think of every decision and ask myself,
    0:11:11 is this a monthly decision, a daily decision,
    0:11:13 a weekly decision?
    0:11:14 I think I usually ask myself,
    0:11:17 without consciously doing this, two things.
    0:11:22 One, is this something that I can recover from easily?
    0:11:27 Meaning if I’m wrong about this, what’s the impact of it?
    0:11:30 Two, what’s the risk of doing nothing
    0:11:33 and waiting for more information?
    0:11:35 More often than not, the answer is wait
    0:11:39 and get more information.
    0:11:40 Certainly on big decisions like to go in a different direction
    0:11:43 with the product, to deviate in a big way
    0:11:46 from your marketing efforts.
    0:11:47 Usually there it’s try and get more information,
    0:11:51 try and get more information, try and get more information.
    0:11:53 Things like you’re out of stock
    0:11:55 and you got a pressure supplier to ship it faster.
    0:11:57 That’s where the sense of urgency comes in
    0:11:59 and you really start to pound the table and get people moving.
    0:12:03 And there’s a lot of those.
    0:12:04 There’s a lot of little decisions in a day
    0:12:06 where if we can do a little bit more to ship that extra order,
    0:12:10 handle that last customer service request, those add up.
    0:12:15 So those small things where a sense of urgency
    0:12:18 allows you to offer better service, better product,
    0:12:22 become better at what you do.
    0:12:24 Those are the small things, right?
    0:12:25 And those things I think you do want to have
    0:12:28 an incredible sense of urgency around.
    0:12:30 The bigger things like should we be selling this product
    0:12:34 or that product or presenting the brand this way or that way?
    0:12:37 I think those things you want to analyze more on a monthly basis
    0:12:41 or quarterly basis or in some cases an annual basis.
    0:12:44 So it’s like daily you want to focus on the micro things
    0:12:46 that move the needle.
    0:12:47 But as you step back, you focus on the more macro stuff.
    0:12:50 100%, right?
    0:12:51 I mean, any successful entrepreneur will tell you this.
    0:12:54 Like you got to be in the details.
    0:12:55 I mean, over time as the business grows,
    0:12:58 you develop a team that you trust to be in the details.
    0:13:00 But even then it’s trust but verify.
    0:13:02 Here’s a great example.
    0:13:03 Like what is Air Canada Delta Airlines or American Airlines?
    0:13:08 It’s not the CEO.
    0:13:09 Nobody thinks about the CEO when they think of these airlines.
    0:13:12 When people say, oh, that airline’s the worst, right?
    0:13:15 I mean, nobody really likes airlines.
    0:13:17 Well, what are they really saying you?
    0:13:19 They’re not saying most of them couldn’t even tell you
    0:13:20 who the CEO is or the management team are.
    0:13:22 They’re saying that that individual person that I dealt with
    0:13:24 at the customer service counter was not nice to me
    0:13:28 or didn’t leave me with a great feeling
    0:13:30 or didn’t help me with what I needed helped in that moment.
    0:13:33 The business happens at the transactional level.
    0:13:37 Any business, that’s where it happens.
    0:13:38 Where the money is exchanged for the goods.
    0:13:40 And I think often the bigger the company gets,
    0:13:43 we kind of forget that.
    0:13:45 But really, that’s what it is.
    0:13:46 I mean, it’s a series of small transactions that add up,
    0:13:51 but you need to continually get good
    0:13:52 at those small transactions.
    0:13:53 And those small transactions often require urgency.
    0:13:56 You know, I used to sell running shoes in high school.
    0:13:58 I loved it.
    0:13:59 I worked at a company called Athletes World,
    0:14:01 which is the equivalent of Footlocker.
    0:14:02 Okay.
    0:14:03 And I just loved it.
    0:14:05 I loved the product knowledge.
    0:14:07 I loved learning about the shoes.
    0:14:08 But my sense of urgency and making sure every customer
    0:14:12 was helped before they walk out of the store.
    0:14:14 Now, I got paid on commission.
    0:14:15 So when I was 16 years old, and I think I made $12 an hour
    0:14:18 at the time and minimum wage was like $5.
    0:14:20 So I thought I was rolling in the dough, right?
    0:14:22 But I operated with urgency.
    0:14:24 I, there was no customer that left the store
    0:14:26 without me talking to them.
    0:14:27 There was, I was all over it.
    0:14:28 And I outsold everyone.
    0:14:31 I was more into it.
    0:14:31 I cared about it more.
    0:14:33 I spoke to more customers in a day than they would.
    0:14:36 But that’s what a business is.
    0:14:38 It’s, it’s how do you get the people on the front lines
    0:14:42 operating with urgency to add value to the customer
    0:14:44 and do that over and over again?
    0:14:46 And I think that’s where the urgency really plays in,
    0:14:49 is, is sort of creating that culture where people care
    0:14:51 about their work and care about the customers
    0:14:53 that they’re dealing with enough to service them
    0:14:56 quickly and efficiently.
    0:14:58 Can you make somebody care?
    0:14:59 Or do you hire people that naturally care?
    0:15:02 At a mentor that used to talk about this,
    0:15:04 he’d call it will versus skill.
    0:15:06 Sometimes they have skill, but they don’t have a will.
    0:15:08 And sometimes it’s vice versa.
    0:15:10 You get people who really care and work really, really hard,
    0:15:12 but can’t really move the needle
    0:15:13 because they just don’t have the skill.
    0:15:15 You can teach skill more than you can will.
    0:15:18 I do, I do believe that you caring about your work
    0:15:22 is something that no one can teach you what to do.
    0:15:26 But I think sometimes you develop the, the bug for it, right?
    0:15:30 If you, you develop a love for what you do over time.
    0:15:33 So sometimes I think it is about patience.
    0:15:36 You know, I don’t know that anybody can,
    0:15:39 can teach you how to have a spark and a sense of urgency,
    0:15:41 but I do think you can cultivate someone’s spark
    0:15:44 and their sense of urgency.
    0:15:45 But ultimately it’s on the person themselves to, to,
    0:15:48 to really tap into what makes them get up
    0:15:49 in the morning and want to achieve.
    0:15:51 You mentioned details.
    0:15:52 One of the commonalities I find between
    0:15:56 exceptional people who’ve done exceptional things
    0:15:58 is they’re always in the weeds.
    0:15:59 And yet there’s this sort of cultural backlash
    0:16:04 against being in the details
    0:16:05 and everybody sort of wants to manage with abstraction.
    0:16:09 Right. Talk to me about learning about the details
    0:16:11 and being in the weeds and why that’s important to you.
    0:16:14 Well, I mean, it goes back to what we were just talking about,
    0:16:16 which is, which is, you know, you don’t,
    0:16:18 you never want to have ivory tower syndrome
    0:16:20 where, where you run a business
    0:16:22 and you’re not connected to your customers,
    0:16:25 where you’re sitting in an ivory tower
    0:16:27 somewhere issuing decrees.
    0:16:28 Having said that, it is a balance.
    0:16:30 One of the things I learned building David’s Tea was
    0:16:32 the difference between running a militia
    0:16:34 versus running an army.
    0:16:35 When you have a small company and you’re running them,
    0:16:38 it’s like a militia, right?
    0:16:39 Like, you know, you got five stores
    0:16:41 and you want to run a sale
    0:16:43 or you want to, you want to do some kind of marketing campaign
    0:16:46 or whatever it is that you’re trying,
    0:16:48 whatever initiative that you’re taking on.
    0:16:50 And you have a meeting and you say, okay, let’s do it.
    0:16:53 And, and it’s super easy because, you know,
    0:16:56 you say turn left and everyone hears you.
    0:16:58 The militias, there’s five of you, right?
    0:16:59 Or 10 of you or whatever and everybody turns left.
    0:17:01 But when the company grows, you become like an army.
    0:17:05 And when you say turn left, you get broken telephone
    0:17:09 if you don’t have the right processes and procedures.
    0:17:11 So I think what you stand for as a company should,
    0:17:14 should never change.
    0:17:15 But how you do things as a company should never stop changing.
    0:17:18 And I do think as a company scales,
    0:17:19 it’s really important to understand how to
    0:17:22 put in place the right processes and procedures,
    0:17:26 not to stifle creativity or to stifle the people.
    0:17:29 You want to empower the people on the front lines
    0:17:31 and make sure that they can still make independent decisions.
    0:17:33 I mean, we’ve all experienced as a customer,
    0:17:35 there’s nothing worse than hearing,
    0:17:36 “I’m sorry, that’s our policy.”
    0:17:38 You know, when you, when you don’t allow the people
    0:17:40 on the front to think for themselves
    0:17:41 and they become robotic about how they deal with people,
    0:17:44 that’s oftentimes the beginning of the end.
    0:17:45 But you do want to have processes and procedures
    0:17:48 to be able to facilitate the flow of information
    0:17:51 to and from the front lines effectively
    0:17:54 so that you are able to connect to the weeds
    0:17:57 without sort of jumping in
    0:18:00 and not allowing people to spread their wings and fly.
    0:18:02 And I think it’s a delicate balance, right?
    0:18:03 You, as a leader, you want to be, have your finger on the pulse
    0:18:07 and understand what’s going on at the lowest level of your company
    0:18:12 where customers are interacting with your team or your products.
    0:18:15 But you also don’t want to micromanage to the point where
    0:18:19 the people who you’ve empowered to do the job
    0:18:24 aren’t able to do it and be celebrated for their own successes
    0:18:27 or learn from their own failures.
    0:18:29 Where did your drive come from?
    0:18:31 Like, what were you like as a kid?
    0:18:33 It seems very abnormal that a 16-year-old at Foot Locker
    0:18:36 would be so driven and motivated.
    0:18:39 I loved it.
    0:18:40 I loved working from a very, very young age.
    0:18:43 I was a bit, my wife says this about my son,
    0:18:45 and I think I was the same way.
    0:18:46 I was a man of action with no plan.
    0:18:48 I remember I really wanted a skating rink in our backyard.
    0:18:51 We had like this tiny little backyard.
    0:18:53 And my parents are like, no.
    0:18:55 So I was really stubborn.
    0:18:56 I’d go and I’d start taking little, you know,
    0:18:59 like the sour cream container.
    0:19:02 I’d wash it out and put water in it
    0:19:04 and start dumping it on the lawn and dumping it on the lawn.
    0:19:06 And my parents are watching me do this,
    0:19:08 and they’re thinking, what is he doing?
    0:19:10 But I kept doing it.
    0:19:11 And I kept doing it.
    0:19:12 And for hours on end, I’m dumping one little sour cream container
    0:19:15 worth of water on the back lawn.
    0:19:17 And finally, my father’s like, this is crazy.
    0:19:19 The kid’s never going to build a rink this way.
    0:19:21 And, you know, but then they started helping me.
    0:19:23 And then my brother started helping.
    0:19:24 And then here we are as a family with our hoses out there,
    0:19:27 spraying the back lawn.
    0:19:29 Sure enough, we have a skating rink, you know?
    0:19:31 And I was a bit like that as a kid.
    0:19:33 I mean, I wanted to work before I was allowed to work.
    0:19:35 I had a paper route at a very young age.
    0:19:39 I went on and I worked at Wendy’s.
    0:19:40 I was the fry guy.
    0:19:42 I think the breaking point for me
    0:19:43 was I had to take out the garbage.
    0:19:44 And I was a small little 14-year-old.
    0:19:46 So you had to throw it over the fence, right,
    0:19:48 to get it into the bin.
    0:19:49 They had the guard for the animals,
    0:19:51 the sort of fence around the garbage bins.
    0:19:53 And I couldn’t quite get it over the fence.
    0:19:55 And so it sort of teetered on the top of the wall
    0:19:58 and then kind of came down on my face.
    0:20:00 And I was like, that’s it.
    0:20:01 That’s how I’m out of here.
    0:20:02 And I think I was probably the youngest person
    0:20:04 they hired at Athlete’s World, which is like the Foot Locker.
    0:20:07 I wrote my resumes.
    0:20:09 I banged on a lot of doors.
    0:20:11 And that was just who I was.
    0:20:13 What were you like in school?
    0:20:14 I didn’t take school all that seriously until later on.
    0:20:19 I mean, I knew I had to do well enough
    0:20:20 to get into a good university.
    0:20:22 But for me, university, I was excited to go socialize
    0:20:26 and have a great time.
    0:20:27 It wasn’t until I met my wife where I really got it together.
    0:20:30 I mean, I got into a great program.
    0:20:32 I went to McGill University.
    0:20:33 But she studied hard.
    0:20:36 I mean, she became a neuropsychologist.
    0:20:38 Harvard educated.
    0:20:40 And she brought up the best of me.
    0:20:42 By my fourth year, I became an honor student.
    0:20:44 And I started to work a lot harder.
    0:20:46 Is that because you wanted to impress her?
    0:20:48 I think if I wanted to hang out with her,
    0:20:49 I had to go to the library.
    0:20:50 So, you know, I mean, she was in the library.
    0:20:52 So yeah, I mean, I wanted to see her.
    0:20:53 I wanted to be with her.
    0:20:54 So I kind of just followed her.
    0:20:56 And she didn’t, you know, she didn’t,
    0:20:58 I used to go out a lot and probably party too much.
    0:21:01 But she wasn’t into that.
    0:21:03 So, you know, she mattered more to me than party.
    0:21:05 So I ended up hanging out with her more often.
    0:21:07 And she brought out some better habits to me.
    0:21:10 What was your, what did your kitchen smell like
    0:21:12 on like Friday nights growing up?
    0:21:14 I mean, I had a very regular upper middle class,
    0:21:18 middle class upbringing.
    0:21:19 My mom had a few different jobs.
    0:21:22 She was a teacher.
    0:21:23 She taught deaf kids for a while.
    0:21:24 Then she became an artist.
    0:21:26 My dad was a psychologist and started working at the hospitals
    0:21:30 and then had his own private practice.
    0:21:32 He worked very, very hard.
    0:21:34 I certainly learned my work ethic from my dad.
    0:21:36 He was up at 545 every day.
    0:21:38 First patient was at seven.
    0:21:39 Last patient was at six.
    0:21:41 Never took a lunch break.
    0:21:42 We always said Friday nights weren’t
    0:21:45 dramatically different than Wednesday nights.
    0:21:47 We, because my dad didn’t really travel for business,
    0:21:49 we always had family dinners.
    0:21:50 And they’re really nice growing up.
    0:21:52 I mean, I was very lucky at my grandparents in my life.
    0:21:55 They would, I guess, come over on Friday nights
    0:21:57 and we’d often barbecue a lot of steak.
    0:22:00 And this is before red meat.
    0:22:01 We knew red meat wasn’t so great for you.
    0:22:03 And so big steak family, we do a lot of steak.
    0:22:05 And I had a nice upbringing.
    0:22:07 I mean, I had a nice family around me,
    0:22:08 but entrepreneurship and business wasn’t really that,
    0:22:11 you know, it was interesting.
    0:22:13 I had this extended family in Montreal
    0:22:15 who had been very successful in business.
    0:22:17 And I had this rich history that I really wasn’t
    0:22:21 in touch with at the time.
    0:22:22 Education was certainly strongly encouraged,
    0:22:25 but, you know, I didn’t have access to CEOs
    0:22:28 and to type A business people in my life early in my life.
    0:22:32 I started to meet them later in my life.
    0:22:34 Once I went to Montreal and went to McGill
    0:22:36 and started to meet some of my extended family.
    0:22:38 Once you’d learned more about your extended family
    0:22:41 and its history of entrepreneurship
    0:22:43 and making fortunes, losing fortunes, remaking them.
    0:22:46 Yeah.
    0:22:47 Did you feel more like you fit in more?
    0:22:49 The way the stories, as I got older,
    0:22:52 the way the stories were told to me
    0:22:53 was like an episode of succession.
    0:22:55 You know, my family built a business
    0:22:58 called Peerless Clothing.
    0:22:59 And, you know, it was filled with this one being mad at that one
    0:23:03 and not talking to this one and feeling slighted.
    0:23:05 And it was basically three brothers.
    0:23:07 The oldest one started it with the dad.
    0:23:09 The middle one came in with the elder one
    0:23:12 and was kind of the inside guy.
    0:23:14 The elder one then, once he had made it,
    0:23:16 decided to go to Japan.
    0:23:18 And in those days, when you went to Japan,
    0:23:19 it was like Bon Voyage, right?
    0:23:20 Like there was no, we’re talking,
    0:23:22 we’re in the 40s and 50s right now.
    0:23:24 And so my grandfather got brought in.
    0:23:27 He was a tall salesman type guy.
    0:23:31 And the business was not doing well at that time.
    0:23:34 And they brought it back together.
    0:23:36 And Peerless Clothing, for people listening,
    0:23:38 was they manufactured, they’re still around today.
    0:23:40 It’s quite a large business.
    0:23:42 And they manufacture clothing for, you know,
    0:23:44 Pierre Cardin, Hugo Boss, and Calvin Klein.
    0:23:47 And anyway, my grandfather ended up,
    0:23:50 the middle brother died.
    0:23:51 And there was a fight over shares and long story short,
    0:23:54 the son of my grandfather’s eldest brother,
    0:23:58 who was adopted, came in and ran the business
    0:24:01 and actually did an incredible job with it
    0:24:02 and took it to a whole new level.
    0:24:04 And he was quite a successful businessman and philanthropist.
    0:24:08 And then from that, another, a cousin of mine,
    0:24:11 my dad’s first cousin,
    0:24:12 went off and started a company called Le Chateau,
    0:24:14 which for years,
    0:24:15 he basically brought the Carnaby Street look to Canada.
    0:24:18 So I became very close with him once I went to McGill.
    0:24:22 Didn’t really know him that well before that.
    0:24:24 And later in life,
    0:24:25 he ended up backing me and David’s team.
    0:24:27 We built it together.
    0:24:28 But yeah, I sort of learned about these stories.
    0:24:31 And I would say in my late teens,
    0:24:33 sort of as I was getting ready to go to McGill,
    0:24:36 and then I would hear stories about my great grandparents
    0:24:39 who came over with nothing and were peddlers
    0:24:41 in the countryside of Quebec.
    0:24:43 And one of my grandmother’s father
    0:24:47 built up a big woolen’s business
    0:24:48 and then lost it all in the Great Depression,
    0:24:51 buying on margin like everybody else.
    0:24:53 And then made it back.
    0:24:55 My grandmother used to tell stories
    0:24:56 about going to school in a carriage
    0:24:57 and then having to quit school the next day
    0:24:59 and walk to the factory, you know, kind of thing.
    0:25:01 So I did grow up with these stories later in life.
    0:25:04 But my entrepreneur drive came in before that.
    0:25:07 I think those stories just validated it for me
    0:25:09 and had me even more excited
    0:25:11 for my entrepreneurial career ahead.
    0:25:14 Talk to me about David’s team.
    0:25:16 Where did, so I’m guessing like after university,
    0:25:20 you followed Emily to Boston.
    0:25:22 No, so Emily didn’t get into Boston so much later.
    0:25:24 We had a lot of ups and downs together.
    0:25:27 Emily didn’t get into her PhD program at first
    0:25:31 and was going to go do something else
    0:25:32 and then decided to wait and reapply it to McGill PhD
    0:25:36 and then got in.
    0:25:37 So we were in Montreal
    0:25:39 after we both graduated McGill.
    0:25:40 We were living together in a tiny basement apartment
    0:25:43 in Montreal.
    0:25:44 And I started a concept called fitting room central.
    0:25:47 Well, most of my friends went off to Goldman Sachs
    0:25:50 or Proctor Gamble.
    0:25:51 I developed, so because I had worked,
    0:25:55 I worked in the buying department in La Chateau
    0:25:57 for a few summers and I sold,
    0:25:59 as I was telling you, running shoes
    0:26:00 and clothing a little bit as well.
    0:26:01 So I understood that business certainly at a base level.
    0:26:06 And I developed a concept called fitting room central
    0:26:09 because when buyers would buy clothing,
    0:26:11 remember when you’re in clothing
    0:26:13 or anything with inventory,
    0:26:14 your biggest risk is your inventory buy.
    0:26:16 You’re deciding what to buy in a season,
    0:26:18 you’re hoping it sells,
    0:26:20 but you’re deciding in advance what you think
    0:26:22 people are going to like.
    0:26:22 So often what large clothing companies will do
    0:26:25 is they’ll test.
    0:26:26 So they’ll, if you have a hundred store company,
    0:26:29 let’s say, you’ll buy for five or 10 stores
    0:26:32 and see how it goes there
    0:26:33 before you take the inventory risk of buying
    0:26:35 for the rest of the stores.
    0:26:37 And we’d have these buying meetings
    0:26:38 where they’re evaluating these tests
    0:26:40 and they’d evaluate whether something sold
    0:26:42 or it didn’t sell.
    0:26:43 But they had no idea why it was selling
    0:26:44 or why it wasn’t.
    0:26:46 Everybody would speculate on that.
    0:26:47 So I developed a system for the fitting rooms
    0:26:50 and the idea being when you buy clothing,
    0:26:52 you actually do it in two steps.
    0:26:53 First, you evaluate the look of something on your,
    0:26:55 sorry, the look of something on the rack,
    0:26:57 then you evaluate the fit of that item on your body, right?
    0:27:00 What we thought is, hey,
    0:27:01 if we can capture the conversion rate at the fitting room,
    0:27:04 we’ll be able to tell you,
    0:27:05 if something’s being tried on a lot
    0:27:06 but it’s not converting out of the fitting room,
    0:27:07 you might want to check the fit.
    0:27:09 And vice versa, if something’s not being tried on a lot,
    0:27:12 but when it does try, get tried on it, it sells,
    0:27:14 well, you know, the fit’s great, but the look may be off.
    0:27:17 It was a little bit ahead of its time.
    0:27:19 We were talking 2005, right?
    0:27:20 But when you think about e-commerce businesses today,
    0:27:22 this is exactly what we do, right?
    0:27:24 We monitor traffic and conversion.
    0:27:26 And then we had ways of capturing the fitting room
    0:27:28 being this point of interaction with the customer.
    0:27:30 You can capture feedback.
    0:27:32 Interesting idea, right?
    0:27:33 Everybody you tell that to,
    0:27:34 and I’m sure many of your listeners are like,
    0:27:36 “Oh, it sounds interesting.”
    0:27:37 Well, like, “Interesting” is a great word in a classroom,
    0:27:39 but it’s a terrible word in business.
    0:27:42 You want to hear things like, “When can you deliver?”
    0:27:44 And I was really good at getting these meetings
    0:27:46 with buyers at Macy’s or Victoria’s Secret or The Gap.
    0:27:51 I’d write these handwritten letters
    0:27:53 to Les Wexner of limited brands, and I’d get a response.
    0:27:56 And we’d have all kinds of meetings.
    0:27:59 But it didn’t progress enough.
    0:28:02 It was a nice to have, not a must-have.
    0:28:03 And it just wasn’t going anywhere.
    0:28:05 I’m sitting in this basement apartment
    0:28:09 while most of my friends are starting to accelerate their careers.
    0:28:14 And my wife, who was my girlfriend at the time,
    0:28:16 was like, “Okay, enough.
    0:28:17 You don’t make any income. You need a job.”
    0:28:20 So I decided to call it quits, which is with a heavy heart.
    0:28:25 And I approached my dad’s cousin who had started Le Chateau,
    0:28:28 this clothing business that had become very big in Canada.
    0:28:31 And he was looking to take a step back from that business.
    0:28:35 He was in the ’70s at the time.
    0:28:37 And he said, “Look, I’ll start a little private equity shop
    0:28:42 and you’ll come help me.”
    0:28:43 And I said, “Great.”
    0:28:44 And I think he paid me like $40,000, I mean, nominal salary.
    0:28:48 And I figured you sort of fake it to you make it.
    0:28:52 I bought a book.
    0:28:53 I bought what Warren Buffett looks for in investments.
    0:28:55 If I’m going to be an investor, I should learn.
    0:28:56 The tea thing kind of clicked for me.
    0:28:59 I always liked tea, certainly growing up.
    0:29:01 I was never a coffee guy.
    0:29:03 And I remember being in a tea shop in Montreal off of Saint Denis,
    0:29:08 which is this really cool street, Asian-inspired tea house.
    0:29:12 And we went in and I started to think to myself,
    0:29:14 I’m like, “Wow, there’s no size, no color like there is in fashion.
    0:29:19 It doesn’t go bad like a turkey sandwich.
    0:29:21 It leaves in a cup so the margins are good.
    0:29:23 You can operate out of small spaces.”
    0:29:25 And we call anything you put in hot and cold water that’s not coffee,
    0:29:29 tea in North America.
    0:29:30 So it’s like cooking, right?
    0:29:32 The combinations of what you can create are endless.
    0:29:34 This is a Warren Buffett business.
    0:29:36 We should do tea.
    0:29:36 And we sort of looked around for one to invest in.
    0:29:40 I got more and more into it.
    0:29:41 I started to develop a love for the product.
    0:29:43 Finally, I think either I turn to my cousin or he turned to me.
    0:29:46 And I said, “Look, let’s just do it ourselves.
    0:29:48 Like we’ll all build it and you’ll back me.”
    0:29:50 And it was a great combination of youth and experience, right?
    0:29:53 Like the way I like to describe it is without him,
    0:29:55 I probably would have 10, 15 stores today.
    0:29:57 And without me, he’d have zero.
    0:29:59 So it really worked out well.
    0:30:01 And the way we went, we opened a store on Queen Street.
    0:30:03 And it didn’t work at first.
    0:30:05 I mean, it sort of worked.
    0:30:06 But it really took a bit of time.
    0:30:09 I remember the summer I got married, which is about a year.
    0:30:12 We had four stores.
    0:30:13 It was about eight months after we started,
    0:30:15 a year after we started.
    0:30:16 And it wasn’t going that great.
    0:30:17 I mean, we weren’t doing well enough that summer
    0:30:20 for the business to survive.
    0:30:22 And I was really worried about it.
    0:30:24 But then we just kept getting better and better at it.
    0:30:27 And it just, it finally caught.
    0:30:30 And people started to get into it.
    0:30:31 And I think what we did that was very different
    0:30:33 is we took a commodity and we uncommoditized it.
    0:30:36 When you think about tea, it’s this incredible drink
    0:30:41 that’s the second biggest drink in the world next to water.
    0:30:44 It’s just, ironically, in North America, we’re not that into it.
    0:30:46 But it’s this timeless ritual that everyone has a tea story
    0:30:51 from when they were younger, somewhere in their family,
    0:30:54 someone drank tea.
    0:30:55 And with David’s Tea, we created this sensory experience
    0:30:59 in the store where you come in and you’re smelling tea
    0:31:01 and you’re tasting tea and you’re talking about tea.
    0:31:03 And it became this very unique experience.
    0:31:06 And I think that’s one of the reasons it worked.
    0:31:07 And yeah, it really grew from there.
    0:31:10 How many stores did you guys end up with?
    0:31:13 When I sold my steak in David’s Tea in 2016,
    0:31:16 we had 200 stores, about 200 million sales,
    0:31:19 about 30 million in Ibada.
    0:31:20 It was a pretty nice business.
    0:31:22 How does it feel now to watch that?
    0:31:26 Flounder.
    0:31:26 Not great.
    0:31:28 And I’ve actually tried to buy it back at one point
    0:31:31 with Bain Capital.
    0:31:32 I’ve moved on.
    0:31:33 I mean, I wish David’s Tea well.
    0:31:35 And I’m very excited about what we’re doing with Fire Belly Tea,
    0:31:38 which is my new tea company.
    0:31:39 While I was developing David’s Tea,
    0:31:42 I always had a private stash.
    0:31:43 What sold at David’s Tea were these heavily flavored teas.
    0:31:46 And that’s just what the market wanted.
    0:31:48 But my palate developed because I would drink it every day
    0:31:52 all the time, right?
    0:31:53 And I would travel these incredible tea regions.
    0:31:56 And I would meet with our tea blenders.
    0:31:59 And I’d learn how to create an amazing tea
    0:32:02 in the right combinations of different ingredients.
    0:32:04 And when I left, I started to realize, wow, I love tea.
    0:32:08 I love creating teas.
    0:32:09 And I love creating the products that go around with it.
    0:32:11 And I would curate these tea collections from my friends.
    0:32:14 I mean, Harley, who’s the president of Shopify,
    0:32:17 and a close friend, I got him really into tea.
    0:32:20 Because when I first met him, he’s like, you know,
    0:32:22 I’m drinking way too much coffee.
    0:32:24 I’m not sleeping well.
    0:32:24 I get the jitters.
    0:32:26 I get headaches.
    0:32:27 I’m like, why aren’t you drinking green tea in the afternoon?
    0:32:29 He’s like, I never thought of that.
    0:32:30 I’m like, oh, my God, green tea is amazing.
    0:32:32 He’s like, wow, it’s kind of bitter, right?
    0:32:33 I’m like, well, yeah, because most people drink
    0:32:35 the equivalent of Folgers for coffee, right?
    0:32:38 Coffee went through these phases,
    0:32:39 where we went from first wave to second wave to third wave.
    0:32:42 And people got fancier and fancier in the types of coffee
    0:32:44 they drank.
    0:32:45 And tea, in many ways, hasn’t, you know,
    0:32:48 David’s team made some headways
    0:32:49 and certainly had slightly better product.
    0:32:52 But I think the really good stuff
    0:32:54 is still new to most people.
    0:32:57 And that’s what Firebelly has become about.
    0:32:59 You know, it’s in curating these collections
    0:33:01 for Harley and other ones of my friends.
    0:33:03 I even brought some to you and got you into it a little bit.
    0:33:07 You know, as we develop, getting people
    0:33:11 into these amazing teas, and, you know,
    0:33:13 all of a sudden, Harley’s drinking green tea in the afternoon,
    0:33:14 no more headaches, no more jitters.
    0:33:16 Because the caffeine in tea is very different, right?
    0:33:18 There’s elvenin in tea as well.
    0:33:20 So whereas with coffee, you get that big spike in crash,
    0:33:24 you don’t really get that in the same way with tea.
    0:33:26 You get more of a sustained energy.
    0:33:27 Elvenin modulates the impact of the caffeine
    0:33:31 on your, in your bloodstream, on your body.
    0:33:33 And it really creates a nice calm energy and a nice focus.
    0:33:37 And then you have herbal teas in the evening
    0:33:39 that are fantastic.
    0:33:40 And whether it’s you want help sleeping or with digestion,
    0:33:44 whether it’s ginger or…
    0:33:45 And so the teas that we create with Fire Belly,
    0:33:48 we don’t use any of these flavorings,
    0:33:49 which is kind of the secret in the tea business.
    0:33:52 If you go label hunting at the grocery store,
    0:33:54 everything has either natural flavor or artificial flavor.
    0:33:57 And it’s not that it’ll kill you,
    0:33:58 but a natural flavor just means it was derived
    0:34:00 from a plant or animal source,
    0:34:01 but it ends up in a laboratory where about 90%
    0:34:04 of what goes into these flavors are preservatives
    0:34:06 and additives that go unlisted on the label.
    0:34:08 We have these all the time.
    0:34:09 They’re not necessarily bad for you,
    0:34:11 but they create kind of a monotone flavor.
    0:34:14 It’s like watermelon chewing gum, right?
    0:34:15 You get that burst of flavor, but then it dissipates.
    0:34:18 It’s very similar with flavored teas
    0:34:20 when they’re using flavorings.
    0:34:21 Whereas instead of using vanilla flavoring at Fire Belly,
    0:34:24 we use real Madagascar vanilla.
    0:34:26 We use really high quality ginger,
    0:34:28 really high quality turmeric.
    0:34:30 And it makes a difference in the quality of the tea.
    0:34:33 And so I think Fire Belly became sort of this brand
    0:34:36 where I got to create the teas I love
    0:34:38 and sort of share my private stash with the world.
    0:34:41 And then you can’t put a Ferrari engine
    0:34:43 in a Winnebago.
    0:34:44 So we had to create the accessories to go with it.
    0:34:46 And so we created, you know, the stop infusion travel mug.
    0:34:49 I mean, you think about accessories,
    0:34:51 it’s all designed for coffee drinkers,
    0:34:53 but like I wanted to put tea drinkers first.
    0:34:55 So we created this travel mug
    0:34:57 where you can stop and start the infusion
    0:34:59 with really high quality loose leaf tea.
    0:35:01 You can make harder iced tea.
    0:35:02 It’s 100% leak proof.
    0:35:03 It’s power coated metal.
    0:35:05 I mean, I get obsessive about all these small details.
    0:35:08 So I’m having a lot of fun with it
    0:35:09 and building up my sort of Chapter 2 act to and tea with Fire Belly.
    0:35:14 I never really drank tea until I met you.
    0:35:17 And then now it’s become like this nightly ritual with my kids,
    0:35:20 which is kind of weird when you think about it, right?
    0:35:23 Like one of my kids’ favorite tea is after-dinner mint
    0:35:26 that you guys make.
    0:35:28 And he just loves this.
    0:35:29 Yeah.
    0:35:30 Like he’ll have four or five cups at night.
    0:35:32 You know, Willie’s doing homework
    0:35:34 and he’s sort of like, he’ll make a teapot.
    0:35:35 Yeah.
    0:35:37 He’s 13.
    0:35:38 My kids too, they get into it, right?
    0:35:39 Because there’s so many different caffeine free teas
    0:35:41 and so many different flavor profiles,
    0:35:44 whether it’s a sweet ginger or a chocolate tea
    0:35:46 or a really nice peppermint eucalyptus tea,
    0:35:50 apple, chamomile, right?
    0:35:51 There’s so many different combinations.
    0:35:52 So kids can get into it too.
    0:35:54 That’s what sort of drove me to create Fire Belly
    0:35:56 is that everyone I would show really high quality loose leaf tea to
    0:36:01 and demonstrate how nice a tea ritual is
    0:36:06 would continue on with it.
    0:36:08 I mean, they’d get into it.
    0:36:09 And I mean, you know, I want to share this with everyone.
    0:36:11 I really want it to be something special.
    0:36:13 I mean, this isn’t something you can find
    0:36:14 at the grocery store, right?
    0:36:15 It’s much higher quality tea than people are used to.
    0:36:20 And I think, you know, why not?
    0:36:22 Tea should have its time.
    0:36:23 I mean, it’s such a, it’s so big in Europe
    0:36:26 and other places in the world.
    0:36:28 It’s just North America that for some reasons
    0:36:30 is a bit late to the party.
    0:36:32 And I just think once they realize
    0:36:35 how amazing high quality tea is,
    0:36:37 it has its place in our daily ritual.
    0:36:40 The world is completely different now
    0:36:42 than it was when you started David’s Tea.
    0:36:44 Very much so, yes.
    0:36:45 So what are the differences you see in the tea space?
    0:36:48 What lessons can you take from David’s Tea?
    0:36:51 And where’s it like harder now and different?
    0:36:54 To contrast, when I started David’s Tea,
    0:36:57 there was no Instagram.
    0:36:58 There was no Shopify.
    0:36:59 You had server rooms.
    0:37:01 And if you want to build a website,
    0:37:02 you know, you call a website guy, right?
    0:37:05 That’s how we used to build websites.
    0:37:06 You found a friend of a friend who is usually a kid
    0:37:09 who knew how to build a website in HTML.
    0:37:11 And the store, a physical retail store
    0:37:14 was much more about distribution than it was discovery.
    0:37:17 I mean, it was about both,
    0:37:18 but nowadays you don’t need a store to distribute, right?
    0:37:21 E-commerce was a tiny, tiny percentage
    0:37:24 of the business back then.
    0:37:26 It’s exploded on the scenes now.
    0:37:28 So it was very different.
    0:37:30 I think the space is much more competitive now.
    0:37:32 There’s a lot of products out there
    0:37:35 that claim lots and lots of benefits.
    0:37:37 But I think some of the fundamentals
    0:37:40 of building a business haven’t changed.
    0:37:41 So, you know, everybody loves to talk about
    0:37:45 what’s changing and disrupting.
    0:37:47 But I think it’s also important to look at
    0:37:48 what doesn’t change.
    0:37:49 And having a great quality product doesn’t change.
    0:37:54 And I like to put my energy into that.
    0:37:57 And one of the things I love about tea
    0:37:58 is that it’s so timeless.
    0:38:00 Tea has been around for hundreds and hundreds of years
    0:38:03 and drank in cultures all over the world for different reasons.
    0:38:08 It’s has proven benefits versus some of these other products
    0:38:12 that come on the market that make claims
    0:38:14 that have not been studied.
    0:38:16 It’s obviously harder to compete with the fad du jour.
    0:38:19 But I want to build a hundred-year company.
    0:38:22 I want to build something that people can trust
    0:38:27 and that isn’t going to waver in some of the principles
    0:38:31 that it stands for.
    0:38:32 And so what we love about loose leaf tea
    0:38:35 is it’s a higher quality product.
    0:38:38 You get the whole leaf.
    0:38:39 You get to watch it expand.
    0:38:40 You get the full health benefits.
    0:38:41 It becomes this pause in your day.
    0:38:44 And I think that’s what we’re about.
    0:38:46 We tend to attract people who are type A.
    0:38:50 I mean, they’re not necessarily entrepreneurs,
    0:38:53 but they’re entrepreneurial and what they do.
    0:38:55 I think it’s for people who are on the go
    0:38:57 who need a moment to themselves
    0:38:58 or a social moment with friends.
    0:39:00 I mean, it’s Tuesday night.
    0:39:02 You don’t always want to have alcohol, right?
    0:39:04 Like, sometimes you just want to have a…
    0:39:05 Hey, can I make you a tea?
    0:39:06 Like, I have a great tea and a great conversation.
    0:39:08 So I don’t think those principles change
    0:39:10 in terms of David’s tea.
    0:39:11 I mean, David’s tea was a fashion brand.
    0:39:13 It was about smell…
    0:39:14 Like, people were discovering,
    0:39:16 wow, you can have tea with vanilla
    0:39:17 and you can have tea with almond
    0:39:19 and it turns pink in your cup.
    0:39:21 And there’s one that’s strawberry.
    0:39:22 And this was very new, right?
    0:39:24 And it was all about smelling it.
    0:39:28 And it was just such a new phenomenon.
    0:39:30 We went from Earl Grey and mint and chamomile
    0:39:33 into all these plethora of flavors.
    0:39:35 And I think with Fire Belly, it’s a little bit different.
    0:39:38 We’re saying, look, we don’t do things
    0:39:41 that you can only do with flavoring.
    0:39:42 Like, we don’t do peach tea
    0:39:44 because you can’t make a peach tea without flavoring.
    0:39:46 But we do really high-quality freeze-dried berries.
    0:39:49 And what has changed about business
    0:39:51 is there’s more of an opportunity to take a niche
    0:39:53 and really get 1,000 true fans with it.
    0:39:56 I think it’s easier with modern-day media
    0:39:58 to talk to niche audiences.
    0:40:00 And so we want to be really good
    0:40:02 at servicing a customer base
    0:40:04 who really cares about having an incredible tea ritual,
    0:40:07 really high-quality product,
    0:40:08 and really just focus on what we do best.
    0:40:11 And I think that’s a little bit different
    0:40:13 than how it used to be.
    0:40:14 I think it’s easier to find your audience at scale
    0:40:18 than it was.
    0:40:19 And you weren’t able to do that in 2007, right?
    0:40:22 In the same way.
    0:40:23 And I think that really changes
    0:40:24 how you think about the business.
    0:40:26 And you’re in physical locations, Macy’s and Erwan?
    0:40:30 We’re in Erwan,
    0:40:31 which is a really hot grocery store right now in L.A.
    0:40:33 We don’t want to be in some of the more mainstream grocers,
    0:40:38 but Erwan really is a special place.
    0:40:40 We’re in Bloomingdale’s.
    0:40:42 We do some of our gift assortment in Creighton Barrel.
    0:40:46 Yeah, and it’s mostly direct to consumer.
    0:40:48 So why those places?
    0:40:49 Tea makes the perfect gift, right?
    0:40:51 So we tend to perform well in…
    0:40:54 We took our best sellers and put it in Erwan.
    0:40:56 I think Erwan has a more discerning customer
    0:40:58 and appreciates really high-quality loose leaf tea.
    0:41:02 So I think Erwan works for us,
    0:41:04 and we’ve been one of the top performers
    0:41:06 in our category so far.
    0:41:08 And I think Bloomingdale’s and Creighton,
    0:41:10 their gift, you go there for Christmas to buy Christmas gifts.
    0:41:14 And tea makes a great Christmas gift.
    0:41:16 And so we’ll do these great gift boxes
    0:41:18 with our accessories and our teas together.
    0:41:21 And it sort of works really well there in November and December.
    0:41:25 When you think about it, you can give tea to anyone.
    0:41:28 You can give it to your mother.
    0:41:29 You can give it romantically.
    0:41:30 You can give it to a coworker.
    0:41:31 It really does make a great gift.
    0:41:33 I mean, the message you’re sending the person is,
    0:41:36 here’s something that’s good for your health and well-being.
    0:41:39 Here’s something that can be a break from your day,
    0:41:41 or it can be social with your family, your friends,
    0:41:43 your colleagues.
    0:41:44 It’s a funny thing.
    0:41:45 Everyone has tea in their cupboard,
    0:41:47 but it just sort of sits at the back and gathers dust.
    0:41:50 And that was one of the things with Fire Belly.
    0:41:52 You know, we wanted to make sure that it was well designed.
    0:41:54 We originally put it in these boxes
    0:41:56 that they’re like books on a bookshelf.
    0:41:57 And we did that.
    0:41:58 We want it to be on your counter front and center,
    0:42:01 and it should look good too.
    0:42:02 And so we’ve approached it from that angle.
    0:42:06 But we haven’t approached it as a fashion product.
    0:42:09 I mean, you know, with David’s tea, that was a big thing, right?
    0:42:11 Like it’s spring, summer, winter, fall.
    0:42:13 It’s like our new fall collection,
    0:42:15 our new spring collection.
    0:42:16 It’s pumpkin-less.
    0:42:17 It’s, well, no, like we don’t really think about tea that way.
    0:42:19 Like real tea drinkers drink tea every day.
    0:42:21 Like it’s fantastic.
    0:42:22 Like Fire Belly is a brand for tea drinkers,
    0:42:26 for people that really love it.
    0:42:27 And that’s what we’re servicing.
    0:42:28 What failures have you had that you cherish the most
    0:42:32 up until this point?
    0:42:34 It’s funny.
    0:42:34 You know, I don’t often think about my failures.
    0:42:37 They just become part of who I am as I go forward.
    0:42:42 But, you know, if you’re afraid to fail, forget it.
    0:42:46 Go get a job.
    0:42:47 Failure takes on many forms, right?
    0:42:48 There’s failure in that it just, like I failed.
    0:42:52 It didn’t work.
    0:42:53 I was a failure.
    0:42:54 And that happened to me when I started that fitting room
    0:42:56 company right out of college.
    0:42:58 And it straight up did not work.
    0:43:00 I had to hang my head down and lick my wounds and move on.
    0:43:04 And, you know, as is often the case in life,
    0:43:07 you have to go down in order to go up a lot of the time.
    0:43:09 And I had to do that in that case.
    0:43:12 And I had to, it humbles you, I think.
    0:43:15 And I wore that one in a big way, you know,
    0:43:17 especially at a time in life where everybody’s trying to flex
    0:43:21 in their advancement in their career, right?
    0:43:23 It’s young professionals.
    0:43:24 Here I was with this major failure right out of the gate.
    0:43:28 And failure can also be in the form of it’s taking too long.
    0:43:32 I think we often don’t think of that as failure,
    0:43:34 but like Mad radish, which is a healthy fast food concept
    0:43:37 I have in Canada, you know, we were,
    0:43:40 we had figured it out for the lunch market.
    0:43:43 And we were accelerating in five day week office stores.
    0:43:45 And then the pandemic came.
    0:43:47 And we almost went out of business.
    0:43:48 And we were failing in a big way.
    0:43:50 And I had invested way more money than I thought I would have to.
    0:43:55 And it had taken far longer than I thought it would.
    0:43:58 But it wasn’t working.
    0:44:00 And I almost stopped.
    0:44:01 And we almost said, you know what,
    0:44:02 let’s sell it for 10 cents on the dollar and move on.
    0:44:05 But we didn’t.
    0:44:06 And we stuck with it.
    0:44:08 And now it’s in a much better place.
    0:44:09 And we got better at the dinner menu.
    0:44:12 We developed a two day part menu.
    0:44:14 So we got really good at the nuances of that business, right?
    0:44:17 And we did that through failures.
    0:44:19 I mean, we just, we kept failing.
    0:44:20 We failed on menu development.
    0:44:22 We failed on real estate.
    0:44:23 We took bad stores.
    0:44:24 We figured out what not to do
    0:44:26 to the point where here we are today.
    0:44:28 And I’m very fortunate.
    0:44:29 I have a couple of partners in that business.
    0:44:32 One of whom is the CEO of the company.
    0:44:33 He’s doing an incredible job.
    0:44:34 I was the CEO of the business.
    0:44:36 And then when I started Fire Belly and I realized
    0:44:39 T is really where I wanted to go back to.
    0:44:42 He took over.
    0:44:43 He was our head of operations.
    0:44:44 And he’s done an incredible job.
    0:44:46 And now the business is starting to grow again.
    0:44:48 And we’ve become, I think, the number one player in Canada
    0:44:51 for healthy fast food.
    0:44:52 And I’m really excited about the growth there.
    0:44:54 But we, I mean, we failed.
    0:44:56 I mean, there was, you know, we failed.
    0:44:57 And we failed.
    0:44:58 And we failed.
    0:44:58 And we failed until finally we started to succeed.
    0:45:01 I mean, it’s a great expression.
    0:45:03 A story told by one of our guests on Big Shot.
    0:45:06 His name is Peter Mays, an activist investor.
    0:45:07 He was Nelson Pelts’ partner.
    0:45:10 He tells a story about going around
    0:45:11 and trying to market his first company
    0:45:14 and getting a valuation that was far below what they wanted.
    0:45:17 And they’re yelling at the investment bankers.
    0:45:19 And we just did this whole road show,
    0:45:20 “What do you mean it’s not worth X?”
    0:45:22 And the guy goes, “Kid, you can’t make chicken salad
    0:45:26 out of chicken shit.”
    0:45:27 And sometimes that’s actually what you have to do.
    0:45:31 You have to make chicken salad out of chicken shit.
    0:45:33 And that takes time.
    0:45:34 And you have to fail.
    0:45:34 You have to be honest about the fact
    0:45:36 that you have chicken shit right now
    0:45:37 and really work on somehow turning it into chicken salad.
    0:45:41 And so I’ve had to do that a lot.
    0:45:43 I mean, and even David Stee, you know, it was a success,
    0:45:46 but a big success.
    0:45:47 But then it faltered several times along the way.
    0:45:50 And then when I left, I mean, it fell apart.
    0:45:54 You know, I mean, I sold my stake in it in 2016.
    0:45:57 And, you know, today it’s worth a fraction of what it was.
    0:46:02 And the market moved on and the company missed it.
    0:46:05 And it’s not easy.
    0:46:07 Business is really hard.
    0:46:09 And that’s why, you know, you have to be ready to keep showing up.
    0:46:12 And you really have to love the journey of it
    0:46:14 more than the end result.
    0:46:15 Because if all you want is that moment where you make the big score
    0:46:19 or you spike, you know, that moment you think you’re going to have
    0:46:22 where you spike the ball and you have that big score,
    0:46:24 well, I actually went through one of the biggest depressions
    0:46:26 in my life after I sold my stake in David Stee.
    0:46:30 I thought that’s what I was playing for.
    0:46:32 I thought I was playing for this big success where, you know,
    0:46:36 the other side of the rainbow.
    0:46:38 And it was great.
    0:46:38 I mean, I had financial independence for the first time in my life,
    0:46:41 but I lost my sense of purpose.
    0:46:44 And I had no plan.
    0:46:45 I didn’t think about the day after David Stee.
    0:46:47 I was so busy trying to build it.
    0:46:49 And we actually don’t talk about this a lot in entrepreneurship,
    0:46:52 which is, you know, the struggle is so difficult
    0:46:55 to get to a place where you’re successful.
    0:46:56 But what happens once you’re successful?
    0:46:58 And what if you do sell your company and now what, right?
    0:47:01 And how do you derive meaning in your life?
    0:47:03 And I mean, you’re not just going to go play shuffleboard
    0:47:05 when you’re, you know, 35 years old.
    0:47:07 I went to a dark place in my life.
    0:47:09 And I didn’t know what to do with myself.
    0:47:12 And it took me a while to reinvent myself
    0:47:14 and sort of tap back into the kid I was that, you know,
    0:47:18 that loved entrepreneurship and building businesses.
    0:47:20 And I did tap back into that.
    0:47:22 And that was a journey on its own.
    0:47:24 And in many ways, not preparing for life after David Stee was a failure.
    0:47:28 Did you recognize that you were depressed?
    0:47:31 How?
    0:47:31 Oh, yeah, I was really depressed.
    0:47:35 Like, I went through, you know, I don’t talk about this often,
    0:47:39 but I was in a really bad spot.
    0:47:41 And it was a weird thing.
    0:47:42 Like, I felt guilty about it because like, wow,
    0:47:44 what right do I have to be depressed?
    0:47:45 I just, I lived, I just had the dream that everybody plays for,
    0:47:48 which is an exit in a major company and financial independence.
    0:47:52 But I was very upset.
    0:47:55 I had some health issues.
    0:47:56 And it’s hard to know whether the health issues were from the depression
    0:47:59 or the stress of building it, or just, you know,
    0:48:02 what came first, the health issues of the depression.
    0:48:03 But no, I had to develop better habits in my lifestyle.
    0:48:08 I had to develop a better perspective on life.
    0:48:11 There was a lot of stress.
    0:48:13 There was a fair amount of internal fighting in the company
    0:48:16 between my original partners, the private equity group.
    0:48:19 It wasn’t an environment where everyone was just focused
    0:48:22 on the customer and adding value for the customer.
    0:48:23 And there was a bit too much in internal conflict,
    0:48:27 which is one of the reasons I felt it was time for me to move on.
    0:48:30 And I think I never had a chance to process all that and deal with that.
    0:48:34 And I had to really understand when it no longer becomes about the money,
    0:48:39 you really have to think about what you’re doing and why you’re doing it.
    0:48:42 You take away that factor that it allows you to drown out
    0:48:45 all the other things in life that are really important,
    0:48:48 like meaning and being able to really appreciate the journey.
    0:48:53 And I didn’t really understand those pieces of my life early on.
    0:48:58 It just became a singular focus where how can I build this and make money.
    0:49:02 What would you say to somebody who’s depressed right now?
    0:49:04 There is no shortcut for the work, period.
    0:49:09 There’s no magic pill.
    0:49:11 There’s no magic elixir.
    0:49:13 It’s about habits.
    0:49:15 You have to do things even when you don’t want to do them.
    0:49:17 I don’t know where I heard this story,
    0:49:20 but I think it was a guy who had survived the internment camps during the war
    0:49:24 and where they were being tortured.
    0:49:26 And he said that it was the people who lost hope that didn’t make it.
    0:49:33 It was the people that had hope, but not expectations that did, right?
    0:49:37 So they knew they’d get out of there, but they didn’t have an expectation on when.
    0:49:40 And I think depression is like that as well.
    0:49:44 You have to get up and go for that run, even though you don’t want to.
    0:49:48 Do that 20 minutes sit, breathing exercise, even though you don’t want to.
    0:49:53 Work on your eating habits or your rituals, whatever they may be.
    0:49:58 And it’s all kinds of different rituals in your life.
    0:50:02 It’s important to develop.
    0:50:03 I’m using the word ritual loosely here.
    0:50:05 Routines, habits, whatever you want to call them.
    0:50:07 When you’re in a dark place, they’re even more important.
    0:50:11 I mean, it’s really easy when you’ve had 10 hours of sleep
    0:50:14 and the sun is shining and it’s warm outside.
    0:50:17 It’s really easy to go for that run or put on that smile or whatever it is.
    0:50:22 That’s where it’s easy.
    0:50:24 Where it’s hard is when you had six hours of sleep
    0:50:28 and you’re not feeling great and you’re feeling sluggish.
    0:50:30 And that’s actually when you need to do it.
    0:50:33 The doing is what matters.
    0:50:34 And life just is like that.
    0:50:37 And I learned that from my father.
    0:50:40 I mean, he got up early and stayed late and put in the work.
    0:50:44 And there is no substitute for the work.
    0:50:46 I don’t know how smart you are.
    0:50:47 You have to put in the work.
    0:50:49 It’s so interesting because the parallels between sort of depression
    0:50:52 and being successful at your job, your career, life,
    0:50:56 they map each other, right?
    0:50:58 Which is like you have to do it when you don’t feel like it.
    0:51:01 And that’s when it matters the most.
    0:51:02 And you sort of have to have that will
    0:51:05 because everybody loses the battle with willpower.
    0:51:07 The routines, the rituals, they carry you through
    0:51:10 when you don’t feel like doing it.
    0:51:11 It’s like, I don’t feel like going on the Peloton today,
    0:51:14 but I do it every day.
    0:51:15 So I have to get on and go.
    0:51:16 And make every day day one.
    0:51:18 We have a habit of beating ourselves up, right?
    0:51:20 Like the idea of being compassionate with yourself
    0:51:22 is really important.
    0:51:24 You miss a day.
    0:51:25 So what?
    0:51:25 Like in meditation, it’s come back to the breath,
    0:51:29 come back to the breath.
    0:51:30 And we call it rabbit holes.
    0:51:31 You go down a rabbit hole where you have these
    0:51:34 almost like blackout moments
    0:51:35 where your mind just carries you in a thought.
    0:51:37 And when you first start meditating,
    0:51:38 most people when they first start meditating,
    0:51:40 they do the same thing.
    0:51:40 They sit down for 20 minutes.
    0:51:42 But don’t do that.
    0:51:43 Sit down for like three minutes or four minutes or five minutes.
    0:51:45 Like build up, right?
    0:51:46 You’re building a muscle.
    0:51:47 You’re building that focus muscle.
    0:51:49 But when we have these sort of blackout moments
    0:51:51 in meditation where our mind wanders
    0:51:52 and we don’t even know where it goes,
    0:51:54 and then all of a sudden we come back and we’re like,
    0:51:55 oh yeah, I wasn’t focused on my breathing
    0:51:57 or whatever visceral exercise I had.
    0:51:59 We have a tendency to beat ourselves up.
    0:52:01 You’re like, oh, I can’t believe I could.
    0:52:02 You know, you do it mentally.
    0:52:03 And we’re human.
    0:52:05 You’re going to make mistakes.
    0:52:06 Like you don’t have to always get it right.
    0:52:08 You’re allowed to slip up.
    0:52:10 But just keep restarting.
    0:52:11 There is no moment in life
    0:52:13 where everything’s just perfect.
    0:52:15 Like life is dynamic.
    0:52:16 It’s not static, right?
    0:52:18 It’s you’re always renegotiating with yourself.
    0:52:20 And it is an ever-changing thing.
    0:52:22 And I think it’s just how do you work on
    0:52:25 bringing the right attitudes into it each and every day?
    0:52:30 I want to go back to 2016.
    0:52:32 You get this fairly big payday.
    0:52:34 Yeah.
    0:52:35 What are the lessons that you wish you knew then
    0:52:38 about money that you know now?
    0:52:40 First of all, money doesn’t buy meaning.
    0:52:46 Number one, money can help facilitate a lot of things.
    0:52:49 But you have to know who you are and what you want.
    0:52:53 That’s really, really important.
    0:52:54 And that has nothing to do with money.
    0:52:56 Buying nice things is going to be fleeting.
    0:52:59 I think we all know this intuitively.
    0:53:01 And yet so many people do this.
    0:53:04 And I’m not saying don’t buy nice things.
    0:53:05 It’s always nice to buy nice things.
    0:53:06 But it’s important to understand that in and of itself
    0:53:09 is not going to give you meaning a really nice car,
    0:53:12 a nice watch, or a nice house, or whatever.
    0:53:14 It’s going to be cool for a minute.
    0:53:16 But eventually it’s going to go away.
    0:53:18 I think I once heard this from a friend.
    0:53:21 You know, the secret to life is something to do,
    0:53:24 someone to love, and something to look forward to.
    0:53:26 Money can help facilitate parts of that,
    0:53:29 especially with something to look forward to.
    0:53:31 But you have to tap in the deeper meaning on what it is,
    0:53:35 what gets you excited on an ongoing basis.
    0:53:37 For me, it’s building businesses.
    0:53:39 But I wish coming out of that experience
    0:53:40 of making money and becoming financially independent,
    0:53:43 I wish I’d taken a little bit more time
    0:53:45 to think about how I wanted to do that
    0:53:48 and where I wanted to do that.
    0:53:50 I think I was a bit too…
    0:53:51 I felt I needed to get back in the game very quickly.
    0:53:54 I think I set an artificial timeline.
    0:53:57 Like I think sometimes we set these artificial timelines
    0:53:59 with ourselves.
    0:54:00 And it’s at least in my case, it was my ego.
    0:54:03 I felt I had to be back in or I was going to be a one hit wonder.
    0:54:07 You know, and I mean, all that’s BS.
    0:54:10 I mean, there is no one way.
    0:54:13 There is no one story.
    0:54:14 I’m now in my early 40s.
    0:54:17 And we love telling ourselves the stories of people
    0:54:19 that validate our narratives, right?
    0:54:21 Like, so I’m like, oh, Sam Walton didn’t start till he was in his 40s.
    0:54:24 Or like, you know, Warren Buffett made most of his money after ’55.
    0:54:27 I mean, all of these things are just ways of telling ourselves
    0:54:31 that we have more life ahead of us.
    0:54:32 And the truth is we do.
    0:54:34 And there is no one way.
    0:54:35 You can always find a story that validates your narrative.
    0:54:38 I think in some ways that’s kind of healthy.
    0:54:40 And now that I think about it now, you know,
    0:54:43 I think, you know, you want to continue to reinvent yourself and not think
    0:54:47 of yourself as too old or, you know, now I have these two businesses
    0:54:51 that are growing and I’m like, oh, I need to grow them fast
    0:54:53 because I only have this many good years.
    0:54:56 I’m entering my prime and it’s like, well, are you?
    0:54:58 I mean, what, you know, who’s to say?
    0:55:00 I mean, they’re endless stories of people that do it in their 50s, 60s, 70s.
    0:55:04 I mean, some in their 80s, right?
    0:55:05 So I think all of that, everybody’s unique.
    0:55:08 And I think it’s really important to forget about, you know,
    0:55:13 if you’re playing for validation from others or you’re playing for external success,
    0:55:18 you’re never going to have the full fulfillment that you get from your achievements in life.
    0:55:27 And I don’t know that I’ve entirely overcome that external validation.
    0:55:31 I don’t think I have, but I certainly work towards it
    0:55:35 and really focus a lot more on internal validation.
    0:55:37 I think coming out of David’s tee, I wish I had, coming out of a big financial score,
    0:55:42 but having not done a lot of the work to understand myself
    0:55:46 and what I really wanted out of life, I wish I had been more prepared for that.
    0:55:50 First thing I would have done, I would have gotten a nice office.
    0:55:52 You know, I didn’t have that.
    0:55:54 I stopped and I didn’t have any, I didn’t know where to go in the mornings, right?
    0:55:58 I went from having this big office with a hundred plus people who, you know,
    0:56:03 with my name on the door and I’d walk in and I was important, right?
    0:56:06 Like, and then the next day I’m out and, you know, I’m waking up and now what?
    0:56:12 And no one’s running up to me anymore and I’m not in this nice office.
    0:56:15 And so I think the first thing I would have done,
    0:56:17 I would have gotten a really nice office.
    0:56:18 I would have, I think I would have consulted with a lot more people
    0:56:21 that had been through that experience of having sold their company.
    0:56:25 I wasn’t very thoughtful about that.
    0:56:26 And in retrospect, I mean, it took me a little longer
    0:56:31 and I became more thoughtful about it over time.
    0:56:33 But by the time I became more thoughtful about it, I’d already jumped into other things.
    0:56:37 And those, of course, take up your entire focus.
    0:56:39 Because once you’re in the game of building a business again,
    0:56:43 you know, you’re trying to manage the swings of the game
    0:56:45 and you’re trying to go on a run where you grow.
    0:56:47 And so you go right back into it, into the doing versus the reflecting.
    0:56:52 You mentioned Warren Buffett.
    0:56:54 I know you’re a fan.
    0:56:54 What are some of the lessons you’ve taken away from him over the years?
    0:56:58 The first one is, I wish I had this superpower.
    0:57:02 Here’s a guy who can make very few decisions
    0:57:06 but make them with so much conviction.
    0:57:09 And then live in Omaha, Nebraska, and like go sit in a fishing boat
    0:57:14 while the world goes on around him.
    0:57:15 I mean, you know, talk about being able to overcome the action bias.
    0:57:20 I just think that’s incredible.
    0:57:21 I mean, a lot of things we’re talking about here today
    0:57:24 where how do you get to a place where you have internal validation
    0:57:27 and you kind of don’t care what others think.
    0:57:30 I mean, very few of us can say that we don’t care about what others think.
    0:57:34 I think he’s one of them.
    0:57:36 He really is one of them.
    0:57:38 I first read about Warren Buffett at the start of David’s Tea.
    0:57:41 I was telling you the story.
    0:57:43 I think it was Buffetology actually.
    0:57:44 I think his daughter-in-law wrote it.
    0:57:47 So that was, I mean, we’re going back now 20 years, right?
    0:57:50 And since that time, I’ve seen him go through waves
    0:57:53 where the world thought he was a dinosaur, right?
    0:57:56 Like when he bought Kraft and when the tech was really booming,
    0:57:59 everybody’s like, or Bitcoin was super hot, right?
    0:58:01 Everyone’s like, oh, this guy’s a dinosaur.
    0:58:03 He’s out. He doesn’t know anything.
    0:58:04 Well, turns out he’s not.
    0:58:06 Then he turns around.
    0:58:06 He buys the Japanese trading houses at $0.10 on the dollar.
    0:58:10 He makes another brilliant move.
    0:58:12 And you’re just like, wow, he’s done it again.
    0:58:14 I mean, I think before 2008, he was another period in 2006, 2007,
    0:58:20 leading up to where he looked like a dinosaur.
    0:58:22 And then, bang, he’s saving the financial world in America
    0:58:25 and making these investments in golden sacks.
    0:58:26 And so I think what I admire about the guy is we have all these sayings in life,
    0:58:33 like play the long game or learn how to sit with something.
    0:58:37 And it’s really hard to do those things, right?
    0:58:38 Like it’s all easier said than done.
    0:58:40 And I think he’s managed to be able to do them.
    0:58:42 And also, the other thing I admire about Warren Buffett
    0:58:46 is being able to express complex things in simple terms.
    0:58:50 It’s like the Mark Twain saying, I’m sorry I wrote you such a long letter.
    0:58:53 I didn’t have the time to write your short one.
    0:58:55 When I was going to McGill, I went into management
    0:58:58 and I realized very early on that I didn’t know how to write.
    0:59:01 I was a terrible writer.
    0:59:02 It’s sort of a lost art form.
    0:59:04 And I want to learn how to write.
    0:59:05 So I went into English Lit at McGill.
    0:59:08 And I ended up minoring in English Lit.
    0:59:10 It was Serendipitous because I met my wife in English Lit.
    0:59:12 And but I also learned how to write.
    0:59:14 I wrote for the McGill Daily newspaper.
    0:59:16 And I really wanted to turn what was a weakness for me into a strength.
    0:59:20 And I became an above average writer.
    0:59:22 I’m no Mark Twain.
    0:59:26 But I’d like to think I can write a decently persuasive email or letter.
    0:59:30 And I think that’s a really important skill set.
    0:59:32 And where that comes in particularly helpful
    0:59:35 is how do you express a complex idea in simple terms.
    0:59:38 And no one does this better than Warren Buffett.
    0:59:41 I mean, you read his annual shareholder letters.
    0:59:44 And he does such a good job taking–
    0:59:46 I mean, something as complicated as the energy industry
    0:59:49 or the railroad business and distilling it
    0:59:52 into a few timeless principles.
    0:59:54 And he does this with investing as a whole, right?
    0:59:56 He teaches us how to have a perspective on investment
    1:00:00 and on investing that will sustain you through a lifetime.
    1:00:04 I wish I had his patience.
    1:00:05 I never will.
    1:00:06 It’s just not who I am.
    1:00:07 I think one of the differentiating factors for him
    1:00:09 is how rarely he actually moves on something and makes decisions.
    1:00:14 He sits on things longer than most.
    1:00:17 And I think that’s a rare quality.
    1:00:18 How do you fit everything in?
    1:00:20 I mean, you have an incredible wife.
    1:00:22 You have three kids, two businesses that you’re running.
    1:00:26 Yeah.
    1:00:26 And a podcast that’s growing.
    1:00:27 A podcast that’s growing.
    1:00:28 Yeah.
    1:00:29 I think a couple of things.
    1:00:30 You know, I think getting up early is really important.
    1:00:33 I don’t really know many extremely successful people
    1:00:35 who don’t get up early.
    1:00:36 I like to work out in the mornings.
    1:00:38 I like to turn my phone off at a certain point in the evening.
    1:00:41 And I know this is going to sound really weird.
    1:00:43 But I actually–
    1:00:44 I bought this thing that I can put my phone in that locks it.
    1:00:47 It’s like a little cubby from my phone.
    1:00:49 And I put it in now around 9, 9.30.
    1:00:52 And it’s locked.
    1:00:53 And of course, at first I was like, wow,
    1:00:54 what if my parents are a bit older?
    1:00:57 What if something happens or I need it?
    1:00:58 And I said, well, you know, my wife has a phone.
    1:01:00 I have my computer.
    1:01:01 It’s not like there’s other ways I can check if I need to.
    1:01:04 But this allows me from sort of–
    1:01:06 I used to go on social and just sort of numb out.
    1:01:09 And a half hour ago by, and I’m like, what am I doing?
    1:01:11 I just wasted a half hour in my life
    1:01:13 numbing out on social.
    1:01:14 With my kids, can I be present reading my son, Harry Potter,
    1:01:18 who’s seven years old and just starting to get into that?
    1:01:21 Can I take one of my daughters out for a tea
    1:01:26 and be able to just listen to them talk about their science
    1:01:29 fair or their gymnastics or whatever it is they’re into?
    1:01:32 It doesn’t take much.
    1:01:34 I’m not religious at all.
    1:01:35 But I think there’s enormous wisdom in the concept of the Sabbath.
    1:01:41 I think it’s just an incredible concept, right?
    1:01:43 Like, what is that?
    1:01:44 So the Sabbath is a Jewish, you know, it’s called Shabbat.
    1:01:48 It’s in Judaism.
    1:01:50 It’s this idea of from Friday night, sundown
    1:01:53 to Saturday night, sundown.
    1:01:55 You don’t work.
    1:01:56 Now, what does that mean today?
    1:01:59 I’ve sort of evolved it to my own personal.
    1:02:02 Like I say, I’m not religious.
    1:02:04 But I think there are principles in there
    1:02:06 that have helped me a lot.
    1:02:08 So I still will work on a Saturday morning sometimes.
    1:02:12 But I won’t.
    1:02:14 I like to come out with a different mindset.
    1:02:16 For some reason, I’ve found a way to take the edge off
    1:02:19 on the Friday night to Saturday night.
    1:02:20 And I think of that as my relaxed time.
    1:02:23 And if I’m working, it’ll be more reading or taking notes
    1:02:26 or reflective emails on my laptop.
    1:02:28 I don’t, you know, there’s working in the business
    1:02:30 and working on the business.
    1:02:32 I like to take my weekends if I’m going to work
    1:02:34 to work on the business and not in the business.
    1:02:36 I really make sure I take time for my kids
    1:02:38 and my wife on the weekends.
    1:02:40 I mean, I make it a point to go out with my wife
    1:02:42 for a date night at least once a week.
    1:02:43 Usually on the weekends, we go for dinner together.
    1:02:46 We take a fair amount of trips.
    1:02:48 I think that’s also really important.
    1:02:50 I like to get away.
    1:02:51 But yeah, I sort of have started to bring a different mindset
    1:02:55 from my Friday night to Saturday night.
    1:02:57 And then Sunday, you start to ramp up again, right?
    1:02:59 Like you sort of gear up for the battle.
    1:03:01 But Monday to Friday, it’s intense.
    1:03:04 Like I’m an intense guy.
    1:03:05 I just am.
    1:03:06 There’s no way to, for better or for worse, is who I am.
    1:03:09 And I go out at heart and I wear my heart on my sleeve
    1:03:12 and I work very, very hard.
    1:03:14 I’m present with my family during the week,
    1:03:16 but for very short periods of time.
    1:03:18 And I’m certainly more present on the weekends
    1:03:20 than on holidays.
    1:03:21 Like I was saying, there’s no substitute for the work.
    1:03:23 You have to operate with a certain level of intensity
    1:03:27 in order to get things done.
    1:03:28 And I work late into the night.
    1:03:30 I work up until about eight or nine o’clock.
    1:03:32 I usually either read a bit or watch a bit of TV
    1:03:34 with my wife and read to one of my kids before bed
    1:03:38 and go to bed and try and get as much sleep
    1:03:40 so I can get up and do it all over again.
    1:03:41 Do you think that’s sort of the biggest missed opportunity
    1:03:44 that people have is like when they stay up late
    1:03:46 because you go to bed early, you wake up early.
    1:03:49 But it’s that like, you know, I don’t know, 9.30 to 11.30.
    1:03:53 Yes.
    1:03:53 You don’t really get anything done.
    1:03:54 You end up scrolling, watching TV.
    1:03:56 Totally.
    1:03:57 But if you get up, if you go to bed at 9.30
    1:03:59 and you get up at five, you’re like ready to go.
    1:04:02 You’re intense.
    1:04:03 Thousand percent.
    1:04:04 Yeah.
    1:04:04 I think that’s the biggest, least productive,
    1:04:08 most dangerous time for our mental state of the day.
    1:04:12 And usually I find it’s also the time of day
    1:04:15 where I’m the most worried about my future, about the business.
    1:04:20 I’m usually the most down on, you know, I’m in a depressive state.
    1:04:24 I’m sort of like, oh, it’s not working.
    1:04:26 Things aren’t going my well.
    1:04:27 I wish this.
    1:04:28 I wish that.
    1:04:28 You know, and I’m sort of down on myself.
    1:04:31 And it’s important to be like, you know,
    1:04:34 more and more I try and distance myself
    1:04:36 and be able to be the observer rather than the participant and not
    1:04:38 and be like, okay, well, like, you’re just tired.
    1:04:41 Like you’re just tired.
    1:04:42 You know, it’s like with kids when you’re like, okay, you’re tired.
    1:04:45 Yeah.
    1:04:45 It’s no different with adults, right?
    1:04:46 Like you’re just tired, like go to bed, call it.
    1:04:48 It’s over, day’s over.
    1:04:50 You know, tomorrow’s another day, go to bed.
    1:04:52 I feel that.
    1:04:53 What’s missing most in life right now?
    1:04:55 That’s a tough question.
    1:04:57 I cheated before this interview and looked at your notes
    1:04:59 and I saw that question and I wasn’t sure how to answer it.
    1:05:03 And I’m still not.
    1:05:05 I think it’s a really difficult question to answer.
    1:05:07 I think the answer is nothing.
    1:05:09 There are lots of things that I want,
    1:05:12 but there are a few things that I truly need that I don’t have right now.
    1:05:15 I think what’s missing is just more, more life, more embracing the journey,
    1:05:21 more being able to take it all in without feeling less than like a,
    1:05:28 you know, like a failure, more being able to just appreciate all the good
    1:05:32 that’s in life versus constantly persevering on what’s difficult or missing or bad.
    1:05:41 Life is short and it should be celebrated.
    1:05:46 It should be elevated.
    1:05:48 And I think there are lots of things I want to do and accomplish.
    1:05:52 I mean, I definitely sit down once a year and I write out goals
    1:05:56 and I write out one-year goals and three-year goals and 10-year goals.
    1:06:00 And but then I kind of like to say to myself and let’s say I achieve none of them,
    1:06:07 right?
    1:06:07 Because you always have that sort of fear.
    1:06:09 Like, what if it doesn’t work?
    1:06:10 What if I can’t?
    1:06:11 What if I’m not that good at this and what if I can’t, right?
    1:06:13 And so what?
    1:06:14 I got three healthy kids.
    1:06:15 I got a great marriage.
    1:06:19 I’ve made enough money.
    1:06:20 I’ve, you know, and so what?
    1:06:22 And I know that sitting here, it’s easy for me to say that a lot, you know,
    1:06:26 but it’s all relative, right?
    1:06:27 You have to remember that’s all relative.
    1:06:28 Like, there’s always somebody who has more and there’s always somebody who has less.
    1:06:31 And that’s true no matter where you are.
    1:06:33 You know, but the truth is, like, I was just as happy
    1:06:35 in that base room apartment in Montreal as I am now.
    1:06:40 You know, so much has changed in my life, but at the same time,
    1:06:43 the real changes, the real things have brought true happiness.
    1:06:46 We’re the personal developments.
    1:06:48 We’re my ability to connect with my wife on a deeper level.
    1:06:51 We’re my ability to truly enjoy and appreciate my kids.
    1:06:56 I think we’re all kind of playing for that no regret old age rocking chair moment.
    1:07:02 At least I sort of use that as a yardstick.
    1:07:06 Be like, well, is this going to matter in my rocking chair?
    1:07:09 And of course, life has many twists and turns.
    1:07:12 And who’s to say you’ll ever be in a rocking chair?
    1:07:14 I mean, it’s, I think it’s just more the sentiment than the reality.
    1:07:17 But I think that thinking about the question, what’s missing in your life,
    1:07:21 you know, the answer is always perspective.
    1:07:24 You have to decide what narrative you want to live.
    1:07:27 Right? Like you don’t get to choose.
    1:07:29 A lot of things in life are completely out of your control.
    1:07:32 But how you think about things and the narrative that you go through life with is in your control.
    1:07:37 You know, everybody could say, well, your pain is not as big as my pain,
    1:07:40 or your hardships aren’t as big as my hardships, but it’s all relative.
    1:07:42 I mean, pain is pain and hardship is hardship.
    1:07:45 And yes, some are worse than others.
    1:07:47 But by and large, we all have things that we need to overcome.
    1:07:49 And I just think that that really it’s doing the hard work to try
    1:07:54 and how can you continue to sharpen your perspective and your narratives
    1:07:58 and that you can celebrate life and get the most out of it?
    1:08:00 I like that because you’re choosing more to focus, right?
    1:08:03 You choose your focus. You really do.
    1:08:05 And that’s something, it needs to be practiced.
    1:08:07 It’s not something you can’t just tomorrow.
    1:08:09 I think it’s hard to wake up tomorrow and be like,
    1:08:11 I’m going to have a positive mindset about everything.
    1:08:12 Well, you’re not like, you know, if you’ve gone through your life
    1:08:14 having a negative mindset about everything,
    1:08:16 you’re not going to be able to do that in one day.
    1:08:18 And probably not in one year and probably not in five years, frankly.
    1:08:22 But how do you take one step forward in that journey towards
    1:08:25 having a better perspective and being able to enjoy life more
    1:08:30 and celebrate all the good that’s in your life
    1:08:32 and not just focus on all the things that are not what you want to be?
    1:08:36 We always end with the same question, I guess.
    1:08:38 Think of it as the rocking chair question now.
    1:08:41 The rocking chair question?
    1:08:42 Which is, what is success for you?
    1:08:43 What do you want to be sitting there looking back on?
    1:08:46 And you’d be like, that’s success.
    1:08:48 When I was a little boy, my father used to say to me,
    1:08:51 he’d say, David, you’re like an eight-cylinder engine
    1:08:53 operating on two cylinders.
    1:08:54 And I didn’t really know what he meant by that.
    1:08:58 I didn’t know the world.
    1:08:59 I didn’t know it was out there.
    1:09:00 I didn’t know all the possibilities.
    1:09:02 But the more I go through life,
    1:09:04 the more I realize that for me is very important.
    1:09:08 I don’t want to ever look back
    1:09:09 and feel like I didn’t use all eight cylinders.
    1:09:12 And I think that applies to everybody.
    1:09:13 I don’t want to feel that I didn’t tap into my full potential.
    1:09:18 I don’t know what that is right now.
    1:09:19 I can’t tell you.
    1:09:20 We all have a certain level that we’re going to reach.
    1:09:23 You know, not everyone’s Michael Jordan,
    1:09:25 and not everyone’s going to be the Warren Buffett
    1:09:28 or the CEO or the president or whatever.
    1:09:30 Right?
    1:09:30 And I don’t think that matters.
    1:09:31 I actually think what’s far more important is,
    1:09:33 did I self-actualize all eight cylinders
    1:09:38 that I was able to self-actualize?
    1:09:42 Did I tap into my full engine?
    1:09:44 Hopefully one day on my rocking chair,
    1:09:46 as the rocking chair question,
    1:09:48 I’m able to say I did that.
    1:09:50 I didn’t shortchange myself.
    1:09:52 I didn’t not show up for myself.
    1:09:56 Thank you so much.
    1:09:57 This has been awesome.
    1:09:58 Thanks, Shane.
    1:09:58 This is great.
    1:09:59 Appreciate it.
    1:09:59 Thanks for having me.
    1:10:00 Recently, I’ve started to record my reflections
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    1:10:06 I sit down, highlight the key moments that stood out for me,
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    1:10:15 that I maybe haven’t quite figured out.
    1:10:17 This is available to supporting members
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    (00:00) Intro

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  • #191 Dr. Rhonda Patrick: Diet Essentials For Healthy Living

    AI transcript
    0:00:00 I did my post-doc training in nutrition and specifically looking at micronutrients.
    0:00:05 So these are about 40 or so essential vitamins and minerals. And these micronutrients are running
    0:00:12 our metabolism, they’re running everything, our neurotransmitters that we’re producing,
    0:00:18 so our cognition, just absolutely everything that is going on in our bodies. So when you think about
    0:00:24 the micronutrients that you need in your diet, it makes it a little bit easier to think about what
    0:00:29 you should be eating.
    0:00:34 Welcome to The Knowledge Project, a podcast about mastering the best of what other people have
    0:00:52 already figured out so you can apply their insights to your life. I’m your host, Shane Parish.
    0:00:59 If you’re listening to this, you’re missing out. If you’d like access to the podcast before
    0:01:03 everyone else, special episodes just for you, hand-edited transcripts, or you just want to
    0:01:08 support the show you love, join at fs.blog/membership. Check out the show notes for a link.
    0:01:14 Today my guest is Rhonda Patrick, a research scientist with expertise in the areas of aging,
    0:01:22 cancer, and nutrition. I first came across her work years ago and a friend of mine sent me this
    0:01:28 mammoth article she posted online on the benefits of Asana. In fact, this is the reason I started
    0:01:35 Asana. Our main focus in this conversation is lifestyle habits that reduce biological aging,
    0:01:41 improve health span, and improve our cognition. We cover a framework for approaching nutrition
    0:01:46 and decisions about food, as well as a deep dive into vitamin D, sun, sunscreen, and hot exposure.
    0:01:55 It’s time to listen and learn!
    0:01:57 If you’re on the road, you have a license plate. But not every license plate supports our provincial
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    0:02:30 A message from the government of British Columbia. Hear that, Cotopounder fans?
    0:02:35 That silence has two friends enjoying the new creamy Parmesan and bacon Cotopounder McDonald’s.
    0:02:42 Because adding crispy bacon and creamy Parmesan sauce to our 100% Canadian beef
    0:02:49 makes it impossible to have a conversation. Try the new creamy Parmesan and bacon Cotopounder
    0:02:57 today and discover how words are so unnecessary for a limited time only participating with
    0:03:02 McDonald’s restaurants in Canada. When I was thinking about where to start, I think the best
    0:03:07 place to start is to give people practical frameworks for approaching topics that we come
    0:03:13 across every day. So why don’t we start with a practical framework for approaching nutrition
    0:03:19 and decisions about the food that we consume? I kind of have my own framework for approaching
    0:03:26 nutrition in it. It has a lot to do with, I did my postdoc training in nutrition and specifically
    0:03:35 looking at micronutrients. So these are about 40 or so essential vitamins and minerals that
    0:03:42 fatty acids also and amino acids that we have to get from our diet. Those are in a variety of foods
    0:03:48 and different foods have different levels and quantities of them. And these micronutrients
    0:03:52 are running our metabolism, they’re running everything, our neurotransmitters that we’re
    0:03:58 producing, so our cognition, just absolutely everything that is going on in our bodies. So
    0:04:04 it’s important to get them because if we don’t get them, we can have deficiencies or insufficiencies,
    0:04:10 which is quite worse because insufficiencies are kind of something that you don’t notice every day,
    0:04:16 but there’s like insidious types of damage just happening each and every day. And it accumulates
    0:04:23 over time and plays a role in age-related diseases like cancer and neurodegenerative disease. So
    0:04:28 these micronutrients are things like calcium, magnesium, vitamin K, vitamin D, which I’m
    0:04:37 sure we’ll talk about is actually something you can mostly get from the sun, omega 3. And so when
    0:04:43 you think about the micronutrients that you need in your diet, it makes it a little bit easier to
    0:04:48 think about what you should be eating. Well, let’s start with some of the most common deficiencies
    0:04:54 in micronutrients. We have magnesium, so almost half of the US population, they get insufficient
    0:05:01 magnesium intake. Magnesium is at the center of a chlorophyll molecule, so chlorophyll gives plants
    0:05:08 their green color. So it’s really easy to think about foods you should eat to get magnesium. You
    0:05:13 should be eating greens, particularly dark, leafy greens. Well, greens are also very high in vitamin
    0:05:19 K. And vitamin K1, there’s two forms, vitamin K1, vitamin K1 is essential for all your blood
    0:05:27 clotting processes. So you’re like, in order to like have your blood clotting, which is important,
    0:05:31 you know, if you have a cut or something, you know, an injury, you want that clotting to happen
    0:05:36 so that you don’t have like a hemorrhage, right? So vitamin K is also, you know, high in leafy greens.
    0:05:42 You can also get calcium as well from greens. So that’s really an easy way to kind of think about
    0:05:47 greens. The other way, the other thing is omega 3s, right? So omega 3s are very high in
    0:05:54 fatty fish. So this would be wild Alaskan salmon or cod or mackerel sardines, like these are good
    0:06:01 forms of fish that have the marine types of omega 3. So that would be DHA and EPA.
    0:06:07 Those are very important for a lot of functions, including brain health and cardiovascular health.
    0:06:12 And a lot of work has been done by Bill Harris and his group at the Fatty Acid Research Institute.
    0:06:20 And they look at the omega 3 index, which is a way you can actually quantify your omega 3 levels.
    0:06:27 And that’s really good to be able to quantify something, because if you don’t quantify it,
    0:06:31 you don’t really know if you are getting enough of it, right? So the omega 3 index is they’re
    0:06:36 characterizing it from red blood cells, which is different than a lot of other ways of measuring
    0:06:41 omega 3, like for example, plasma omega 3, which is basically kind of reflective of your dietary
    0:06:47 intake the last week or so. The red blood cell or the omega 3 index is more of a long term status.
    0:06:53 So it’s like 120 days for a red blood cell to turn over. So the omega 3 index is a good marker
    0:06:59 of your omega 3 status. People that have a high omega 3 index, and that would be 8% or more,
    0:07:06 have a five year increased life expectancy compared to people with a lower omega 3 index,
    0:07:14 which is more like 4%. Now people in the United States on average have about an omega 3 index
    0:07:20 of about 5%. And you compare that to, for example, countries like Japan, where they eat a lot of
    0:07:25 seafood, their omega 3 index is around 10%. There’s been tons of studies looking at omega 3 index
    0:07:31 and life expectancy. And there’s been also like data where they stratify like looking at, you know,
    0:07:38 for example, and this I like talking about this, because I think it really puts in perspective
    0:07:42 the framework of nutrition and thinking about instead of focusing on what to avoid,
    0:07:47 focusing on what you need, because if you focus on what you need, then it’s obvious what you don’t
    0:07:52 need, right? There’s no nutritional value in processed foods. You’re not getting micronutrients,
    0:07:57 you’re getting calories, you’re not getting protein, you’re not getting things that you need.
    0:08:01 So smoking is something that everyone knows is bad. You should avoid smoking, right? It’s,
    0:08:07 you know, heart disease, cancer, you’re going to have a decreased life expectancy,
    0:08:11 emphysema, all kinds of problems, right? What Bill Harris’s group had done has,
    0:08:16 they looked at life expectancy of smokers and non-smokers, and then they categorized
    0:08:22 their omega 3 index. And if you look at this data, it’s just mind-blowing. So obviously,
    0:08:30 non-smokers that have a high omega 3 index of 8% or more have the highest life expectancy.
    0:08:37 And the lowest life expectancy is smokers with a low omega 3 index. So that’s the worst of the
    0:08:44 worst. But when you look at smokers with a high omega 3 index, they have the same life expectancy
    0:08:53 as non-smokers with a low omega 3 index. In other words, having a low omega 3 index was
    0:09:00 like smoking. And when I say the life expectancy, if you look at the graph in the publication,
    0:09:06 the curves like overlay perfectly. It’s kind of freakish where you’re like, whoa, like the people
    0:09:12 that are smoking, but they’re getting a lot of omega 3 have the same life expectancy of these
    0:09:17 people that don’t smoke, but have very low omega 3. And that’s kind of like, I like talking about
    0:09:22 that because I feel like it puts it in perspective for people because like I said, no one’s really
    0:09:27 thinking about, I’m not eating my fish today. I’m not supplementing with an omega 3 supplement
    0:09:32 to get those omega 3s. But people are thinking about, oh, I shouldn’t smoke because it’s bad,
    0:09:38 right? So again, it goes back to that framework of thinking about what you need. And starting there,
    0:09:45 as opposed to just like, okay, what should I avoid? Because when you think about what should I avoid,
    0:09:51 then people aren’t thinking about magnesium. They’re not thinking about the vitamin K. They’re
    0:09:56 not thinking about omega 3. And by the way, magnesium, I said about half the population
    0:10:03 in the United States doesn’t get enough. They’re not eating enough greens. And unfortunately,
    0:10:07 there’s not a great test for magnesium because our body stores magnesium in our bones. And so
    0:10:12 anytime we’re not getting enough in our diet, our body pulls it out of our bones to like,
    0:10:16 because we need it. It’s so important. You need it to make energy. Like without magnesium,
    0:10:20 you can’t make energy. So nothing’s going to function. You also, it’s needed to repair damage.
    0:10:25 Like every time you have, you know, like right now, you and I, we’re having a conversation,
    0:10:30 you know, we’re, you know, neurotransmitters are firing, we’re thinking about things like that’s
    0:10:35 causing damage, metabolism, all that stuff causes damage on a daily basis. But our body repairs
    0:10:40 that damage. But magnesium is a cofactor for these enzymes. These are proteins that are doing
    0:10:44 everything for that to function properly. And so if you don’t get enough of that magnesium to do
    0:10:49 that, what happens is you don’t repair that damage properly. And that can increase the risk
    0:10:54 of getting a mutation that can lead to cancer. You know, it’s been found that for example,
    0:10:58 for every 100, you know, milligram increase in magnesium intake, there’s something like a 20%
    0:11:05 decrease in pancreatic cancer risk. And there’s been lots of studies like this looking at
    0:11:10 magnesium intake and cancer risk. And so the higher the magnesium intake, the lower the cancer risk.
    0:11:14 So again, it’s one of those things where it’s, you can’t look in the mirror and go,
    0:11:18 as you’re brushing your teeth, Oh, I don’t have enough magnesium today, right? Like nothing’s like
    0:11:22 showing you that, but it’s happening. That damage is insidious. And I mentioned you pull it out of
    0:11:27 your bone, like it’s pulled out of your bones. And that’s another thing it leads to osteoporosis
    0:11:32 over time. So remembering to eat your leafy greens is getting your magnesium. So you,
    0:11:37 so women need about, I’d say about 320 milligrams a day adult women need about 320 milligrams a day
    0:11:44 of magnesium. Men need around 420 milligrams a day. You know, this can change based on your,
    0:11:50 your physical activity level as well. So like if you’re physically active, if you’re sweating,
    0:11:54 you sweat out magnesium, you also use it up for energy. So you might actually require anywhere
    0:11:58 between 10% to 20% more than that level. So what’s called the recommended daily allowance
    0:12:05 in the United States. So, you know, again, and people aren’t even meeting that.
    0:12:08 So there’s lots of reasons to invest in, you know, these micronutrients and to think about
    0:12:15 the foods that you need to eat. I have so many questions. One is, is there a difference between
    0:12:21 consuming magnesium and omega three through food, like leafy greens or fish and supplementation?
    0:12:29 Yes, let’s start with magnesium. So magnesium, if you’re consuming it in the form of leafy greens,
    0:12:35 it is, it is bound to a, it’s the fiber matrix. It’s called phytate. And that does decrease the
    0:12:44 bioavailability of it. You can do raw, but also cooking them will increase the bioavailability
    0:12:50 of minerals like magnesium. And it is good. You want to kind of get a variety of things. You
    0:12:54 want to have some raw veggies, but you also want to have cooked. And when you cook, it does actually
    0:13:00 increase the bioavailability of not just magnesium, other minerals as well that are bound to that,
    0:13:05 that fiber matrix that, which has phytate there. Supplementation is also kind of tricky with respect
    0:13:10 to magnesium because you don’t really absorb more. I mean, it’s about a hundred, I would say
    0:13:16 anywhere between 120 to 150 milligrams per dose. Like once you get above that, you’re not really
    0:13:24 absorbing more. You’re just kind of causing more GI distress. And it’s a little bit of like a laxative
    0:13:30 effect. So some people actually use it specifically for that reason. So they do hire doses. Generally
    0:13:36 speaking, if you are supplementing with magnesium, you want to make sure you’re going at a lower dose
    0:13:43 because you’re not really going to absorb more. And it’s just going to cause like gut issues.
    0:13:47 If you want to supplement with more than just 150, you have to spread your doses out,
    0:13:51 you know, take it earlier with the meal and then take it later in the day as well.
    0:13:56 But the other thing is that when you’re getting it from food, it is packaged in with other minerals.
    0:14:01 And there are, there’s some argument to be made that having, for example, there’s like,
    0:14:07 you know, twice as much calcium as magnesium in a lot of the foods. And so you’re getting this
    0:14:13 two to one ratio. And so, you know, there’s kind of a reason for that. I wouldn’t say that it’s
    0:14:18 been heavily studied, but it’s thought that you kind of want to keep that ratio correct, like two
    0:14:24 to one calcium to magnesium ratio. So if you’re just like supplementing with lots of magnesium,
    0:14:28 and let’s say you don’t get enough, maybe you don’t eat dairy, or maybe you’re lactose intolerant,
    0:14:32 or, you know, maybe you’re just not getting enough calcium, you can kind of have mineral
    0:14:36 imbalances as well. And then there’s the form that you’re going to supplement with, right? So
    0:14:40 there’s a lot of different magnesium supplements out there. The most important difference when
    0:14:47 you’re looking for a magnesium supplement is to avoid the, what’s called the inorganic forms.
    0:14:54 And this isn’t like organic pesticide. What we’re talking about is so like magnesium oxide or
    0:15:00 magnesium sulfate, like they’re just not very bioavailable. Like you’re not going to absorb
    0:15:05 as much from those. But if you get like the organic form, so this would be something that has like
    0:15:10 an organic molecule. So magnesium citrate, magnesium malate, magnesium glycinate, magnesium
    0:15:19 torate, these are all forms of magnesium that are relatively the same in terms of their bioavailability.
    0:15:26 I personally like taking magnesium glycinate, because glycinate is like a form of glycine,
    0:15:32 which is a inhibitory neurotransmitter. And so I like getting a little bit extra glycine. There’s
    0:15:38 like, there’s some science behind, you know, glycine, perhaps being beneficial and supplementing
    0:15:44 with it. Just I think that’s the main thing with respect to magnesium supplementation is that
    0:15:50 the forms do kind of matter and the dose. And what about the omega-3s? Is it, can I just go to the
    0:15:57 store if I’m not going to eat a lot of fish and buy an omega-3 supplement? Or is fish the primary
    0:16:03 way that we actually get bioavailability from this? Yeah, that’s also a great question. It
    0:16:09 really does obviously depend on quite a few factors. So with respect to the seafood and fish,
    0:16:15 the type of fish does matter, right? So like you need, like there’s some fish, like that’s just
    0:16:21 not that fatty. The omega-3s EPA and DHA are the marine forms of the omega-3. And those are the
    0:16:29 ones I was talking about with the omega-3 index and life expectancy. Those are the forms that have
    0:16:33 been used in randomized controlled trials with supplementation that have decreased
    0:16:37 cardiovascular events by like 25% compared to placebo. Those are the ones that are important.
    0:16:43 They’re only in the really oily fatty fish. So one of the best forms is salmon. And wild salmon
    0:16:52 has higher levels than farmed. For example, wild Alaskan salmon is probably one of the best
    0:16:57 salmons to consume for omega-3. It also has astaxanthin. It’s what gives the fish that pink
    0:17:04 color. If you are eating quite a lot of fish, you’d have to really get an omega-3 index test to
    0:17:11 know for sure how much you require. But you know, I would say probably like at least, you know,
    0:17:16 you’re eating it four times a week, something like that, which most people do not do. In Japan,
    0:17:22 they do. And their omega-3 index is very high. Like I don’t even know if many Japanese supplement,
    0:17:26 they’re just, they eat seafood like every day. The other thing to consider is, well,
    0:17:30 what type of fish? So we talked about oily and fatty fish, but also you want to look at
    0:17:34 contaminants. Like larger fish have things like PCBs and mercury because they’re eating smaller
    0:17:40 fish. So those things accumulate in their fat. So like you don’t want to eat swordfish, for example.
    0:17:45 It’s just there. The mercury in swordfish is just through the roof, right? So it’s really like the
    0:17:50 trade-off there isn’t very good. So again, that’s where salmon comes into the picture because it’s
    0:17:56 very low in mercury. It’s high in omega-3 smaller fish. So sardines would be another one. Again,
    0:18:01 there’s a lot of data out there that you can look up like USDA has all this like
    0:18:05 contamination mercury levels versus omega-3. So that stuff is easy for people to find.
    0:18:11 I would say by and large, the easiest way to get a high omega-3 index and these studies have been
    0:18:17 done, randomized controlled trials, people giving supplement, supplement forms of omega-3 is definitely
    0:18:22 to supplement. And fish oil supplements, generally speaking, if you’re taking around two grams a day
    0:18:29 of a fish oil supplement, that is enough to raise someone from a 4% omega-3 index, which is the low
    0:18:35 end, to a 8% omega-3 index, which is the high end. You obviously want to make sure you’re getting
    0:18:41 enough of the EPA and DHA, those two important omega-3s. And you want to make sure you’re not
    0:18:47 getting a high contaminant level like mercury, PCBs. But the other thing to keep in mind is you
    0:18:52 want a low oxidation level. So omega-3 fatty acids are prone to oxidation just because their
    0:18:58 molecular structure is a polyunsaturated fatty acid. And so the way people, companies, you know,
    0:19:05 are manufacturing this fish oil matters. So some good third-party testing sites to look at.
    0:19:12 I would say consumer lab is one that’s really, they go and just go to grocery stores and where
    0:19:19 people are generally going and buying their supplements. And they just measure and test
    0:19:23 all this stuff. And there, there’s some really affordable brands that have decent omega-3 levels,
    0:19:30 DHA and EPA levels, and low oxidation, low contaminant levels. And consumer lab, you know,
    0:19:36 test all those. So that would be a good site to go to to find a good omega-3 supplement.
    0:19:41 Another one is the International Fish Oil Standard Site, I-F-O-S. Those are for the data
    0:19:46 nerds, to be honest, because there’s like a lot more data there. And if you’re like into this stuff
    0:19:52 and you want to like really dig, because they just give you everything, like all the data,
    0:19:57 like you could imagine, that’s a great site for people that are sort of nerd, want to nerd out
    0:20:01 on that. But for some people, they’re like, I just want to know my grocery store, what do I get?
    0:20:05 Then consumer lab is a great option. It’s like, it’s broken down in a way that like a child could
    0:20:09 even understand. It’s okay, this is the one I want to buy. Is there a difference between wild and
    0:20:15 non-wild, I guess, or captive or factory farmed, whatever you want to call it, farmed fish,
    0:20:21 in terms of the nutrient density that we’re pulling out of them?
    0:20:26 You know, there is a difference. I mean, the wild salmon, they’re out there in the ocean,
    0:20:30 and they’re eating fish and like, you know, crustaceans and all the things that they’re
    0:20:34 supposed to eat, like that’s what they eat, right? In the farmed salmon, I’m pretty sure there’s
    0:20:41 some feeding of stuff that’s like not even, I mean, we’re talking like corn and stuff too.
    0:20:46 Yeah, if you were to look at the fish before, in the factories before they inject it with
    0:20:53 astaxanthin, they look albino because they don’t eat all the right things, so they’re not naturally
    0:20:59 pink. I said inject, but I’m not sure, maybe they actually just give it astaxanthin, they eat it.
    0:21:04 I forgot, but they’re giving it exogenous astaxanthin so that it does have the pink color.
    0:21:10 The Omega-3 content was also higher in the wild salmon. So again, to your question, yes,
    0:21:17 there is a difference between the farmed salmon and the wild salmon, but you know,
    0:21:24 sometimes when you’re out at a restaurant, like you’re not going to get the wild salmon.
    0:21:28 Is it the end of the world? In my opinion, no. Like I said, choose your battles. I still think,
    0:21:32 you still are getting Omega-3s. You’re still getting DHA and EPA. It’s not like it’s terrible,
    0:21:37 but I do think it’s preferable if you are getting the wild salmon.
    0:21:42 You mentioned organic. Is there a difference between organic and inorganic, I guess,
    0:21:51 but inorganic in the sense of being non-organic produce? Why would we choose one over another,
    0:21:56 and what difference does it make from a composition or bioavailability point of view?
    0:22:01 So pesticides are obviously something that are used now in agriculture because these farms are
    0:22:08 huge and we’re growing mass quantities of foods, and so they’re spraying things that will ward off
    0:22:14 insects. So insecticides or pesticides, as is known, and also fungicides and other things
    0:22:19 to prevent fungus and anything that’s going to destroy the crop. A lot of these types of
    0:22:24 pesticides are obviously damaging to the insects, but to humans, the question is, well, are they
    0:22:31 damaging to humans? There were a lot, especially things like rotonone, perquate. These were used
    0:22:37 for a long time, and those are chemicals that actually cause… We use them. Scientists use
    0:22:44 them. I’ve used it myself in the lab to induce Parkinson-like symptoms in animals because it
    0:22:51 disrupts your mitochondria, which are little organelles inside of almost all of your cells
    0:22:57 and that are producing energy. Super important. In Parkinson’s disease, the mitochondria and
    0:23:04 your neurons become dysfunctional. You can cause this by just giving them this pesticide,
    0:23:10 perquate, or rotonone. It’s funny. I remember the first time I was learning about this in…
    0:23:15 This was actually even before I was in graduate school, but also in graduate school, I was like,
    0:23:20 “Oh, I’m putting this stuff to give it to a mouse to study Parkinson’s or to induce a Parkinson,
    0:23:29 like human model of Parkinson’s.” This was put on our produce, and I was like,
    0:23:33 “That was really upsetting to think about.” There’s been studies even on the newer types
    0:23:39 of pesticides that are used on produce. There have been studies that have shown they’re
    0:23:44 probably not good to have on a daily basis because of that insidious damage that they’re
    0:23:49 causing. People are probably thinking of glyphosate. Roundup is a big one as well.
    0:23:55 When it comes to those pesticides that are used, there are certain vegetables and fruits that
    0:24:02 are very thin skin that absorb it. Even if you washed the vegetable off, it’s already been absorbed
    0:24:07 through the skin. Let’s talk about an avocado versus a strawberry. Is it so important to eat
    0:24:15 organic for avocados? Not really. It’s got a really thick skin. Strawberries, on the other hand,
    0:24:21 have a very thin skin. That would be something that you want to choose organic.
    0:24:24 I would say that, yes, organic would be the best choice. If you can’t always afford organic,
    0:24:30 then choose. Bananas, is that so important? Probably not. Avocado is probably not.
    0:24:34 Oranges probably not. Apples, yes. Thin skin. Again, there’s lists out there that will list the
    0:24:40 things that are like, okay, if you’re going to not do organic, here’s the vegetables and fruits
    0:24:45 that are the safest to not. I love the dirty dozen list, but it’s actually more practical to
    0:24:51 remember the thickness of the skin as the barrier, the membrane between pesticides. How do you wash
    0:24:59 your produce? I say this having seen, I think last night on Instagram, some guy putting baking soda
    0:25:07 and vinegar and soaking it for 20 minutes and like, is that how we wash produce? How do you wash
    0:25:12 produce to get stuff off of it? What do you do? I just use water. I just use water and wash it,
    0:25:18 because I do buy organic as well. You’re thinking about pesticides. You’re like, oh,
    0:25:22 well, I don’t want to get Parkinson’s disease or cancer. It’s causing damage. My mentor, Bruce
    0:25:28 Ames, he’s now 96 years old. I don’t know how many years ago it was. It must have been back in
    0:25:35 the 80s. He had done some experiments with hematologists from his lab, and they were looking
    0:25:41 at what happens if you don’t get enough folate. So that’s another one of those essential micronutrients
    0:25:47 that you have to get from your diet. Guess what? Leafy greens are one of the best sorts of folate.
    0:25:51 So leafy greens are just, they’re packed with certain micronutrients, but they don’t have a
    0:25:56 lot of protein, right? So folate, again, we have to get from our diet. And if we don’t get enough
    0:26:02 folate, it actually causes damage to our DNA much more than eating a pesticide wood,
    0:26:07 because folate is required to make new DNA. We’re constantly making new cells in our body.
    0:26:14 And if you don’t have that folate, the precursor to make one of the nucleotides of DNA isn’t going
    0:26:20 to be there. And so your body substitutes something else in there that’s from RNA. That’s not supposed
    0:26:25 to be there, and it causes DNA damage. And he had done these studies where it was like,
    0:26:29 he took animals, put them on a low folate diet similar to what some people in the United States
    0:26:34 get. And then he took the other group of animals and he irradiated them with ionizing radiation.
    0:26:40 Okay, this is like, yeah, you’re going to want to avoid this, right? And the folate deficiency
    0:26:48 was like ionizing radiation. It did the exact same thing. It caused double strand breaks in DNA,
    0:26:53 exactly like the ionizing radiation. So not getting that important micronutrient from
    0:26:58 your leafy greens, folate, was like getting ionizing radiation. So again, back to that
    0:27:05 theme that we started with, thinking about what you need is so important. And we’re sitting here
    0:27:11 talking about pesticides. Oh, we should avoid them. Yes, but guess what’s worse? If you don’t
    0:27:16 eat the greens, you’re not going to get enough folate. Folate is so important. It’s in every
    0:27:22 processed food. They put the oxidized form of it, folic acid. It’s kind of one of those things where
    0:27:27 it’s like, oh, it’s another form of folate and it is more stable, which is why it’s used in
    0:27:36 processed foods rather than folate. But it is not the exact same as folate. It’s preferable if
    0:27:43 you’re going to get the folate from your diet, from leafy greens. Yeah, let’s come back to
    0:27:48 sort of the framework for approaching this. And so we’ve talked about micronutrients a little bit.
    0:27:53 Let’s talk about macro. So, I mean, so I’m sitting here talking about all these micronutrients and
    0:27:58 it was like vegetables was a big thing we’re talking about, right? But we also hit on omega
    0:28:01 3s and that was fish. Protein is amino acids or something that we need to get from our diet every
    0:28:08 day. Much like we store glucose as glycogen in our liver and our muscles, we store fat, like
    0:28:15 triglycerides, right, adipose tissue. We don’t really store amino acids, although our muscle
    0:28:23 skeletal muscle is kind of a reservoir for them. And during periods of fasting or
    0:28:30 low protein intake, we pull from our muscle to get amino acids because they’re essential to
    0:28:35 survive. And what does that mean? That means you’re pulling important protein from your muscle and
    0:28:42 that does cause muscle atrophy. So you want to avoid that, right? And so in order to help avoid that,
    0:28:49 all these, you know, regulatory committees had come up with, let’s figure out how much protein
    0:28:54 people need to take in every single day to avoid those losses, right? And so studies were done
    0:29:00 many, many years ago and that number came up to be 0.8 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight
    0:29:09 is what was the recommended daily allowance for protein intake. Fast forward decades, you know,
    0:29:18 you’ve got all this new science and new technology that’s come out and new ways of measuring things.
    0:29:23 And, you know, any scientist will tell you that your data is only as sensitive as the tools that
    0:29:29 you’re using, okay? Data from experts like Dr. Stuart Phillips and others, they started to,
    0:29:36 you know, look into how you measure protein losses and amino acid losses. And it turns out that
    0:29:44 those studies that were done decades ago were using tools that were, oh, they were basically
    0:29:51 underestimating the losses of amino acids. It turns out using new techniques that are more sensitive
    0:29:57 that in order to just prevent your body from like pulling from, you know, your skeletal muscle to
    0:30:04 get amino acids, the minimum amount of protein you need to take in is actually 1.2 grams per
    0:30:11 kilogram body weight, which is higher than the 0.8 grams per kilogram body weight, right?
    0:30:16 And they also did some studies looking at, well, what if you’re physically active, right? You’re
    0:30:21 causing damage to your muscle. You’re using a lot of energy. I mean, lots of things going on.
    0:30:26 That number goes up to 1.6 grams of protein per kilogram body weight. This was a big eye
    0:30:34 opener for me a couple of years ago when I talked to Dr. Phillips and started looking
    0:30:39 and reading his research because I always thought people were getting enough protein.
    0:30:42 And turns out a lot of people are not getting enough protein because they’re not getting at
    0:30:49 least that 1.2 grams per kilogram body weight, bare minimum. That, I think, is you have to think
    0:30:57 about, okay, well, where do I get my protein meat? Is animal meat? It’s probably one of the best
    0:31:00 sources because essential amino acids are very highly concentrated in poultry and meat and fish.
    0:31:06 If you’re a vegetarian or a vegan, you just have to really work really hard and supplement with
    0:31:10 protein powders and stuff to get that amino acid composition up.
    0:31:16 Is all animal protein the same? I would imagine you need the complete set of amino
    0:31:24 acids for it to be the most bioavailable in your body. I don’t know what I’m talking about here,
    0:31:28 obviously. But is there a big difference between steak and chicken and other sources of protein
    0:31:35 that we typically think of? There are differences with respect to their
    0:31:38 micronutrient profiles. Steak has a lot more iron, for example. There’s a lot of zinc in
    0:31:45 shellfish, oysters. With respect to just the essential amino acids, getting them from any
    0:31:53 of those sources is pretty good with respect to protein. You will find that per ounce of food
    0:32:03 that you’re eating, maybe there’s a little bit more denser in meat than fish or something like
    0:32:08 that. But there are subtle differences between them, but also just in the whole micronutrient
    0:32:13 profile itself. But with respect to the essential amino acids, if you’re really trying to hit that
    0:32:18 1.2 to 1.6 grams per kilogram body weight, that’s very important.
    0:32:25 That’s a lot of protein. It’s really a lot of protein, especially for people that are physically
    0:32:29 active. Why is that so important? Well, if you’re constantly pulling amino acids from your muscle,
    0:32:36 it’s like pulling from your retirement fund early. Because our muscle mass peak is probably,
    0:32:44 I would say, anywhere between 20 to 30 years old is when we peak muscle mass.
    0:32:48 After 30, as you get into 40, you start going down. You want to try to build up that muscle mass
    0:32:58 reservoir earlier in life, like you do what your retirement fund. You want to build it up
    0:33:02 because you’re going to be pulling from it no matter what. Even if you’re working out later
    0:33:06 in life, you’re still going to be pulling from it because you just lose more muscle mass and
    0:33:10 strength as you age. It’s just part of the aging process. The more you can counter that with
    0:33:16 resistance training, with making sure you’re getting enough protein, then the better off
    0:33:20 you’re going to be. If you didn’t do it earlier in life, it’s never too late. That’s something
    0:33:25 also to keep in mind. Don’t give up. I’m already 50. It’s too late for me. No, because you can get
    0:33:31 gains in muscle mass and really actually great gains in strength, particularly with resistance
    0:33:36 training. Protein intake is one easy thing. A lot of people, like our parents, not everyone’s
    0:33:43 exercising. They’re not doing resistance training. Get that protein intake becomes even more important
    0:33:49 at that point. Something also that you might find interesting, Shane, is that we’re talking about
    0:33:53 Omega-3s. There’s some work from Chris McGlory. He had basically done some research that have found
    0:34:00 high-dose Omega-3s could prevent disuse atrophy. When people are older, they’re not using their
    0:34:09 muscles a lot. When you’re not using your muscles a lot and you’re certainly not getting enough protein,
    0:34:14 you start to atrophy even more. If you gave them a high-dose Omega-3, so this was like
    0:34:20 four to five grams a day, it totally prevented disuse atrophy. They did the study in younger
    0:34:27 adults and younger females, but it was 50% less. He’s done some other studies and mechanism and
    0:34:33 looking into it. He thinks that what’s happening is Omega-3s are sensitizing your skeletal muscle
    0:34:39 to amino acids. In other words, you’re getting more amino acids into the muscle. You’re getting
    0:34:44 more bang for your buck. More amino acids are getting in when you have the Omega-3s there,
    0:34:50 because Omega-3s are really important for the skeletal muscle membrane and stuff. It might
    0:34:56 be easier just to get the nutrients in. I want to start using this in a practical way. If I
    0:35:03 were to make a smoothie in the morning, what is the best thing to put in my body at the start
    0:35:11 of the day after having slept, which means I’ve been fasting? What is the most incredible smoothie
    0:35:18 you can think of that would just be full of health benefits for the day? It would have a
    0:35:22 Omega-3, it would have protein powder, it would have leafy. You’d walk me through this. Do you do
    0:35:27 this? I do a smoothie. It doesn’t have Omega-3, but I’ll walk you through my smoothie that I do.
    0:35:32 I probably about four to five days a week have this smoothie. Typically, this smoothie is about,
    0:35:40 I don’t know, four or so kale leaves. That’s usually my green source that I use.
    0:35:45 I’m getting the magnesium, I’m getting the vitamin K, I’m getting the folate, but I’m also getting
    0:35:53 something in there called Lutein and zeaxanthin, which is, these are carotenoids much like beta
    0:35:58 carotene or astaxanthin, like we were talking about. It’s another one that accumulates in
    0:36:03 the eye, rods and cones of the eye, so it helps prevent macular degeneration,
    0:36:07 but it accumulates in the brain as well. It’s so interesting because there’s been studies that
    0:36:12 have shown that giving older adults supplementing with something like 20 megs, which is what three
    0:36:17 kale leaves has of Lutein, it improves neural efficiency. Basically, your brain works better
    0:36:26 with less energy. There’s been other studies in older adults where giving them Lutein and zeaxanthin
    0:36:32 will improve crystallized intelligence. That’s basically, as you get older, it’s the ability
    0:36:37 to still use all the information that you’ve learned throughout your life and still use it.
    0:36:43 That’s the kale. It also has fiber, right? Fiber is great for your gut. I also add an avocado,
    0:36:51 and avocado also increases the bioavailability of those carotenoids, the Lutein and zeaxanthin,
    0:36:58 by up to six-fold, anywhere between three to six-fold. You’re getting more of the Lutein and
    0:37:05 zeaxanthin. You’re basically making them more bioavailable by adding the avocado. Also, it’s a
    0:37:10 great source of mono-insaturated fat. Avocados are high in potassium. Something like 96% of the
    0:37:17 US population doesn’t get enough potassium. Then I add a ton of frozen blueberries.
    0:37:23 Blueberries, yes, you’re getting your vitamin C, and you’re getting some fermentable fiber for the
    0:37:31 gut, but they’re also high in those phytochemicals. They have polyphenols in them, and they have
    0:37:38 anthocyanins. They’re like superpowers for the brain. There’s been so many studies that have
    0:37:44 been done, randomized control trials either with freeze-dried blueberry extract or actually just
    0:37:49 blueberries, showing it improves cognition, it improves mood. When I was a postdoc, I did some
    0:37:57 studies in people. We were looking at freeze-dried blueberry powder. I was looking at DNA damage
    0:38:02 in their blood cells. Markers of those double-stranded breaks I talked about, like if you don’t get
    0:38:08 enough folate, it causes double-stranded breaks. People that are people that are eating terrible
    0:38:12 diets and that are overweight and obese have more double-stranded breaks in their blood cells.
    0:38:18 That’s something that I’ve measured. We were getting a population of people that were overweight
    0:38:22 and obese, and then giving them this freeze-dried blueberry extract. Over the course of four,
    0:38:27 eight weeks, it lowered their DNA damage. Personally, what I notice is the mood enhancer.
    0:38:34 It’s like I get that blueberry, and it’s like, whoa. I used to add bananas to my smoothie years
    0:38:41 and years ago. It’s not that bananas are bad for you, but they have this enzyme in them called
    0:38:46 polyphenol oxidase, PPO. Well, as the name implies, it breaks down polyphenols,
    0:38:53 which is what you want from the blueberries to get the benefits in the brain and the benefits.
    0:38:57 Yeah, exactly. There was a very, very recent study in 2023 that came out,
    0:39:01 and this was a controlled trial where people were given a smoothie with blueberries,
    0:39:07 either with and without the banana, and then metabolites of polyphenols were measured
    0:39:11 in their urine and blood. If they had the banana, their polyphenol levels were just plummeted,
    0:39:18 like they weren’t getting them from the blueberries. I’ll tell you what’s enraging about it.
    0:39:23 Is anywhere you go, if you want to buy a smoothie when you’re out and about,
    0:39:27 everything has a banana in it. I’m a parent, and so I’m out and about,
    0:39:34 and I have my kid with me, and it’s like, I want to get a smoothie, and it has blueberries in it,
    0:39:39 and I’m like, but it also has a banana. There’s been studies on children as well,
    0:39:44 and giving children blueberries improves their cognition. They perform better on tests. It’s
    0:39:50 not just good for adults, it’s throughout the lifespan. Now I have to tell them, okay,
    0:39:55 don’t put the banana, but everywhere you go, there’s a banana in the smoothie.
    0:39:59 That’s interesting. I’m going to give you my smoothie recipe after, and you can create it,
    0:40:02 but I’m going to switch out the banana starting tomorrow. Okay, so we have kale leaves, avocado,
    0:40:08 frozen blueberries, and protein powder. Protein powder. Especially if I’m doing it,
    0:40:14 like you said, first thing in the morning, and sometimes I’ll have my smoothie in the afternoon,
    0:40:18 in which case, if I didn’t work out and I’ve already gotten my protein, I won’t put the protein
    0:40:23 powder, but these days, I’m mostly always putting them to be honest. I’m doing something every day,
    0:40:27 and it’s hard to get the protein requirement for me. I usually do some whey protein,
    0:40:33 and then I also add a little bit of hydrolyzed collagen powder as well.
    0:40:37 If you’re getting the protein, you probably don’t need the hydrolyzed collagen powder,
    0:40:41 but I personally, there’s studies showing that randomized control trial is showing that it improves
    0:40:45 like skin elasticity, and things that I’m also interested in addition with respect to skin.
    0:40:51 I mean, there’s all sorts of studies also showing it helps with joint health and this and that,
    0:40:54 and then the other thing I add is I do a little bit of moringa powder.
    0:40:58 So, moringa, it’s high in some micronutrients, like it has things like zinc and iron and magnesium,
    0:41:06 but it also has something in it that is called moringogen, and it is a phytochemical that is very
    0:41:18 similar to sulforaphane, which is found in like broccoli, broccoli sprouts. It’s really high in
    0:41:23 broccoli sprouts, and it activates genetic pathways in our body, the same ones that sulforaphane
    0:41:28 activates that have been shown to increase antioxidants in the brain, like glutathione,
    0:41:34 that have been shown to lower DNA damage in our cells, all sorts of benefits,
    0:41:38 but the other thing that it does, and I’ve noticed this, so I used to wear a continuous glucose
    0:41:43 monitor like for years. It blunts the postprandial glucose rise from a smoothie when I put moringa
    0:41:50 powder in it, and so I put that in my smoothie as well. Now, that’s a little spicy tasting. I
    0:41:55 would say if you’re like in one of those moods where you don’t want the like not so great tasting
    0:42:01 smoothie, you know, you can skip the moringa or go for a smaller amount, but I do like a big
    0:42:07 keeping tablespoon of it. Do you use like a liquid and ice? Oh, and then I add some water, yeah.
    0:42:12 Water, okay. Water to kind of mix it up. That’s pretty cool. I’m going to give you my smoothie.
    0:42:16 You can give me a grade on this, and keep in mind, I’m a parent of two boys who devour food,
    0:42:22 so we came up with this, and I’ve never told anybody the exact recipe before, but here’s
    0:42:27 basically what it is. And we call it the Tom Brady. It’s got protein powder in it. It’s got AG1.
    0:42:34 It’s got walnuts. It’s got blueberries, yogurt, almond milk, but like real almond milk, no other
    0:42:41 additives or anything. Banana, chia seeds, and hemp seeds. Yes, you’re going for the kind of
    0:42:48 omega-3 that’s in those plant sources like walnuts and chia seeds is ALA. And we were talking a lot
    0:42:57 about the EPA and DHA, which are from the marine sources. ALA, I mean, now walnuts are great.
    0:43:03 There’s like studies showing like if you eat a handful of walnuts a day, you’re, you know, you
    0:43:07 have lower cancer risk and cardiovascular disease risk, they’re clearly good for you. They’re not
    0:43:12 the same as the EPA and DHA, so don’t substitute. I’ll tell you, you can, so your body does convert
    0:43:19 ALA from plant sources of omega-3 into EPA and DHA, which is essentially what the final
    0:43:25 products that you need are, but everybody does it differently. And the conversion efficiency is
    0:43:31 about 5%. Now women, when they’re making, when they’re high in estrogen, that can go up really,
    0:43:38 that can go up much higher. And I think that’s because, because during pregnancy and child
    0:43:44 development in utero, the DHA is so important that your body makes sure you’re just turning all
    0:43:51 that ALA into that DHA, because when you’re pregnant, your estrogen level goes, it’s like
    0:43:56 100-fold higher, it’s like super high. If there are people that are relying on just plant sources,
    0:44:02 of omega-3, that is a mistake. And if you do an omega-3 index test, and there’s, you know,
    0:44:09 omega-quant is probably one of the best places to do that, then you’ll figure, you’ll figure that
    0:44:16 out really quick that year. Okay, well, yeah, well, this is great, right? So like, what would we
    0:44:20 supplement here? We take out the bananas and, because they’re counteracting the blueberries,
    0:44:25 we’d add avocado, that’s a lot of fat in there. What else would we like take out or add or
    0:44:31 switch? What would you say? So you’re doing the AG greens as your source of green?
    0:44:35 I’m doing that as sort of like the base vitamin, because they have a daily multivitamin, and I
    0:44:41 just count that as their daily multivitamin. That’s their daily multivitamin. Okay, but what,
    0:44:44 did you add any greens in there? I didn’t. No, there’s no greens in there. So that would be,
    0:44:48 that would be something that I would add some, sneak some kale leaves in. Oh my god, if they saw
    0:44:53 that, they wouldn’t drink it. No, don’t let them see. Do they have to make it to be part of it? So I
    0:44:58 put kale leaves in my sons or even romaine lettuce. Here’s the other thing. So there’s really not a
    0:45:03 lot of foods that can go into a smoothie that would degrade the polyphenols, because they’re high in
    0:45:09 that enzyme polyphenol oxidase. But the ones that are are bananas and beets and anything in that
    0:45:15 family. So like chard, I used to put chard in my smoothie, like like Swiss chard, you know, like
    0:45:21 they’re so, it’s so good. And look, these are great foods to eat. Like just don’t put them in your
    0:45:25 smoothie with blueberries. It’s exactly. So I mean, I used to put chard in my smoothie and
    0:45:33 like this, this like changed my world. I was like, this is unbelievable. I can’t, you know,
    0:45:36 thankfully I stopped doing the banana in my smoothie. In fact, I just kind of just got lazy
    0:45:41 and it was like, okay, kale, I just need like a base of greens, you know what I mean? Thankfully,
    0:45:45 like years ago. So even though this study just kind of came out last year, I’ve, I’ve been ahead
    0:45:51 again. I wish I knew that they’re going to blame me for their poor test results. Now they’re going
    0:45:55 to be like, you know, you sent us to school with blueberries and bananas. Dad, like,
    0:46:00 what were you thinking? Are they, are they physically active? Cardio respiratory fitness
    0:46:04 is another thing that’s like, it correlates with academic performance. So like the better fit the
    0:46:08 child is, like they score better on a lot of academic tests as well. Okay. I want to get to
    0:46:14 fitness and say, I want to cover a sort of grass fed and then heat and cold exposure. And then we
    0:46:19 we can dive into fitness grass fed, non grass fed. Is there a difference? I see this everywhere
    0:46:24 between grass fed butter, non grass fed butter, grass fed beef, non grass fed beef. Is there a
    0:46:29 difference from a consumer point of view in terms of what I’m ingesting? There’s slight
    0:46:34 differences there. Definitely. So we were just talking about the omega three profile. So I would
    0:46:40 say one of the biggest differences is the omega three and then the omega six profile in let’s talk
    0:46:47 about meat, like grass fed, you know, cows that are grass fed versus not. So what I mean by that
    0:46:53 is like, they’re getting that plant source of omega that ALA that that plant source of omega three,
    0:46:59 they’re getting if they’re, they’re eating like grass, right? They’re getting it from from the
    0:47:04 plants that they’re eating. And they’re also not getting as much of what would be a type of food
    0:47:12 that is higher in omega six. So this would be like if they’re being fed corn, for example,
    0:47:18 a corn, you know, oil-ish processed kind of like pellets or whatever, you know, if you’re eating,
    0:47:24 you know, for example, ground beef from a just conventional cow, then you’re going to have a
    0:47:29 lot more of the omega six and less of the omega three. I never thought about this before, but
    0:47:35 like you just said, like we’re not supposed to eat processed foods, but then we’re eating animals
    0:47:38 that are eating processed foods. Yeah. Again, this goes back to my take on nutrition and how to
    0:47:43 and thinking about the framework of how to eat. First and foremost, I think the most important
    0:47:48 thing is how do I get these important vitamins and minerals and fatty acids and amino acids like
    0:47:54 protein? How do I get all those right? Okay, I’m getting I’m getting an idea of how I should be
    0:48:00 eating. Then it comes the next layer. Do I need to have organic or, you know, is a little bit of
    0:48:06 pesticides okay? Do I need to eat grass-fed or, you know, because at the end of the day, food’s
    0:48:11 expensive, right? Yeah, totally. Way more expensive now than years ago. Exactly. It’s even worse now.
    0:48:18 And so I do think it is better if you can afford it. If you can afford it, great. If not, don’t
    0:48:25 worry about it. If not, like the most important thing is what if you’re eating conventional meat
    0:48:32 and you’re getting a little bit higher omega six? Well, if you’re supplementing with fish oil over
    0:48:35 a day, who cares? You’re getting that getting the omega three is what is most important. It’s
    0:48:40 and people are so focused on, oh, but the omega six is so high when your body actually needs omega
    0:48:45 six. So if you’re getting it from like, you know, dietary sources versus like oils, process cooking
    0:48:53 oils and stuff. And even that, look, I don’t cook with vegetable oil. I don’t use vegetable oil at all.
    0:48:58 However, I’m going to be frank. Okay, when you look at the data, taking people that are eating
    0:49:05 like a high saturated fat diet. So they’re eating more like butter, you know, saturated fat like
    0:49:10 coconut oil and substituting that with vegetable oil. There’s no effect in their cardiovascular
    0:49:14 disease risk, or they do better. You can look at this two ways. You can say, oh, well, if it’s the
    0:49:20 same saturated fat versus vegetable oil, then clearly saturated fats, not as bad as we thought it
    0:49:25 was. That’s true. But the second way you can look at it is, oh, they substituted the saturated fat
    0:49:31 with the vegetable oil, and it wasn’t any worse. So maybe the vegetable oil isn’t killing us as
    0:49:35 bad as we thought. And this is the one thing I like to point out, because I still don’t use them,
    0:49:41 because when I think about it from like my mechanistic brain point of view, it’s like,
    0:49:46 well, vegetable oil is very high in polyunsaturated fat, like we talked about omega threes being
    0:49:51 a type of poly, they’re prone to oxidation. And when you add heat into the picture,
    0:49:56 boom, that’s like tons of oxidation. Perhaps in those studies where they’re substituting
    0:50:00 saturated fat for vegetable, were they putting vegetable oil on salads, or were they frying it,
    0:50:06 deep frying, and consuming oxidized lipids? We don’t really know. You’re still better off avoiding
    0:50:13 the vegetable oil, particularly for cooking, in anything that’s with heat. And then obviously,
    0:50:18 processed foods have tons of vegetable oil that have been cooked at a high heat. When you go out
    0:50:23 to eat, I mean, like those restaurants are using vegetable oil, it’s cheaper, they’re probably
    0:50:27 reusing it, which is even more oxidized, right? I mean, these are things like you don’t want to
    0:50:31 think about it, you’ll just never go out. I mean, like you have to like enjoy life, right?
    0:50:34 Be practical, totally. Yeah, like you can’t obsess over everything or like you become like a maniac.
    0:50:40 One thing we can all afford is vitamin D, and we’re all sort of lacking in that.
    0:50:46 Walk me through sort of how we can get that, the difference between sunlight
    0:50:52 and supplementation, as well as the effect of sunscreen on our absorption of vitamin D, and
    0:51:02 is sunscreen actually killing us more than just being in the sun?
    0:51:06 So vitamin D, food is not a great source of it. Like you can find, like it is fortified in some
    0:51:12 fatty foods, unfortunately, it’s fortified with the wrong form, it’s fortified with D2 rather
    0:51:17 than D3, which is what we make in our skin from the sun. The primary source of it is, as you
    0:51:23 mentioned, it’s from the sun, and specifically it’s UVB radiation from the sun. That is really
    0:51:29 important because UVB radiation only occurs during certain times of the year. In regions where you’re
    0:51:35 more northern, so for example in Canada, you’re not making vitamin D a good four or five months
    0:51:43 out of the year. It’s very challenging to make a lot of vitamin D from being out in the sun.
    0:51:48 Summertime, different, lots of UVB radiation, right? So you need to be in the sun and you
    0:51:55 need to be at a certain time of year, depending on where you live, there’s lots of things.
    0:52:00 You mentioned sunscreen as well. There’s a lot of factors that are involved in
    0:52:04 the ability to produce vitamin D3 in the skin from the UVB radiation, and that has to do with
    0:52:11 sunscreen. So anything that blocks out UVB radiation is going to block out the ability to
    0:52:17 make vitamin D. Melanin, the pigmentation that is like a sunscreen, it’s natural sunscreen and
    0:52:23 people that some people have, like in some regions of the world that are certainly more equatorial,
    0:52:29 that is also a natural sunscreen. It blocks out UVB radiation, which is why your body responds
    0:52:34 when you’re in the sun, your body tans because it’s like, “Oh, next time I’m in the sun,
    0:52:38 I need to protect myself.” It’s an adaptation. The other thing that regulates the production
    0:52:44 of vitamin D3 from the sun is age. The older you get, the less, I would say, efficient your body
    0:52:53 is it making vitamin D3 from the sun. For example, a 70-year-old makes four times less than their
    0:53:00 20-year-old former self. Bioavailability of vitamin D3 is important as well, and that’s
    0:53:05 regulated by body mass and weight. You make vitamin D3 in your skin, but it gets released into your
    0:53:11 bloodstream, then it’s converted into another form that is actually not a vitamin, it’s a steroid
    0:53:19 hormone. Vitamin D is actually much more important. It’s not just a vitamin, it’s actually a hormone
    0:53:24 that our body needs. Basically, the more body fat you have, the less bioavailable vitamin D3 is,
    0:53:31 and so you actually need more vitamin D3, the more body fat that you have. This hormone
    0:53:38 is extremely important because it is regulating about 5% of the human genome, the protein encoding
    0:53:47 human genome. It’s doing a lot of things, and you can imagine, so what it does, there’s actually
    0:53:53 a little sequence inside of our DNA. It’s a little repeat sequence that vitamin D recognizes,
    0:54:01 and this whole complex of vitamin D in a receptor goes down and binds to that little
    0:54:06 sequence of DNA, and it turns on a gene or it turns off a gene, and it does it in a very coordinated
    0:54:12 manner. When you don’t have enough vitamin D, that stuff all goes wrong, and so lots of things can
    0:54:20 happen. Because of sunscreen, because of our modern-day lifestyles, we’re inside technology,
    0:54:27 we’re on our computers, less farming, less agricultural work out in the sun, majority of
    0:54:33 people are not getting enough vitamin D3. Something around 70% of the US population
    0:54:40 is insufficient in vitamin D3, so that is defined as having blood levels of vitamin D
    0:54:46 less than 30 nanograms per milliliter. Another percentage of the population is
    0:54:53 deficient, so there’d be less than 20 nanograms per milliliter.
    0:54:57 But we’ve been told not to go outside. We’ve been told to layer up the sunscreen.
    0:55:02 Are these things getting in the way of vitamin D? Are they helping us? How do we make sense of all
    0:55:09 this? Let’s be clear. If you have fair skin and you’re going out in the sun a lot, then you can
    0:55:19 increase your risk for DNA damage, and skin cancer is one. For example, Australia. Australia is like
    0:55:27 the melanoma cancer is through the roof in Australia, and melanoma is the worst type of
    0:55:32 skin cancer to get. There’s a lot of fair skin people living there, and Australia is very close
    0:55:36 to the equator. There’s definitely many months out of the year where you’re just
    0:55:41 lots and lots of UVB radiation, but people that were sort of native to that region had darker
    0:55:47 skin. They had more melanin, and so the solution to people that are more fair skin living in
    0:55:53 Australia is actually sunscreen and a hat and a vitamin D3 supplement. Yeah. The question is,
    0:56:01 where do you find the balance? How much sun exposure is enough? Do I need to supplement,
    0:56:07 and do I have to wear sunscreen? I think that all depends on a variety of factors. It isn’t
    0:56:12 like a one-size-fits-all. It’s like, okay, well, where do you live? Do you live in Southern California,
    0:56:17 like where I do? Do you live in Australia? Do you live in Canada? Those are all factors to
    0:56:23 keep in mind. Then just measuring vitamin D levels. Where am I at? Then you can go, okay, well,
    0:56:29 clearly, I don’t wear sunscreen. I don’t go out in the sun a lot because I work inside a lot.
    0:56:35 Even without the sunscreen, I’m still not getting enough vitamin D3. You have to
    0:56:41 measure something. Is there a difference? If I go out and buy a vitamin D3 supplement,
    0:56:48 is there a difference between that and the sun? Then do I want to take that with anything I notice?
    0:56:55 I think athletic greens includes vitamin K with that. Is that for the bioavailability?
    0:57:00 No, it’s not for the bioavailability. Let’s address your questions because they’re really
    0:57:04 great questions. Differences between sun exposure and supplemental form. Again, vitamin D3 supplemental
    0:57:13 form, which is key. The differences between vitamin D3 from the sun versus supplemental,
    0:57:19 yes, there’s differences. Let’s say you’re in sub-Saharan Africa where you’re so close to the
    0:57:28 equator and you can make vitamin D3 from the sun and you’re out in the sun. Let’s say you’re a
    0:57:33 Bushman or something out there all the time. There’s been studies that have measured the
    0:57:37 levels of people that are aboriginal to these equatorial regions like Bushman in sub-Saharan
    0:57:42 Africa. Their natural vitamin D levels are something like anywhere between 80 to 100
    0:57:47 nanograms per mil. They don’t really go above that. The reason is because your body senses
    0:57:53 like the vitamin D levels. When you’re still being exposed to the sun, instead of converting it
    0:58:00 into vitamin D3, it converts it into this other metabolite. It’s like, okay, we’re putting the
    0:58:06 brakes on this. We’re not going to do anymore. If you’re taking a supplement and you don’t measure
    0:58:10 anything, let’s say you’re taking an insane number. There’s upper limits that have been
    0:58:17 sort of identified as the safe amount to supplement with vitamin D3 every day. The Institute of
    0:58:23 Medicine in the United States has set that as 4,000 IUs a day. That doesn’t mean you can’t go
    0:58:27 above that. That’s just the safe upper limit where you’re not going to have any toxicity effects.
    0:58:32 Let’s say you’re taking 100,000 IUs a day, way over 4,000. Those natural mechanisms aren’t going
    0:58:40 to kick in in the skin that they do when you’re being exposed to a lot of UV radiation and your
    0:58:46 body’s like, oh, I have enough vitamin D3, so I’m going to stop. You can over-supplement with
    0:58:53 vitamin D3. It is fat-soluble and it can be toxic. It’s challenging to do. You would have to take
    0:58:59 something like 100,000 IUs or something a day for a year. The biggest effect is vitamin D3 can
    0:59:07 you can make your calcium more bioavailable. We’re talking about bioavailability of other
    0:59:12 minerals. Calcium is much more bioavailable in the presence of vitamin D, so you absorb about
    0:59:18 40% more calcium from your diet if you have adequate levels of vitamin D. One concern is,
    0:59:24 well, if I have a lot of vitamin D and I’m taking calcium, then maybe I’m going to get hypercalcemia,
    0:59:30 right? Too much calcium in the bloodstream. There are studies that have shown it’s exceedingly
    0:59:35 high doses that you have to do for a long time to get that, but that is the concern with taking
    0:59:41 too much vitamin D3 is that you’re going to get too much calcium in your blood, which can have
    0:59:46 acute toxicity effects, but also long-term effects with calcification of your arteries and your
    0:59:53 vascular system because calcium can form a precipitate really easy. That’s the concern.
    0:59:59 Then you mentioned your athletic greens. They put vitamin K2 in there. I mentioned vitamin K1,
    1:00:08 which is found in leafy greens. It’s involved in blood coagulation, so clotting. When you
    1:00:13 take in your greens, you’re getting the vitamin K1. It goes to the liver, and it activates all
    1:00:19 those coagulation proteins, blood for blood clotting. When you get enough of that from the
    1:00:23 greens, it stays in circulation, and it does exactly what vitamin K2 does, which is activates
    1:00:29 proteins that are involved in shuttling calcium out of your vascular system and bringing it to
    1:00:34 your bones, bringing it to your muscle where you want calcium to be, and not in your vascular system
    1:00:39 where it can form a precipitate and then a plaque. I want to mention one other thing because you did
    1:00:43 say bioavailability. It’s related, and it has to do with magnesium. We were talking about it’s
    1:00:48 a cofactor for enzymes like DNA repair. I didn’t talk about a really important one. It’s actually
    1:00:53 a cofactor for both enzymes that convert vitamin D3 into the circulating form of vitamin D that we
    1:01:01 go and we measure. It’s called 25-hydroxy-vitamin D, and then eventually into the act of steroid
    1:01:05 hormone. There’s been studies showing that people that don’t get enough magnesium, even if they’re
    1:01:11 getting enough vitamin D, even if they’re supplementing with it, they won’t convert it into the
    1:01:15 steroid hormone. It’s a hormone that we need. As I mentioned, half of the US population doesn’t
    1:01:21 get enough magnesium. If you’re not getting that magnesium, that’s a problem. Something
    1:01:27 like athletic greens does have magnesium in it, I think. But also, if you’re doing greens,
    1:01:32 that’s a really good source of magnesium as well. You want to make sure you have your magnesium
    1:01:36 covered, especially for the vitamin D as well because they work together. You need them both.
    1:01:40 Let’s switch gears and talk about a framework for approaching
    1:01:44 deliberate heat and possibly deliberate cold exposure.
    1:01:49 Deliberate heat exposure. When we say deliberate heat, you’re going into a hot environment.
    1:01:56 You’re going to do something like a hot sauna, a steam room, a hot bath, something that is
    1:02:03 either the ambient temperature of the room is elevated or the water and your body is submerged
    1:02:10 in the water. What is that doing? Well, that is actually kicking on a physiological response
    1:02:17 that is in many ways very similar to moderate intensity aerobic exercise because when you are
    1:02:26 exposed to this deliberate heat exposure, when you’re exposed to the ambient increases in
    1:02:32 temperature, you’re elevating your core body temperature, which is what’s happening with
    1:02:37 physical activity. Your heart rate increases. Your plasma flow increases. Your stroke volume
    1:02:44 increases. All these things that are happening during physical exercise are happening during
    1:02:49 this deliberate heat exposure. There’s a somewhat of a, I would say,
    1:02:54 mimicking effect of moderate intensity aerobic exercise. There’s actually been studies that
    1:02:59 have compared that head to head. They’ve looked at being on a stationary cycle, doing not anything
    1:03:06 crazy, but 120 watts and then comparing that to sitting in a sauna for 20 minutes, doing each of
    1:03:12 those for 20 minutes. They were comparable in terms of heart rate elevation during the physical
    1:03:18 activity or during the heat exposure, the changes in blood pressure during the activity,
    1:03:24 and then the improvements after. Blood pressure improved after the stationary cycling. Blood
    1:03:31 pressure improved after the deliberate heat exposure. Resting heart rate improved after
    1:03:38 the stationary cycling and resting heart rate improved after the deliberate heat exposure.
    1:03:42 Certainly, it’s important for people that are disabled, people that can’t go for a run or a jog,
    1:03:48 or even get on a bike, but it’s also important for the population, I think, of people that
    1:03:53 won’t get on a bike or go for a run or they would rather just feel like they’re sitting in a spa
    1:04:01 and at the very least, or maybe people that are just so adverse, there are people that are so
    1:04:07 adverse to cardiovascular exercise that if you can just get them into a sauna and we can talk
    1:04:12 about parameters in a minute, but if you can get them into something that’s at least mimicking
    1:04:17 the moderate intensity cardiovascular exercise and they’re getting those adaptations, those
    1:04:23 cardiovascular adaptations that they would get with at least a little mild to moderate intensity
    1:04:28 exercise, that’s going to be beneficial in the long run as well. Then it’s also beneficial for
    1:04:34 people that are physically active. You might go, “Well, why is that?” Being physically active,
    1:04:39 like being aerobically active, doing aerobic exercise, one of the best benefits is it improves
    1:04:44 what’s called cardiorespiratory fitness. That’s probably one of the, I would say,
    1:04:48 one of the best biomarkers of longevity, like concrete things that you can measure.
    1:04:52 It’s measured by measuring something called VO2 max. It’s the maximum amount of oxygen you can
    1:04:57 take in during maximal exercise. Cardiovascular exercise improves that, particularly if you’re
    1:05:02 doing a high-intensity exercise training, things that are high-intensity interval training, for
    1:05:08 example, is one of the best ways to improve it, especially if you’re doing longer intervals of
    1:05:12 like at least a minute. There’s been two types of studies, observational data looking at people
    1:05:16 that just routinely exercise or people that routinely exercise and do the sauna. Then there
    1:05:24 was measurements of cardiorespiratory fitness. It was pretty clear that people that routinely
    1:05:29 exercised and routinely did the sauna had a better cardiorespiratory fitness than people
    1:05:34 that only routinely exercised. In other words, there was a benefit to do sauna on top of the
    1:05:39 exercise. Then there’s been intervention studies where it’s like, “Okay, we’re going to take people,
    1:05:44 give them an exercise workout. I think it was a stationary bike.” Then right after that exercise
    1:05:50 workout, they’re either going to just do passive recovery or they’re going to go into a sauna and
    1:05:53 recover for 15 minutes. I forgot how many weeks it was, something like on the order of four weeks
    1:05:59 or something like that. They measured cardiorespiratory fitness in a variety of other biomarkers,
    1:06:03 like lipids, like LDL, total cholesterol, blood pressure, things like that. While there was
    1:06:09 improvements, obviously with exercise, the ones that did exercise plus the sauna had an even
    1:06:16 greater improvement in their cardiorespiratory fitness. Their VO2 max was improved even more
    1:06:20 than exercise alone. They also had greater improvements in blood pressure and greater
    1:06:24 improvements in their lipid numbers and things like that. There was every reason to
    1:06:30 add a deliberate heat exposure on top of exercise as well.
    1:06:34 You’re the reason I have a sauna. I think I first came across your work and you had this 70-page
    1:06:39 website on the benefits of a sauna. I remember skimming the first three pages of it going,
    1:06:47 “I really need a sauna.” You’re the reason I have a sauna. When we say “doing the sauna,”
    1:06:53 what does that mean in terms of temperature, in terms of duration? Is a hot tub the same as the
    1:07:00 sauna? Talk to me about that. A lot of the studies that have been done on sauna have come out of
    1:07:09 Finland where they’re using Finnish sonnas, which are generally speaking, it would be what I would
    1:07:15 call a regular sauna where you have an electric heater with some rocks that are hot. In Finland,
    1:07:23 they often use water and they pour it on the hot rocks. There’s a humidity aspect there anywhere
    1:07:29 between 10 to 20 percent humidity. A lot of the observational studies and intervention studies
    1:07:35 showing, like I just mentioned one about VO2 max improvements, blood pressure improvements,
    1:07:41 they’re done in Finland and a lot of those parameters used. Generally speaking, our regular
    1:07:47 sauna is about 175 degrees Fahrenheit and 10 to 20 percent humidity. The average time spent in this
    1:07:55 sauna is about 20 minutes for the benefits to really be, I would say, robust. Then there’s
    1:08:04 frequency. How often do you do it? There have been a variety of studies that have looked at
    1:08:10 all-cause mortality, so dying early from all causes that are non-accidental and then looking at
    1:08:18 cardiovascular-related mortality like dying from a heart attack, for example. People that are more
    1:08:25 frequently using the sauna, that’s a dose-dependent effect. People that use the sauna, for example,
    1:08:29 two to three times a week have a 24 percent lower all-cause mortality compared to people that only
    1:08:36 use it one time a week, but people that use it four to seven times a week have a 40 percent lower
    1:08:42 all-cause mortality compared to people that only use it one time a week. In other words, it seems
    1:08:47 like the minimal effect of dose to get the most robust effect would be four times a week. The
    1:08:53 same goes for other parameters. Dying from cardiovascular-related mortality, it’s 50 percent
    1:09:00 lower in people that use the sauna four to seven times a week compared to one time a week, whereas
    1:09:06 if you’re only doing it two to three times a week, it’s something like 27 percent lower.
    1:09:09 When I said duration in the sauna, it’s really important so those studies were also done looking
    1:09:14 at, okay, let’s say people are only staying in the sauna for 11 minutes versus greater than 19
    1:09:20 minutes, so 20 minutes. They didn’t have that robust 50 percent reduction in cardiovascular
    1:09:26 related mortality if they only stayed in for 11 minutes. It was much less. It was a little bit
    1:09:30 like it was improved, but it was not 50 percent. The temperature and the duration and the frequency,
    1:09:35 those are three parameters that are important with respect to using a regular hot sauna.
    1:09:41 The reason I say regular hot saunas is because another type of sauna that’s very popular are
    1:09:47 infrared saunas. Infrared saunas do not get as hot, so they’re not warming the ambient air around you.
    1:09:56 They’re working through another mechanism and they’re moving molecules inside your body around
    1:10:02 and heating you up in a different way. You do sweat a lot and you can get your core body temperature
    1:10:09 elevated, particularly if you stay in quite a long time. You do have to keep in mind that you
    1:10:14 can’t take those parameters and go, “I’m going to stay in a 145-degree infrared sauna for only 20
    1:10:20 minutes,” because that’s what those Finnish studies have shown because they’re completely
    1:10:24 different. If you’re just staying in for 20 minutes, like the same amount of time in each,
    1:10:28 you’re not going to get those blood pressure improvements from an infrared sauna, which makes
    1:10:33 sense. It’s not as hot. It takes longer to elevate that core body to get your heart rate elevated.
    1:10:38 Anyone that’s done, like, I’ve done a lot of infrared sauna and I’ve done a lot of regular hot
    1:10:42 sauna and I know, and also wearing a heart rate monitor, you can wear your Fitbit or your Woop
    1:10:49 or whatever into the sauna and you’ll know when your heart rate starts to get elevated and it’s
    1:10:55 not going to be after 20 minutes in an infrared sauna. For me, I’d say 16 minutes is more like the
    1:11:02 duration that I would have to stay in to start to get more elevations in my heart rate. Again,
    1:11:08 that’s that mimicking of the modern intensity exercise, but there’s also biomarkers that
    1:11:13 have been measured. For example, we haven’t gone into this yet, but heat shock proteins.
    1:11:19 These are one of the adaptations that happen when your body is forced to increase its core
    1:11:26 body temperature, whether that’s through physical activity, which is making you hot,
    1:11:29 making you sweat or a deliberate heat exposure. Studies have been done looking at people that
    1:11:34 go into a relatively hot sauna. This would be 163-degree Fahrenheit sauna. If they stay in for
    1:11:41 30 minutes, they can raise their heat shock proteins about 50% over their baseline levels.
    1:11:47 Heat shock proteins have a lot of beneficial effects. They’re involved with preventing proteins
    1:11:53 from aggregating and forming plaques in the brain, in the vascular system. They also are very
    1:11:58 important for preventing muscle atrophy. There have now been studies that have been done showing
    1:12:02 that just even locally heating, the studies that have been done have been called immobilization
    1:12:08 studies where they’re mimicking an injury or an event. Let’s say you go and an older person
    1:12:14 goes into the hospital. They have the flu, whatever. They’re basically immobilized for a
    1:12:18 period of weeks. They’re not using their muscles. Their muscles were atrophying at a rapid rate.
    1:12:24 Studies have been done where if you apply even just local heat, you can cut that disuse atrophy
    1:12:30 by as much as 40%. Heat shock proteins are a good biomarker for heat stress. So is increased
    1:12:37 heart rate. We talked about you’re getting up to 110, 120. You can get up to 120 beats per minute
    1:12:42 sitting in the hot sauna. That’s really an indication that your core body temperature is
    1:12:46 being elevated. Your body is doing that work. You can elevate your heat shock proteins by
    1:12:51 being submerged from the shoulders down for about 20 minutes in about 104 degree Fahrenheit water,
    1:12:58 which is the standard hot tub level. I do think there are comparable effects with respect to the
    1:13:05 modality of heat exposure. Whether we’re talking about a hot sauna or a hot bath, perhaps an infrared
    1:13:11 sauna, again, the duration, the parameters will change. The parameters will change. But I do think
    1:13:16 that you can find comparable effects. There are personal preferences at play. I like both hot
    1:13:24 tub and hot sauna. I find that I cheat more with a hot tub. I’m more prone to put my arms out when
    1:13:29 I get really hot. When I’m in the sauna, there’s nowhere to go. If I’m getting hot, then I have
    1:13:35 to get out and then I’m like, “Oh, I’m giving up mentally.” I’m like, “No, I’m not going to give
    1:13:39 up.” But if I’m in the hot tub, I don’t feel like I’m giving up when I’m just getting my arms out.
    1:13:43 There’s an immune benefit too. Your immune system, isn’t there?
    1:13:46 There is. There have been some observational studies as well looking at pneumonia risk.
    1:13:53 I think it was something like 40% lower in people that use the sauna four to seven times a week.
    1:13:59 There have been a lot of really early studies on, again, these are coming out of Finland where
    1:14:04 there’s humidity. There’s steam involved as well. You’re working your cardiovascular system.
    1:14:12 The lungs are affected. I don’t know all the mechanisms. I don’t know that they’ve all been
    1:14:18 worked out, but there is some sort of benefit on the lugs and also just the immune system as well.
    1:14:24 It seems like immune changes happen as well. It’s funny. I do get into the sauna when I’m feeling
    1:14:30 a little under the weather or even if I am sick because I find it’s easier than getting on my
    1:14:36 Peloton. I get in there and I’ll do the steam and I feel so much better. I feel so much better.
    1:14:41 There’s my grandmother or grandfather used to tell me, “Sweat it out.” There’s almost
    1:14:47 like something true to that when you are feeling sick. Absolutely. When you are sick, you get a
    1:14:52 fever. The fever response, your core body temperature is elevated and heat shock proteins are
    1:14:57 activated. Heat shock proteins do play a role in what is called the innate immune response.
    1:15:03 That’s the immune response that you have when you’ve never seen a virus or a bacterial
    1:15:08 pathogen before. It’s not the antibody response. It’s that, “Okay, let’s fire away and get,”
    1:15:14 so heat shock proteins do play a role in that. When you are getting in the sauna, when you’re
    1:15:19 doing some form of deliberate heat exposure, you are elevating your core body temperature.
    1:15:24 The fever response is a very important part of our immune system’s way of
    1:15:29 dealing with the pathogen. It’s important. We get a fever for a reason. The reason I actually
    1:15:35 got into the sauna way back in 2009 had nothing to do with cardiovascular effects or even the
    1:15:42 effects on muscle mass, but it was the effects on my mood. I was very stressed out in graduate
    1:15:49 school. This was 2009. I was using the sauna every morning before I would go into the lab
    1:15:55 and do my experiments. That would often fail. It was very stressful. I started to notice quite
    1:16:01 quickly that I was able to handle that stress a lot better. I wasn’t getting so depressed after,
    1:16:08 and so down and anxious. That’s when I was like, “Something is going on here.” It was very noticeable
    1:16:14 for me. Then I started to look into the literature and come up with my own theories, which I,
    1:16:21 connecting the dots, where I actually did publish on this back in 2022. It’s in my huge review article
    1:16:27 on the sauna. It’s called, “How sauna use can increase health span?” I think it has to do with,
    1:16:33 when you get into the sauna, again, you’re mimicking a lot of the same effects that
    1:16:37 cardiovascular exercise. You’re releasing a lot of endorphins as well. Those are the
    1:16:42 feel-good opioids that we release in our brain. What’s really interesting is that also the opposite
    1:16:48 of endorphin is called dinorphin. It’s also an opioid that we release in our body. It’s that
    1:16:56 opioid that’s involved in the discomfort feeling. When you’re working out, when you’re getting
    1:17:01 hot, you’re feeling uncomfortable. Your body’s making dinorphin. Dinorphin is part of what it
    1:17:08 does is it cools down your body. It’s playing a role in, okay, you’re elevating your core body
    1:17:15 temperature. The adaptive response is, “Okay, we need to cool down somewhat.” Dinorphin plays a
    1:17:19 role in that, but it also is what’s responsible for that uncomfortable feeling when you’re like,
    1:17:24 “Oh, I’m so hot. I want to get out.” When you release dinorphin, you have a response, a feedback
    1:17:28 loop in your brain, where dinorphin causes your body to make more receptors to the feel-good
    1:17:35 endorphin, and it sensitizes those receptors. It makes sense if you think about it. When your
    1:17:40 body’s not feeling good and you’re getting that uncomfortable feeling, it wants to make sure that
    1:17:44 it’s going to counter that with feeling-good. The next time you make endorphins from a hug,
    1:17:50 from your child, or a joke, you laugh at whatever, you’re going to feel even better because you’re
    1:17:55 going to be more sensitive to those endorphins. It’s called mu-opioid receptors, and that’s
    1:18:01 what you make when you increase endorphin. Anyways, but now there’s lots more research coming out,
    1:18:06 so work from Dr. Charles Raison, and now his protege, Dr. Ashley Mason. It’s a type of sauna
    1:18:12 that’s like a bed, and it’s a chamber with a head out, and so your whole body is in it.
    1:18:18 They are elevating your core body temperature to about 101.3 degrees Fahrenheit, so you’re
    1:18:23 getting a fever. They’re inducing a feverish response. Now, many people have to be in this
    1:18:28 sauna, and an infrared gets up to about 145-ish or something like that, and they’re in there for
    1:18:33 60 minutes, 50 minutes to 60 minutes, and they’re getting a feverish response. It’s a
    1:18:40 very intense procedure, but they induce this feverish response 101.3 Fahrenheit just one time
    1:18:47 in people with major depressive disorder, or they did a sham control where they made them
    1:18:53 feel like they were getting hot, but it wasn’t hot enough. The people that got the active treatment
    1:18:58 had an antidepressant effect that lasted six weeks after. It was enormous and crazy. Placebo
    1:19:04 group didn’t get it at all. It’s amazing what our body can do to heal itself when we’re not always
    1:19:11 injecting it with stuff, too. There’s all these other ways to go about healing it. It’s almost
    1:19:15 like it knows what it’s doing sometimes. It does. I agree with you. I mean, it’s so exciting to
    1:19:20 potentially have a non-pharmacological treatment for depression, because it’s undeniable that
    1:19:27 doing aerobic exercise, like they have compared running to classical antidepressants like SSRI,
    1:19:33 so serotonin, reuptake inhibitors. In terms of the antidepressant effects, it’s the same.
    1:19:39 Only the running has all the other benefits. There are people that are really severely depressed
    1:19:44 that just can’t even get out of bed. They’re not going to go for a run. It’s true. There are people
    1:19:50 that will not get out of bed, but will they get into a sauna? It’s a lot easier. It really
    1:19:57 opens up doors. It’s just so exciting. Super promising as we age, too, for the aging population.
    1:20:04 A lot of people who don’t want to exercise when they get a lot older, or the aches and pains,
    1:20:08 and maybe it’s a low-intensity way to do that. I can say for myself, during COVID,
    1:20:13 it was probably one of the most stressful periods of my life. The sauna, I think it saved my life
    1:20:20 a lot. I was using the sauna five, six times a week, and it was just sort of like, A, it was
    1:20:27 mentally grounding. It was something I look forward to. It was a great ritual, but it sort of kept
    1:20:32 me out of trouble for some reason. I could never explain it. I’m an N of one, and I’m not super
    1:20:37 scientific and all that, but I was like, “This is working. This is keeping me happy, and going,
    1:20:42 and motivated, and I got to keep doing more of this,” because yeah, it was really crazy.
    1:20:48 I want to talk about exercise. Maybe we’ll do that in part two, because I don’t think we’re
    1:20:51 going to do it justice here in the next 10 minutes. Maybe we can end with the top three
    1:20:58 interventions you can think of from a diet perspective, and then the top three interventions
    1:21:04 you can think of from a behavioral perspective that would have the biggest bang on people’s lives.
    1:21:10 Diet-wise, the top three things that people can think about would be to make sure they’re getting
    1:21:18 enough of their marine source of omega-3, so supplementing with two grams of a pretty decent
    1:21:25 quality fish oil brand per day. It’s like low-hanging fruit. Then I would say vitamin D3.
    1:21:33 Most people, 4,000 I use is a pretty safe bet. At the very least, doing 4,000 I use a day of
    1:21:41 vitamin D3, as you mentioned, it’s the cheapest supplement. It’s something like a penny a pill.
    1:21:46 It’s the most affordable thing to do. Then making sure you’re eating your greens and
    1:21:54 getting your protein, so thinking about the magnesium and then the 1.2 grams per kilogram
    1:22:01 body weight a day are the biggest bang for your buck, I think. Then with respect to behavioral
    1:22:08 exercise, and particularly doing a good amount of high-intensity exercise, and we didn’t get so
    1:22:13 much into it, but it really is one of the most important things that you can do. There’s studies
    1:22:18 showing that people just doing one to three minutes of getting their heart rate up to 80%
    1:22:22 max heart rate for one to three minutes three times a week is associated with a 50% reduction
    1:22:29 in all cause mortality and cancer related mortality. It’s easy to do. You can do that.
    1:22:34 You can just get up and do three minutes. It’s not that challenging. Also, resistance training
    1:22:41 and muscle mass, super important. You need to be building that muscle mass and maintaining it,
    1:22:47 because frailty, you get to a point when you start to get older and all of a sudden you have an event
    1:22:54 where you’ve got influenza or whatever and then you start to not working out. You lose so much
    1:23:00 muscle and you get a couple of those stacked on over a couple of years and then all of a sudden you
    1:23:04 can’t walk. Your mobility goes down and then the curve just drops. Resistance training is extremely
    1:23:12 important. If you’re doing those two things, you’re probably going to be maintaining a healthy
    1:23:17 body weight because at the end of the day calories in, calories out, doesn’t matter. If you’re doing
    1:23:22 the exercise and the resistance training and you’re focusing on getting the proper micronutrients
    1:23:29 from your veggies and protein intake, you’re probably not going to be eating all the junk.
    1:23:33 The last thing I would say, behavioral wise, I would add sauna or deliberate heat exposure.
    1:23:40 I think that’s huge for a lot of reasons. For the cardiovascular reasons, there’s mental health
    1:23:47 effects as we talked about. There’s also other brain effects. Dementia risk is lower as well.
    1:23:52 Then muscle atrophy, you can do the deliberate heat exposure to help prevent muscle atrophy
    1:23:57 as well. I think those are the three behavioral changes. By the way, exercise can forgive a lot
    1:24:04 of sins, including lack of sleep. That’s why I start with that. I don’t make the sleep the most
    1:24:10 important. I actually think it’s exercise. We’re going to have to have you on for part two because
    1:24:14 I really want to dive into both resistance training and cardiovascular exercise with you.
    1:24:19 This has been an amazing conversation. Thank you so much for your time.
    1:24:23 Well, I look forward to your round two, Shane. Thank you for all the great questions. It’s been
    1:24:27 a lot of fun. Wow. What a fun conversation that was with Dr. Rhonda Patrick. I just want to go
    1:24:34 through some of my takeaways and notes from this one. I think the big overarching message that we
    1:24:43 got across today is that a lot of people focus on the micro. If you notice,
    1:24:51 Rhonda kept bringing it back to the macro. I don’t mean in terms of nutrients. I mean,
    1:24:55 in terms of what we focus on, we’re overly focused on these little minute things because
    1:24:59 they’re really within our control. We want to feel like we’re doing something when in reality,
    1:25:05 there’s these big things that we’re not focused on that nobody’s really arguing about. You might
    1:25:11 argue whether seed oil is bad for you. I think it is or not. At the end of the day, are we getting
    1:25:17 the right magnesium? Are we getting folate? Are we getting omega-3s? How are we positioning
    1:25:23 ourselves? This is how I think about food personally. This is one of the reasons I’m
    1:25:28 exploring this with Dr. Rhonda Patrick and some other guests is the food that you put into your
    1:25:35 body is sort of a lead domino for a whole bunch of other things. It affects your mood.
    1:25:40 It affects your energy. It affects how you handle stress. It affects how you handle your
    1:25:45 emotions. It really dictates a lot of what comes downstream. Paying attention to the food in your
    1:25:51 body is a really good way to take control of your life. It’s a really small thing you can do to put
    1:25:56 yourself on easy mode every day. We didn’t get into talking about sugars. We didn’t talk about
    1:26:01 oils too much. I really wanted to get into that. I also really wanted to get into exercise routines
    1:26:07 and talk about that. But I think we’ll try to do that in the next episode. We’ll definitely do a
    1:26:12 part two of this. I did take away sort of like grass-fed was better. If you can afford it,
    1:26:19 if not, don’t stress over it. Same as organic. If you can afford it, great. If you can’t,
    1:26:25 don’t stress over it. Again, if you had to pick and choose, I loved her heuristic for using thin
    1:26:33 and thick skin as the way to pick and choose. If you’re sort of like, “Oh, I want to do some
    1:26:39 organic,” and not all, I liked her approach to sort of washing veggies. It’s very practical and
    1:26:45 pragmatic. It doesn’t have to be sort of the Instagram that you see of the vinegar and the
    1:26:52 baking soda and the water and soaking it for 15 minutes. I liked the very end when we talked
    1:26:59 about sort of like here are three behavioral interventions that you can do that really make a
    1:27:03 difference. Here are three sort of supplement dietary things. Again, they were fish oil,
    1:27:09 vitamin D3, greens and protein, and then high intensity exercise, resistance training, and
    1:27:20 sauna, which I really like in part because I’m biased to have a sauna. I think that that makes
    1:27:25 a big difference. It made a big difference for me during COVID. I think it’s made a big difference
    1:27:30 for other people that I’ve talked to. One thing we didn’t talk about was sleep. I know a friend
    1:27:35 of mine, Andrew Worgensen, has one and he says it really, really drives his sleep. I don’t know if
    1:27:41 it helps me sleep. Sometimes I get in there and I nap to be honest with you. I like talking about
    1:27:47 this smoothie. If you remember, she had a smoothie recipe and it was sort of like four kale leaves,
    1:27:52 avocado, frozen blueberries, which she actually went out of the way to say a ton of frozen blueberries,
    1:27:58 protein powder, collagen powder, and there was that meringue of powder water. Then we talked
    1:28:05 about my smoothie, the one that I make with the kids and how I was unintentionally adding bananas
    1:28:11 and blueberries together and sort of undoing the amazing effect of blueberries. I’m going to switch.
    1:28:18 I’m going to try to switch it out and see what the kids think or even if they notice,
    1:28:22 switch out the banana, put in avocado. Again, in mine, we call it the Tom Brady. It was protein,
    1:28:28 A.G.1, walnuts, blueberries, yogurt, almond milk. I’m going to switch out the banana, chia seeds,
    1:28:34 and hemp seeds if you want to. Hemp seeds are a really good sort of source of extra calories and
    1:28:41 fat for the kids. If you are trying to get them to eat more, which I have one kid who eats a
    1:28:48 lot, one kid who doesn’t eat a lot, I’m always trying to get more nutrient dense food into both
    1:28:54 of them. What else do we talk about? We sort of talked about the sun and sunscreen and so
    1:28:59 circumstantial. There’s not a lot to take away from that other than when you’re out in the sun,
    1:29:04 be careful about what you’re sort of putting on your skin and also be careful about how much
    1:29:11 sun you are getting. You don’t want to get sunburned. Yeah, I just really thank you guys for
    1:29:18 listening. If you have any questions or follow-ups, just send me an email, Shane@fs.blog. What I’ll do
    1:29:26 is I’ll sort of create a little sheet and we can make questions for follow-up for round two. We’re
    1:29:33 definitely going to do this again. I really appreciate you taking the time to listen and
    1:29:42 learn with me. As you can see, this is my journey and I’m learning along with you, so I really
    1:29:48 appreciate it. Thanks for listening and learning with us. For a complete list of episodes,
    1:30:00 show notes, transcripts, and more, go to fs.blog/podcast or just Google the Knowledge Project.
    1:30:07 The Furnham Street blog is also where you can learn more about my new book,
    1:30:12 Clear Thinking, turning ordinary moments into extraordinary results. It’s a transformative
    1:30:17 guide that hands you the tools to master your fate, sharpen your decision-making,
    1:30:22 and set yourself up for unparalleled success. Learn more at fs.blog/clear.
    1:30:29 Until next time.
    1:30:31 [Music]
    1:30:42 [Music]
    1:30:46 [BLANK_AUDIO]

    Shane Parrish sits down with the renowned biochemist Dr. Rhonda Patrick to explore the intricate world of nutrition and health. Dr. Patrick provides a deep dive into the role micronutrients play in our daily health, detailing how deficiencies and insufficiencies in vitamins, minerals, fatty acids, and amino acids can lead to serious health issues over time. Shane and Dr. Patrick also discuss the science behind deliberate heat exposure. She outlines the optimal sauna conditions—temperature, duration, and frequency—necessary to achieve these health benefits and explains the physiological mechanisms at play.

    Rhonda Patrick has a Ph.D. in biomedical science and a Bachelor of Science degree in biochemistry/chemistry from the University of California, San Diego. She has done extensive research on aging, cancer, and nutrition.

    (00:00) Intro

    (04:40) A philosophy for nutrition

    (15:36) Micronutrients through supplements vs. food

    (25:43) Wild-caught vs. farm-raised fish

    (28:44) Organic vs. non-organic vegetables

    (36:14) On macronutrients

    (40:20) How protein levels differ in different foods

    (45:27) The best morning smoothie recipe

    (54:48) Dr. Patrick grades Shane's ”GOAT” smoothie recipe

    (59:14) Grass-fed vs. non-grass fed

    (01:04:40) On vitamin D (Is sunscreen killing us more than the sun?)

    (01:19:48) Deliberate heat and cold exposure

    (01:44:27) Top three behavioral and diet interventions for life and health improvements

    Watch the episode on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/theknowledgeproject/videos

    Newsletter – I share timeless insights and ideas you can use at work and home. Join over 600k others every Sunday and subscribe to Brain Food. Try it: https://fs.blog/newsletter/

    My Book! Clear Thinking: Turning Ordinary Moments into Extraordinary Results is out now – https://fs.blog/clear/ 

    Follow me: https://beacons.ai/shaneparrish

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  • #190 Brad Jacobs: Building a Business Empire

    AI transcript
    0:00:00 So I looked at that org chart and said this is a messed up org chart, which is great for making money
    0:00:04 If you can find something that’s messed up and
    0:00:07 Easy to un-mess up. Oh, yeah, there’s your money. There’s your opportunity to make a lot of money
    0:00:12 You’ve made a few billion dollars. What lessons have you learned about money and spending money and living with money?
    0:00:20 That you wish you knew sooner. You know, seriously, you throw me off a little bit with the question because
    0:00:24 When you look at the the numbers the real growth has been through M&A through acquisitions
    0:00:28 What’s been my secrets on acquisitions? Here’s the gist. A lot of people have a rigid
    0:00:32 Business plan that’s spelled out for many years and that’s it and it’s very it doesn’t usually work
    0:00:38 Why because life changes markets change economies change and if you’re rigid if you’re just rigid thinking
    0:00:45 You’re gonna have things come your way to make money for shareholders and feel love. It’s nice. It’s great
    0:00:49 But it’s really not our thing. That’s a bad way of thinking you said you can get a lot of things wrong if you get the
    0:00:54 Big trend, right? What major trend are you most interested in right now? I’m most interested in
    0:01:01 Because it is the trend it is the number one trend
    0:01:22 Welcome to the Knowledge Project a podcast about mastering the best of what other people have already figured out so you can apply their
    0:01:28 Insights to your life. I’m your host Shane Parrish a quick favor to ask before we start most people
    0:01:36 Listening on Apple podcasts or Spotify right now. Haven’t yet hit the follow button
    0:01:41 If you can hit the follow button now, I would appreciate it the more people who follow this show the better the guests
    0:01:47 We can get thank you and enjoy the conversation
    0:01:51 If you’d like access to the podcast before everyone else special episodes just for you
    0:01:57 Hand edited transcripts, or you just want to support the show you love join at fs.blog/membership check out the show notes for a link
    0:02:05 Today my guest is Brad Jacobs executive chairman at XPO Brad is a career
    0:02:12 CEO and serial entrepreneur with unique track record of starting multi-billion dollar companies
    0:02:19 I think he’s up to seven of them by now, which have created tens of billions of dollars in shareholder value
    0:02:25 His goal with all of his ventures is to generate outsized value for shareholders by hiring
    0:02:30 Talented people committed to thinking big he recently wrote a book called how to make a few billion dollars
    0:02:36 Which is a playbook for creating outsized value now all of that sounds really simple
    0:02:41 So I wanted to sit down with Brad for a wide-ranging conversation. How exactly does he do it?
    0:02:47 Let’s get into the weeds. We talk about AI trends human nature mergers and acquisitions running meetings
    0:02:54 What he looks for when hiring and so much more whether you’re running a business or working in one
    0:03:00 You’ll walk away from this conversation with clarity around how to improve your results
    0:03:05 It’s time to listen and learn
    0:03:09 Today’s episode is brought to you by eight sleep eight sleeps pod cover is redefining sleep leveraging both data and technology to improve health
    0:03:25 The pod cover will improve your sleep by automatically adjusting your bed’s temperature based on your individual needs
    0:03:31 The cover can be added to any bed like a fitted sheet and allows you or your partner to cool or warm your side of the bed as low as
    0:03:38 55 degrees if you’re crazy and up to 110 degrees if you’re also crazy. I
    0:03:43 Use an eight sleep every night. I find this thing is amazing
    0:03:47 Not only at adjusting temperatures some nights, you know, you’re just cold and you want to warm up and some nights
    0:03:53 You’re really warm and you want to cool down. It’s remarkable how
    0:03:56 Consistently awesome my sleep is and how much the eight sleep affects that you can go to eight sleep com
    0:04:03 Slash Farnham Street and get two hundred dollars off plus free shipping on the pod cover by eight sleep
    0:04:08 That’s eight sleep comm slash Farnham Street
    0:04:11 Some of my favorite brands are on Shopify including Gymshark all birds outweigh socks and arrow press
    0:04:19 Shopify is the global commerce platform that helps you sell at every stage of your business
    0:04:25 It doesn’t matter if you just have an idea or already operate a multi-million dollar company
    0:04:31 Shopify is there to help you grow every step of the way because businesses that grow grow with Shopify
    0:04:37 What I love about Shopify is that it’s like you have a multi-billion dollar tech team working just for you from day one
    0:04:45 If you’re just starting this means you can go from idea to store in a few minutes
    0:04:49 But it also means if you’re an existing company you can save money and time
    0:04:53 If you’ve ever checked out from a store and thought that was so easy chances are it was shop pay
    0:04:59 Which is the internet’s best converting check out up to 36 percent better compared to other leading commerce platforms
    0:05:07 Go to Shopify comm slash Shane now to grow your business no matter what stage you’re in
    0:05:13 If you’re on the road you have a license plate, but not every license plate supports our provincial parks
    0:05:21 Proceeds from BC parks license plates help conserve the beauty of nature from the peaks of our mountains
    0:05:28 To the shores of our beaches
    0:05:30 Adventure starts with a license plate choose the one that gives back
    0:05:35 Discover how BC parks license plates help protect our parks at BC parks dot CA slash get involved a message from the government of British Columbia
    0:05:45 Ray Kurzweil who wrote the singularity is one of your heroes and you recently met him
    0:05:54 I’m curious what you took away from that conversation and what it was like
    0:05:58 Well, I did recently meet him and it was like meeting Albert Einstein or meeting so on
    0:06:03 Michelangelo because we look at his context his wide context
    0:06:08 he’s looking at the history of the universe going back 13 points something billion years and how we got here and then
    0:06:15 looking at those trends and
    0:06:17 Where are we going? He identifies the most important trend of all which is
    0:06:23 Mesopians have created technology of created tools starting with stone pebbles and
    0:06:28 over a couple million years ago and then fire and then settlements and and
    0:06:32 Over the last couple hundred years so much so much more so much more in the last 20 years
    0:06:37 Accelerating accelerating and now with AI it’s accelerating even more and
    0:06:41 Where’s that going?
    0:06:43 Where’s that going is the tools that we’ve created the technology we’ve created is becoming
    0:06:49 more capable than we are at certain of our traits and
    0:06:52 we’re able to outsource a lot of our activities to our own technology and
    0:07:00 Ray predicts a singularity whereby
    0:07:03 Technology becomes more intelligent more capable than humans and we merge with technology that we use so much technology in our own
    0:07:12 In our own bodies with wearables and nanobots and so forth that in AI and outsourcing our memory and sensory and so forth that
    0:07:20 You really can’t call it homo sapiens anymore because the traits
    0:07:23 Characters have changed so much that will say homo sapiens has become extinct and there’s a there’s a new new species
    0:07:29 And I think it’s probably right. What do you think the benefits of that are and what do you think the drawbacks are?
    0:07:34 Well, the benefits are we should be able to accomplish a lot more
    0:07:38 So if you look at us as a planet eight billion people there’s a lot of things we do well
    0:07:43 but there’s a lot of things we don’t do well primarily get along with each other and
    0:07:46 Information sharing is not there resource sharing is not there. I think with advances in technology
    0:07:51 we will be able to
    0:07:54 distribute resources more intelligently and and and more
    0:07:59 abundantly and have more resources for more people and I think
    0:08:03 Medicine will be better and science science will be better and be able to live longer
    0:08:07 We’ll be able to be more in touch with the way we think and to be able to think more constructively because that’s one of the places
    0:08:13 Where it’s an area of improvement for humans is we don’t think rationally a lot of times
    0:08:17 And I think with technology and AI advancements that we will think more rationally, so it’ll be non-stop therapy
    0:08:24 So to speak how do you think rationally when you have all this the information coming at you from all over the world your emotional
    0:08:30 You have big swings. I mean you’ve lost billions of dollars and in market cap in a day. I don’t always think perfectly rationally
    0:08:37 I’m not a perfect person. I’ve
    0:08:39 paid attention to the way I think
    0:08:42 over the course of my life and I’ve studied with various people who that’s their specialty is analyzing how you think and
    0:08:48 I did a couple of years of therapy for three hours a week for for a couple years. So I I have spent a lot of time
    0:08:56 Reflecting on how I think what my automatic thoughts are what my biases are what my cognitive distortions are and I’m aware of those and
    0:09:04 I apply various techniques and tools in the toolkit that you learn from
    0:09:09 Cognitive therapy dialectical bit behavior therapy positive psychology, etc to to think more rationally and more constructively and more accurately
    0:09:16 And I think that helps me in business quite a bit in business
    0:09:20 You need to keep your head on your shoulders. You need to be calm. You need to be cool
    0:09:25 You need to be collected you need to be dealing with lots of changing
    0:09:28 unplanned circumstances and then capitalizing on those and not being overwhelmed by those not being
    0:09:35 Beat up but but utilize what comes in capitalizing what comes in to create money to create money for shareholders
    0:09:42 So I think that the human capital in them in the psychological
    0:09:46 Sense is very very important. So I I put energy into that
    0:09:50 You said you can get a lot of things wrong if you get the big trend, right?
    0:09:54 What major trend are you most interested in right now?
    0:09:59 I’m most interested in AI because it is the trend it is the number one trend
    0:10:05 whereby our technology the software that intelligence will be able to consume so much information much more than
    0:10:13 We human beings can even with a hundred billion brain cells the power of compute computing is so much greater and
    0:10:19 be able to then analyze that and be able to
    0:10:22 spit things out and be able to
    0:10:25 Eventually, I’m looking forward to the point where
    0:10:29 Computers become emotional where they do have emotion with you have empathy just like we have mirror neurons in the front of our in the prefrontal cortex
    0:10:36 I’d like to see that trend fruit of materialized where
    0:10:40 Computers can feel can have theory of mind can be sitting here with a conversation with Shane Parish and and feeling what you’re feeling and
    0:10:49 And feeling happy about what you’re feeling happy about feeling sad about something you’re not feeling happy about
    0:10:55 Now I’m looking forward to that trend a lot. No saying AI is sort of everybody recognizes AI as being a trend
    0:11:02 But you’ve spotted several trends well before people recognize them and you are way ahead on the AI curve, too
    0:11:10 As I understand it. How do you spot those trends before they become mainstream?
    0:11:16 Well, I do spend a lot of time thinking about trends
    0:11:18 I look I spent a lot of time thinking about the wider context of things like, okay, here’s a situation
    0:11:25 What’s the context of that situation?
    0:11:27 What’s its origin?
    0:11:29 What’s its present conditions and characteristics?
    0:11:31 What are the ways it could go and what would be the catalyst to make it go right or straight or left?
    0:11:37 I
    0:11:38 Intentionally think about trends quite a bit because in business in the business world
    0:11:42 You’ve got to get the major trend, right?
    0:11:44 You’ve got to get the major trend, right and as my main business mentor make rest in peace little Justin used to say
    0:11:50 You can mess up a lot of things
    0:11:52 But if you get the main trend, right, you’re gonna make a lot of money and conversely if you don’t get the main trend, right?
    0:11:58 You’re swimming upstream. You can do a lot of other things, right?
    0:12:02 But you’re not gonna make a lot of money. So I intentionally spend time thinking about
    0:12:06 What’s the where does all this fit in and where could it be going?
    0:12:10 What’s your research process like I like people and I like picking people’s brains
    0:12:14 And I’m shameless about asking people their opinions and I like to be a student more than a teacher
    0:12:20 I find a lot of people make the mistake as they get older or they get more successful
    0:12:24 They they think they know everything they start teaching all the time
    0:12:27 I’m sharing through the book I wrote and through podcast like this and so forth the few little things that I think I have insights
    0:12:33 That I can give back to but I absolutely view myself as a student of life
    0:12:37 I’m I don’t view myself as as a guru who’s figured it all out by a long shot
    0:12:42 and I think if you keep that that element of profound curiosity of
    0:12:47 really interesting and being very interested to learn and
    0:12:50 Being involved with the sensory experience be involved in the intellectual experience be involved in an analytical capabilities
    0:12:58 I think you can learn a lot more and you can see trends that otherwise
    0:13:01 You don’t see it just in it and you’re living it, but you’re not seeing the trend
    0:13:05 You’re just kind of going along a lot of people who reach your level of success
    0:13:11 sort of outsource a lot of this work to other people and by that I mean
    0:13:16 Do research on this come back to me. Give me these points, but you seem very
    0:13:20 Hands-on in the weeds very involved in the detail. Why is that important to you? I do both shame
    0:13:27 I do have a team that researches things for me, but I also I should I like to roll up my sleeves and get into it myself
    0:13:33 I like to find even like when I do M&A
    0:13:35 So you know my teams that I’ve led have done about 500 acquisitions. I’ve been involved in those acquisitions
    0:13:42 So I I get into the details of what are we buying and to buy those 500 companies
    0:13:48 We looked at thousands and thousands of other companies that we didn’t buy and I and I I love the process
    0:13:54 I love studying each company figuring out how they get to the point where now there are millions or hundreds of millions or billions of
    0:14:01 Dollars of revenue and they started from scratch and how do they do that? It’s like a miracle. It’s fantastic
    0:14:06 I’m very impressed and excited and enamored with entrepreneurs and companies that have
    0:14:12 Created huge growth and huge value and I want to understand that so I want to get into the detail of it
    0:14:18 I want to pick their brains. I I see a big value in asking lots of questions people now today
    0:14:24 You’re the one asking questions. I’m actually but normally it’s the roller-versal normally
    0:14:28 I’m asking a lot of questions if you go into a management meeting. I’m usually asking lots of questions
    0:14:33 What have you learned about asking questions that you wish you knew five years ago? I take questioning from the
    0:14:38 Therapist so I wrote in the book that the only time my life that I’ve been depressed
    0:14:43 But I was really depressed was in the mid-2000s when I had stepped down from being CEO of this big company
    0:14:51 You know the rentals and now I didn’t have anything to do. I didn’t I was I was doing some art
    0:14:55 I was you know studying art and buying art and I was doing things with my family so forth
    0:15:00 but I didn’t have a business and I learned from that that
    0:15:03 Everyone has their own thing that makes them excited me is running businesses. I’ve been a CEO since I’ve been
    0:15:09 23 years old and I like being a CEO. I really like that job real a lot
    0:15:14 Now I wasn’t a CEO and I felt a big gap
    0:15:17 I felt I felt depressed I was down and had a lot of
    0:15:20 Unconstructive thoughts and inaccurate thoughts and so forth and that drew me just to meeting a lot of fantastic psychotherapists
    0:15:27 And I mean fantastic at the top of their game. So there was a psychotherapist in New York City
    0:15:33 Called Albert Ellis. He died about 10 15 years ago and he had formed a
    0:15:39 school of therapy called
    0:15:41 Rational emotive behavior therapy REBT, but in short it was cognitive therapy. It was cognitive behavior therapy
    0:15:48 He’d together with another
    0:15:50 Psycho psychiatrist actually Aaron Beck whose family and friends called him Tim
    0:15:54 I got the privilege of meeting him to and spending time with him in his family
    0:15:57 Tim back or Aaron Beck and Albert Ellis were the co-founders of cognitive therapy and
    0:16:02 I find that
    0:16:05 therapists have of all the different professions are
    0:16:08 the best at asking questions and the best of
    0:16:12 Getting a person to relax getting a person at ease and to open up and when I learned from studying those psychotherapists
    0:16:19 First is you need before you start badgering someone with questions and inquiring and asking them all these important things
    0:16:25 Sometimes personal things was intimate things about private things
    0:16:28 You need to create you need to create an atmosphere you create an environment. That’s a safe place. That’s a zone where
    0:16:35 Your it’s okay to be vulnerable. It’s okay to say what you really feel
    0:16:41 It’s okay to take off your mask and show who you really are warts and all and that’s really really important and to do that
    0:16:48 you need to be listening and
    0:16:50 I learned from studying them that
    0:16:53 the most
    0:16:54 Maybe the most maybe the single most powerful thing you can do in a relationship with its personal as professional is to
    0:17:01 Give someone your 100% like you’re doing up. You’re giving me 100% of your attention. I can see it
    0:17:07 You’re you’re looking at me. You’re listening to me
    0:17:08 You’re actually paying attention to what I’m saying and that feels good. By the way, that’s making me put a little pressure on me to perform
    0:17:15 Better give me good answers, but you’re doing something powerful. You’re you’re giving me your attention
    0:17:20 You give me 100% of your attention and I find with therapists. That’s that’s their their little that’s one of their tricks
    0:17:27 One of their skills one of their techniques is you have your session for 45 minutes or two hours or whatever it is and during that time
    0:17:33 They’re all yours. They’re all listening to you and they’ve got all their attention on you and
    0:17:38 That has a certain effect on the person speaking and secondly, they’re not being judgmental
    0:17:45 So they’re not they’re going with you. No, there’s they’re not they’re not
    0:17:50 disagreeing with you without first
    0:17:52 finding a way of agreeing with you
    0:17:54 joining then leading
    0:17:57 Validating then disputing so even when they are changing the way you’re thinking is that she is a better way to look at that
    0:18:04 So another way we can look at that be more constructive before doing that before that disputing before that changing that transforming
    0:18:12 They’re first joining there the showing that they understood you they listen to you
    0:18:15 They got you they got what you said message received and I find that’s really powerful in business
    0:18:20 Whether you’re dealing with employees or whether you’re dealing with someone whose business you’re trying to buy
    0:18:26 We’re dealing with a vendor or you’re dealing with a investor or an upset customer
    0:18:31 It’s a it’s very good to do that. It’s very nourishing and nurturing to give someone
    0:18:37 100% of your attention and listen to them
    0:18:41 Non-judgmentally I call it non-judgmental concentration. I
    0:18:45 Think I made up that phrase. Maybe I didn’t I forgot and I should have attributed to someone else
    0:18:50 But that’s a phrase I use non-judgmental concentration when you’re really taking all your consciousness and giving it to someone and and not
    0:18:58 Judging them but going with them trying to get into their way of thinking their their way of feeling even so not just
    0:19:05 What are they thinking?
    0:19:07 But how are they feeling? So what’s the emotion that’s underlying that and and I use that I use that quite a bit
    0:19:15 in you in the book I have a chapter on
    0:19:18 How to have an electric meeting how to run an electric meeting which means the meeting that’s powerful a meeting a meeting that
    0:19:26 Everyone goes away exhilarated. Everyone goes away with
    0:19:29 Lots of things to do that can create a lot of value for the shareholders
    0:19:34 Not just one of these whole home meetings and an element of that meeting is
    0:19:38 everyone in the meeting shuts off all their devices and
    0:19:42 Concentrates concentrates non-judgmentally non-judgmental concentration on the one person who’s speaking at a time
    0:19:50 No side conversations. They’re talking over each other
    0:19:53 One person speaks at a time, but everyone in the room gives them all their attention. It’s really powerful thing
    0:19:58 I like that a lot. It’s sort of the secret to our podcast in a way, which is I want to see the world through your eyes
    0:20:05 I don’t have to agree or disagree. That’s not my job
    0:20:09 I just want to see what you see think what you think smell what you smell and then that way
    0:20:15 I can truly understand where you’re coming from and I think that so often listening is
    0:20:20 transactional in the sense of I’m waiting for you to stop so I can just say something or I
    0:20:26 Have this point. You don’t understand it
    0:20:28 So I’m not really listening to you because you’re talking about something else now
    0:20:32 And I think it’s one of the biggest reasons we miss communicate
    0:20:35 Yeah, is the work with that the psychotherapist is that where you learned about re-arranging our brain and controlling the mind and
    0:20:44 The importance of sort of thought experiments and mindset or talk to me a little bit about that was one of the places
    0:20:51 you know from my my main hobby since I was a teenager has been meditation and various forms of meditation and then from meditation and to
    0:20:59 learn self-hypnosis and then and then from there I learned all the
    0:21:02 Mindfulness and the positive psychology and cognitive therapy and so forth
    0:21:07 so I’ve mixed and matched a lot of different schools of thought and
    0:21:10 Customized it for me my own personality my background and my individuality. So it’s not just one thing
    0:21:17 I’ve had many different influences that have
    0:21:20 Created the way I look at life and the way I deal with reality and a lot of that was my education
    0:21:26 I was a kid was I studied music. I studied music in math, but in music
    0:21:31 It is a lot about relationships unless you’re a solo performer and I was not I like playing a group
    0:21:36 I like a band. I like playing with other people
    0:21:39 interacting with the other folks is
    0:21:41 Part of the magic of making really great music that’s that’s had a big influence on me, too
    0:21:46 I define myself I self-identify as a musician more than a business person, which you might find odd because I’ve
    0:21:52 been a lot of time building big businesses and running large enterprises, but
    0:21:57 when I think about myself, I think about myself as a music musician who
    0:22:02 happens to be doing a lot of business and
    0:22:05 Has done well at business, but I I feel like a musician and by that I mean
    0:22:11 My sense of sound is the dominant sense and I’m I listen very I listen to sounds
    0:22:17 I listen to my heartbeat listen to my breath. I’ve seen the sounds in this room going on right now. I I
    0:22:22 Suffer quote-unquote and I put air quotes on it because I don’t consider it suffering. I consider it fantastic
    0:22:28 Tinnitus
    0:22:30 Where where you have ringing in your ear from when I was a teenager probably from listening to music too loud and
    0:22:37 I have right now. I’m hearing very high-pitched sounds. I love it
    0:22:41 It keeps it interesting. It’s my friend. It keeps me in tune. They sometimes they get louder sometimes get softer now
    0:22:47 some people have tinnitus and they
    0:22:50 And I might be mispronouncing that but you know I’m talking about yeah
    0:22:54 Yeah, ringing there that and they say oh my god’s a terrible thing. It drives me crazy and they get all upset about the thing
    0:22:59 I have just the opposite attitude. I feel I’m lucky to have that. I really am lucky and I I wouldn’t know what life would be like without it and
    0:23:10 That’s part of being a musician part of part of being a musician is
    0:23:13 Embracing sounds no matter what they are. Hmm. No matter what they are and that’s that’s the reality of the moment and you should
    0:23:21 Be in that reality and go with that. What’s the relationship if you had to guess between music
    0:23:28 Math and business a lot for me a lot
    0:23:32 So let’s start with the business and then that’ll show how those other two things relate to it
    0:23:38 Business is about making money for shareholders
    0:23:40 at at court the report card for a business is
    0:23:44 You take money from other people the form of equity the debt you pay back
    0:23:49 But the equity is dear and people invest equity into the business and now you have to give them back that money when they sell their shares
    0:23:56 But much much more money than they gave you so in my companies
    0:24:02 We’ve been fortunate that we’ve been able to give back 32 times their money one and another company is over 150 times
    0:24:09 So really really large large large returns like over the top
    0:24:13 Unusually high returns that wasn’t by luck. That wasn’t
    0:24:19 Quincinental if it was Quincinosa wouldn’t happen five times in a row and in large amounts
    0:24:25 That was because there was a playbook. That’s because there was a method to it and
    0:24:30 that method
    0:24:32 Incorporates many many different elements and I talk about quite a bunch of them in the book that together
    0:24:38 Give you an ability to create what we call alpha in the business world
    0:24:42 Which is not just beta which is the markets going up to you going together with the market
    0:24:46 but alpha which exceeds the beta exceeds the overall uplift that pretty much all boats are lifting by the same time and
    0:24:53 Part of the part of the ingredients to that
    0:24:59 formula to make
    0:25:00 huge huge returns for shareholders
    0:25:02 involve
    0:25:05 analytical thought
    0:25:06 Careful analysis of numbers is all the math
    0:25:08 making order out of disorder trying to see where how does this all fit together and
    0:25:14 Seeing the relationships between different things
    0:25:18 How to reduce things to simplicity because a great mathematicians
    0:25:23 Reduce very complicated things to a formula for example. Yeah expressed with just a few hand strokes
    0:25:30 So that’s math. That’s mathematics. That’s the beauty of mathematics is seeing the patterns
    0:25:36 seeing the seeing this how to make sense out of this and
    0:25:40 On the music side, it’s being able to improvise because my training was originally classical
    0:25:48 but then I had the fortune to study with
    0:25:53 African-American musicians in in in Bennington college Milford graves Bill Dixon and
    0:25:58 part of that whole training was to be spontaneous and to be
    0:26:04 Improvising and to be in the moment and there is no wrong note if someone plays a note
    0:26:11 That’s just a new note. It’s not the wrong note. It’s like, okay, we changed key. Let’s go with that. Come on
    0:26:16 Let’s get going. Oh now we’re on so so that ability to
    0:26:21 Go with the flow in music. You need to have that in business. A lot of people have a
    0:26:26 Rigid business plan that’s spelled out for many years and that’s it and it’s very
    0:26:33 Not non flexible that doesn’t usually work. Why because life changes markets change economies change
    0:26:41 People change results that you get opportunities that you hadn’t even thought of at the beginning. So you need to you need to
    0:26:49 improvise you need to capitalize on that and to make money from that and if you’re rigid if you’re just rigid thinking
    0:26:56 If you’re not a musician, you’re not a musical business person
    0:26:59 You’re gonna lose opportunities. You’re gonna have things come your way to make money for shareholders and feel well
    0:27:06 It’s nice. It’s great, but it’s really not our thing. That’s a bad way of thinking. I’ll share with you one of the
    0:27:12 best business deals I did in my life was I bought in
    0:27:17 2015 a less than truckload trucking company called Conway is based in Ann Arbor, Michigan
    0:27:22 There’s a few billion dollar deal
    0:27:24 It was a pivot because this was a hard asset business that tens of thousands of trucks and drivers
    0:27:29 It was an asset heavy as asset heavy businesses as you’re gonna get with fixed costs and
    0:27:34 depreciation amortization was not an asset like brokerage business
    0:27:39 Which is why how I started expo was as an asset like non-asset-based business
    0:27:43 But here was an opportunity
    0:27:46 To buy something really really cheaply at a small fraction of what it was worth
    0:27:51 And even a smaller tiny fraction of what I knew we could make it be worth within a few short years
    0:27:57 This is a company that had a lot of excess overhead the organization chart was not
    0:28:01 Mathematical going back to symmetry and formula things that relationship makes sense. I like to take and I love org charts
    0:28:09 I just love to geek out on org charts and org chart should be pretty
    0:28:14 Or chart should be simple. They should be elegant. They should be geometrical
    0:28:18 They should not be really complicated like you took some spaghetti and threw it like an abstract art on a canvas
    0:28:24 This was this was this is a bad org chart
    0:28:27 This had three things of the three different HRs and three different IT organizations and a lot of duplications and
    0:28:34 This didn’t make any sense a lot of silos and heavy heavy on the
    0:28:40 Non-revenue generating top part of the organization. We should be the lightest part of any organization the heaviest part should be
    0:28:46 Parts of the organization that make money that generate revenue that you close to the customer to generate sales
    0:28:51 So I looked at that org chart and said
    0:28:53 This is a messed up org chart, which is great for making money if you can find something that’s messed up and
    0:28:59 Easy to un-mess up
    0:29:03 Booyah, there’s your money
    0:29:05 There’s your opportunity to make a lot of money and that was it which is like I got so excited about the opportunity to take this company
    0:29:10 And I saw a way we could
    0:29:12 Significantly grow the profit margin in the cash flow that I pivoted I pivoted and go ahead and do the deal
    0:29:19 I got beat up real bad by the market. They said oh it’s a change and I said give me some time and I remember I
    0:29:25 Remember Eli Gross who now runs investment banking for Morgan Stanley, but at the time he was covering me XBO as a transportation
    0:29:33 banker and
    0:29:35 He said, you know, you’re gonna be in the doghouse here for a little while because it’s a pivot and markets don’t like pivots
    0:29:39 But assuming you’re right and I know you have high conviction and you deliver the numbers
    0:29:45 Over time you’re gonna be a hero here and everyone’s gonna understand what you did and fortunately he and I were right and
    0:29:51 You look at that deal even though it was a pivot. It was a change. It was an improvisation
    0:29:56 We bought it for about
    0:29:59 three billion dollars
    0:30:00 Roughly half of it was equities. It really bought it for a billion and a half dollars plus with some leverage today
    0:30:06 It’s worth
    0:30:07 something like 15 billion dollars and that’s after
    0:30:10 having taken out
    0:30:13 many like five billion dollars of net cash from it that’s after
    0:30:17 Selling off five hundred fifty million dollars of the truckload business. That’s after taking its warehouse business
    0:30:25 It’s supply chain business, which was called Menlo and putting that into our GxO subsidiary
    0:30:29 That was after taking the brokerage business and putting that with our RxO brokerage business
    0:30:34 So this was the gift that kept giving Conway. It’s been an amazing, amazing, amazing ride and the returns
    0:30:40 It’s been a I can’t do it in my head, but something like a 20-bagger 15-bagger. It’s a huge huge return on investment capital and
    0:30:47 Had I not been trained as a musician in a mathematician, I don’t know that would have sought shame
    0:30:54 I don’t know. I didn’t have the mathematical skills. I would have been able to see
    0:30:59 Okay, this is a mess, but we can make it clean
    0:31:02 I don’t know if I would have been able to have the courage
    0:31:06 To improvise and to change from what the the script was
    0:31:11 For something that I that I had a high conviction
    0:31:14 Would be very very lucrative for our shareholders and in business the bottom line the report card is
    0:31:22 How much money did you generate for your shareholders? That’s the that’s the one it’s an examination with one question on it
    0:31:29 It’s how much did you make your stockholders? How much money did you make for your stockholders?
    0:31:33 How much how much bliss did you give to your investors in terms of return on their capital they invested in you?
    0:31:39 They trusted you with you’re a fiduciary in business. You’re you’re a you have a solemn
    0:31:45 sacred
    0:31:48 Obligate responsibility where you’re taking other people’s money
    0:31:52 debt and equity particularly the equity and you’re the custodian for that you’re a custodian of it that you’re
    0:31:57 temporarily
    0:32:00 Using their their money and your job is to multiply that they have a thousand other places. They could put that money
    0:32:06 They picked you. Yeah, they picked you now
    0:32:09 You’ve got a big big responsibility
    0:32:11 and I think the the training of a mathematician the training of a musician and then all these
    0:32:17 implementations I’ve done in the meditation and therapy and so forth
    0:32:21 I think that’s been what largely explains at least as far as I can understand
    0:32:26 Why my companies have created so much alpha. I have so many rabbit holes. I want to go down there
    0:32:31 I think the opportunity hiding in complexity is really interesting because the way that I think about this and correct me
    0:32:37 If you see it differently is bad ideas
    0:32:40 Can easily hide in complexity?
    0:32:44 But they can’t hide in simplicity. What’s your reaction to that? I need to digest it my immediate reaction is yeah
    0:32:51 I think I get that because when it’s when so go back to that organization chart that I saw at Conway
    0:32:57 It was just a mess. It’s like wow. It’s all over the place and triple dotted lines and squiggly lines
    0:33:03 And you had to have different colors and it’s like that’s not a real elegant
    0:33:06 Yeah, I think I see what you’re saying in that you could hide inefficiencies as opposed to when it’s a clean
    0:33:14 Organization chart
    0:33:16 Everyone’s got clear KPIs keep performance indicators everyone has clear metrics everyone has clear goals and the compensation is tied to that and
    0:33:24 People rewarded for achieving those goals. Yeah, it’s hard to hide the other thing that I thought was really interesting
    0:33:30 Is you brought up the leverage point? How do you think about leverage and debt and employing it and at what point?
    0:33:37 Does it become too risky?
    0:33:39 And at what point do you think a future opportunity cost you mentioned sort of taking advantage of whatever the world brings?
    0:33:45 But if you take on too much debt
    0:33:48 at now for an acquisition
    0:33:50 You’re reducing your ability to adapt in the future should interest rates rise should
    0:33:57 Accompany become available that you really want that’s a dream that wasn’t available when you took on all the debt
    0:34:03 How do you think about that? I’m a Zen Buddhist approach to debt not too much not too little
    0:34:07 I don’t think it’s an optimal balance sheet if you have no debt
    0:34:11 Because you can improve the returns by shrinking your your share count because you have fewer shares
    0:34:17 So the same amount of returns is is greater per share to a few returns. I think it’s good to have a little bit of leverage
    0:34:23 I don’t think you should have a lot of leverage particularly in today’s world
    0:34:28 I don’t think you should have a lot of leverage because this significant geopolitical risk
    0:34:32 The geopolitical risk in the Middle East and Ukraine in Taiwan. There’s the United States politics is very volatile
    0:34:39 there’s a lot of things that could go wrong real quick and and a
    0:34:44 kind of shock to the system would would hurt companies that have too much debt because business would slow down look
    0:34:52 What happened during COVID if you were very highly levered during COVID if you had way too much debt and
    0:34:57 Then everything slowed down and your revenues went down. You might not have been able to make your interest payments or your debt repayment payments
    0:35:04 And could have gone bankrupt companies don’t go bankrupt. Let’s say too much debt
    0:35:07 You go bankrupt from not being able to repay your debt
    0:35:09 So I don’t think you should have too much debt in my new company that I’m forming QxO
    0:35:14 We’re gonna have I think our target a healthy target should be one to two turns of debt by that
    0:35:19 I mean we take our free art our EBITDA, which is a measure of our cash flow and and we say let’s have one or two turns of that
    0:35:27 so if our
    0:35:28 EBITDA ends up being for instance in a period of time for example billion dollars
    0:35:31 Well, let’s have one or two billion dollars a debt and that’s that’s a comfortable amount not too much more than that now
    0:35:36 You could have for short periods of time
    0:35:39 You could lever up like when I bought Conway we levered up to about four times a little more than four times
    0:35:45 But we very quickly sold off and mentioned that truckload division for $550 million. Boom
    0:35:51 We paid down a whole bunch of debt right from that. We generated a lot of free cash flow
    0:35:54 We took that free cash flow instead of doing more acquisitions. We paid down debt
    0:35:59 So you can get your leverage under control by one of two ways by improving your profits by increasing your EBITDA
    0:36:06 Or by paying down your actual gross amount of debt
    0:36:09 And I think you can manage that and that’s a that’s something a good CFO does you sit in the past that you need to be liked and loved
    0:36:16 And yet you’re quite contrarian at times in your approach to things. How do you reconcile these two things?
    0:36:22 I think you have to be contrarian. I think if you want to make a lot of money in business
    0:36:28 You can’t just be a conformist to do at what is in in fashion and what everybody else thinks if you’re gonna do what everyone else thinks
    0:36:36 You’re gonna get returns that everyone else gets which is by definition average
    0:36:41 So my companies have not made average returns my companies have outperformed their indexes
    0:36:47 Not by one or two hundred basis points, but sometimes by five or six times what the index was so
    0:36:53 You have to do you have to think differently and take things that are from a different point of view
    0:36:58 So one of my favorite investors in my companies has been Orbus
    0:37:02 Out in California and in Bermuda and their contrarians
    0:37:06 They’re willing to make a bet and a significant bet if they have a high conviction about a trend or a company that the markets not seeing
    0:37:14 something’s out of favor but
    0:37:16 The market doesn’t understand something about it. Maybe a company is not studied enough. It’s not covered enough
    0:37:21 Maybe management is not good at communicating their story and and it’s dislocated the price is dislocated
    0:37:26 and you can get a real good value by buying those shares and then being patient
    0:37:31 Playing it out the cycle and make real good returns and I’ve seen them do that with my companies when
    0:37:36 Something happened in the marketplace that made us a cheap stock for for a short period of time
    0:37:41 Boom, they came in they bought a lot of shares and wrote them up and then sold there. We were really high
    0:37:46 I think that contrarian value approach to investing to business is profound. I think that’s important and
    0:37:53 I remember I remember when I
    0:37:57 Sold my first company Amarax my old brokerage company. We started a company in 1979
    0:38:03 bunch of broke scrappy kids and we’re in the right place at the right time and the
    0:38:09 Iranian
    0:38:11 Revolution took place and the shaga kicked out and Khomeini came in and they took 400 hostages and and the oil prices went way
    0:38:18 Way up. So it was a great time. It was a sad time for the world
    0:38:21 It’s a lot of a chaos and problems
    0:38:24 But it was really good to get in the oil business oil business would really volatile and
    0:38:27 Some young whippers snappers like us could come in and be taken seriously by
    0:38:31 Exxon and mobile and Texaco and Shell and Gulf and BP and all the customers that became our big customers over time
    0:38:37 We built that business up over four quick years to about a little under five billion dollars in brokerage volume
    0:38:43 So that’s that was really big rapid rapid growth curve and a good team doing that around the world
    0:38:49 And then I sold it and I wanted to start a new business and I wanted and I was ambitious
    0:38:54 I was single. I wasn’t married enough kids. I could take risks. I could afford to do that
    0:38:59 and I was members speaking with my my uncle Howard and
    0:39:02 May he rest in pieces long long passed away
    0:39:07 and of course my uncle Howard was born in the
    0:39:09 1920s, maybe even late late 19 tens and grew up in the depression, obviously and
    0:39:16 During world during the World War two and so forth in it was very tough times
    0:39:21 So he’s very good
    0:39:22 You know, he grew up in a time when there’s a lot of emphasis towards being very frugal and very risk averse
    0:39:28 He became an accountant and worked for the government
    0:39:30 And I remember talking to him and saying yeah, I’m gonna I’m gonna start another company instead of being an oil broker
    0:39:37 I’m gonna I’m gonna go to the I’m gonna go to the adult table instead of the kitty table
    0:39:40 I’m gonna I’m gonna be an all trader because I’ve been I’ve been making all this money for my clients where they’re making
    0:39:46 Three four five dollars a barrel and I’m making five or ten cents a barrel
    0:39:50 Of course, I had no risk, but they were taking positions. So now I’m gonna I’m gonna put my money where my mouth is
    0:39:55 I’m gonna put my money into into a bank. I’m gonna get a letter of credit
    0:39:59 I’m gonna actually buy and sell as opposed to just broker. He’s oh Brad. Don’t do that. Don’t do that
    0:40:05 You should maybe take a small percent of your savings and put it into your new business
    0:40:10 but take the vast majority of your money and just tuck it away just in case the next thing doesn’t work out and
    0:40:15 Fortunately, I overruled my uncle Howard and I had to go with what he said. I did exactly the opposite
    0:40:22 I took a completely
    0:40:24 Contrary in position where I took I think it was like a hundred thousand dollars or maybe at most two hundred thousand dollars
    0:40:29 And I tucked that away. I took all the rest of my money. I
    0:40:34 Deposited it with bank Paribas and now it’s BMP Paribas back then was Paribas and
    0:40:39 They gave me a billion dollar line of credit and I swung for the fences
    0:40:43 I I used sometimes up to
    0:40:45 $990 million of that line of credit doing counter trade deals doing
    0:40:50 Prefinance deals doing barter doing processing deals deals that I they were very complex going back to the math very very complex
    0:40:59 But organized I knew what I was doing and sometimes people would look at it and say
    0:41:04 Wow, there’s a lot of elements to what you’re doing there. You’re buying it. You’re shipping it. You’re refining it
    0:41:09 You’re hedging it. There’s a lot a lot of moving parts there said yeah
    0:41:12 but I understand each one of these parts and
    0:41:14 It’s just math to me and I actually feel this is low risk
    0:41:17 This is basically just execution risk and I’m comfortable taking on the execution risk part of it
    0:41:23 I don’t have market risk even though it looked like I did but I really didn’t and and as a result of
    0:41:28 Not taking his advice and taking contrarian position and having the courage or the guts and the the strength to
    0:41:35 Believe in what I wanted to do that. I had a thought and I the courage to say okay. I’m gonna run with this thought
    0:41:40 I’m gonna go with this gonna better myself. I’m gonna bet on this idea
    0:41:43 We built a really nice oil trading company and did very very well for our sales and for our shareholders
    0:41:49 Where did that confidence come from? Well, I don’t know probably confidence comes at a young age
    0:41:54 I would think so when you ask a question like that, you know, normally start thinking about like what did your mother say?
    0:41:59 What your father yeah, so if I had to think about what did my mother say? What did my father say that was?
    0:42:04 very
    0:42:07 Transformational the first things that would pop my mind are with my dad what I loved and I had a lot of respect for and he was a
    0:42:12 Great dad a very honest person and it was a very dedicated and good provider for the family, but he was very
    0:42:20 Very blunt in what he said. He wasn’t very
    0:42:23 Diplomatic what he said just said what it what he really thought and I remember one time
    0:42:27 When we were doing we had been doing an errand
    0:42:31 We’re driving home and he was in the driver’s seat. I was in the passenger seat and we’re at a stoplight and
    0:42:36 My father turned to me and said and he’s a big guy with a low voice and you know big laugh and and said
    0:42:44 Bradley and my mom and dad were the only people ever call me Bradley
    0:42:48 Anyone knows me calls me Brad. Is it Bradley?
    0:42:50 It’s really good that you have a
    0:42:52 Really good personality because you’re solely not going to get anywhere with those looks
    0:42:57 Laugh real loud and that moment was a was a deep moment for me because on the one hand
    0:43:06 I was crushed just like 13 years old
    0:43:09 You don’t know whether you’re good-looking or ugly when you’re 13 years old
    0:43:12 You just are you just are which aren’t you don’t even think about that, but the message I was getting from my father was
    0:43:17 You know, I may not be such a good-looking guy. Okay on the other hand the other message
    0:43:23 He was giving me was but you have leadership skills
    0:43:26 You have personality you have charisma you can you get people to follow you you can become the president of your class
    0:43:31 You can become your group leader. You can be the leader of your band and so forth
    0:43:36 You can be president of student council and somehow or another despite your your what he considered that not pretty appearances
    0:43:43 Not beautiful appearance you were able to
    0:43:45 Be a leader and accomplish things and get stuff done and get formed teams get people. So I think in a very
    0:43:51 very very paradoxical kind of way my father insulting me on that I
    0:43:58 Gave me confidence it gave me confidence of okay, so maybe I don’t have
    0:44:03 Great all-american good looks. Who cares? I’ve got something else
    0:44:07 I’ve got something in terms of being able to to lead
    0:44:10 So maybe that that helped give me confidence because that’s that’s a an experience that
    0:44:15 I’ve relived many times over my life my father because it’s a big deal what your father thinks of you what your mother thinks of you on my mother’s side
    0:44:22 If I had to think what was something that gave me a lot of confidence my mother, okay?
    0:44:27 so so my mom passed away about ten eleven years ago and
    0:44:31 You know from the book one of the questions I like to ask people because I learned this from Marty Seligman the father of positive psychology is
    0:44:40 what’s a what’s the happiest moment of your of your day as opposed to how did you day go and
    0:44:45 just have a little different angle to that question and
    0:44:49 We like to be validated. We like to feel we’re appreciated. We’re recognized or understood or approved of particularly from our parents and
    0:44:58 my mom was was on her deathbed and
    0:45:03 My brother and sister and I were hanging out on her deathbed for a good couple weeks
    0:45:09 and I don’t know if you’ve been around people who have died but you know
    0:45:13 they’re sort of dying and then suddenly they wake up and like talking to you like nothing’s going no no problem and
    0:45:18 And then they lie down again start dying it and they go in and out
    0:45:23 it’s kind of half dying and have not dying so forth and
    0:45:25 My mother had been lying there and you know that breathing funny when they’re when they’re dying
    0:45:29 It’s like it’s really strange way of breathing. It’s not normal way of breathing irregular breathing and then they’re not breathing for periods of time and
    0:45:36 there’s a very bizarre experience death and
    0:45:39 You never we didn’t quite know whether this was it like we never talked again. She’s done and
    0:45:44 She suddenly like sat up
    0:45:47 She looked all three of us in the eye and said
    0:45:50 I’m really happy each of you turned out so well and smiled with a mother’s love and
    0:45:58 And they’re just kind of gracefully lied down and continued the dying process, but that moment
    0:46:05 That might be the happiest moment of my life when when my mother my mom the person whose body I came out of the person who took care of me from
    0:46:13 right from day one even before day one nine months before day one
    0:46:18 approved of me and
    0:46:21 validated me and and gave me a stamp of approval and
    0:46:25 That’s given me confidence even though that’s later in life. That gave me a boost that was right at the beginning of
    0:46:33 Starting expi logistics, which of all different companies. I’ve started that was the one that was the the biggest so far the most most
    0:46:38 Successful, so I would say that confidence
    0:46:41 Later in life came from that boost that my mother gave me of just approving of us
    0:46:47 Why do I’ve learned something from that?
    0:46:49 I’ve learned something from that and I try to learn from all these things how I can apply this to business
    0:46:54 I’m a business person. I’m trying to make money for shareholders. That’s my goal line
    0:46:57 So all these things that I’m going through life learning about I’m then trying to take them
    0:47:02 And apply them to business to make money for shareholders. So what did I learn from that? I learned that the relationship between a
    0:47:09 Parent in this case my mom and me and the other example my dad and me. It’s a real important experience has a big
    0:47:16 Influence on the person what the authority figure thinks about the person and when you’re in business, particularly if you’re the CEO
    0:47:25 You’re the authority figure. You are kind of like the dad
    0:47:28 you’re kind of like the mom of in my case 150,000 employees and
    0:47:32 You have to be careful what you say and it’s not just it’s not just what you say Shane
    0:47:39 you can’t just be you can’t fake it and and if you
    0:47:43 Don’t like someone disagree with somebody like say, oh, yeah, aren’t you great?
    0:47:46 It’s because because people are smart people realize when you’re guessing them
    0:47:51 They just know that they know when it’s phony and they know when it’s real too. So what I’ve learned is
    0:47:57 You’ve got to rearrange your brain go back to the book
    0:47:59 You’ve got to rearrange your brain your way of thinking so that you are positive about people
    0:48:04 there’s nobody’s all good and nobody’s all bad and what I know at least and
    0:48:09 If you can train yourself to
    0:48:12 See the real good in someone and to reflect that to them and to make sure when you’re doing the change part
    0:48:20 The improvement part when you’re giving them constructive feedback of how they could be doing a better job
    0:48:25 Do that second don’t do that first
    0:48:28 First thing is be like my mom and say, you know, I’m just so happy how well you all turned out that that say that first
    0:48:36 You know when I do performance appraisals when I do performance reviews my direct
    0:48:41 Subordinates what my reports my direct reports. I always start out with the positive stuff
    0:48:46 I don’t start right off with okay. Here’s some things that you’re messing up that you need to be doing better
    0:48:50 It’s important to have that part of the conversation too because you need to help the person achieve more and do better
    0:48:56 But you want to start the conversation with I really want to congratulate you for XYZ
    0:49:02 I really want to appreciate I was I want to express my appreciation because you’ve done one two and three
    0:49:08 But it’s got to be sincere. It can’t be phony baloney false flattery
    0:49:12 That is like you better off to not say anything and then giving phony compliments, but you should I try to
    0:49:20 Rearrange my brain so I appreciate a person and say well, why not hire this person in the first place?
    0:49:25 What did I love in this person? What did I admire? What did I respect?
    0:49:27 What did I really got me made them real high in my estimation and then
    0:49:31 Translate that to okay. How is that materialized and what they’ve done and what concrete things have they done not have
    0:49:38 Compliments that are just like general compliments, but have very specific concrete compliments of you know
    0:49:44 You did this this and this kudos tip of the hat good good job on that and
    0:49:49 It goes back to the psychology of validate
    0:49:54 then dispute join
    0:49:56 Then lead I apply that to business
    0:49:59 I do that with with customers in the world of business, you know
    0:50:04 We’ve had millions millions millions of customers. They’re not always happy because we’re not no service providers perfect
    0:50:09 Once in a while you mess stuff up and you have a you have a difficult conversation with the customer
    0:50:14 Maybe they’re not trained in rearranging your brain and they go right into the insults
    0:50:17 They skip the whole part about hey, we really like what you’re doing here
    0:50:20 They just go right to darn it. You’ve been late on this even damaging that or your invoicing is messed up or whatever it is and
    0:50:26 What I learned from all that the answer question is
    0:50:30 I’ve got to empathize with that. I’ve got a first under I have to put my
    0:50:36 Mind in their mind. I’ve got to put myself in their shoes. I’ve got to I’ve got to say
    0:50:43 I’ve got a really on I got a picture clearly how much what we did messed up their supply chain or cost them money or
    0:50:49 Costs on a job or whatever just close one annoyance. We’re just made it difficult shoot up their time or and and and made them frustrated
    0:50:56 Whatever, whatever I have to figure out. What’s upsetting them going back to what are they saying? What are they feeling?
    0:51:02 So I’ve got I’ve got to get in tune with how they’re feeling and I’ve got to
    0:51:06 Show them that I’ve heard them. I felt them. I’ve both heard understood them
    0:51:12 I’m what they’re said and I’ve also felt the emotion that they’re feeling and and that I get that and that and that I’m
    0:51:21 I have a an action plan to solve it. So that is a sequence told that I like your human-centric approach to this
    0:51:28 There’s there’s a lot of people who sort of take for granted. Maybe positive feedback and so they offer
    0:51:34 Negative only feedback to the people who the who they work with is that a blind spot or what do you think of that?
    0:51:42 I think it’s a mistake. I think it’s a mistake to give only positive feedback or only negative feedback
    0:51:47 so for example right now I’m in the middle of performance appraisals and
    0:51:51 Where each person is writing three things that they’re really proud of that they’ve accomplished in the last few months and
    0:51:58 That they really feel good about and there’s an achievement. It’s definitely a plus not a negative
    0:52:04 But also three things that you know could have done better or we will do better going forward things that we didn’t quite achieve that
    0:52:11 We hope to achieve so it’s a balance. It’s three good things. It’s three bad things, but when I run meetings
    0:52:16 I like to make it like an Oreo cookie. I like to make the good stuff
    0:52:20 The negative stuff, but then end on the good stuff. It’s very important how you end a meeting
    0:52:25 Whatever reason psychologically how you end a meeting makes a big difference in how that person leaves the meeting
    0:52:31 So ideally even if we’ve had a tough meeting where we said look these numbers are in the red
    0:52:36 They’re not in the black. These numbers are down. They’re not up and we need to up our game
    0:52:41 And here’s our action plan and here’s how we’re going to hold ourselves accountable
    0:52:44 and here’s how we’re going to tinker with compensation in order to reward people for doing better and to
    0:52:49 Not and take hit their bonuses and maybe eliminate the bonuses if they don’t get better fast
    0:52:55 So there’s tough conversations that that you have to have but I don’t like to end on that. Yeah, I like to end on
    0:53:00 exercises along the lines of
    0:53:04 Having everyone in the room. Okay. Now we’ve done all the all the all the tough stuff. We’ve worked hard on the business
    0:53:09 And now let’s put that aside
    0:53:11 Take a breath now. Let’s just talk about
    0:53:13 Who I’ll ask each person I’ll go around the room
    0:53:16 It’s supposed to have a dozen people in a meeting and I’ll say
    0:53:19 Tell me so we’ve just been meeting for two hours. We were working hard. I can’t put some we identified some really important problems
    0:53:26 We need to solve and that if we solve them we’re gonna create a lot of money for our shareholders
    0:53:31 So good job team. It was tough, but good job. We were good rigorous process and you worked hard and and a lot of a lot of
    0:53:38 Imperfections came up during the meeting and that was was humbling in a lot of ways
    0:53:42 But now I want to ask you something after working two hours collaboratively in a meeting like this difficult meeting
    0:53:48 Who’s star went up and why who said something that?
    0:53:52 They’ve maybe already held them in high esteem
    0:53:55 But even you hold them in even higher esteem now as a result of
    0:54:00 The way that they thought their thinking process or maybe the elegance and grace with which they expressed a difficult subject or
    0:54:07 The way they tackled something from an innovative way
    0:54:10 Someone who contributed to the magic of creating alpha creating money for our shareholders
    0:54:16 How did they do? Oh, they they handled a situation of conflict because you have conflict in business in a way
    0:54:23 That was nice. That was kind-hearted. That was not mean-spirited
    0:54:27 So whatever why tell me every I go around the whole room
    0:54:30 I say tell me someone in this room who said something or did something or didn’t say something or didn’t
    0:54:36 Didn’t do something that made their star go up and why and people feel really good about that
    0:54:40 And I have a whole series of exercises and questions that I do like that
    0:54:43 Well, one of my do is when we have long meetings or sometimes we have like 10-hour meetings
    0:54:48 So there’s even 12 over meetings
    0:54:49 We have people coming in from around the world and we’re doing a quarterly operating of you
    0:54:53 We’re really covering lots and lots of material
    0:54:55 We take just few breaks and just keep going at it going at it. So people are tired at the end of that
    0:54:59 It’s been a long long day. We’ve been going from
    0:55:01 7 in the morning 7 at night for example with just a few quick
    0:55:05 10 or 15 minute breaks. We work right through lunch. We’ll write right through dinner. I
    0:55:10 like to end with
    0:55:12 sometimes with
    0:55:13 getting everyone at the end of all that we stand in a circle and
    0:55:17 And I don’t want to say anything. I just want
    0:55:21 I just want to spend five full minutes five minutes a long time to be standing in a circle with
    0:55:27 15 or 20 other people not saying a word and I want I want everyone to look at each person and
    0:55:34 I want them to do two things. I want them to think to themselves think to themselves. I
    0:55:39 Really respect this person because or I really admire this person or I’m so grateful that this person is on my team
    0:55:48 It’s on the team with us this or the these these this person has XYZ qualities that are so noble. It’s so fantastic
    0:55:54 So positive regard that of each person each person one by one
    0:55:59 I want them to look around look around the circle and the second thing I want them to do is I want them to say
    0:56:04 Not only am I grateful for being on the same team with this person? I really wish this person a lot of success
    0:56:10 I hope this person has a fantastic future at this company. I hope this person has a
    0:56:16 Fantastic career. I hope they knock it out of the park in terms of their numbers in terms of
    0:56:20 profit the generation that they’re going to do and and I find those that two-handed
    0:56:25 experience of
    0:56:28 gratitude of praise
    0:56:30 Gratitude the gratitude that comes from honest praise of each person and then the
    0:56:35 The wish the well-wishing to each person. It just it everyone goes away from the meeting just
    0:56:40 Figuredly flying on here. He’ll go away with a really good feeling and feelings count in business
    0:56:46 In business, I have I write about this in the book of the love vibe that
    0:56:49 You want the love vibe? You don’t want the hate vibe
    0:56:53 You want the you want that good vibration going around in the company? You want people feeling good about themselves?
    0:56:58 Good about the company
    0:57:00 Good about the people they’re working with good about the customers good about the vendors
    0:57:05 you want there to be like one big happy family and
    0:57:09 You have to work at that that doesn’t happen just by itself. That’s not a natural
    0:57:14 Event that’s something that requires effort that requires intentionality that requires some skill. You’ve made a few billion dollars
    0:57:22 What lessons have you learned about money and spending money and living with money that you wish you knew sooner?
    0:57:31 You know sushi you throw me off a little bit with the question because I don’t define myself as in terms of how much money I’ve made like that’s
    0:57:39 Like just not like the big deal for me, but it’s a report card, but it’s not it’s not who I am and
    0:57:46 It’s not my be all and end all I happen to be in a business that makes a lot of money
    0:57:51 So I make a lot of money and my occupation is making money for shareholders when I look at my motivation
    0:57:57 If you want to understand my gestalt how I look at the world how I look at myself
    0:58:00 It’s really ice if you take those psychological tests. I score very high on
    0:58:07 Need to be appreciated so how does that translate into being a CEO?
    0:58:10 Where that translates into well, I can be a perfect example last week. We had a call with my 75
    0:58:17 Co-investors in my new company QxO. So my wife and I are putting in nine hundred million dollars and then Sequoia and
    0:58:26 A few dozen friends and family like really friends in family like my sister or my brother and my niece and nephew
    0:58:32 Are putting another hundred million dollars. We’ll have a cool one billion dollars. You’ve been putting it into this company and
    0:58:38 I told them at the end of the call. It was an hour cause give him updated what I’m working on. I thank them
    0:58:44 Not for the hundred million dollars. I didn’t need the hundred million dollars. I could put another hundred million to mine it
    0:58:49 But I thank them for
    0:58:51 For giving me motivation
    0:58:53 Giving me inspiration giving me a purpose because I want to please them. I want to make them happy
    0:58:59 I want to make them a lot of money. I like being happy. I like being feeling good about myself
    0:59:04 I like looking in a mirror and like who I’m seeing and how I define that is
    0:59:08 pleasing the people that I love and those are my investors my co-investors my my close friends and family and
    0:59:14 The people who have been good to me over the years and I give back to them. Let’s deep dive on M&A
    0:59:20 How do you think about it at a high level and then specifically walk me through your process for not only evaluating companies?
    0:59:29 but
    0:59:30 Beginning to end including integration M&A has been a big part of my business career not in the first 10 years in the first 10 years from
    0:59:37 1979 to 1989 I
    0:59:41 Was in the oil business. It was all organic. We didn’t do one single acquisition
    0:59:44 So I’ll just trading and brokering and building up a business organically, but since 1989
    0:59:49 I’ve been doing
    0:59:52 Roughly about 500 acquisitions. I’ve done a lot of M&A. I love M&A
    0:59:56 I love M&A as a way to create value for shareholders because I don’t know of another way on a risk-adjusted basis on a
    1:00:05 certainty level that is
    1:00:08 More likely to create massive shareholder value than doing sensible M&A in order to
    1:00:15 Understand how to create value. I have to understand how am I going to scale up the business? I
    1:00:22 Only know how to create tremendous shareholder value by growing a business tremendously that that’s how I know how to do it and
    1:00:29 Of course, it’s organic and I’ve had very good organic growths the companies
    1:00:34 I’ve led have been well-performing companies that have had good market share and growing market share and we’ve
    1:00:39 Taken customers away. We’ve taken business away from our less not as our competitors weren’t managed as well
    1:00:45 But the real when you look at the the numbers the real growth has been through M&A through acquisitions
    1:00:50 What’s been my secrets on acquisitions? I’ll try to be concise because I did a
    1:00:55 Hour-and-a-half podcast McKinsey a couple of years ago and Andy West. That was the only question
    1:00:59 That’s one question. I babble down for an hour and a half. It’s still a big people still watch that that podcast
    1:01:04 They really told everything about it. Here’s the gist. The gist is
    1:01:09 You first have to select an industry. You can’t just do M&A
    1:01:14 So I spent the last year
    1:01:16 Going around studying dozens of industries looking at hundreds and hundreds of acquisition opportunities
    1:01:22 Mostly with Goldman Sachs Morgan Stanley and some other friends Sequoia and some friends
    1:01:26 figuring out could I apply my playbook to this industry is the industry big enough is
    1:01:33 The industry fragmented enough. Is there M&A to do is bigger better?
    1:01:37 That’s not always the case are the economies of scale do you have a competitive advantage by being bigger?
    1:01:42 Is there a way to apply technology because my companies have always been tech forward?
    1:01:46 to the industry
    1:01:48 Because the industry is a little sleepy on technology is the way I run a business the way
    1:01:53 I do the intake of people and the culture and the way we interact with each other and so forth is that something that’ll work in
    1:01:59 This industry is applied in this industry. Is it it’s something related to something?
    1:02:03 I know about industrial services for example most of my companies since 1989 have been industrial services and
    1:02:09 I looked at many many different industries and I settled on
    1:02:12 The one that checked every single box, which was building products distribution and then in my company is going to be QXO and
    1:02:18 M&A will be a big big component of what we do. There are this 800 billion dollars of
    1:02:24 Distributors in Western Europe and in North America, which is where I want to plant my flag
    1:02:30 I want to build a company. That’s called 50 billion dollars
    1:02:34 I can do that if there’s an 800 billion dollar size
    1:02:37 I can take 6% of that through acquisition and through organic growth. I can get to 50 billion dollars
    1:02:44 There’s many other industries that are nice, but I’m not gonna be able to get to 50 billion dollars
    1:02:48 I want to get to 50 billion dollars. So this industry. There’s a clear path of how I can do that
    1:02:53 now I can’t just but and there’s
    1:02:56 Roughly about 7,000
    1:02:59 Distributors here in the United States is about almost twice that amount in Western Europe
    1:03:03 So it’s roughly about 20,000 distributors. You’ve got to be very careful about who you buy
    1:03:08 There has to be a reason why you’re buying that company. That’s to be a strategic a compelling
    1:03:13 Strategic reason of why you’re buying that company. What make what makes sense for that? Why is that good for customers?
    1:03:19 Why is that going to make our business a better business?
    1:03:22 Why does that fit with the other things that we’ve already bought and put together? How’s it going to integrate?
    1:03:26 Well, I like to look at the multiples that I pay for an acquisition
    1:03:31 The price that I pay for an acquisition is very very important because when I look at the levers of how we create shareholder value
    1:03:39 What contributes to that the biggest level the biggest component is the differential between
    1:03:44 when I raise capital at due to my relationships with mostly institutional investors and
    1:03:50 Because of the track record and what I can deploy that at on
    1:03:54 Doing acquisitions the second biggest lever is how much can I improve the businesses that I buy?
    1:04:00 Those that there’s many many levers, but those are the two biggest levers
    1:04:03 So I pay close it when I’ve studied all these different industries. I’ve studied
    1:04:08 historical
    1:04:11 Acquisition multiples and one of the reasons I like billing products distribution is I believe that I’ll be able to buy companies at
    1:04:18 Lower multiples of their profit that I’ll be able to raise capital at and that’s going to be a big that desigio that spread
    1:04:24 That difference that Delta is going to create value boom just right away right from the first day
    1:04:29 Now you asked about integration
    1:04:31 Integration is extremely important
    1:04:34 Anybody can buy a company. It’s not that hard. You write it. You send a wire. You sign a document
    1:04:40 it’s a few dozen pages the lawyers have gone over it and you wire the money and
    1:04:44 You own it. So that’s not the hard part. The hard part is
    1:04:49 After you’ve selected the right industry after you selected the right companies within that industry to buy after you
    1:04:58 had disciplined so that you don’t so that you pay the right price for all those
    1:05:03 Then you have to integrate them. I’ve never run companies that have like
    1:05:08 Hundreds of different companies all running separately with different names and different syph systems and different back offices and
    1:05:15 There is some level of decentralization where you need to be closer to the customer
    1:05:19 but I have a very strong appetite for standardization
    1:05:23 standardization of
    1:05:26 The ERP system that you close the books with
    1:05:29 So you close the books promptly right after the close of the month and then you can have
    1:05:33 Standardized dashboards all the managers have the same format of the numbers
    1:05:39 They’re looking at the KPIs and they see them graphically very easy to understand. I
    1:05:43 like to see so they can benchmark every company every
    1:05:47 location to every other location every district to other districts every region to other regions and
    1:05:53 For that you need standardization. I like to have a very standardized
    1:05:56 HR IS human resources system where all the people in the organization and we’ll build the build this company up
    1:06:04 We’ll have hundreds of thousands of employees. I need to have a standardized data system for all of our employees
    1:06:10 Everyone’s on this for 401k. It’s the same exact way of doing all the benefits are the same all the performance appraisal the same
    1:06:18 Compensation I can see right away. I need to have transparency to the information about I need to have the organization charts very accessible right away and
    1:06:25 Every time we do an acquisition
    1:06:27 I need to pull that information up right away while we’re studying it quickly
    1:06:31 So we have a competitive advantage against other bidders to see what would the synergies be so I need standardized
    1:06:36 HR technology about about everything I need a standardized
    1:06:41 CRM customer relationship management system like salesforce.com or several others as well and
    1:06:47 For that to be able to make sure we’re looking at customers
    1:06:51 The attractiveness of those customers the profitability of those customers the size of their spend
    1:06:56 So therefore the potential of those customers going forward
    1:06:59 All the interactions we’ve had with those customers. I need to see that a standardized way all across the globe
    1:07:05 Everywhere in every country. We’re functioning it. So I need a standardized technology for
    1:07:10 Customer relationship for sales manager. So I’m giving I need a standardized internal social media
    1:07:16 I happen to like I’ve used workplace by Facebook. It’s not the only one, but I like that one really well
    1:07:21 It’s nice and the interface is really really good
    1:07:24 So I like to have everyone on the same one because I like to have one company with one culture where everybody can ping each other
    1:07:30 I like I don’t want to have these silos of companies like sometimes you see these companies
    1:07:34 Roll up many different companies, but it’s all a mishmash. It’s all separate. I don’t like that at all. I see a lot of these
    1:07:43 Middle market private equity firms do that. They roll up these small companies
    1:07:47 They’re doing five ten twenty million dollars EBITDA each and they bat and they just buy a bunch of them
    1:07:52 And now they’re up to a hundred million or two hundred million EBITDA and they just get a bigger multiple because they’re bigger
    1:07:56 But it’s a mess whoever buy those whoever buys those companies is a lot of work to be done
    1:08:00 You’ve got to now standardize everything and integrate everything and opportunity to improve them
    1:08:04 But it’s a lot of cost and time to fix all that stuff up
    1:08:08 So I I integrate from the moment that we agreed to buy a company
    1:08:13 we’re starting the integration process and the day we close the acquisition
    1:08:17 Gazam we’re in there and and we’re standardizing everything as much as we possibly can and we’re communicating and communicating quite a bit a
    1:08:25 big part of the success for M&A is
    1:08:28 Forming the relationship with people and making sure we get off on the right foot and making sure that we don’t lose
    1:08:36 the great talent and making sure we on the same time we’re identifying
    1:08:41 the weak players and
    1:08:43 Gracefully and generously exiting them. So there’s a lot of different components to M&A
    1:08:48 I’m
    1:08:50 Summarizing a lot of different facts each one of those things we could talk for an hour just on that that block
    1:08:54 But those are the kinds of things that go through my mind in my approach to M&A
    1:08:58 You have some unique questions when you interview sort of the top 10 to 15 people as part of the diligence process
    1:09:05 Can you walk me through what at least two or three of those questions are where you get the most useful information? Yes
    1:09:10 So you see some companies when they’re negotiated by a company do this very lengthy and
    1:09:16 Detailed and bureaucratic diligence process and they hire a firm and they write this big huge memo that nobody ever reads and
    1:09:23 or some wonk reads it but nobody important reads it and
    1:09:26 Especially just to cover their butt. I’m not trying to cover butts. I’m trying to make money for shareholders
    1:09:31 My goal is to make money for shareholders period and so what I’m looking for in diligence is I want to know how they make money
    1:09:38 I want to know the history of this company. I want to know the current state of this company
    1:09:42 I want to ask those people. I like to interview the top 15 or so people one on one like an hour hour and a half
    1:09:49 I like to ask them if this was your money, would you buy this company and
    1:09:54 What would if you did buy it
    1:09:58 What would you change? What would you do differently? Where’s the opportunity to do something differently than it’s been done and
    1:10:03 I like to ask them
    1:10:06 Okay, if you were bought buying this company
    1:10:09 What would you not change what is so good about this company that’s making it successful that’s attracted a big bidder like ourselves
    1:10:16 That we should make sure we’d be crazy to change that so I like to ask questions like that questions that give me insights into
    1:10:24 How the business got to where it is? What is what’s the future of this company?
    1:10:29 How could we improve the company going forward?
    1:10:31 We’re the things that have been blind spots of the current where the company’s been run that we could fix and
    1:10:37 What are the things that are working? Well that maybe we could put more resources into where have we not been spending enough money?
    1:10:42 Where we were not investing enough money into something that could be a good return on investment on the other hand
    1:10:48 Where have we been? Where has the company been wasting money? Where has the money been?
    1:10:54 Going into things that why are we doing that doesn’t really help customers?
    1:10:57 It doesn’t delight customers doesn’t make customers happier or doesn’t improve our our customer bit business reviews
    1:11:04 So why are we even doing it? That’s a I like to ask those questions
    1:11:08 And they’re really revealing that the first person who I talked to had questions like that was cat Cole
    1:11:14 Who is the vice president now at athletic greens when she turned around Cinnabon?
    1:11:21 That’s what she would do. She went and worked in the stores and asked the employees what they would do differently
    1:11:25 And it was so revealing in terms of what they ended up changing. I find
    1:11:29 so many times in corporations
    1:11:34 People don’t ask those questions. Yeah, and I’m big and asking those questions
    1:11:40 I’m big at surveying using town halls one-on-one interviews small group interviews
    1:11:46 Asking questions about how we’re gonna win. How are we gonna win? What are we doing wrong?
    1:11:51 What can we be doing better? What are we doing right that we should do more of and I find it?
    1:11:56 Very valuable very very valuable. It yields a great return on time and
    1:12:02 as I write about in my book, there’s only two things the manager manages return on capital and return on time and
    1:12:10 I believe that
    1:12:13 Asking the employees and getting them involved in the process is a great return on time a great return on capital
    1:12:18 What’s the role of a board in a strong founder led company?
    1:12:23 Like QxO when you’re you’re investing 900 million of your own money
    1:12:28 You’re the founder the CEO largest shareholder. What role will that play?
    1:12:34 How does that change the role of a board especially when it comes to M&A?
    1:12:37 I’ve been really fortunate to have fantastic boards boards that are very strong
    1:12:42 People comprised of people who are really competent people have you’re invested in the company. They’re leaning in they take the job seriously
    1:12:49 they they’re passionate about the company and
    1:12:52 My relationship with the board is a little bit different than most most boards
    1:12:56 We’re completely transparent completely open any board member can reach out to any person in the company
    1:13:02 Anytime they want and ask them anything they want and there’s no supervision or people have to accompany them or none of that
    1:13:09 So I want board members be very very informed. I want board members to get copies of the customer surveys
    1:13:15 I want the good and the bad. I want them to see that I want and I want them to see the analysis
    1:13:20 I want them to see the analysis of the customer surveys of where we’re doing. Well, we’re falling short. I want them to know that I
    1:13:26 Want the board members to have all the employee surveys and see all the word cloud word cloud analysis that we do all the trend
    1:13:33 Analysis and all the benchmarking we do I want them to see where the pain points are of employees
    1:13:38 I want them to see where employees are happy. I want them to see the trends of employees
    1:13:42 I want the directors to be invited to every operating view and every monthly operating view every quarterly operating view of any
    1:13:49 Part of the company that tickles their fancy. I want them the more they’re involved the better off we’re benefiting from them
    1:13:55 So I like to have board members that are very involved very knowledgeable and we have
    1:14:01 good conversations about the important stuff and I don’t run board meetings the way most
    1:14:08 Fortune 500 company boards are run most fortune 500 company board members board meetings are kind of they’re very scripted and
    1:14:16 they sometimes even rehearsed and
    1:14:19 There’s a careful
    1:14:21 Store that’s being told by management and it’s done by PowerPoint is done by rehearsed presentations that come up and
    1:14:29 Just complete waste almost a complete waste of time
    1:14:31 You could do that whole thing is by sending them a document. There’s no reason to convene a meeting for that
    1:14:36 It’s just a it’s just a kabuki dance. It’s just it I like to have
    1:14:40 Real board meetings where ahead of time everyone’s read all that data and between board meetings
    1:14:47 they’ve been in the business to what I’ve been talking about and
    1:14:50 They come to the meeting and we bring in over the course of a day
    1:14:54 somewhere is between
    1:14:56 10 and 20 managers executives sometimes senior ones sometimes mid-level managers sometimes front-level exact managers
    1:15:04 employees and
    1:15:06 I I go around the room and I like every single director to ask whatever they want to ask
    1:15:11 I don’t want to add I don’t want them to tell me ahead of time what they’re going to ask and I don’t want them to tell
    1:15:16 The men the managers who they’re interviewing to know what the questions are ahead of time
    1:15:21 I don’t want our executives or our frontline employees to waste time and I’m using the word waste deliberately
    1:15:26 Preparing for the meeting some speech some script some sometimes phony baloney sales story about how great things are
    1:15:34 I want to ask real questions. I want to include in the tough ones and I want people to
    1:15:38 Answer them honestly and spontaneously in the moment and completely so that those I love our board meetings
    1:15:45 So I’m now chairman at the moment of three different companies
    1:15:48 Xpo GxO and RxO and so we tend to have our board meetings
    1:15:53 Every three months around the same time around the same two-week period. It’s some of my favorite meetings the whole year
    1:15:59 Because I had highly engaged directors who are knowledgeable about the business
    1:16:04 And who asked really good question. I learn a lot. I learn a lot at the board meetings
    1:16:09 I don’t dominate the board meeting with I’m the person speaking all the time a lot of times
    1:16:13 You find that the the chairman of the CEO is like
    1:16:15 Making a whole big deal about themselves board meetings should not be about the chairman and the CEO or the chair and CEO
    1:16:21 The board meeting should be about the directors
    1:16:24 Getting the information they need to get they want to get they should be getting
    1:16:28 Should it be focused on problems or what’s going well or how do you think about that from a board level and then I want to get
    1:16:34 Into more specifically management meetings, but look at the board level. How would you organize that around?
    1:16:40 How do you craft an agenda for that? I don’t craft the agenda
    1:16:45 So I know what I craft is I figure out who are the right people to bring in
    1:16:49 But even that in terms of the management we should bring in I don’t do that all by myself
    1:16:54 I get input from the lead independent director
    1:16:57 I get input from the vice chair we come up with something together with the CEO and then I
    1:17:03 Distributed around to the whole board. So what do you think? How does this look? I don’t have any changes people usually have changes
    1:17:07 They’ll say that’s great, but I’d also like to have a section on HR just even yesterday
    1:17:11 We’re preparing for a board meeting and one of my vice chairs said, you know, that’s that’s good
    1:17:16 But I want to have a section on human capital management on people management
    1:17:20 So we rearrange things and we’re bringing some HR folks. So
    1:17:25 My goal is to get the right people in the room in front of the directors and and then let the directors ask
    1:17:31 What they feel is right to ask. I don’t want to
    1:17:35 Micromanage the agenda because that’s my agenda. I want I am never going to be smarter
    1:17:42 Then the sum of all the directors that’s never gonna have mathematical or you have the wrong directors, right very much
    1:17:50 So yeah, and I like directors who are smart and we’re engaged and really want to prove the company
    1:17:56 They want to play their role. They want to take their fiduciary duty very very carefully. They have a strong duty of loyalty
    1:18:01 They have a strong duty of care when you think about decision-making
    1:18:05 How often are decisions made by?
    1:18:07 committees and the companies you run versus made by
    1:18:11 Individuals well, I hate the word committee period committees just like a bureaucratic red tape slow
    1:18:20 Kind of low-energy kind of word. I just can’t stand the word. So I try not to call things committees
    1:18:24 Just a nomenclature. However, there are sometimes when a group of people will have to make a decision because it’s more than one discipline
    1:18:33 That’s required to get to the right decision
    1:18:35 There might be a task that we have that has a financial elements
    1:18:39 You need someone from finance accounting that certainly has an operational
    1:18:42 Element to it. You need ops person there. We’ll also have a big people element. So I need an HR person there
    1:18:47 And so I could have if it’s a big decision with big impact
    1:18:51 Then I’m going to have C level never the COO the CFO CHRO. That’s a big decision
    1:18:57 I’m not going to waste those very important people’s time with small decisions Fp and a financial planning analysis
    1:19:03 Plays a big role in my company more than in most companies the Fp and a people are the ones who were
    1:19:09 Turning all these ideas in a meeting to listen to all these ideas and they’re turning them into numbers
    1:19:14 They’re turning them into forecasts and turning them into projections that turning me to probabilities to turning them to the look
    1:19:20 We we have this these 10 things we’re going to work on to create alpha for our shareholders
    1:19:26 They’re attaching
    1:19:28 Probabilities teach one of those I got a 90% chance of this is in the bag. This is going to happen
    1:19:32 This is a long shot. This is like a 10 20% chance of happening, but it’s not a zero percent
    1:19:36 It’s a 10 or 20 percent and it’s got a high return if we achieve it
    1:19:40 So it’s worth putting the effort in but I’m only going to give 10 or 20 percent credit
    1:19:43 We’re even going to give less credit than that and and they’re also doing budgeting constant iterative budgeting
    1:19:49 We don’t do budgeting once in a while. We do budgeting every day
    1:19:54 every single day where we’ve got our our but our numbers that our plan is our plan and
    1:20:01 where are we tracking versus the plan and
    1:20:05 the FPA people are
    1:20:08 Are really good at figuring out who’s sandbagging and who’s
    1:20:13 Exaggerated by that at what I mean by that is you have some managers who just do their personalities or for whatever reason
    1:20:20 Or maybe they’re playing games with their bonus. They want to lower expectations. So they come out looking like heroes
    1:20:25 Well, that’s not good because we want to know the real
    1:20:28 Like the outcome so we can plan around that on the other hand you have some people who are
    1:20:37 Overly self-confident and they think this is definitely going to happen
    1:20:39 And I’m gonna grow this that but if you look at their history if you look over the last three years
    1:20:44 They’ve missed their predictions by three to five percent like pretty much every year. So they’re gonna discount them based on the
    1:20:50 Past predicting their future likely to succeeding so the FPA people play a big big role in that and figuring out
    1:20:57 What is the?
    1:20:59 highest lowest and likeliest outcome for all these different endeavors that we’ve got and they’re also playing a big role for
    1:21:06 Allocating capital. So we talked before about the two big things that senior executives do is is
    1:21:13 Decide what kind of ways we’re gonna spend money allocate capital because it’s finite even if it’s billions of dollars
    1:21:19 It’s not trillions because it is billions. It’s finite capital
    1:21:23 How are we going to spend invest that capital of all the different ways we can invest?
    1:21:27 What’s the highest and best uses of that capital and how are we going to manage time?
    1:21:33 How are we going to get everyone focused on the things that really matter and not waste their time on the silly stuff that
    1:21:39 Really doesn’t matter. It’s not going to create
    1:21:41 Massive value for our shareholders, which is what our mission is the FPA people help with
    1:21:47 Understanding that putting into numbers because sometimes you can get very
    1:21:51 inspired and motivated and it’s a really really creative fantastic
    1:21:56 Inspiring project comes up when you analyze the numbers. Yeah, it’s really not a really good return on time return on capital
    1:22:03 So maybe we shouldn’t be spending so much time on that. So we’re we’re also
    1:22:07 Managing how much time are we spending as an organization on what kind of projects you find a lot of time in corporate America?
    1:22:14 somehow or another they get lost management gets lost on these
    1:22:18 tangents that are not central to their main mission of creating value for shareholders and
    1:22:24 The FPA people keep track of that the scorekeepers to keep everyone honest of how we’re investing capital
    1:22:31 How are the returns on that capital versus what we expected it to be we planned on how we spending our time is how we’re spending our time?
    1:22:39 Proportionate to what has the highest impact of how we’re spending our time and this is a very important role
    1:22:46 So FPA ends up being kind of omnipresent throughout the organization anytime
    1:22:51 We’re making big decisions because they’re really good at getting all this down to to reality to real numbers and they report to the
    1:22:58 CFO is that the structure and internally FPA has has two lines
    1:23:03 One is to the CFO on the they have a dotted line to operations and to me
    1:23:07 So I rely on my FPA person like every day. I want to know for two reasons
    1:23:13 I want to know internally how we’re doing on the projects that we’re
    1:23:16 We’re attaching high-priority to I also want to know how we’re doing on our commitments to shareholders to investors
    1:23:22 when you’re a CEO of a public company you have a
    1:23:26 Really important mission in that you’ve promised
    1:23:29 What your numbers are going to be in the future? How much your profits going to be how much your organic revenue?
    1:23:35 Go it’s going to be how much your margins are going to be what your return of capital is going to be
    1:23:38 How much a free cash flow is going to be and now you’ve got a you’ve got a promise out there
    1:23:43 You’ve got a guidance you’ve got a forecast and and you’re working really hard to achieve that
    1:23:47 I need to know and FPA is the best place to know that
    1:23:51 How we tracking against that and if we’re tracking higher than that and significantly higher than that
    1:23:56 There’s a big deviation from that. Well, we’ll talk to to legal and we’ll talk to IR and the investor relations
    1:24:02 And we’ll say should we update the the investment community ahead of the quarter ahead of when we normally produce our results and
    1:24:08 Equally importantly, maybe even maybe more importantly. I want to know God forbid if we’re tracking below our estimates and
    1:24:17 Once I know that then I have a meeting and I say whoa
    1:24:20 We’re me of our of our six or seven top metrics that we’ve promised to our investors
    1:24:25 We’re doing well on these five or six from these one or two. No, no, no, it’s not doing very well
    1:24:30 What are we going to do to get back on track? So constantly?
    1:24:34 using our
    1:24:36 Sensing information gathering and then getting back on track getting back on track
    1:24:41 Do you do the forecasting because you’re going to be going to the capital markets for?
    1:24:46 For capital at some point in the future within
    1:24:48 Acquisition strategy or would you not do that if you knew you weren’t going to raise additional capital?
    1:24:55 Well, I I am a big user of capital markets because all my companies have grown through
    1:25:00 Acquisitions and I’ve needed capital to grow those acquisitions
    1:25:04 We’ve raised money from the largest sovereign wealth funds in the world and some of the largest pension funds in the world some of the
    1:25:10 largest long-only funds and you know
    1:25:13 Endowments and a lot of different people whose money we’ve taken and give them back a lot more money than they gave us
    1:25:19 So in order to do that
    1:25:21 You’ve got to hit that you’ve got to meet your promises your results matter results matter. They’re very very important
    1:25:27 So even if we weren’t raising capital the fact that we’ve taken capital
    1:25:31 Sometimes we’ve gone for years without raising cash
    1:25:34 Well, we’ve maybe refinanced debt to take advantage of changing interest rates or something like that
    1:25:38 But in terms of raising equity, which is the dear thing raising equity sometimes we’ve done some acquisitions like in 2015
    1:25:45 We did two big acquisitions and then we digested them and we integrated an optimized and doubled and tripled the profit without doing any acquisitions
    1:25:52 During that period of time. We didn’t need to raise equity and we didn’t so but even though we weren’t raising equity
    1:25:58 Even though we were not going to the back to the capital market chain
    1:26:01 We still paid
    1:26:03 Extremely rigorous attention to how we’re doing on the numbers. That’s our job
    1:26:08 our job as executives as managers custodians of this business is to produce results and that’s measured ultimately in financial results
    1:26:17 It’s also produced in infinite in operating results
    1:26:20 It’s also concerned of customer satisfaction employees satisfaction
    1:26:24 but all those things lead to
    1:26:26 financial metrics and
    1:26:28 You’ve got to stay focused you have to have the whole organization focused on
    1:26:32 Delivering those financial metrics and that’s how you deliver them. It’s a it’s a conscious
    1:26:38 Intention and a sense of honor in a sense of I need to do this. This is this is what we need to do
    1:26:43 This is our promises promises made promises kept when people tell you they’re not motivated by money
    1:26:49 You get suspicious. Why well, I actually respect people highly if they’re not motivated by money
    1:26:55 I know a lot of artists. I know a lot of musicians. I have
    1:27:00 Friends and relatives who are professors or retired professors in academia. This is not into money
    1:27:06 I mean, there’s not into money. They don’t think about they don’t read the Wall Street Journal
    1:27:10 They’re not interested in that whatsoever and and I respect that they have a higher calling in a way
    1:27:15 They’re they’re focused on some deeper parts of life
    1:27:18 But that’s not who I want in my company
    1:27:21 I want my company people who are
    1:27:23 Absolutely motivated by money or raw capitalists who people who want to make money for themselves and their families and that
    1:27:31 We can figure out a way that by being part of our company they can help us make money for shareholders
    1:27:37 So that we can pay them more money here. They could make somewhere else. I’ve mad people on the senior level make
    1:27:44 Many many people make become millionaires multi-millionaires. I’ve had people become tens of millionaires
    1:27:50 I had one person who made over a hundred million dollars. I
    1:27:53 Have a couple people now who are on track to make very large amounts of money. This is a good thing
    1:27:59 This is a this is an outgrowth of success because we’ve tied everybody’s compensation
    1:28:05 We’ve been very thoughtful about compensation plans. We’ve tied their compensation to contributing to our big goals and
    1:28:11 The only way they can make all this money is if they’re making money for shareholders
    1:28:17 so I love compensation plans for the senior executives that have a big component of
    1:28:23 equity
    1:28:25 That’s tied. It’s dependent on TSR total shareholder return. So we look at what are the how does our stock perform?
    1:28:33 versus
    1:28:35 called S&P 500 and
    1:28:37 What percentile are we if we’re less than called the 55th percentile?
    1:28:42 I’m not so sure that you get any that I don’t not sure the equity should vest
    1:28:46 I could argue that if we’re only getting roughly half
    1:28:51 Roughly we’re very middling in the results. We’re giving that’s not why people invested in us
    1:28:56 People gave us the sovereign wealth funds or pension these big investors
    1:29:00 They’ve given us money because they expect us to be much much higher returns than the average company
    1:29:05 So I like to have people bet on themselves so that if our if our shareholder returns are less than 55% or so
    1:29:12 I don’t want it to vest if it’s 65% invest some if it’s 75% invests more if it that if it if it’s
    1:29:21 85% 90% 95% I want it to I want them to make I want it to double vest
    1:29:26 I want them to make twice as much as they would otherwise. So I want their interest
    1:29:30 Aligned with the shareholders. I want it to be so that the shareholders are saying wow
    1:29:37 I really hope senior management team makes a fortune because the only way they’re gonna make a fortune is if
    1:29:41 We’re beating all the competition in terms of the returns with our investment. So I like to I like that to happen one thing
    1:29:48 I liked about
    1:29:49 Goldman Sachs’s compensation plan that I took for them years and years ago when they were partnership a big chunk of their compensation plan
    1:29:56 I’m not up to date in their compensation plan now
    1:29:57 But back when they were private partnership a big chunk like a significant percent of their comp was based on
    1:30:04 How many other?
    1:30:07 Partners said that they helped them with what they were working on. Yeah, in other words
    1:30:11 I didn’t just work on what I was trying to work on
    1:30:13 But I helped you Shane with your cusp with your client and that group effort going back to being a super organism
    1:30:20 So if we can have people on the front line in the mid-level management be rewarded financially because that’s the biggest reward
    1:30:27 It’s not the only reward, but financially
    1:30:29 Financially rewarded for helping other people achieve their goals. That’s a good thing too. So we have all these bespoke
    1:30:36 Compensation plans that are well designed that a lot of thought go into that result in the magic
    1:30:43 Meaning creating outsized returns for shareholders. That’s the that’s how we do it
    1:30:48 Now we also do just general recognition
    1:30:52 That’s not as powerful as financial rewards, but it’s still a good thing. So we have all the usual things of
    1:30:58 people getting awards and rewards and trips to to places and president’s clubs and
    1:31:05 Employee of the month all those kind of things where people feel good about themselves because they’re recognized for going above and beyond
    1:31:11 But if I had to pick just one or two the feel-good stuff or the money
    1:31:15 I’m going with the money. I like a powerful motivator
    1:31:18 I like how everything’s tied to sort of like win-win everybody wins, right?
    1:31:21 You’re it’s not one of those places where you’re you can get outsized
    1:31:25 Compensation even if our shareholders lose. That’s a terrible thing. That’s an unfair thing. That’s that should never happen
    1:31:32 You should you you shouldn’t you should have a complete alignment between
    1:31:37 How shareholders do with their investment in the company and how the employees do?
    1:31:42 either both of those groups should be making a lot of money or
    1:31:46 Not a lot of money now the shareholders can’t control that all their two years invested in their money
    1:31:52 The employees control that if the employees are selected well are working together in a good culture
    1:31:58 Well are using technology or using ways that they they can succeed or have good feedback loops and
    1:32:04 They’re they’re making good decisions and being held accountable for decisions
    1:32:08 They’re exceeding them and delivering the numbers and the share price reflects that the share price goes up
    1:32:12 That’s great
    1:32:13 The shareholders should make a fortune and the employees should make a fortune neither one should make a lot of money at the expense of the other
    1:32:20 That’s not fair. That’s just not that’s not right. What CEOs do you think are underappreciated capital allocators when I look at?
    1:32:28 the companies that have
    1:32:32 Taken money and had small amounts of money and turned it into a huge amount of money
    1:32:37 Immediately, I’m thinking Mike Moritz a quiet Sequoia
    1:32:40 He was chairman of Sequoia Capital now. He’s retired from that. He’s a Sequoia heritage senior advisor
    1:32:46 Sequoia heritage, but if you look at his career everything he’s done over the decades
    1:32:49 And I’ve studied Mike very very well for many many decades
    1:32:52 He was one of my first outside investors Sequoia Capital came into my United Way systems way back in
    1:32:58 1989 1990 and
    1:33:01 What is he the champ? What is he the genius of? He’s the genius of
    1:33:05 Taking small amounts of money and turning them into huge amounts of money
    1:33:10 So you look at at Google at Yahoo at Netscape at Sun Micros all these companies that he invested
    1:33:17 Relatively small amounts of money and ended up being worth like 10 billion bucks. That’s
    1:33:21 That’s good capital allocation. That’s really really intelligent capital allocation
    1:33:26 So I immediately think of I think of a Mike Moritz for something like that
    1:33:30 I think in the industrial sector. There’s also people who who have
    1:33:36 gone through the same kind of processes I’ve gone through and
    1:33:39 Been been disciplined at how the allocate capital and achieved high ROIC as a result of that
    1:33:46 You think of the Academy level
    1:33:48 CEOs over the years Dave Cody for example when he was at Honeywell for years
    1:33:53 He was very very rigorous at this but very mathematical very dispassionate very intelligent about okay guys
    1:34:00 This is how much money we’ve got where we’re gonna get the biggest returns and allocating it very very carefully there
    1:34:05 So those are the people who come to mine off off top of my head talk to me about the relationship between quality and speed need both
    1:34:12 So you see companies sometimes
    1:34:15 Be really good on quality, but oh my god. They take forever. So it’s
    1:34:21 It’s really not achieving what you’re trying to achieve
    1:34:24 You see other companies that move real super fast
    1:34:28 But it’s at the sacrifice of of QAQC of quality assurance quality control
    1:34:33 The real golden mean is how do you move fast?
    1:34:37 but move fast intelligently so that
    1:34:41 You’re not sacrificing quality. In fact, you’re moving fast and improving quality at the same time
    1:34:48 That goes back to mathematics that goes back to engineering that goes back to planning
    1:34:52 understanding the lay of the land
    1:34:55 Understanding what exactly is the inefficiency that we’re trying to take out of the system
    1:35:00 What’s the biggest lesson you’ve learned from the past year?
    1:35:03 You could pick any time frame with this last 12 months last 10 years less my whole life and
    1:35:09 Ask me what’s the biggest lesson I’ve learned for sure. I’m going to immediately default to something with people
    1:35:15 It’s first I’m going to fall the people and then I’m going to fall to technology
    1:35:19 These are the two things because these are the two biggest needle movers
    1:35:23 These are the two biggest categories of things that make a difference
    1:35:26 So the last year what have I learned about people? Okay? One thing I’ve learned about people is
    1:35:32 I’m working with a team now at my my new company. That’s largely the same
    1:35:37 They were on my teams before they were either xpo or one of the xos and what I’ve learned is it’s great to have the band back together
    1:35:44 It’s great to work with people that you know that you’ve been in the battles with
    1:35:50 You’ve shared the glories. You’ve shared the pain. It’s great to be work work with people who?
    1:35:55 We’ve been in the dark days together. We’ve been in the strong days together. We’ve won together. We’ve been victorious together
    1:36:01 We can complete each other’s sentences. We get each other. We know each other’s spouses. We know each other’s kids
    1:36:06 That’s that’s a beautiful thing. I haven’t always had that I have brought
    1:36:11 Some people from company to company usually an initial founding management for QxO or all XO people and
    1:36:19 One thing I’ve taken away from that is I really love these people. These are people I really
    1:36:24 Just respect and admire and I just I’m just so thankful that I get to work with them
    1:36:30 Like I feel and I think we all feel this way
    1:36:33 I think all of us feel that each of us is getting the long end of the stick by working with the rest of this team
    1:36:39 That’s very hard to find a team a group of people this size
    1:36:44 That all love each other that all respect each other that all admire each other’s professional and personal
    1:36:50 characteristics and traits and that’s that’s a beautiful thing
    1:36:53 That’s a big takeaway for me now
    1:36:56 I’m gonna go for two for on this. What’s my biggest takeaway on technology in the last 12 months on technology?
    1:37:02 what I learned was I
    1:37:05 went through this process of studying dozens of industries and I went through the checklist and one of the checklist one of the
    1:37:12 things on the checklist was
    1:37:13 Can I play can I take technology and apply?
    1:37:16 our tech forward mentality and our willingness to invest in technology and put our money where our mouth is and put money in technology in
    1:37:24 In an industry where we’ll get a competitive advantage and I found an industry building products distribution that I
    1:37:31 Can do that. I found a company an industry that’s got
    1:37:34 20,000 companies and there’s about six or seven that are doing really cool things in technology
    1:37:40 And that’s pretty much it. I hate to say that so negatively, but I think that’s an objective assessment of it
    1:37:45 I think there’s half a dozen or so companies the biggest ones that are a couple of medium-sized companies too
    1:37:52 but mostly the biggest ones who are
    1:37:54 Approaching technology in the same spirit that reproach technology now
    1:38:00 We’re gonna double down on that and spend a lot more money and have the best technologists involved like we always have in our companies
    1:38:07 But if you look at the 99% of all the other companies there where other industries were 20 years ago now
    1:38:13 I like that Shane. I like going into an industry where I got something I can bring to the industry that’s gonna help
    1:38:19 But I can be transformational. I can be a catalyst to improve the quality of the industry
    1:38:24 I’m happy to get everyone all excited and share the vision about investing in technology
    1:38:28 But we always or I guess I always end with the same question. What is success for you on on the professional level?
    1:38:36 It’s very simple. It’s continuing my tradition of
    1:38:40 Generating superlative shareholder returns like off-the-charge great returns for investors. That’s my report card that is success
    1:38:48 Period. There’s a lot of other things that build up to that. I have to have an engaged workplace
    1:38:55 I have to have good relations with my local communities have to do all those good stakeholder stuff
    1:38:59 But at the end of the day the report card is one question
    1:39:03 What is my share price performance versus the benchmark and not only relative but absolute terms as well?
    1:39:10 So it’s it’s about stockholder appreciation for sure professionally all the things
    1:39:15 I’m doing of hiring people and putting in technology all the things we’ve been talking about for less couple hours
    1:39:19 that all comes down to
    1:39:21 To making money for shareholders if you’re not making money for shareholders. It’s just jabber jabber. It’s just talk
    1:39:26 So for me success is defined by how is my stock price performance versus everybody else?
    1:39:33 So that’s that’s clear for me. It’s very clear my mind
    1:39:35 Personally, you know, it’s about my family. It’s about my friends. It’s about my relationships with them
    1:39:40 It’s about can I create ways where in the limited times?
    1:39:45 I don’t have as much time as most people because I’m really into the business
    1:39:48 But in the limited time that I do have can I make those enriching experiences? Can I make those experiences where?
    1:39:53 There’s a lot of love in the room. There’s a lot of good stuff going on. There’s a lot of positive vibes
    1:39:59 And I’m they’re very symbiotic wonderful relationships where I’m helping the people I I love and and they’re helping me
    1:40:06 And if I can achieve that that’s success. That’s amazing. Thank you so much for your time today
    1:40:11 This was a fascinating and wide-ranging conversation. I really appreciate the opportunity shame
    1:40:23 Thanks for listening and learning with us for a complete list of episodes show notes
    1:40:28 transcripts and more go to fs.blog/podcast or just Google the knowledge project
    1:40:35 Recently I’ve started to record my reflections and thoughts about the interview after the interview
    1:40:41 I sit down highlight the key moments that stood out for me
    1:40:45 And I also talk about other connections to episodes and sort of what’s got me pondering that I maybe haven’t quite figured out
    1:40:52 This is available to supporting members of the knowledge project. You can go to fs.blog/membership
    1:40:59 Check out the show notes for a link and you can sign up today
    1:41:01 And my reflections will just be available in your private podcast feed
    1:41:05 You’ll also skip all the ads at the front of the episode
    1:41:08 The front of street blog is also where you can learn more about my new book clear thinking turning ordinary moments into
    1:41:15 Extraordinary results. It’s a transformative guide that hands you the tools to master your fate
    1:41:21 Sharpen your decision-making and set yourself up for unparalleled success
    1:41:25 Learn more at fs.blog/clear until next time
    1:41:30 You
    1:41:32 You
    1:41:34 (gentle music)
    1:41:37 [BLANK_AUDIO]
    Throughout his tenure, Brad Jacobs has built multiple billion-dollar companies. While there is no “playbook” for growing a business, he focuses on a few factors above all else in every company he operates, and in this conversation, he reveals them all.

    Shane and Jacobs discuss how to read anyone during an interview through a series of intentional questions, the exciting role of AI and technology in the future of business, and where money-making ideas hide in companies. Jacobs also shares how his training in math and music made him a better business operator, the one thing he focuses on to grow his businesses, how to spot big trends before everyone else, and the only thing a company should focus on for success.
    Brad Jacobs has started five companies from scratch and led each to become a billion-dollar or multibillion-dollar enterprise. These include three publicly traded companies: XPO Logistics, where he serves as Chairman and CEO, United Rentals, and United Waste Systems. Before starting XPO in 2011, Jacobs founded United Rentals in 1997 and led the company as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. In 1989, he founded United Waste Systems.
     
    (00:00) Intro
    (04:44) The future of AI
    (07:21) How to think rationally
    (08:48) The major trend
    (10:57) The research process
    (13:29) On asking better questions
    (19:35) On rearranging your brain
    (22:23) On music, math, simplicity, and business
    (32:26) Leverage, debt, and optionality
    (35:11) What it takes to take contrarian bets
    (40:45) Confidence and parents
    (50:21) Why negative-only feedback is detrimental for employees
    (56:14) Money lessons
    (58:13) A deep dive on M&A (Jacobs’ secret sauce to growing his companies)
    (01:07:51) Questions to immediately get to know anyone
    (01:11:14) On boards and board meetings
    (01:16:57) On decision-making
    (01:23:37) The role of capital markets
    (01:25:41) The type of person you don’t want to hire
    (01:31:16) The best capital allocators
    (01:33:53) Biggest lesson Jacobs learned from the past year
    (01:37:20) On success
     

    Watch the episode on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/theknowledgeproject/videos

    Newsletter – I share timeless insights and ideas you can use at work and home. Join over 600k others every Sunday and subscribe to Brain Food. Try it: https://fs.blog/newsletter/

    My Book! Clear Thinking: Turning Ordinary Moments into Extraordinary Results is out now – https://fs.blog/clear/ 

    Follow me: https://beacons.ai/shaneparrish

    Join our membership: https://fs.blog/membership/

    Sponsors:

    Eight Sleep: Sleep to power a whole new you. https://www.eightsleep.com/farnamstreet

    Shopify: Making commerce better for everyone. https://www.shopify.com/shane

  • #189 Chris Davis: Three Generations of Wealth

    AI transcript
    0:00:00 I just think you have to think about how do you position? You have no idea if you’re going
    0:00:04 to be sailing through a storm. Be prepared for that and have redundancy, have resiliency,
    0:00:11 but, you know, imagining there’s some tropical island where you can go and drop the anchor and
    0:00:16 just wait it out, that’s not an option. There is no safe harbor.
    0:00:38 Welcome to the Knowledge Project, a podcast about mastering the best of what other people
    0:00:42 have already figured out so you can apply their insights to your life. I’m your host, Shane Parrish.
    0:00:49 A quick favor to ask before we start. Most people listening to this podcast on Apple or Spotify
    0:00:56 haven’t yet hit the follow button. If you can hit the follow button right now, I would appreciate it.
    0:01:02 The more people who follow the show, the better the guests I can get. Thank you so much and enjoy
    0:01:09 the conversation. If you’d like access to the podcast before everyone else, special episodes
    0:01:14 just for you, hand-edited transcripts, or you just want to support the show you love,
    0:01:19 join at fs.blog/membership. Check out the show notes for a link.
    0:01:23 Today, my guest is Christopher Davis, a member of the board of directors of Berkshire Hathaway and
    0:01:30 the Coca-Cola Company and the chairman of Davis Select Advisors, an independent investment management
    0:01:36 firm founded in 1969 that oversees about 20 billion in client assets. If you recognize the name,
    0:01:43 this conversation needs no introduction, just dive right in. And if you don’t recognize the name,
    0:01:48 you will love this conversation. It’s not just about investing. We talk so much about life and
    0:01:53 living. Oh, it’s just fascinating. Tom Gainer introduced us and it was like finding this older
    0:01:59 brother you never knew you had. Our conversation was supposed to go for an hour and ended up being
    0:02:04 nearly three hours. I almost missed my flight. We discuss topics such as risk, including unique
    0:02:09 insight from his front row seat on the board of Berkshire Hathaway, why retirement has no appeal,
    0:02:14 the value of writing,

    Most families who obtain immense wealth squander it by the third generation. But Chris Davis comes from a family whose grandfather and father all became independently wealthy of each other, and Davis has done the same. How does that keep happening? In this conversation, we find out.

    Shane and Chris discuss life and investment lessons he learned from his father and grandfather, why writing is more important to clarify one’s thinking no matter who’s reading it, and the surprising benefit of reading physical newspapers and wearing ties to work. Davis also shares his value-investing philosophy, what he learned from working with and meeting Charlie Munger, and what parents can do to raise kids who aren’t entitled. Davis talks about his alcohol drink tracker and why it’s important to him, why he never puts himself in situations where envy can grow, and the insights from Warren Buffett’s key letter about why investment managers underperform.

    Chris Davis is on the board of Berkshire Hathaway and The Coca-Cola Company. Davis is Chairman of Davis Selected Advisers-NY, Inc., an independent investment management firm founded in 1969. Davis joined Davis Selected Advisers-NY, Inc. in 1989 as a financial analyst, and in 1995, he became a portfolio manager of the firm’s flagship funds.

    Watch the episode on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/theknowledgeproject/videos

    Newsletter – I share timeless insights and ideas you can use at work and home. Join over 600k others every Sunday and subscribe to Brain Food. Try it: https://fs.blog/newsletter/

    My Book! Clear Thinking: Turning Ordinary Moments into Extraordinary Results is out now – https://fs.blog/clear/ 

    Follow me: https://beacons.ai/shaneparrish

    Join our membership: https://fs.blog/membership/

    Sponsors:

    Eight Sleep: Sleep to power a whole new you. https://www.eightsleep.com/farnamstreet

     

    (00:00) Intro

    (03:20) Life lessons Davis learned from his grandfather and father

    (26:24) The importance of writing things no one reads

    (36:55) Davis’ experiences through financial crises

    (52:31) Why Davis loves managing a mutual fund

    (55:49) Why Berkshire Hathaway operates with margin

    (01:01:05) What is risk?

    (01:04:02) On low interest rates and their future impact

    (01:14:46) The mismatched timelines between CEOs, companies, investors, and policy

    (01:22:19) How Davis and Munger met

    (01:30:20) Lessons learned from Munger

    (01:41:29) Why avoiding weaknesses is the ultimate recipe for success

    (01:55:46) How to raise non-entitled kids and avoid lifestyle creep

    (01:16:10) On happiness

    (02:27:00) Good vs. bad board meetings

    (02:31:34) Three generations of wealth

    (02:37:15) On success

  • #188 Bryan Johnson: Five Habits for Longer Living

    AI transcript
    0:00:00 Okay, phase one is like, do something that is unrecognizable in your time and place.
    0:00:06 Okay, so we’ve seen this throughout history.
    0:00:09 Phase two is people come with pitchforks.
    0:00:12 Phase three is you’ve got to survive a whole bunch of attacks, you know, like the power
    0:00:18 to be you’re going to want to start taking you down.
    0:00:21 If you get past phase two and phase three, you get to open up a little bit and you kind
    0:00:26 of have some open horizon.
    0:00:28 And so that’s where I’m at now is I’ve survived the major dunk, you know, where people try
    0:00:32 to cancel me in society.
    0:00:34 I’ve survived several attempts at takedowns and now I’m still at it.
    0:00:39 And so I’m really happy I’m on the stage four now.
    0:00:42 And now it’s just opening up into a bigger gameplay.
    0:01:02 Welcome to the Knowledge Project, a podcast about mastering the best of what other people
    0:01:06 have already figured out so you can apply their insights to your life.
    0:01:09 I’m your host, Shane Parrish.
    0:01:12 Every Sunday, I send out the brain food newsletter to over 600,000 people.
    0:01:17 People call it noise canceling headphones for the internet because it’s full of wisdom.
    0:01:20 You can apply to life and work.
    0:01:23 Sign up for free at fs.blog/newsletter.
    0:01:27 If you’re listening to this, you’re missing out.
    0:01:29 If you’d like access to the podcast before public release, special episodes that don’t
    0:01:33 appear in the feed, hand edited transcripts, or you just want to support the show you love,
    0:01:39 you can join that fs.blog/membership.
    0:01:42 Check out the show notes for a link.
    0:01:46 Today my guest is Brian Johnson.
    0:01:49 In 2007, Brian founded the payment process and company Brain Tree, which almost killed
    0:01:54 him through depression.
    0:01:55 He sold the company in 2013 for I think about 800 million.
    0:01:59 In 2021, he decided to dedicate his significant resources to Blueprint, an algorithmic approach
    0:02:06 to optimal health and living.
    0:02:08 Brian turned his decision rights over to an algorithm and now lives in accordance with
    0:02:13 its guidelines.
    0:02:15 In this conversation, we talk about Blueprint, the diet and sleep routine you need to reverse
    0:02:19 aging, how to overcome depression, how he stopped binge eating, the automatic rules
    0:02:25 he uses, lessons he wished he knew earlier about money, his daily schedule for anti-aging,
    0:02:32 why posture matters, overcoming hair loss, the relationship between sexual health and
    0:02:37 biological health, hot and cold exposure, sunscreen, frying pans, and so much more.
    0:02:43 What I love about Brian is that he’s living life on his own terms and he’s not harming
    0:02:48 anybody else.
    0:02:51 It’s time to listen and learn.
    0:02:59 So what’s it like to buy your first cryptocurrency on Kraken?
    0:03:02 Well, let’s say I’m at a food truck I’ve never tried before.
    0:03:05 Am I going to go all in on the loaded taco?
    0:03:08 No, sir.
    0:03:09 I’m keeping it simple.
    0:03:10 Starting small, that’s trading on Kraken.
    0:03:12 Pick from over 190 assets and start with the 10 bucks in your pocket.
    0:03:17 Easy.
    0:03:18 Go to kraken.com and see what Crypto can be.
    0:03:21 Not invested by a script of trading involves risk of loss.
    0:03:23 If you’re on the road, you have a license plate, but not every license plate supports
    0:03:33 our provincial parks.
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    0:04:23 so unnecessary for a limited time only, participating with Donald’s restaurants in Canada.
    0:04:30 I was thinking about where to start, and I think we’ll start with your love of biographies.
    0:04:34 Where did this start, and what are a few of the lessons that you’ve learned from them?
    0:04:40 I suppose I approach this question with the contemplation, how do you understand reality?
    0:04:49 There’s a few ways of doing it.
    0:04:50 We’re born into this world and we’re given a narrative about existence, and that narrative
    0:04:56 depends upon when you’re born and where you’re born and to whom you’re born.
    0:05:02 But you’re told certain things about yourself and why you exist and what to care about and
    0:05:08 how society works and what ethics are and norms, and there’s never been universals.
    0:05:13 If you look at the thousands of different societies that have emerged on earth, it’s
    0:05:17 extremely varied.
    0:05:20 If you’re poking at this situation and you’re saying, “Okay, I know that I’m born into a
    0:05:25 given system and this system is not a universal truth system, it’s just where I’m at in time
    0:05:29 and place and it’s going to change in time,” then you can go about poking at a few ways.
    0:05:36 You can try to say, “I’m going to take a quantitative approach and say I’m going to learn the world
    0:05:40 through mathematics or through physics or through some scientific discipline or I’m
    0:05:46 going to understand it through behavioral psychology.”
    0:05:50 You have to approach systems understanding, and biographies for me was something that
    0:05:57 always intuitively helped me make sense because I was able to transport myself in time and
    0:06:03 be in different times and places instantaneously and understand with a pretty decent level
    0:06:10 of detail what was happening at that point, how people thought, what they cared about,
    0:06:16 how it contrasted with my time and place.
    0:06:18 I’d say biographies have been the most useful thing I’ve ever invested my time in that has
    0:06:25 helped me understand reality with various dimensions and perspectives at any given moment.
    0:06:32 Are there a few that stand out to you that you reread time and time again?
    0:06:37 Probably the biography of Zero by Charles Seif, the number zero.
    0:06:43 It was not common sense to me that the number zero has not always been around, but it took
    0:06:49 humanity a long time, thousands of years to discover the number of zero, and even when
    0:06:55 you do discover it, to really understand the potential.
    0:07:00 From Cartesian geometry, from Euclid elements to Cartesian geometry, or the function that
    0:07:06 zero plays in the vanishing point in art, or how zero enables the modern world in computation.
    0:07:13 It took a long time.
    0:07:15 I’d say zero is probably my favorite one because it’s an entity, it’s an idea, it’s
    0:07:23 a concept, it’s a number that has revolutionized almost every part of society.
    0:07:28 I was listening in previous interviews and you said, “I think it was age 24.
    0:07:33 You got depressed.
    0:07:35 What happened?”
    0:07:36 I think the onset was circumstantial.
    0:07:38 I had my first baby, and he was colicky, so he just cried nonstop.
    0:07:46 I don’t think his mother and I got a night of sleep of good rest for six months.
    0:07:51 Meanwhile, I was building a startup, and I was grinding at that with all the stresses
    0:07:56 of not having income and trying to make something work that was new.
    0:08:01 Then I was in a new marriage, and then I was also dealing with some internal turmoil related
    0:08:06 to my religious situation where I wanted to leave my religion, but I was pretty stuck
    0:08:12 in the system, my community and the family, and all of my community structure.
    0:08:19 It was just a chaotic time in life.
    0:08:22 One day, I remember it as the day my brain snapped.
    0:08:28 I just felt like something broke, and I couldn’t put my finger on it, but something felt different.
    0:08:34 I was in that hole for 10 years.
    0:08:37 Did you know you were depressed?
    0:08:39 Yes, unquestionably, yeah.
    0:08:43 It strikes me with somebody who takes such a scientific approach to things that you would
    0:08:49 do the same with depression.
    0:08:51 What was the process of, after you recognized you were depressed, what was the process to
    0:08:57 sort of get out of that depression?
    0:08:59 I was raised in this small rural community that was really, the existence was religion,
    0:09:09 and so I was taught to understand reality through story, not through mathematical methods,
    0:09:18 not through scientific methods.
    0:09:19 In fact, I didn’t meet an engineer until I was in my early 20s, and so I just hadn’t
    0:09:27 yet developed the cognitive abilities to think like a scientist or engineer.
    0:09:33 It’s always complex looking at your past, but I do reflect what would have been like
    0:09:41 if I would have had some awareness and some training early in life of how to think about
    0:09:45 the world quantitatively.
    0:09:48 It was one of the most significant moments of my life when I read this book by Gary
    0:09:51 Becker, a Nobel Prize Laureate from the University of Chicago.
    0:09:57 He was writing essays for Newsweek, and he would take a given topic like poverty, for
    0:10:04 example, and he wouldn’t describe it in qualitative terms, in story terms.
    0:10:09 He would talk about it in numerical terms, and it was, I think, one of the most joyous
    0:10:15 moments of my life to understand that reality could be understood in mathematical terms.
    0:10:25 I did go to the University of Chicago, and I got a master’s degree there, but I do wonder
    0:10:30 in that decade of repression, if storytelling wasn’t my primary skill set for problem solving,
    0:10:37 what would have happened in my life?
    0:10:39 What advice would you have today for somebody who might feel depressed, having been through
    0:10:44 that yourself?
    0:10:45 First, I understand you.
    0:10:49 The mind is relentless, and so when people feel suicidal, I am deeply empathetic.
    0:10:57 It is rational to want to kill oneself.
    0:11:00 It’s reasonable, so when you’re in that moment, it feels lonely when you try to explain to
    0:11:07 somebody how you feel and how life is not worth it, and a response is something like
    0:11:14 get over it, or just feel better, or go outside.
    0:11:19 It’s hard.
    0:11:20 It makes you feel very isolated and not able to reach out and get the help you need.
    0:11:27 One is, I would say I understand you deeply, and I empathize with you deeply, and then
    0:11:32 I would say there’s some basic things you can do to increase your circumstances.
    0:11:38 One would be sleep.
    0:11:40 I would make sleep your number one life priority.
    0:11:43 The most important thing you do at any given day is high-quality sleep, and I would build
    0:11:48 your life around it, because when you have good sleep, so many of the things in life
    0:11:53 are much better, and then if you get good sleep, you can start doing some baby steps
    0:11:58 into exercise, even going on a walk every day, doing something small, and then starting
    0:12:02 to add a few good foods and a few fewer bad foods, but just baby stepping your way, because
    0:12:10 when you’re depressed, you don’t have the ambition and energy to do big stuff, and so
    0:12:15 really it’s the winds that are in the baby steps, and it starts to sleep, because once
    0:12:18 you can sleep well, your energy goes up, and your motivation goes up, and your discipline
    0:12:23 and willpower increases, so try to get the flywheel moving in a positive direction, where
    0:12:29 every day you have just a little bit more energy to make one more positive baby step.
    0:12:36 It’s almost autocatalytic for the negative, right?
    0:12:40 Like you, because you’re depressed, you become more depressed, like it feeds into itself.
    0:12:45 It does, and sometimes I suppose in a dark humorous sort of way, we humans kind of got
    0:12:54 stuck in this really weird level of consciousness, like a dog seems to be optimal, and it’s level
    0:13:04 of happiness about existence, and we humans are smart enough to do the remarkable things
    0:13:09 we’ve done, but yet our mental existence can be extraordinarily challenging, and it seems
    0:13:15 to be we share many of these challenging traits, that it’s not often that we’re given a default
    0:13:21 mental state that is just nice all the time.
    0:13:24 It’s a pretty brutal place in our minds, most of our minds, and I wonder if in how we’re
    0:13:29 moving as a species if we can evolve past this, and if we do look back, and like, yeah,
    0:13:35 we got stuck in that narrow band that was pretty uncomfortable.
    0:13:39 When did you start to overeat or binge eat, as you mentioned before?
    0:13:45 It was a soothing mechanism for my depression.
    0:13:49 I wanted to feel some form of stimulation.
    0:13:52 I was so dead inside, something, some sort of arousal, some sort of pleasure.
    0:14:00 My life was just devoid of pleasure.
    0:14:03 In the religion I was in, it’s like you don’t do caffeine, you don’t smoke, you don’t drink,
    0:14:09 you don’t go to clubs, you don’t look at porn, you basically just devoid of those kinds of
    0:14:14 pleasures, and you’re supposed to derive pleasure from being in service of others and obeying
    0:14:21 God’s commandments, and those are your rewards that generate.
    0:14:25 Of course, those things do generate rewards, and we all understand that when we do help
    0:14:30 up someone else, we do feel that, but when you’re grinding 24/7 on a startup, startups
    0:14:36 are just pure pain.
    0:14:38 You don’t feel joy for years, and when you’re raising babies, you have these glimpses of
    0:14:42 joy, but most of it’s just really hard work with a newborn, and so I think my life is
    0:14:48 just devoid of pleasure, and I was trying to find a vector where I could feel something,
    0:14:55 and that’s what it would do for me.
    0:14:57 Those patterns of self-destructive behavior get in the way of so many of us.
    0:15:01 I guess the question is, how do we stop the patterns of self-destructive behavior?
    0:15:08 This is the essence of my entire life’s mission, this single question.
    0:15:15 What I did is after failing for a few years and a few hundred times of saying, “Tomorrow
    0:15:22 I’ll start, tomorrow is the day,” one last time, just this one last time, and failing
    0:15:28 a few hundred times to stop that, one day I jokingly said, “Evening, Brian, you’re fired.
    0:15:35 You make my life miserable,” and evening, Brian was the version of me that occupied
    0:15:40 my consciousness from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. He was tired from the day.
    0:15:45 He was fighting multiple fires.
    0:15:47 He was trying to deal with the emotional upset of all the things that had happened during
    0:15:52 the day, very common human experience, and then in that window of time, when he’d be
    0:15:58 down, that’s when he goes, “I don’t think evening, Brian’s a bad guy.
    0:16:02 I just think he was just trying to find a relief of the burden that he felt in that
    0:16:07 role,” and I fired him.
    0:16:10 So the past few years has basically been trying to reimagine my reality of who’s in charge
    0:16:19 of me, who makes decisions, at what point, what is a sacrifice, and what’s appropriate,
    0:16:23 and what I’ve come down to is with Blueprint, I wanted to demonstrate that an algorithm takes
    0:16:30 better care of me than I can myself, and to do that, I became the most measured person
    0:16:36 in human history.
    0:16:37 I wanted to show that if you ask the body’s 70 plus organs to speak, and you consult scientific
    0:16:44 evidence, and then you let the algorithm run, so it tells me what time to go to bed, it
    0:16:49 tells me what to eat, it gives me all these nudges on what to do, and if I just simply
    0:16:54 say, “I can’t deviate,” my mind can’t impromptu, saying, “You know what, we’re going to add
    0:16:59 a brownie to the lunch session here.”
    0:17:02 So removing that, and I basically am arguing, this is the core of it, I’m arguing that
    0:17:10 as a species, this is the most important question facing the human race hands down.
    0:17:19 As algorithms improve, and they increasingly become better at it at a variety of tasks,
    0:17:25 including taking care of ourselves and planet Earth, what do we do?
    0:17:30 I think it’s the defining question and contemplation of our existence.
    0:17:35 What percentage of people do you think, and you have this, you have a blueprint, and the
    0:17:41 algorithm can take care of you better than you.
    0:17:44 We can use self-driving cars as an example, which we know statistically they’re better
    0:17:48 at driving than we are as individuals, or collectively, maybe not individually.
    0:17:57 What percentage of people are comfortable handing over the reins to an algorithm, which
    0:18:03 is a purely scientific process, which assumes nothing, measures everything, and adapts as
    0:18:09 it gets input.
    0:18:11 Yeah, this topic is sufficiently rich and nuanced.
    0:18:16 I wrote an entire book about it titled “Don’t Die,” and in the book, I break myself out
    0:18:22 into multiple characters, like evening brines, present depression, this guy’s scribe, dark
    0:18:28 humor brine, all these people are there, and they have this discussion on what does it
    0:18:35 mean to have individual choice?
    0:18:38 What does it mean to be run by an algorithm?
    0:18:40 What does an ideal existence even mean?
    0:18:43 What does it mean to have choice?
    0:18:45 It’s a really nuanced conversation, but I’d say I’ve been hosting dinners at my house
    0:18:50 for the past few years, and having two and a half hour long conversations about this
    0:18:55 topic, and it does take about two and a half hours to get people warmed up.
    0:18:59 I can abbreviate it for you, though, and I can tell you the five big emotional swings
    0:19:04 that happen.
    0:19:05 One, as I say, I pose the question, if you could have access to an algorithm that can
    0:19:09 take better care of you than you can yourself, would you say yes?
    0:19:13 Now, immediately, people are like, but what about?
    0:19:16 It branches into a thousand questions.
    0:19:18 I just say, just assume what you want.
    0:19:21 Let’s just keep it high level and abstract, yes or no.
    0:19:25 Then people go through this process where the majority of people are vomiting distaste.
    0:19:31 This is the worst idea.
    0:19:32 I hate it for all these reasons.
    0:19:34 A teeny number of people are like, please save me from myself.
    0:19:39 The others are like, yeah, but I want to make the following exceptions, which really is no.
    0:19:44 There’s a lot of resistance.
    0:19:45 The next term, as I say, now imagine the 25th century is viewing us right now, and they’re
    0:19:51 observing through our comments on this question, what our norms and ethics are, and how we
    0:19:57 understand ourselves in time and place.
    0:19:58 In the same way, we would look at the 16th century with cold, detached perspective on
    0:20:03 what they thought, and then you flip it.
    0:20:07 Now, people are looking at themselves in the mirror, so no longer are they defending their
    0:20:12 knee-jerk reactions.
    0:20:14 They’re invited to be reflective.
    0:20:16 How did I behave in this moment?
    0:20:18 What am I really saying I care about?
    0:20:21 The next turn is you say, what things about our current reality may change that would
    0:20:29 make our current reality unintelligible to us?
    0:20:33 Now you’re in this creative space where it’s like, okay, we assume all these things to be
    0:20:38 unquestionable truths about our existence, but we know from history, none of these things
    0:20:45 ever really hang out for very long.
    0:20:47 Society moves into new truths and new norms, so wherever we’re at now, it’s a temporary
    0:20:53 state.
    0:20:54 Once you’re there, now you’ve swung from no way to, I’m being reflective of myself to
    0:21:00 how might things change, and then the next step is about the philosophy of this change,
    0:21:05 which is zero’s principle thinking, and then full circle back to the thought experiment.
    0:21:09 You can see through those beats with about 12 people, it takes each person the ability
    0:21:15 to cycle through these ideas and emotions and hear how other people respond, but at the
    0:21:20 very end, the majority of people who attend my dinners are like, I got to say I get it.
    0:21:26 I understand the situation.
    0:21:29 When you say it, and I want to go through some of the details of Blueprint.
    0:21:33 To me, it sounds like an algorithm for living, and the algorithms in charge of you, and the
    0:21:39 algorithm is basically just creating a bunch of automatic rules for success or a recipe
    0:21:44 to follow.
    0:21:45 You follow the rules, the algorithm.
    0:21:50 You create an output, which is sort of your biomarkers and your indicators that feeds
    0:21:54 back into the system and it adjusts.
    0:21:58 It strikes me that that’s sort of easy and really hard, too.
    0:22:04 Do you have, I’m imagining your house and walking through it, and do you have bags
    0:22:09 of chips?
    0:22:10 Do you have ice cream?
    0:22:11 You just don’t do it because the algorithm told you?
    0:22:13 Or how important is the role of environment, and how important is the other stuff going
    0:22:18 on here to actually shape that behavior?
    0:22:23 If you’re here at the house and you’re hanging out with me, there’s not a lot of trouble we’re
    0:22:27 going to get into with what I have in stock.
    0:22:30 If we want to get wild and down some extra virgin olive oil, but no, I basically don’t
    0:22:38 trust myself still.
    0:22:40 That strikes me as really interesting because it’s sort of like, okay, we can have this
    0:22:44 thing of what we want to do, but now we get to create an environment or a reality, and
    0:22:49 it can be an artificial environment, which the algorithm kind of is an artificial environment
    0:22:53 for you.
    0:22:55 You have to follow that.
    0:22:56 You have to have multiple things in line.
    0:22:58 I’ll give you an example.
    0:23:00 A few years ago, I was trying to work out three days a week.
    0:23:06 I ended up going to the gym because I was like, “Am I actually working out three days
    0:23:09 a week?”
    0:23:10 I was like, “Can you give me a list of all the times that I swiped in?”
    0:23:13 They gave me this list, and it was going like one and a half times a week.
    0:23:19 I was talking with Daniel Kahneman a little later that year, and he had this phone call,
    0:23:25 and he was talking to this gentleman on the phone.
    0:23:27 At the end of the call, he said, “I have a rule.
    0:23:30 I never say yes on the phone.
    0:23:32 I’ll have to get back to you tomorrow.”
    0:23:34 He hung up, and I was like, “Tell me about this.
    0:23:36 What is this rule?”
    0:23:37 He’s like, “Well, I found I was saying yes to please other people.
    0:23:41 I want other people to like me.
    0:23:43 I’m a human.
    0:23:44 I’m a social.”
    0:23:45 I end up doing these things that aren’t really good for me.
    0:23:48 I created this rule to do this, and I was like, “Well, this is amazing.
    0:23:52 This is the most powerful thing I think you’ve done.
    0:23:54 You’ve got a Nobel Prize.”
    0:23:56 This is really interesting because you rewire your brain in the moment to think in a certain
    0:24:01 way, which your automatic response becomes that.
    0:24:04 I was like, “I’m going to try this.
    0:24:06 I’m going to go to the gym every day.
    0:24:08 I’m going to work out every day, and the duration or scope can change, but I’m going to exercise
    0:24:12 every day.”
    0:24:13 The conversation went from should I work out today, which in my head is like, “Oh, I have
    0:24:18 a really busy day.
    0:24:19 I didn’t sleep well.
    0:24:20 I’m not going to work out today.
    0:24:21 I’m going to do extra tomorrow.”
    0:24:22 You negotiate with yourself, “I’m going to do exercise every day,” and it completely
    0:24:26 changed my approach to exercise and my health.
    0:24:31 It sounds like the blueprint is very much an automatic set of rules where you have multiple
    0:24:36 things aligned, but you’re trying to follow this pattern.
    0:24:39 I’m wondering what your response to that is, and specifically around how we can correct
    0:24:45 our self-destructive behaviors.
    0:24:48 Your experience is exactly mine.
    0:24:50 To say yes, and to what you said, if our conversation is about a practical topic of how do you achieve
    0:24:58 better health, or how to increase crop yield, or how to run a more efficient driving route.
    0:25:07 Those are interesting questions.
    0:25:08 The backdrop of this thought experiment is, as a species, are we facing an existential
    0:25:15 outcome?
    0:25:19 What are the stakes?
    0:25:20 Is it we’ll make a little bit less money, or we’ll have maybe a four-pack instead of
    0:25:24 six-pack on our abs, or are we really talking about life and death?
    0:25:29 My premise is that we are in existential moment as a species on a variety of fronts.
    0:25:36 Then it invites a contemplation of, if that is the case, what do you do?
    0:25:42 That question itself primes the response.
    0:25:47 How do you stop self-destructive behaviors?
    0:25:51 If I say how do I stop self-destructive behaviors, without identifying these things, a person
    0:25:59 has a given willingness to change their behavior, but then it’ll stop if it’s a nice to have.
    0:26:07 If it’s life or death, the behavioral change profile may be very different.
    0:26:14 Really, I think it depends on where the person is coming from.
    0:26:18 Someone mentioned to me recently, I haven’t verified this, that the only way to get someone
    0:26:24 to change is to tell them they’re pregnant, or diagnose them with a certain condition.
    0:26:29 Otherwise, no change will happen.
    0:26:32 That’s interesting.
    0:26:33 A friend of mine had heart surgery a while back, and I went to visit him in the hospital.
    0:26:45 I was talking to the surgeon, and the surgeon had said all the typical things about changing
    0:26:51 your diet and changing your lifestyle.
    0:26:54 When I was talking to the surgeon, he goes, “Oz are about 10% that he’s going to do this.”
    0:27:02 I said, “Well, that’s interesting.”
    0:27:04 He’s like, “I’ve been a surgeon for 30 years.”
    0:27:09 People used to change all the time, because I used to have to break ribs, there was a
    0:27:13 physical pain, a big scar, a visual reminder.
    0:27:17 He’s like, “Now the incision is half a centimeter, and you’re in and out of the hospital and
    0:27:24 there isn’t a lot of pain.”
    0:27:27 People change a lot less than they used to.
    0:27:29 I thought that that sort of related to what you were talking about.
    0:27:33 I’m wondering if you can walk me through at a high level the overarching day of blueprint.
    0:27:41 What does it mean to live like Brian Johnson?
    0:27:44 The premise on this is I was posing the question, in the early 21st century, is it the case
    0:27:51 that we have achieved longevity escape velocity, which means that for every one year of chronological
    0:27:58 time that passes, can I stay the same age biologically?
    0:28:03 If not, where are we at?
    0:28:05 That’s the backdrop on what my daily routine is.
    0:28:09 What we did to establish this routine is we looked at every single scientific publication
    0:28:14 that’s ever been done on health span and lifespan.
    0:28:18 We then graded the evidence of these papers and we then stack ranked them according to
    0:28:23 effect size.
    0:28:24 Then we’ve systematically been implementing each one of these protocols.
    0:28:30 Becoming the most measured person in history and then using all the scientific evidence.
    0:28:35 My day begins really the night before.
    0:28:36 I go to bed currently at 9.30 PM.
    0:28:39 I just changed my bedtime from 8.30, but it’s 9.30 on the dot.
    0:28:46 I don’t have a two hour window of time.
    0:28:49 I recently logged eight months of perfect sleep using my wearable, which no human in
    0:28:54 history had ever done.
    0:28:55 I wanted to demonstrate that you can get reliable high quality sleep for this extended period
    0:28:59 of time.
    0:29:00 Then I wake up naturally and never wake up with an alarm, roughly 4.30, 5.30 in the morning.
    0:29:06 I’ll weigh myself, the body composition, weight, hydration, fat, et cetera.
    0:29:13 I’ll take my inner ear temperature.
    0:29:16 I’ll take two pills.
    0:29:18 I’ll do a few minutes of UV light therapy to start my circadian rhythm.
    0:29:24 It’s still dark in the morning.
    0:29:25 I’ll go downstairs.
    0:29:26 I’ll make myself a morning concoction.
    0:29:28 I’ll take 60 pills.
    0:29:30 I’ll do light therapy on my hair.
    0:29:32 Like once a week, I’ll do my blood pressure.
    0:29:36 I’ll then work out for about an hour in a specific protocol.
    0:29:40 I’ll come in, I will make breakfast, which is a few pounds of vegetables.
    0:29:45 I’ll shower, I’ll do a skincare routine, and get ready for work.
    0:29:49 I’ll eat my second meal of the day, and then I work for the day.
    0:29:54 Then throughout the day, I’ll do various doctor’s appointments, medical procedures,
    0:30:00 and measurement.
    0:30:01 Then I have a wind down routine that I follow ritually.
    0:30:06 What we’ve done is we’ve tried to stack hundreds of protocols into my daily routine because
    0:30:13 we do so many things and we’re trying to follow the evidence.
    0:30:16 I’m not able to just randomly do things that has to be highly structured in order for us
    0:30:20 to control this experiment with the rigor we need for the results.
    0:30:25 We’ve just done this for several years and fine tuned it.
    0:30:28 We go through the process of measure myself, look at the evidence, we do the protocol,
    0:30:33 measurement, evidence protocol, again and again and again.
    0:30:36 I have a few dozen biomarkers that are pretty phenomenal.
    0:30:39 For example, my cardiovascular capacity is in the top 1.5% of 18-year-olds.
    0:30:46 My bone mineral density is in the top 0.02% of 30-year-olds, which is age-minute for that
    0:30:52 test.
    0:30:53 My strength test, same thing, like top 1.5% and 10% of 18-year-olds.
    0:30:58 The biomarkers across my entire body, whether it’s my cardiovascular ability, my strength,
    0:31:03 my muscle, my muscle and body fat are in the top 99.5% tile.
    0:31:07 It’s produced a pretty impressive list of biomarkers that indicate that I’m in pretty
    0:31:12 good health.
    0:31:13 I thought your workouts were like 25 reps of exercise and stuff.
    0:31:17 Is that giving you the incredible strength?
    0:31:20 Yes.
    0:31:21 So it’s about an hour a day and you’re right.
    0:31:23 It’s like 20 plus, and it’s mostly I try to flex and stretch every muscle in my body.
    0:31:31 I don’t do heavy weights that are hard in the joints, but yes, even doing these things,
    0:31:38 I do it every single day.
    0:31:39 I don’t take any rest days.
    0:31:42 And yeah, on my bench press, it’s a top 10% of 18-year-olds.
    0:31:47 And we use 18-year-olds.
    0:31:48 A lot of people, I mean, with 99% certainty when I say this, people are like, “But wait
    0:31:52 a second.
    0:31:53 Why not a 30-year-old?”
    0:31:54 It’s because you max out your weight to rep ratio at age 18.
    0:32:02 So even though you can lift more in your 20s and maybe even your 30s, your ratio peaks
    0:32:08 at 18.
    0:32:09 The same is true with your VO2 max, your cardiovascular fitness.
    0:32:13 And so we do a reference to an 18-year-old, not because it’s an easy way to pick off a
    0:32:17 number.
    0:32:18 We do it because according to these age, these biological age standards, you’re looking
    0:32:23 at when a male peaks performance.
    0:32:28 And I think your last meal is at like 11.30 a.m.
    0:32:31 That’s right.
    0:32:32 So I have roughly 10 hours or so of fasting before I go to bed.
    0:32:35 Do you feel hungry when you go to bed?
    0:32:37 I used to.
    0:32:38 I’m now normalized to it.
    0:32:40 And does that help your sleep?
    0:32:41 What happens if you eat later?
    0:32:43 I assume this was all measured.
    0:32:45 I eat my last meal of the day at 11 a.m. for the objectives of good sleep.
    0:32:52 Because I mean, there’s supposedly good benefits on fasting.
    0:32:54 I think the evidence is still maybe developing.
    0:32:58 So I mostly do it for sleep because when I eat my last meal of the day, I have all my
    0:33:03 digestion finished.
    0:33:05 So when I go to bed, my resting heart rate is around 46 beats per minute.
    0:33:09 And if it’s 46, I’m going to have a perfect night’s sleep.
    0:33:12 If I eat at 5 p.m. or 6 p.m., then my resting heart rate is going to be 56.
    0:33:19 And when I do that, I’m going to knock off about 50% of my REM and 50% of my deep, and
    0:33:25 I’ll increase my wake time by about 35 minutes.
    0:33:28 And so I’ve done so many experiments now, it is algorithmic.
    0:33:33 And I know exactly what happens when I eat what at what time and how it affects my sleep.
    0:33:38 It sounds like blueprint is optimized for the sole variable of sleep.
    0:33:43 Is that correct?
    0:33:44 I mean, so sleep is an important one.
    0:33:46 It’s the number one priority because everything else hinges upon that.
    0:33:50 But it also, we are the first endeavor in history to focus on trying to rejuvenate every
    0:33:57 organ of the body.
    0:33:58 So we have 70 plus organs, and we’ve tried to quantify and rejuvenate every organ of
    0:34:03 my body.
    0:34:04 So we just tried to rejuvenate my thymus, which is a gland right behind your chest here responsible
    0:34:10 for your immune system.
    0:34:12 And so, you know, I can say I’m chronologically 46 years old, but the more important number
    0:34:19 is what is the biological age of my heart and of my lungs and of my liver.
    0:34:25 And that’s really the more powerful predictor than a chronological number.
    0:34:31 And where were you when you started blueprint?
    0:34:33 Were you basically your biological age for your, like, was everything the same?
    0:34:39 No.
    0:34:40 It was.
    0:34:41 I was coming from a pretty bad place.
    0:34:43 After being depressed for a decade and running, you know, being a startup entrepreneur my
    0:34:47 entire life and having just gone through a bunch of stuff, I was pretty beat up and
    0:34:53 I was in a bad state.
    0:34:54 So I definitely subscribed to grind culture where you do things in society to try to earn
    0:35:02 people’s respect and have a position of a status in a social group to when you conform
    0:35:08 with these social norms.
    0:35:11 And so like when you hear a story about a colleague who worked on a program, a problem
    0:35:16 for two days straight and didn’t sleep, it’s like, wow, they’re so awesome and amazing.
    0:35:20 You know, like that it’s very hard to not to be induced to think that that’s an emulation
    0:35:25 worthy behavior.
    0:35:26 So I had to peel myself out of grind culture and find out that this is the thing is we
    0:35:31 are accustomed death is the enabler of all things immortality.
    0:35:37 You know, if you love country, die for your country.
    0:35:40 If you want to pay the ultimate price of being a hero, sacrifice your life.
    0:35:45 You know, if you want to achieve immortality in your professional endeavor, have your works
    0:35:51 live beyond your death.
    0:35:52 Everything we think about existence is around death.
    0:35:56 And I was calling question to death that maybe we have reached this time and place in human
    0:36:00 history where death is no longer inevitable.
    0:36:03 And if that is true, everything about our reality changes.
    0:36:08 Do you think we’ll see a quantum leap in average age in the next 15 years?
    0:36:14 Like average average life expectancy.
    0:36:16 So not people.
    0:36:17 So yes, there’s people who will learn from what you’re doing.
    0:36:21 They’ll change their habits and they’ll extend their personal life expectancy.
    0:36:24 But do you think we’re going to see a collective big leap?
    0:36:28 I mean, like you have sort of Jeff Bezos and Patrick and John Collison and people pouring
    0:36:33 money into billions of dollars into research on this topic.
    0:36:39 To me, the most compelling contemplation is trying to predict how fast intelligence is
    0:36:50 improving.
    0:36:51 We humans have been the dominant force of intelligence on this planet for 200,000 years.
    0:36:58 And we’ve been able to increase our abilities of intelligence by forming better cooperation
    0:37:03 in our society.
    0:37:05 With language and all kinds of organizational methodologies, we’ve increased our ability
    0:37:08 to utilize our intelligence with technological tools.
    0:37:13 We’ve now created intelligence in AI that is creating better intelligence.
    0:37:19 And if you say, what is the speed at which intelligence is improving, it’s fast, faster
    0:37:25 than we can comprehend.
    0:37:27 And so when we make these, when we model out the future and we say, what’s going to happen
    0:37:33 on a 10 year time span, we are unqualified to answer that question because that time frame
    0:37:44 exceeds our own intellectual capacity to imagine.
    0:37:48 So it’s the first time in human history where we, the superior form of intelligence are
    0:37:53 up against a wall of not knowing what to predict what comes next because it’s going to supersede
    0:37:59 us so fast.
    0:38:01 And so this is the thing, this is why I come down to the only thing I know to be true in
    0:38:07 the year 2024 is don’t die.
    0:38:11 That’s it.
    0:38:12 I don’t know anything else other than I want to be around for what could be the most spectacular
    0:38:19 existence in this part of the galaxy.
    0:38:21 Yeah.
    0:38:22 There’s a part of me that really believes if we take care of ourselves really well right
    0:38:27 now and we don’t die, we’re going to get a lot of advantage from technology that thinks
    0:38:32 about things in a way that we couldn’t even comprehend.
    0:38:35 I mean, you take the, for inspiration, if you say, okay, well, point me to an example
    0:38:40 of where intelligence has been used, that would give me any sort of bearings on what
    0:38:46 I might imagine.
    0:38:47 Okay, so take alpha fold.
    0:38:49 It was, many people thought solving the protein folding problem was unsolvable or would take
    0:38:56 us some unknown duration of time and deep mind allocated their attention to that thing
    0:39:01 and solved it faster than anyone ever thought possible.
    0:39:04 The same thing would go.
    0:39:06 And so when these groups of people that are very talented focus on a very narrow problem,
    0:39:12 they solve stunningly hard problems faster than anyone thought.
    0:39:18 And as these systems get better and use more broadly and as these systems create better
    0:39:23 systems, this is why we are at this launch point and, you know, is it going to happen
    0:39:28 in two years, one years, five years, I don’t know, but it’s basically if you zoom out far
    0:39:33 enough, it’s in the blink of an eye at this point.
    0:39:36 And it’s a don’t die is don’t die individually, don’t kill each other, don’t kill planet Earth.
    0:39:43 And when you’re building the AI, the objective function of AI is this don’t die audiology.
    0:39:48 So if you, I mean, what I’m trying to say is like, so we’ve never been in the situation
    0:39:52 before where we’re baby steps away from creating superintelligence.
    0:39:56 And when you’re at this, in this moment, we have this, this incredibly practical question
    0:40:03 to ask, what do we do?
    0:40:05 Like, how do we think about reality?
    0:40:07 What do we care about?
    0:40:08 What are our ideals?
    0:40:09 What are our objectives?
    0:40:10 And then if you start surveying the world of like, Hey, who can tell us how to practically
    0:40:14 think about reality, and you probe religions and capitalism and communism and socialism
    0:40:19 and like any other group, who can pull up and say, here’s a playbook, here’s an instruction
    0:40:25 on how you actually think about reality.
    0:40:28 And that’s what I’ve been trying to fill is that void is there is no philosophical stack
    0:40:33 that informs humanity on what to do on a daily basis.
    0:40:37 For example, what to eat for breakfast all the way through the most complicated question
    0:40:41 of how do you begin thinking about a philosophical alignment with AI?
    0:40:46 I have some specific questions about blueprints.
    0:40:48 So like, how much water are you consuming a day between 60 and 80 ounces?
    0:40:54 Is that the only beverage that you really consume?
    0:40:57 It is.
    0:40:58 You drink mineralized water.
    0:41:00 So it’s always tea or has some electrolytes in it.
    0:41:03 Is that tap water?
    0:41:04 Is it filtered?
    0:41:05 Is it out of a glass or plastic?
    0:41:07 It’s filtered and it’s ceramic.
    0:41:09 How do you think about things like Teflon and things that can sort of like get into your
    0:41:14 body or things that are widely sort of thought to get into your body like microplastics and
    0:41:20 Teflon?
    0:41:21 Yeah.
    0:41:22 I mean, I try to avoid plastic bottles.
    0:41:25 I use stainless steel cookware filtered water.
    0:41:30 I don’t eat out.
    0:41:32 I don’t use a takeout materials.
    0:41:34 So I try to avoid the things that are more polluting.
    0:41:38 Why vegan?
    0:41:39 I think that’s a personal choice, isn’t it?
    0:41:42 Yeah.
    0:41:43 Yeah, it is.
    0:41:44 Is there anybody doing this who’s an omnivore?
    0:41:46 Yeah, my son.
    0:41:47 And are his results sort of similar to yours?
    0:41:50 Yeah, pretty similar.
    0:41:51 I think that diet is a special kind of provocative.
    0:41:57 People break out into warring tribes instantaneously and the intensity around this topic is a lot.
    0:42:05 And so I’ve really just stayed out of it.
    0:42:07 I’m impartial.
    0:42:08 I don’t want to get into the war.
    0:42:10 And so I just say you do you.
    0:42:12 I do think that every day there’s more evidence coming out suggesting plant-based diets are
    0:42:21 more conducive for longevity.
    0:42:23 So I think the evidence in time will speak for itself, but right now, of all the battlefields
    0:42:29 I could choose, this is not the one I want.
    0:42:32 That’s a really interesting way to put it.
    0:42:33 I think it’s really interesting, too.
    0:42:35 People aren’t convinced by data.
    0:42:36 I mean, you can show them all the data in the world, and it’s not going to change their
    0:42:39 mind.
    0:42:40 How do we take blueprint and build habits with it?
    0:42:45 So it’s one thing to know, okay, here’s this manual, follow this manual, and this manual
    0:42:49 is going to be better at running your life than you are.
    0:42:53 You can take your evening, Brian, you can put them away and just follow the instructions.
    0:42:57 But how do we actually turn that into habits that we follow?
    0:43:01 Every person is different in how they go about change, and there’s many ways that people
    0:43:06 go about habit, you know, behavioral change with very habit formation techniques.
    0:43:12 For me, it’s really helpful to understand my own behavioral change in a larger context,
    0:43:21 where I say, I’m endeavoring to maintain my health so that I don’t die, so that I can
    0:43:29 participate in what may be the most spectacular existence in the galaxy.
    0:43:33 Now for me, that’s really motivating because I have a goal, and I have a reason to live,
    0:43:38 and I have something to look forward to.
    0:43:41 Now a side effect of that is my body feels great, and it looks great, and I can do all
    0:43:46 sorts of things.
    0:43:47 But for me, it’s the bigger goal that motivates me.
    0:43:49 For other people, they may have much different goals of they want to fit into a certain pair
    0:43:57 of clothing, or they want to look good for a certain event, or they want to achieve a
    0:44:01 certain physical outcome.
    0:44:02 So the end goal, I think the motivation is really important, and then I go through the
    0:44:09 process as you heard me say, is I like to break myself out into my various selves, because
    0:44:14 I am dozens of different kinds of people.
    0:44:17 I’m morning Brian, I’m evening Brian, I’m after workout Brian, I’m dad Brian, and every
    0:44:23 one of those situations, I’m biochemically a different human.
    0:44:26 I have a different way of understanding reality, and I’ll make decisions that are different
    0:44:30 in each one of those circumstances.
    0:44:31 Like you said with Daniel, where he doesn’t say yes on the phone, because in that moment,
    0:44:35 he pleases others Daniel, and he wants to be a different version to let him in his life.
    0:44:40 So I do the same approach.
    0:44:41 I break myself out into different persons, and I decide which versions of me have authorization
    0:44:47 and win, because who’s in charge, 10 PMU who sets the alarm for 6 AM, or 6 AMU who wants
    0:44:56 a few more minutes with the snooze button.
    0:44:58 And so you need to make those decisions on who is in charge, because if you just let
    0:45:03 it roll out, the present you is always going to win, and always get what they want at the
    0:45:09 expense of other versions of you that have your better interests at heart.
    0:45:14 And then the third is once you get to the structural where you have a goal, and you’ve
    0:45:17 separated yourself out and you know who’s making decisions to win, then you can do these
    0:45:21 hyper focused things on behavioral change, like you can pair a habit.
    0:45:25 So every time you see a given thing, you do a certain action.
    0:45:28 And so that’s really in my estimation, how I’ve tried to stack my life, where basically
    0:45:34 I’ve tried to build a life where I make zero decisions of doing things I don’t really want
    0:45:43 to do, and I’ve almost got it.
    0:45:46 Like it’s actually, I’m surprised I’ve gotten this close to achieving it.
    0:45:50 I just don’t behave in ways that I regret anymore.
    0:45:53 And that’s phenomenal because I was just like walking regret before.
    0:45:57 What I love about you is that you’re living life on your own terms and you’re not hurting
    0:46:03 anybody.
    0:46:04 And yet what you’re doing is so outside of what we consider normal, that you get so much
    0:46:11 hate and vitriol.
    0:46:14 How do you handle that?
    0:46:15 I love it.
    0:46:17 I have such a positive relationship with the hate.
    0:46:21 It energizes me.
    0:46:23 I am endlessly amused by it.
    0:46:26 I think it’s just fun to engage with.
    0:46:30 And depression was a much better troll than anyone online.
    0:46:38 My depression could eat me up pretty efficiently, getting new, the zingers and the dunks.
    0:46:44 Everyone else, it’s just played for me.
    0:46:48 I guess you can think about these two phases, like, okay, phase one is do something that
    0:46:55 is unrecognizable in your time and place.
    0:46:58 Okay, so we’ve seen this throughout history.
    0:47:00 Phase two is people come with pitchforks.
    0:47:04 We know this.
    0:47:06 Phase three is you’ve got to survive a whole bunch of attacks, like the power to be you’re
    0:47:13 going to want to start taking you down.
    0:47:15 And then phase, if you get past phase two and phase three, you get to open up a little
    0:47:20 bit and you kind of have some open horizon.
    0:47:23 And so that’s where I’m at now, is I’ve survived the major dunk where people try to cancel
    0:47:28 me in society.
    0:47:29 I’ve survived several attempts at takedowns, and now I’m still at it.
    0:47:35 And so I’m really happy I’m on the stage four now, and now it’s just opening up into a bigger
    0:47:39 gameplay.
    0:47:40 Yeah, I was amazed at some of the stuff that I read online and some of the stuff that you’ve
    0:47:44 been through.
    0:47:45 And I don’t know if you want to share some of that or not.
    0:47:48 What’s been the hardest moments for you?
    0:47:50 I’m so happy to be alive.
    0:47:54 I appreciate existence with an intensity that I’ve never felt before.
    0:48:02 I know what it feels like to want to end your life.
    0:48:06 You know, like I desperately wanted to kill myself for 10 years, and I’m grateful I didn’t
    0:48:12 and I’m grateful I’m alive.
    0:48:14 So when people come and dunk on me, or when they’re trying to attack me, or when they’re
    0:48:22 saying things about me, it’s okay.
    0:48:26 It’s fine.
    0:48:29 Everyone’s just trying to do their thing and deal with themselves.
    0:48:31 So it’s not really worth getting caught up in.
    0:48:35 I think it’s possible that we’ll look back at ourselves right now and we’ll say, “Oh,
    0:48:44 man, can you believe how hard it was to be human?
    0:48:49 Do you remember how bad it was?
    0:48:52 The anxiety and the depression and the jealousy and the angst and the FOMO and all the things
    0:48:59 we felt?
    0:49:00 God, that was just so hard.
    0:49:03 Can you imagine going back to doing that?
    0:49:05 In the same way we imagine previous areas not having the technology we do today, I think
    0:49:11 it’s possible that we’re just in this moment in time of a conscious existence.
    0:49:14 It’s really brutal.
    0:49:15 And so I guess I don’t really expect anything different.
    0:49:18 If people’s internal experiences are beating them up, they’re going to try to beat other
    0:49:22 people up too.
    0:49:23 It’s just kind of the situation.
    0:49:24 It’s okay.
    0:49:25 Do you think you have that confidence to sort of face that because you’ve been to a really
    0:49:32 dark place and come out of it?
    0:49:34 Yes.
    0:49:35 I think it’s also because I get great sleep.
    0:49:37 Honestly.
    0:49:38 But you’ve also, it’s one thing, like I get this, it’s one thing when it’s an anonymous
    0:49:44 person online saying something about you, really mostly says something about them, but you’ve
    0:49:51 also had people close to you come after you and that’s a whole different kind of vulnerability
    0:49:57 and feeling.
    0:49:59 I was poor my entire life.
    0:50:02 My mom made my clothes for school.
    0:50:06 I worked in third grade.
    0:50:08 I worked the school tables at lunch to pay for leftover food.
    0:50:13 So my mom wouldn’t have to pay my $25 a month of cafeteria money.
    0:50:17 Like I knew we were poor and I was in on my family’s circumstances and I didn’t make money
    0:50:26 until I was 34 years old until I sold brain tree.
    0:50:30 And I’ve had money for 10 years now for 12 years and I’ve learned a lot of lessons about
    0:50:36 the complexity of money.
    0:50:38 I really wish that I would have spent more time having made money and say, can I talk
    0:50:46 to somebody who’s had wealth and can tell me how this game works?
    0:50:52 But I will tell you, of the people close to me over the past 12 years, a very large number
    0:51:04 like almost like 50% have ended up doing something to me that is unambiguous bad behavior.
    0:51:18 In some cases, illegal behavior and this is not to say they’re bad and I’m good.
    0:51:26 It’s meant to say that when you’re around these circumstances, it’s oftentimes very
    0:51:33 hard to keep your bearings.
    0:51:37 And sometimes you lose your reality and you become so lost in it, you can no longer tell
    0:51:43 what’s going on.
    0:51:45 But money is extraordinarily complicated and it drives people to do crazy things.
    0:51:50 And I’ve seen this pattern now repeat itself so many times in my personal life, like those
    0:51:56 who are the closest people to me.
    0:51:58 And to see what they would do when money was at stake, they’ll do anything.
    0:52:03 And they lose touch with reality in the pursuit of that objective.
    0:52:10 I have a friend who is incredibly wealthy and we’ve been friends for a number of years now.
    0:52:16 And one thing that struck me a few years ago was his circle kept getting smaller and smaller.
    0:52:25 And I remember asking him about this and I was like, we were hanging out last year and
    0:52:30 I’m just making this up.
    0:52:31 But there was like 30 people here and now there’s like 15.
    0:52:35 And you see it shrink over time and he said, yeah, you know, because people do these things
    0:52:41 that they ask me for something or they do things and then I can’t really trust them.
    0:52:48 And then everybody who’s trying to be my friend, and I’m paraphrasing here and I’m not going
    0:52:53 to reveal who it is, but everybody who’s trying to be my friend wants something from me or
    0:52:57 that’s how I think about it.
    0:52:58 So it’s really hard for me to like, open up to new people because I’ve become skeptical
    0:53:04 of motivations and intentions.
    0:53:07 That’s been what I have seen.
    0:53:10 So when I’ve shared my problems, they are almost identical to the life experiences other
    0:53:18 people have had.
    0:53:19 It’s just algorithmic.
    0:53:21 This is what I’m saying.
    0:53:22 I wish I could go back in time and talk to somebody because it is so predictable how
    0:53:26 people will behave in these circumstances that you can do so many things to try to lessen
    0:53:33 the negative outcomes.
    0:53:35 But I’m inherently a very trusting person and I am hands off, right?
    0:53:40 Just kind of let people do their own thing.
    0:53:42 And that’s just not a good recipe.
    0:53:44 Most people can’t thrive in that environment.
    0:53:47 Most people will really struggle to play by the rules that we as a society have agreed
    0:53:55 that would constitute fairness and honesty and legality.
    0:53:59 So again, it’s fine.
    0:54:02 This is not a critique of people.
    0:54:03 It’s just, it’s the human condition.
    0:54:05 It is what it is.
    0:54:06 And this is the same, I don’t trust myself.
    0:54:10 This is why I don’t have sweets in my house.
    0:54:13 It’s not like I think I’m the best person in the whole world.
    0:54:16 I know that I will cheat.
    0:54:19 I will do things I don’t want to do if I put myself in those circumstances.
    0:54:24 So this is coming from a place of distrust of myself and all things that we humans do.
    0:54:30 If I inherited or suddenly came into $500 million tomorrow and I came to you and said, “Brian,
    0:54:36 I just got this big chunk of money.
    0:54:40 Give me the lessons that you’ve learned over the last 12 years that I should put in place
    0:54:46 today.
    0:54:47 What would they be?”
    0:54:48 One is I would suggest you not change anything in your life for six to 12 months.
    0:54:56 Keep on with your same habits and have the money so you can distinguish between your
    0:55:02 preferred lifestyle and what money would otherwise alter your perception of what you want.
    0:55:09 Because once you start acquiring things, you start losing your perspective on where your
    0:55:15 baseline is.
    0:55:18 And the shock of going from zero to five million is so sudden that it scrambles your reality.
    0:55:25 And then number two is it is reasonable that a large majority of people are going to want
    0:55:37 something from you at all times.
    0:55:40 And it will be small things like a niece or a nephew when you’re invited to their wedding.
    0:55:48 Most people will give a gift $100 or $200 or $20, whatever the number is in that cultural
    0:55:55 norm for the family, they’re going to expect you to give something for $500 or $1,000 because
    0:56:01 you have so much money.
    0:56:03 And so people just assume that because you have so much money that you have more obligation
    0:56:11 to them.
    0:56:12 So there’s this asypical relationship.
    0:56:15 And then three is I’d say identify what you want the money to achieve.
    0:56:24 And that really needs to come from you on what your objectives are.
    0:56:28 Because if you don’t determine your objectives in life, money will run you.
    0:56:34 And so it creates this really inverse relationship where you wanted the money so you could achieve
    0:56:41 your objectives, but now money’s running you and you’ve lost yourself.
    0:56:44 And if you don’t follow those three things, pretty soon you’re in a situation where you
    0:56:48 don’t know what is up and what’s down, you don’t know who you can trust, you’ve got people
    0:56:52 on the inside who are engaging in potentially compromising behavior without you knowing.
    0:57:00 And so it just creates a real challenging environment.
    0:57:02 And then your internal world becomes destabilized where, like your friend said, you just don’t
    0:57:08 know who you can trust and it becomes a really isolating experience.
    0:57:13 Does that ever make you feel lonely?
    0:57:15 It’s a challenge.
    0:57:16 Like anything, I mean, like in life, it’s like all of our problems are equal.
    0:57:24 It’s not like if you’re rich, you have fewer problems, it’s not like if you’re poor, you’ve
    0:57:31 got, I mean, like, so there are like, there’s like, there are some clear differences.
    0:57:36 Like if you’re poor and you’ve got a very serious medical condition, you don’t have the
    0:57:39 resources to address that, that’s a very big difference.
    0:57:42 But overall, every person I know who’s wealthy has just as many problems and it fills to
    0:57:49 them, their problems are just as intense as everyone else at every other class of wealth.
    0:57:55 Excluding like the extreme situations where like a person does not have the ability to
    0:58:00 pay for basic nutrition or does not have the ability to pay for medical bills or is suffering
    0:58:04 from some other like on the disparities.
    0:58:07 But what I’m trying to say is human suffering is pretty universal.
    0:58:13 And there’s a lot of misperception that somehow money lessens problems.
    0:58:20 You know, it’s not a panacea.
    0:58:22 It has its own problems.
    0:58:25 And many people with money wish they didn’t have the money.
    0:58:27 But of course, that’s also hypocritical because if they did, just give it away like talk to
    0:58:32 talk.
    0:58:33 It’s complicated and nuanced.
    0:58:35 And it’s just a very hard question to parse because it’s hard to imagine those circumstances.
    0:58:41 It’s hard for society to talk about, too.
    0:58:44 I feel like it’s exceptionally hard for my wealthier friends to talk about money than
    0:58:50 it is for other people because if they risk getting slapped on the hand for saying anything
    0:58:57 that is just insensitive because their experience is complex, that it causes very serious problems
    0:59:05 in life.
    0:59:06 It creates loneliness.
    0:59:07 It puts them in very challenging situations.
    0:59:11 And then there are natural responses like boohoo, like go complain to someone.
    0:59:16 And I understand that.
    0:59:18 It’s also just like, I think it misses a little bit because we all live together in society
    0:59:23 and we share classes of problems.
    0:59:25 And so to me, it’s a bigger observation about how all of us struggle all the time and how
    0:59:33 it’s worthwhile to contemplate how we can all struggle less.
    0:59:36 Yeah, we’re more similar than we tend to think that we are, I think, across not only cultures,
    0:59:43 but socioeconomic statuses, too.
    0:59:47 I want to come back to blueprint for a second.
    0:59:48 I want to go through specific things.
    0:59:51 So I want to go through nine things.
    0:59:53 I want to go through behavioral interventions.
    0:59:56 I want to go through diet interventions and supplement interventions.
    1:00:00 And I want you to give me your top three behavioral interventions, top three diet interventions,
    1:00:07 and top three supplements that people listening to this, if they’re looking to sort of like
    1:00:12 play around with blueprint, but maybe they don’t want to go all in that they can do and
    1:00:16 they’ll get a noticeable sort of like bang for the buck out of.
    1:00:20 Yeah.
    1:00:21 And I can tell you, I would structure that just a little bit differently.
    1:00:25 I can tell you the top five power laws.
    1:00:28 Okay.
    1:00:29 Yeah, let’s do that.
    1:00:30 And so you by doing these five things, you could achieve a life expectancy of 92.
    1:00:36 So one, don’t smoke.
    1:00:38 Yeah.
    1:00:39 Two is exercise six hours a week.
    1:00:43 And that’s a combination of strength and flexibility and cardiovascular.
    1:00:47 Three is eat a blueprint like diet or like Mediterranean diet.
    1:00:53 Four is maintain a BMI between 18.5 and 22.5.
    1:00:59 And then five is a limit alcohol consumption and those five things, the power laws, sleep
    1:01:07 is a contender for being a power law of health.
    1:01:11 I think the evidence is emerging now that we’ve got much better measurement around it.
    1:01:15 Talk to me about the alcohol consumption because that one is sort of a bit vague in
    1:01:20 a sense of you didn’t offer specifics like BMI or like this range.
    1:01:25 What is a limited alcohol consumption?
    1:01:28 Is that like two ounces a week?
    1:01:30 Is it six?
    1:01:31 Is it like we’re best with none, but up until this point, it doesn’t hurt us.
    1:01:35 If I remember correctly, it’s something like between one and three glasses of wine a week
    1:01:41 equivalent.
    1:01:42 So it’s limited.
    1:01:44 I do zero alcohol intake.
    1:01:46 You used to drink alcohol though.
    1:01:48 Yeah, I drink three ounces of red wine for breakfast daily.
    1:01:52 Yeah.
    1:01:53 What was the thinking behind that?
    1:01:54 You gave it up.
    1:01:55 I think I remember if I remember correctly, it’s because you couldn’t afford the 80 calories
    1:01:59 in your diet.
    1:02:00 Correct.
    1:02:01 Yeah.
    1:02:02 But you liked red wine.
    1:02:03 It was delicious.
    1:02:05 It was such a wonderful experience.
    1:02:07 Yeah.
    1:02:08 It increased the joy of food a lot.
    1:02:10 Do you ever have wine now or it’s just like a rule that you don’t have it because once
    1:02:15 you go down that path, it’s like a slippery slope?
    1:02:19 I don’t now because even small amounts negatively affects my sleep.
    1:02:23 Even if I drink them, drink it around noon or even if I do three ounces at noon, I still
    1:02:28 sometimes see effects in sleep and nothing is worth trading high quality sleep to me.
    1:02:36 That’s fascinating.
    1:02:37 Are there certain foods that if you ate even at 11.30, would disrupt your sleep that you
    1:02:43 know about?
    1:02:44 Carbohydrates.
    1:02:45 So breads, pastas, even rice is hard for my body to digest.
    1:02:52 Is that your body or most bodies?
    1:02:55 My body.
    1:02:56 And maybe it’s because I don’t eat rice very often, so the one-time occurrence.
    1:03:00 But yeah, when I eat anything of that variety, my resting heart rate will be 55 plus, probably
    1:03:06 56, 57 range, then of course anything fried, but I never eat fried.
    1:03:11 But if I did, it would definitely do it.
    1:03:16 Flowers of all types.
    1:03:18 Even like almond flour?
    1:03:19 Yeah.
    1:03:20 Oh, interesting.
    1:03:21 I tried a bunch of different flowers that I wanted to find, I wanted to find some variety
    1:03:27 of foods that would do it and then also sugar.
    1:03:32 So if I, you know, on occasion I’ve tried like a fun drink, like someone took me and
    1:03:39 got a boba or something, boba or something like that, he’s made by tapioca.
    1:03:43 But yeah, that will do it for me, that will increase my, so I know now the list of foods
    1:03:48 that increase my resting heart rate.
    1:03:50 And this is the cool thing.
    1:03:51 You know, before I would say I would be confronted with a situation of like, I really want to
    1:03:57 eat this cookie, but I know I don’t, I really shouldn’t.
    1:03:59 Then I did it anyways, you know, and I probably did that in my life a thousand of times maybe.
    1:04:05 And for the first time in my life, I’ve gotten to a point where I can look at the cookie
    1:04:10 and have it in my hand and say, you know what, the pain of eating this thing so far exceeds
    1:04:16 the momentary pleasure from eating it, there’s no way I’m going to do it.
    1:04:21 And I can feel that with such confidence.
    1:04:23 I’m not even tempted to eat the cookie, whereas before I was just desperate in its face to
    1:04:28 just be, you know, there’s no way I was going to win in that situation.
    1:04:31 I was going to eat the cookie.
    1:04:32 And then after that, I was going to eat the five more in the pack, you know, I couldn’t
    1:04:35 have stopped myself.
    1:04:37 And so now my, I finally, finally, finally, finally got to a place where I can model out
    1:04:42 the pain and that’s so unpleasant that I just don’t want to do it.
    1:04:46 And the pain in this case is, you know, it’s going to impact your sleep and therefore you
    1:04:50 know it.
    1:04:51 How much of that relates to the fact that you’ve had eight months of perfect sleep?
    1:04:55 Like if last night was like, oh, the streak ended and now you’ve got the cookie in your
    1:04:59 hand, are you still thinking with the same logic?
    1:05:01 Well, that’s what I actually measured my brain at my brain interface company, Colonel.
    1:05:06 I looked at my brain based upon sleep patterns and I saw, we saw in my brain, I had less
    1:05:12 willpower when I had a poor night’s sleep, when I had less RAM and less deep.
    1:05:17 And so yes, when you have bad sleep, you have substantially less willpower.
    1:05:22 Well, it’s so interesting because I talked to my kids about this and I talked about it
    1:05:26 in the context of positioning and easy mode or hard mode.
    1:05:29 And I’m like, when you go to sleep, it doesn’t mean you’re not, like when you sleep well,
    1:05:33 it doesn’t mean somebody’s going to do something, you’re not going to do something to you tomorrow
    1:05:37 that makes you angry or upset.
    1:05:39 It means your ability to regulate your emotions and have a healthy response is going to be
    1:05:44 much easier than if you have a poor night’s sleep.
    1:05:47 So you can like, you’re playing on easy mode or hard mode and I think sleep is one of the
    1:05:51 prime indicators of that.
    1:05:53 Great job.
    1:05:55 Why does posture matter?
    1:05:56 You have like the best posture of, I’m like conscious of this and like, I’m actually having
    1:06:00 better posture during this interview because of you.
    1:06:04 You know, like I, I realized that I present complexity in people’s lives that, you know,
    1:06:14 someone sees an article about me or a video or something.
    1:06:19 And if they’re not in the same place as me, it can have a net negative reaction where
    1:06:24 the person’s like, damn it, I’m never going to be able to do what he does.
    1:06:31 So that makes me feel bad about myself.
    1:06:33 And so why even try?
    1:06:35 And I’m deeply empathetic about that and I, I wish that wasn’t the outcome.
    1:06:40 And so I really try to be thoughtful and meet everyone where they’re at where I hope that
    1:06:47 when someone thinks about me and if they view my posture or they view my habits, that they
    1:06:54 can think of me like an angel on their shoulder of like, I’m, I’m there, I’m there with you
    1:06:58 friend.
    1:06:59 Like I, I want you to be your best self and I understand you and there’s no judgment
    1:07:03 coming from me and it’s fine if you make mistakes, it’s cool.
    1:07:08 But it’s, it’s complicated and I understand that it’s difficult.
    1:07:13 And so posture, I do work extraordinarily hard.
    1:07:16 I’m also mindful that it potentially has this boomerang effect where people get discouraged.
    1:07:22 But yeah, I mean, I, I maintain a posture because I discovered I’ve got genetically narrow
    1:07:27 internal jugular veins, these two pipes on the side of the neck.
    1:07:30 And so I’ve have restricted blood flow out of my brain when I have bad posture.
    1:07:35 So it kinks my veins.
    1:07:39 And so I, we did a whole bunch of measurement with MRI and ultrasound and I worked, did a
    1:07:43 bunch of physical therapy to strengthen certain muscles that maintain proper posture.
    1:07:47 And so I’ve just built it as a habit now, but it took me months and months.
    1:07:53 Uh, you know, for example, as a family, we have a habit where one day one of my eldest
    1:07:58 son made fun of me and he’s like, dad’s like an AI.
    1:08:01 And he was like, he’s like this, like, you know, being this AI move.
    1:08:04 And so his impersonation of me was reduced to so now every time anyone in the family
    1:08:13 has improper posture, that means if you’re holding a phone directly down, you’re looking
    1:08:17 at your heads hanging over, or you’re in some other catastrophic postural position, you’ll
    1:08:22 hear a zip and everyone in the family just like, we’re right, and I get straight up.
    1:08:27 And so we’re now a family where we support each other in proper posture, but it took
    1:08:31 us a while to get there.
    1:08:33 That’s awesome.
    1:08:34 What’s the relationship between our biological health and our sexual health?
    1:08:38 Well, yeah, if you’re male and you’re not getting enough sleep, your nighttime erections
    1:08:44 are eliminated.
    1:08:46 And nighttime erections are an important biomarker for sexual health, psychological health and
    1:08:52 cardiovascular health.
    1:08:54 And you know, I’ve measured my nighttime erections extensively as we basically, we try to measure
    1:08:59 everything we can measure as I know it’s atypical.
    1:09:02 And so this is not a common measurement people are familiar with, but that’s true for the
    1:09:06 entirety of blueprint, we’re doing things that are new.
    1:09:09 But I guess I say that because people oftentimes associate the cost of not getting good sleep
    1:09:15 with feeling a little bit grumpy the next day, you know, or a little bit more irritable,
    1:09:20 but they don’t really understand the whole body consequences where basically your sexual
    1:09:26 function goes to zero.
    1:09:28 It’s not that you can’t still have intercourse check, you can, but I pointed out it’s a pretty
    1:09:34 devastating cost on not getting good sleep.
    1:09:40 So yeah, all these things are deeply connected.
    1:09:44 And this is why coming back to grind culture, grind culture assumes death is inevitable.
    1:09:51 So you’re trying to achieve immortality through the means that you have.
    1:09:55 And so once you go back down the stack and you start questioning these things about our
    1:09:59 reality, it leads you down this path of like, do I really believe in this cultural moment
    1:10:04 of this thing or is there something else really bigger going on?
    1:10:08 One of my friends who was in the special forces for a long time used to be deployed often.
    1:10:15 And he said one of the things that they looked for in the troops and they asked them about
    1:10:19 regularly was there the poop and whether they had a morning erection.
    1:10:25 I love that.
    1:10:26 That’s fantastic.
    1:10:27 And I’ve heard of anyone else measuring erections.
    1:10:31 It’s so important and I know it’s taboo and funny and people like to dunk on it, but it’s
    1:10:35 really important.
    1:10:36 I’m asking this as a bald dude, but can you prevent your hairline from receding?
    1:10:41 I mean, I imagine it’s way too late for me now, but do you do that?
    1:10:46 Can you?
    1:10:47 Yeah, hair loss is an enormous amount of work.
    1:10:49 The technology is really not great.
    1:10:51 So what I do currently is in the morning, I put a topical application on my hair that
    1:10:59 is based upon my genetics of what things I do and don’t respond to and metabolize.
    1:11:07 And then I put a red light cap on my head and activate certain things.
    1:11:12 I then work out, eat breakfast and I’ll shower and I’ll use a certain shampoo that basically
    1:11:18 creates the right environment on the scalp.
    1:11:21 And then I’ll do once a month.
    1:11:24 I just started this new therapy where I’ll use this laser across the scalp and then I’ll
    1:11:30 apply exosomes and that’s a combo therapy to help hair grow stronger and faster.
    1:11:38 And then I used to do PRP, which is you draw blood out, you pull the plasma, you re-inject
    1:11:42 the growth factors.
    1:11:43 I stopped doing that because we’re now doing this laser exosome treatment.
    1:11:46 Yeah, that’s it.
    1:11:47 So basically it’s a topical application, which you’ve probably heard monoxidil is the most
    1:11:51 common thing.
    1:11:52 So it’s monoxidil plus a few little goodies, plus red light cap therapy, plus this laser
    1:11:57 and exosome treatment.
    1:11:58 Yeah, I mean, I should be bald at this point.
    1:12:00 I started losing my hair in my late 20s and the men in my family are bald basically.
    1:12:08 So I’m grateful I have some hair.
    1:12:10 I started losing mine in my mid-20s and then it sort of stopped.
    1:12:13 It receded and then thinned out massively and then just all of a sudden stopped.
    1:12:19 Yeah.
    1:12:20 I mean, the technology that is very close is exciting.
    1:12:25 There’s cloning therapies that are being developed.
    1:12:28 So if you had a few follicles, you can then clone it and then do basically like implantation.
    1:12:33 So I think it’s a possibility that in like five years’ time that you would be able to
    1:12:41 restore hair yourself.
    1:12:42 Is there any biological longevity reason why hair matters?
    1:12:46 I mean, there’s probably a sexual attractiveness angle to it.
    1:12:50 There’s probably a confidence angle to it.
    1:12:51 There’s probably a lot of internal ones, but is there any biological sort of like longevity
    1:12:56 reasons why it matters?
    1:12:58 If there is, I’m not aware of it.
    1:13:00 What do you think of hot and cold exposure?
    1:13:03 Do you do that?
    1:13:04 I don’t.
    1:13:05 It’s not that they don’t potentially have benefits for right applications.
    1:13:11 The hot and cold therapy didn’t make our cut because it doesn’t increase health span.
    1:13:18 Rather, the evidence was not strong enough for my team to recommend it to be cut into
    1:13:24 the protocol.
    1:13:25 So if you go back to how we think about this, we’ve looked at all the scientific evidence
    1:13:28 through the specific lens of increasing life span health span.
    1:13:34 And then we’ve ranked them according to power laws.
    1:13:37 And so this is not to say we won’t do it at some point in time.
    1:13:41 We’re very open-minded and we’ll always change our minds following the evidence.
    1:13:44 It’s just right now, we don’t think the evidence supports it to incorporate as a habit for
    1:13:49 longevity purposes, which is our aim.
    1:13:51 Now if somebody is doing it for recovery and other objectives, that’s an entirely different
    1:13:55 question.
    1:13:56 So it has nothing to say about the technologies for those just for my highly focused objective.
    1:14:04 If you think of Blueprint as like a hundred pieces of Lego, and each one of those pieces
    1:14:08 of Lego is an intervention based on scientific evidence, what’s the last piece of Lego you
    1:14:13 took out and put in a new piece of Lego because you’re like, “Oh, this is better than that
    1:14:18 piece of Lego?”
    1:14:19 I recently started taking oral monoxidil.
    1:14:22 So there’s the liquid monoxidil for hair growth, or for other hair loss prevention.
    1:14:28 I took an oral version, which initially that drug was approved for high blood pressure but
    1:14:34 was then repurposed for high hair growth because it made hair grow all over the body.
    1:14:38 But I started experiencing some side effects.
    1:14:41 I stopped that.
    1:14:42 So we do stuff like that.
    1:14:46 Every few days we’ll try something new like that.
    1:14:48 So that one stopped.
    1:14:49 And then let me think before that, I did those blood transfusions.
    1:14:54 So my son gave me his plasma and I gave my dad my plasma.
    1:14:59 And I did six of those one a month for six months, and we saw no effect in me.
    1:15:04 But when I gave my father plasma, my father’s speed of aging slowed by the equivalent of
    1:15:11 25 years.
    1:15:12 So from a 71-year-old to a 46-year-old, and those results remained stable for six months,
    1:15:19 which is the last measurement we did.
    1:15:21 So in that case, the plasma therapy was promising.
    1:15:26 And it didn’t work in me probably because my biomarkers are already pretty competitive
    1:15:31 with an 18-year-old, whereas my father benefited significantly because his biomarkers as a 71-year-old
    1:15:37 are pretty different than my biomarkers.
    1:15:39 And so in that case, we discontinued the therapy for me, but he could continue if he wanted.
    1:15:45 That’s fascinating.
    1:15:46 That seems like a really easy-ish intervention that you can do to extend the longevity of
    1:15:51 your parents.
    1:15:53 From the outside looking in, it can sound wild and creepy and weird and everything on a personal
    1:15:59 level to be able to do something like that for a parent is a special experience.
    1:16:07 It’s not too dissimilar than donating an organ.
    1:16:10 That’s very commonplace, and we don’t think of organ transplants as weird or organ donation
    1:16:14 as weird.
    1:16:15 So it’s just a new idea, and so people think it’s weird, but it’s actually identical to
    1:16:21 what we already do in life, and we actually applaud people who make those kinds of sacrifices.
    1:16:26 And I should clarify, it’s not a sacrifice.
    1:16:28 Giving plasma is not a sacrifice.
    1:16:31 If our goal is not to die, how do you think about the things like sunscreen and other
    1:16:38 things that are sort of proximate to us, especially about things we put on or in our bodies?
    1:16:44 Right?
    1:16:45 So we talked earlier about plastic bottles and sort of trying to avoid that.
    1:16:49 Do you have a particular sunscreen you use?
    1:16:51 I imagine you’ve thought about this more than any other human.
    1:16:54 We do try to be thoughtful.
    1:16:56 We’re not perfect.
    1:16:57 There’s so many things we’re looking at at any given time, but yeah, we use a sunscreen
    1:17:03 Elta MD, E-L-T-A-M-D, and it’s a good one that has less bad stuff in it.
    1:17:12 I generally try to avoid the sun when the UV index is above four, so I get sun exposure
    1:17:19 in the morning and in the night, and this is also another contentious part in society
    1:17:24 where I get a lot of flak for the paleness of my skin, and it’s a cultural norm that
    1:17:32 tan skin is somehow a signifier of health and wellness and beauty, but the sun ages
    1:17:41 and damages the skin and creates cancer risk.
    1:17:45 So it’s not this culture of tan skin is not going to survive much longer because it will
    1:17:53 just naturally push in the direction where we generally over a long enough time horizon
    1:18:00 move towards more positive habits for society.
    1:18:04 Sometimes it takes a very long time, but I think this is one of them that our current
    1:18:08 ideas around sun exposure will change.
    1:18:12 I’m not suggesting we will avoid the sun altogether.
    1:18:14 I’m suggesting we will be more mindful.
    1:18:17 It won’t be a case where, because currently our general dispositions are pretty brazen
    1:18:23 towards the sun.
    1:18:25 It’s not a careful balance of get sun exposure, but only so much.
    1:18:32 It’s like unadulterated sun exposure is kind of like this.
    1:18:37 It kind of is like around certain dietary preferences where it’s really a much bigger
    1:18:44 social thing than it is a data thing or science thing.
    1:18:49 And that’s fine, this is how people kind of break out into camps, but we measure my skin
    1:18:55 age using multi-spectral imaging and using a whole bunch of other technologies.
    1:19:01 So we see exactly what happens when.
    1:19:05 And by looking at the data, it’s just very hard to go do something that’s going to actively
    1:19:14 accelerate my speed of aging when the objective of this project is to try to slow it as much
    1:19:18 as possible.
    1:19:19 And then I want to ask, just before we sort of wrap up here, how do you envision, and
    1:19:25 I know we don’t have a long window in terms of what we can see, but if you zoom out, how
    1:19:30 do you see AI helping us?
    1:19:32 I actually, I tried to embody the problem of AI.
    1:19:39 I tried to become the species as a problem.
    1:19:44 And so I did that with a thought experiment where I said, okay, I’m a collection of 35
    1:19:49 trillion cells.
    1:19:52 And that’s a lot of intelligent agents all doing their own thing with different objectives.
    1:19:56 The body doesn’t have a singular objective.
    1:19:59 The body has all kinds of conflicting objectives at all moments.
    1:20:04 And I wanted to see, could I achieve goal alignment within me, Brian Johnson?
    1:20:12 And that’s what I’ve been trying to do.
    1:20:13 And so first I had to say, okay, in order to understand these 35 trillion cells, I need
    1:20:17 to get a read of as many of them as possible.
    1:20:22 Then I need to find the evidence to tell me how I align the cells.
    1:20:26 And then I need to implement it with exactitude.
    1:20:29 And this is a problem that is identical to AI.
    1:20:33 So we’re building the superintelligence, and we then are going to give it objective functions
    1:20:38 and say, all right, AI, do this, solve this math problem, or help me write this thing,
    1:20:43 or have this conversation with me, whatever the thing we’re asking it to do, it has goals.
    1:20:49 And it has goals.
    1:20:50 We’ve programmed into it.
    1:20:51 It has goals that it emerges from the system itself.
    1:20:54 So we’re basically trying to say, what are our goals?
    1:20:57 Under what circumstances and for whom?
    1:21:00 So it’s a giant goal alignment problem.
    1:21:03 So my situation, I had to say, okay, is 10 p.m. Brian in charge, who’s that alarm?
    1:21:08 Or 6 a.m. Brian who wants to hit this news button?
    1:21:11 Who’s in charge and under what circumstance?
    1:21:13 That’s the same kind of goal alignment problem you have with AI.
    1:21:15 And it’s the same kind of problem we have with planet Earth.
    1:21:18 So Earth needs to be a home where we can thrive.
    1:21:21 If we kill Earth, we’re in a bad situation.
    1:21:23 And so when I say don’t die, it’s don’t die individually, don’t kill each other, don’t
    1:21:28 let the planet die, don’t kill it, and align AI with don’t die.
    1:21:32 Don’t die is deceptively simple and endlessly expansive.
    1:21:38 It is a heuristic, it is a computational model, it is a mathematical framework, it is a biological
    1:21:44 system, it is a closed loop algorithm, all those things in two words.
    1:21:49 And this is what I’m putting forward as a species, is if we care to be around for the
    1:21:55 future, we need to be able to figure out how to cooperate at the most basic level.
    1:22:02 And don’t die is the most played game in every single minute of every single day on planet
    1:22:07 Earth.
    1:22:08 There’s not a game, even capitalism is not played more than don’t die.
    1:22:12 Every two seconds you and I breathe to not die.
    1:22:16 We look both ways before we cross the street, we throw out moldy food, it is the most played
    1:22:21 game in existence.
    1:22:22 Now, the moment you stand up above don’t die, you break out into a billion different directions
    1:22:28 of what people want, how they understand the world, what they care about, what they’ll do
    1:22:32 and why, all the rules and justifications.
    1:22:35 So you really have to say, if we’re trying to goal align a superintelligence around something
    1:22:39 and not kill the Earth and not kill each other and not die ourselves, how do you do it?
    1:22:43 And that’s what I’ve tried to put forward is, this is an actual plan, a practical plan
    1:22:48 that spans what to eat for breakfast and how to align a superintelligence system with all
    1:22:52 of our interests.
    1:22:54 That’s beautiful.
    1:22:55 We always ask the same question to end, which is, what is success for you?
    1:22:58 But I have a feeling it’s going to be two words.
    1:23:01 I would say, it’s the courage to believe that I don’t know.
    1:23:10 That’s a perfect way to wrap up this conversation.
    1:23:12 Thanks a lot for your time.
    1:23:13 Thanks for having me.
    1:23:15 All right.
    1:23:17 It’s time for a few of my reflections after that conversation.
    1:23:21 That went pretty amazing, I thought.
    1:23:25 So you know, I try to get into these things.
    1:23:27 I’ve been eating Brian’s diet for the last week with a few exceptions here and there,
    1:23:33 but generally speaking, the pudding and the bowls are pretty good.
    1:23:37 They’re awesome.
    1:23:38 They’re missing a little bit of salt for my taste, but the reason behind that, I talked
    1:23:42 to him after.
    1:23:44 And the reason behind that is that the lentils and stuff have enough salt in them that if
    1:23:48 you consume the quantities that he’s talking about on his website, you actually get the
    1:23:53 daily amount of salt that you need.
    1:23:55 I loved exploring a little bit of different angles to it.
    1:24:00 I think the most surprising part of this conversation for me was the lessons on money that he wishing
    1:24:06 you earlier.
    1:24:07 And I haven’t heard him talk about that anywhere else.
    1:24:09 I really enjoyed that.
    1:24:11 The posture thing, I find myself sitting up straight right now, even noticing it.
    1:24:16 And I think that that’s a really good sort of angle to it.
    1:24:20 I love the idea that, you know, we can improve our sleep as the one critical variable and
    1:24:29 everything else falls in line.
    1:24:30 Sleep is a lead domino to so many other things.
    1:24:33 And sleep positions you to play the next day on easy mode.
    1:24:36 It doesn’t change the day that’s coming at you, but it does change how you handle it.
    1:24:40 And I think one of the things that I’m going to try is just experimenting, eating dinner
    1:24:44 a little earlier and seeing how that affects my resting heart rate while I sleep.
    1:24:55 Thanks for listening and learning with me until next time.
    1:25:01 Thanks for listening and learning with us for a complete list of episodes, show notes,
    1:25:07 transcripts and more go to fs.blog/podcast or just Google the knowledge project.
    1:25:14 The Furnham Street blog is also where you can learn more about my new book, Clear Thinking,
    1:25:19 turning ordinary moments into extraordinary results.
    1:25:22 It’s a transformative guide that hands you the tools to master your fate, sharpen your
    1:25:27 decision making and set yourself up for unparalleled success.
    1:25:32 Learn more at fs.blog/clear.
    1:25:37 Until next time.
    1:25:37
    1:25:46 [Music]
    1:25:48 you
    1:25:50 [BLANK_AUDIO]
    What can you do (or avoid) tomorrow to guarantee you can live longer?
    In this episode, Bryan Johnson reveals the five simple disciplines you can start doing to live healthier and longer. Johnson shares what his daily routine looks like, the ins and outs of his experimentation process, and why he gave his father plasma.
    Johnson also opens up about the constant hate he receives from people online, how he deals with it all, and what he wishes he’d known when he sold his company.

    Bryan Johnson is the world’s most measured human. Johnson sold his company to PayPal in 2013. Through Project Blueprint, Johnson has achieved metabolic health equal to the top 1.5% of 18 year olds, inflammation 66% lower than the average 10 year old, and reduced his speed of aging by the equivalent of 31 years.

    Johnson is also the founder of Kernel, creator of the world’s first mainstream non-invasive neuroimaging system; and OS Fund, where he invested in the predictable engineering of atoms, molecules, and organisms.

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    Timecodes:

    (00:00:00) Intro

    (00:03:45) On biographies

    (00:08:03) On depression and coping mechanisms

    (00:14:18) Self-destructive behavior and how to pitch Blueprint to someone

    (00:26:50) What a day looks like on Blueprint (exercise and what to eat)

    (00:42:06) How to turn Blueprint protocols into habits

    (00:45:17) Embracing the hate

    (00:49:07) The downsides and lessons of making money

    (00:59:22) The five habits

    (01:05:09) Why does posture matter?

    (01:07:48) Relationship between biological health and sexual health

    (01:09:50) Hair-loss prevention

    (01:15:46) Sunscreen, plastics, and other miscellaneous impacts on aging

    (01:18:30) How will AI help us?

    (01:22:10) On success

  • #187 Dr. Becky Kennedy: The One Thing You Can Say That Changes Everything

    AI transcript
    0:00:00 you know, they’re like explorers in the world.
    0:00:02 I mean, that’s like how I think about teens.
    0:00:03 Like that’s what their job is.
    0:00:04 Their job is to explore.
    0:00:05 They’re trying to figure out who they are.
    0:00:07 Their job is to go through this kind of identity formation phase.
    0:00:10 And I also think a lot about like the difference
    0:00:12 between like an explorer and a nomad.
    0:00:15 And I feel like the big difference
    0:00:16 is an explorer has a home base.
    0:00:18 But what I always want parents of teens to know
    0:00:21 is like your teen still needs you in the most intense way.
    0:00:25 And they will come back.
    0:00:27 They need to know you’re there, right?
    0:00:28 Like knowing when you’re exploring
    0:00:30 that your home base is there.
    0:00:32 Like I think we all know feels very different
    0:00:34 than checking for a home base
    0:00:36 and feeling like it has dissolved, right?
    0:00:38 And that to me says so much about the connection
    0:00:40 of teens and parents during these really tricky years.
    0:00:43 (upbeat music)
    0:00:45 (upbeat music)
    0:00:48 Welcome to The Knowledge Project,
    0:01:01 a podcast about mastering the best
    0:01:03 of what other people have already figured out
    0:01:04 so you can apply their insights to your life.
    0:01:07 I’m your host, Shane Parrish.
    0:01:10 Every Sunday, I send out the brain food newsletter
    0:01:12 to over 600,000 people.
    0:01:14 It’s considered noise-canceling headphones
    0:01:17 for the internet and is full of timeless wisdom
    0:01:19 you can apply to life and work.
    0:01:22 You can sign up for free at fs.blog/newsletter.
    0:01:25 Check out the show notes for a link.
    0:01:28 If you’re listening to this, you’re missing out.
    0:01:29 If you’d like access to the podcast
    0:01:31 before public release, special episodes
    0:01:34 that don’t appear anywhere else,
    0:01:35 hand-edited transcripts,
    0:01:37 or you just want to support the show you love,
    0:01:39 you can join at fs.blog/membership.
    0:01:42 Check out the show notes for a link.
    0:01:45 Today, my guest is clinical psychologist,
    0:01:47 Dr. Becky Kennedy.
    0:01:49 She’s simply known as Dr. Becky
    0:01:51 to the millions of people around the world.
    0:01:53 She’s the author of “Good Inside,”
    0:01:55 a guide to becoming the parent you want to be.
    0:01:58 In this conversation, we discuss the eight most important
    0:02:01 words you can say to your partner or child
    0:02:03 when they tell you anything that’s hard,
    0:02:05 setting boundaries, effective apologizing,
    0:02:09 regulating emotions, both our own
    0:02:11 and teaching our kids how to do the same thing,
    0:02:14 the importance and step-by-step guide
    0:02:16 to repairing after a blow-up with your kids or partner,
    0:02:20 addiction, specifically around kids and screens
    0:02:23 and video games, building confidence and resiliency,
    0:02:27 and so much more.
    0:02:28 After re-listening to this conversation,
    0:02:30 I was struck by just how much of what we talk about
    0:02:34 applies to kids, partners, coworkers, and ourselves.
    0:02:38 Stick around at the end for my reflections.
    0:02:41 It’s time to listen and learn.
    0:02:44 – Hear that, Codepaner fans?
    0:02:51 That silence has two friends enjoying
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    0:02:58 Because adding crispy bacon and creamy Parmesan sauce
    0:03:03 to our 100% Canadian beef
    0:03:05 makes it impossible to have a conversation.
    0:03:09 Try the new creamy Parmesan and bacon Codepaner today
    0:03:13 and discover how words are so unnecessary
    0:03:16 for a limited time only
    0:03:17 at participating McDonald’s restaurants in Canada.
    0:03:20 – If you’re on the road, you have a license plate,
    0:03:23 but not every license plate supports our provincial parks.
    0:03:26 Proceeds from BC Parks license plates
    0:03:29 help conserve the beauty of nature
    0:03:31 from the peaks of our mountains to the shores of our beaches.
    0:03:35 – Adventure starts with a license plate.
    0:03:38 Choose the one that gives back.
    0:03:40 Discover how BC Parks license plates
    0:03:42 help protect our parks at bcparks.ca/getinvolved.
    0:03:47 A message from the government of British Columbia.
    0:03:50 – Let’s start with a common term that we use as adults.
    0:03:56 And as adults, we use with our kids,
    0:03:59 but I don’t know if I have a really good understanding
    0:04:02 of it, which is what is a boundary?
    0:04:05 So here’s how I define a boundary
    0:04:06 and I define it this way
    0:04:08 because then it’s something I can actually assess
    0:04:11 and I can know if I’m setting one or not.
    0:04:13 So to me, a boundary is something we tell someone else,
    0:04:17 we will do and it requires the other person to do nothing.
    0:04:22 And so the reason I really, really like that definition
    0:04:27 is because we can then afterwards say, okay,
    0:04:30 well, the thing I did, did I tell someone what I will do?
    0:04:34 And does it require the other person to do nothing?
    0:04:36 And almost always we say, no, like I actually kind of
    0:04:40 was asking my kid to clean up the clothes on their floor,
    0:04:44 which is something we all have to do.
    0:04:45 I would say that’s a request.
    0:04:46 We make requests of our kids all the time,
    0:04:49 but learning to really differentiate a request
    0:04:51 from a boundary is critical.
    0:04:53 And it saves us from the frustration
    0:04:55 and the cycle of my kid doesn’t respect my boundary
    0:04:58 or this person doesn’t respect my boundary.
    0:04:59 And to me, the way I think about boundaries
    0:05:01 is someone kind of quote might not respect my boundary,
    0:05:04 but if I am setting a boundary
    0:05:07 that is dependent on what I’m doing
    0:05:09 and is not at all dependent on what someone else does,
    0:05:12 then I really retain a lot of power
    0:05:14 and I really like that perspective.
    0:05:16 – So what would be an example of like a boundary
    0:05:19 and a relationship that you have with your partner
    0:05:22 or your spouse and a boundary you might have
    0:05:25 with a teenager?
    0:05:27 – Let’s start with like a moment of frustration.
    0:05:28 Where for you Shane, like where are you frustrated
    0:05:30 with the spouse or where do you hear you’re like,
    0:05:32 oh, people tend to like get frustrated
    0:05:33 and want to set boundaries in this way.
    0:05:35 – People disagree on what to do on a Friday night.
    0:05:38 – Great, that’s great.
    0:05:39 Okay, so let’s say, you know,
    0:05:42 I tend to be tired at the end of a week
    0:05:45 and I want to go to bed early and my partner’s like,
    0:05:48 but I really like to have dinner together
    0:05:49 and I want to have time together,
    0:05:51 but I’m so frustrated ’cause I’m like,
    0:05:52 my husband comes home at like nine o’clock
    0:05:54 and expects me to like cook dinner then with him
    0:05:56 and all of a sudden it’s 10 and I’m exhausted
    0:05:58 and I want to connect too, right?
    0:06:00 But here’s the situation.
    0:06:02 So I think what we might do is we might say,
    0:06:04 I really needed to be home by seven.
    0:06:06 Like can you get home on seven on a Friday
    0:06:08 and then that’s a place where we could cook dinner together?
    0:06:10 And then let’s say my husband rolls in at nine
    0:06:12 and I’m like, what the heck?
    0:06:14 Like I told him to have dinner at seven
    0:06:16 and like he didn’t do it
    0:06:17 and he never listens to me and he doesn’t respect me
    0:06:19 and we tell ourselves all these stories.
    0:06:20 To me, I would say in that situation,
    0:06:22 I was making a request of my husband.
    0:06:24 I was making a request.
    0:06:25 And most of the time in our relationships, by the way,
    0:06:28 we can’t always set boundaries.
    0:06:29 Like we do make requests
    0:06:30 and hopefully our relationship is strong enough
    0:06:32 with someone which we can talk about
    0:06:35 where they would, you know, when they can honor our request,
    0:06:38 right?
    0:06:39 But I’m making a request because the success is dependent
    0:06:42 on my husband coming home at seven,
    0:06:44 which he just did not do.
    0:06:46 Here’s a very different approach,
    0:06:48 which I don’t always recommend taking
    0:06:50 but sometimes we have to take
    0:06:51 if we feel like we keep getting in situations
    0:06:55 where we’re kind of really unsatisfied.
    0:06:56 I’d say, hey, the last couple of weeks
    0:06:58 we talked about you getting home at seven
    0:07:00 or trying to, you keep getting home at nine.
    0:07:02 Look, I don’t want to end up in that place again
    0:07:04 where then I get tired and I get resentful
    0:07:06 and we get in this fight.
    0:07:07 I just want to be very, very clear.
    0:07:09 I would love to have dinner with you tonight.
    0:07:10 I really would.
    0:07:11 And I know for me, if you’re not home by seven,
    0:07:13 cooking together and having that connected moment,
    0:07:16 it just is not going to then happen
    0:07:17 in a way that feels good to me.
    0:07:19 So if you get home by seven tonight,
    0:07:20 I’m so excited that we can have dinner together.
    0:07:22 And if you come home at nine, I get it.
    0:07:24 You will probably find me having already
    0:07:27 had a bowl of cereal and then reading in my bed
    0:07:29 and I won’t be able to make dinner.
    0:07:32 And we can talk about it again next week.
    0:07:34 So it’s literally laying out what I will do.
    0:07:39 And then let’s say my husband does get home at nine.
    0:07:41 I might still be upset.
    0:07:42 I mean, I’d be like, this is such a bummer, you know?
    0:07:44 But I’m not going to feel so resentful.
    0:07:47 I’m not going to feel so angry
    0:07:49 because I laid out two situations based on my needs.
    0:07:53 And either way, I have kind of a path I can walk down
    0:07:58 that’s within my control.
    0:07:59 – It doesn’t require him to do anything,
    0:08:01 but at the same time he has a choice.
    0:08:04 – Yeah, and people say, well,
    0:08:05 is that just threatening your husband to me?
    0:08:08 We really underplay like our intention
    0:08:11 and how that intention then gets really felt by someone.
    0:08:13 Like I could say the same thing to my husband.
    0:08:15 I could say, look, and if you’re not home by nine,
    0:08:18 I mean, I mean, if you’re not home by seven,
    0:08:21 you’re going to find me in bed
    0:08:23 and I’m not gonna have dinner.
    0:08:24 Like if I said it that way,
    0:08:26 I feel like you would receive it as like,
    0:08:27 are you threatening me?
    0:08:29 Like what’s going on?
    0:08:30 Right?
    0:08:31 It’s very different than, hey, sweetie,
    0:08:33 like I don’t know, maybe works crazy busy for you.
    0:08:35 Like I can respect that too.
    0:08:36 And if you do get home at nine,
    0:08:38 I just want to be very clear I will be in bed
    0:08:40 because I’m just exhausted by then and I can’t cook
    0:08:42 and I don’t want to feel resentment toward you.
    0:08:44 And so I need to be with my book at that time.
    0:08:46 Probably going to fall asleep
    0:08:48 and hopefully we can get time together
    0:08:49 at another point in the weekend.
    0:08:50 Like I think you feel such different intention there, right?
    0:08:54 So to me, boundaries are not threats.
    0:08:57 They’re actually an assertion
    0:08:59 of your own wants and needs within your relationship.
    0:09:02 I feel like in that way,
    0:09:03 a boundary is a way of saying to someone,
    0:09:05 here’s what I need to still feel good in our relationship.
    0:09:08 I think that’s actually another way to think about it.
    0:09:11 Where so many times people worry,
    0:09:12 my boundary is gonna threaten my relationship,
    0:09:14 maybe with my husband or I tell my mother-in-law,
    0:09:16 oh, they can’t come over a certain day,
    0:09:18 but boundaries are really a way of saying,
    0:09:20 this is what I need to continue feeling good
    0:09:22 in our relationship.
    0:09:23 And in that way, it’s actually a way of inviting someone
    0:09:27 to maintain closeness with you.
    0:09:29 – I like that.
    0:09:30 And I really like how you described it.
    0:09:32 And I want to come back to that after,
    0:09:33 but I want to hit maybe teens
    0:09:35 and what would be a good one around screen time,
    0:09:37 which is something that all parents deal with, I’m sure.
    0:09:41 – Love this, okay.
    0:09:42 So when we think we’re setting a boundary,
    0:09:45 but we’re really making a request, it might sound like this.
    0:09:49 Hey, you can go on Fortnite for,
    0:09:51 I don’t even like to name the number of minutes
    0:09:54 ’cause when I do people will also be like,
    0:09:55 oh, my kid does more than that, is that bad?
    0:09:57 But let’s just say X number of minutes, okay?
    0:09:58 You can play Fortnite for X number of minutes.
    0:10:00 And after that, I want you to turn it off
    0:10:03 and come to the kitchen, okay?
    0:10:05 Now, if you know video games and I know video games,
    0:10:08 and if you know phones and I know phones,
    0:10:10 the idea that your kid is going to be able to stop themselves
    0:10:12 at a certain time is just probably setting everyone up
    0:10:14 for failure, it’s just you get sucked in,
    0:10:16 it’s not about willpower, it gets you addicted,
    0:10:19 you’re in a game, and either way still,
    0:10:21 I’m making a request, the success of what I just said
    0:10:24 to my kid is dependent on them doing this.
    0:10:27 If it’s so important for me, for my kid
    0:10:30 to only play Fortnite for X number of minutes,
    0:10:32 I could say one of two things.
    0:10:34 Hey, I just wanted to be perfectly clear
    0:10:36 about what will happen after X number of minutes.
    0:10:39 If you’re still playing, and I really don’t want to do this,
    0:10:43 I am going to come in, and I am going to take the remote,
    0:10:47 and I am going to turn it off.
    0:10:49 Like, I don’t want to get there, I’m sure you don’t either,
    0:10:51 so maybe we should do the whole thing we talked about
    0:10:53 where you said a timer five minutes before,
    0:10:54 and you actually determine if you have time
    0:10:56 for another game, so you’re not in the middle of it
    0:10:57 when I turn it off, or maybe I say,
    0:10:59 hey, I am going to use a new system,
    0:11:01 I’m going to use this form of parental controls
    0:11:03 where your iPad turns off at a certain number of minutes
    0:11:06 with the five minute warning before,
    0:11:08 and so at the end of that amount of time,
    0:11:10 it is going to go off, I just wanted to let you know
    0:11:12 what’s going to happen.
    0:11:13 The success of what I just said is not dependent
    0:11:16 on my teenager quote, listening to me.
    0:11:19 My boundary is now totally within my control.
    0:11:22 – I like that a lot, and I love the way
    0:11:24 that you explain this to them.
    0:11:26 How do you learn how to do that?
    0:11:28 And both when you were talking to your fictional
    0:11:32 sort of partner around, hey, I really want to have dinner
    0:11:35 with you, if you’re not home at this time,
    0:11:37 it probably means we’re not going to have dinner together,
    0:11:39 I’m not going to be able to do that, you know.
    0:11:41 How do you learn how to talk like that
    0:11:43 if it’s not modeled for you as a child?
    0:11:46 Like how do you as an adult learn
    0:11:48 how to communicate in that way?
    0:11:49 Which when you say it, that strikes me as so effective,
    0:11:52 but whenever I want to talk about something
    0:11:55 like this in my head, it never comes out that good.
    0:11:57 – I love that question, and there’s a couple of ways
    0:11:59 I want to answer it.
    0:12:00 So first of all, to me inherent in your question
    0:12:04 actually was like the idea of like learning in general.
    0:12:08 I don’t know, we all learn a lot of stuff
    0:12:09 by the time we’re adults that my guess is
    0:12:11 is not inherent to us, right?
    0:12:13 And most of the things we learn aren’t inherent,
    0:12:15 it’s not actually inherent to learn how to swim.
    0:12:17 Like if you don’t learn how to swim,
    0:12:18 you’ll be an adult who can’t swim,
    0:12:20 there’s plenty of adults who can’t swim,
    0:12:21 it doesn’t just come to you with age.
    0:12:22 I think actually that’s one of the most powerful things
    0:12:24 I think about is like age does not teach skills, right?
    0:12:27 People are like, at what point will my kid
    0:12:30 no longer engage in X behavior at what age?
    0:12:32 I’m like, well, what are you doing in these years?
    0:12:34 You know, like either in this amount of time or never,
    0:12:36 depending on what we do, right?
    0:12:38 So just like you can teach someone to swim
    0:12:40 or you can teach someone a new language,
    0:12:42 like we can all learn more effective ways to communicate.
    0:12:47 And it’s just in the realm of things
    0:12:50 that we often don’t think of as a skill.
    0:12:52 Like for some reason we think I should either
    0:12:54 know how to do that or I’m not an effective communicator
    0:12:57 but someone else should just get what I’m trying to say
    0:13:00 instead of thinking, oh, like how could I learn this?
    0:13:02 I think there’s a lot of practice that’s involved.
    0:13:05 No, more concretely than that,
    0:13:07 I think what you’re noticing in the way I modeled
    0:13:10 those two kind of boundary setting situations,
    0:13:12 first of all, let me just say like,
    0:13:13 if you think I would actually say that
    0:13:15 in the heat of the moment to my kids, like I would it,
    0:13:17 like my husband’s like listening to this thing like,
    0:13:19 can you please talk to me like that
    0:13:21 because you don’t sound that nice.
    0:13:22 So please listeners, do not think–
    0:13:24 – He’s gonna leave a comment on YouTube.
    0:13:26 – Like don’t think I do this all the time, okay?
    0:13:29 But when we are kind of upset with someone
    0:13:32 or have been frustrated with someone,
    0:13:34 we have the tendency to approach them
    0:13:36 in a very adversarial way.
    0:13:38 And then how we think about someone
    0:13:40 affects how we communicate to them.
    0:13:42 So if I was like, my husband doesn’t respect me
    0:13:44 and my husband cares more about work
    0:13:46 than he does about my relationship,
    0:13:47 then you know what I’m gonna say to him?
    0:13:49 Hey, if you’re not home by seven,
    0:13:51 just not gonna be waiting for you
    0:13:54 because I have things to do in my life too, right?
    0:13:56 Of course, because that’s the mindset I’m in.
    0:13:59 And I think this is such a general point
    0:14:00 and I’ll share it because I think it’s applicable
    0:14:03 to every life situation
    0:14:05 that when you’re in conflict with someone,
    0:14:07 you’re in one of two mindsets
    0:14:08 and I’m a very visual person, so explain it visually.
    0:14:11 You’re either sitting on one side of the table
    0:14:14 and you’re looking at them
    0:14:15 as if they’re sitting on the other side of the table,
    0:14:17 kind of how I’m looking at you.
    0:14:19 And I’m looking at you like you are the problem.
    0:14:22 And so I’m on one side of the table,
    0:14:24 you’re on the other side of the table
    0:14:25 and I’m looking at you like you are the problem.
    0:14:28 Okay, the other mindset we can be in
    0:14:31 is I’m on one side of the table
    0:14:34 and let’s say Shane, you’re sitting next to me
    0:14:37 on the same side of the table
    0:14:40 and together we are looking at a problem.
    0:14:44 I actually think this is like profound
    0:14:46 because to me, nobody should ever communicate with anybody
    0:14:49 until you get yourself in that second mindset.
    0:14:52 We often think, what are the words?
    0:14:54 What do I say?
    0:14:54 What’s the script?
    0:14:56 At the end of the day, the mindset’s gonna win, right?
    0:14:58 Or the script won’t be effective
    0:15:00 because you’re in an adversarial mindset
    0:15:02 and the person will feel that, right?
    0:15:04 And so I think the kind of biggest skill
    0:15:08 is recognizing what mindset am I in.
    0:15:10 And I think we have a lot of clues to that.
    0:15:11 Like even when we start to think about the person
    0:15:14 we wanna talk to,
    0:15:15 we can even notice the language we’re using, right?
    0:15:17 Like, oh, my husband doesn’t respect me.
    0:15:19 He’s always at work.
    0:15:20 Like he doesn’t even care about our relationship.
    0:15:21 I definitely know what mindset I’m in, right?
    0:15:24 If I’m in the second mindset,
    0:15:25 I’d probably be saying like,
    0:15:27 wow, he’s really overloaded at work
    0:15:29 and I miss him, right?
    0:15:32 Maybe I say that, I’ve really missed my husband.
    0:15:34 I wonder if I’ve ever told him that.
    0:15:35 That’s very much like,
    0:15:36 me and my husband are on the same side of the table
    0:15:39 and we’re kind of looking at the problem of,
    0:15:42 you know, not being as connected as we used to be.
    0:15:45 Kind of like, now all of a sudden,
    0:15:47 also I feel different in that mindset.
    0:15:48 Like I honestly feel sad just saying that to you right now.
    0:15:50 Like, oh, it stinks.
    0:15:52 And maybe my husband feels that way.
    0:15:53 Maybe he’s not even aware that he feels that way,
    0:15:55 but maybe he does.
    0:15:56 And maybe he’s nervous about his job
    0:15:58 and he feels like he’s gonna get fired
    0:15:59 and he thinks he’s gonna let me down
    0:16:00 if he does that ’cause he’s the breadwinner.
    0:16:02 I’m making these things up.
    0:16:03 But when I’m in a me and you against a problem mindset,
    0:16:08 we communicate completely differently.
    0:16:10 Same with our teen, right?
    0:16:12 Like me versus you and a simple thing could be,
    0:16:15 you never pick up the towel.
    0:16:16 Like how many times do I tell you to pick up a towel?
    0:16:17 Like you see the towel on the ground.
    0:16:20 Like just pick it up and put it in your bathroom,
    0:16:22 hang it up versus, hey, look,
    0:16:25 we both know towels on the floor.
    0:16:27 Like we both know that’s not where they go.
    0:16:29 And you’re a responsible kid.
    0:16:31 Like and I know you have heard what I’ve said.
    0:16:35 So there must be something getting in your way of remembering.
    0:16:37 Like there must be.
    0:16:39 ‘Cause I don’t think you look at the towel
    0:16:40 and think I’m gonna piss off my mom.
    0:16:41 Like I really don’t think that’s happening.
    0:16:42 So can we figure this out together?
    0:16:44 Like what would make it easier for you to remember?
    0:16:47 Like I actually had this
    0:16:48 with my own, my 12 year old son recently.
    0:16:50 And he’s like, mom, it’s so funny.
    0:16:51 I walk out of my room.
    0:16:52 I don’t even see the towel.
    0:16:53 Like I don’t even see it.
    0:16:54 Like I guess I drop it and then I don’t even see it.
    0:16:56 And I was like, oh, that’s really interesting.
    0:16:57 What do you see?
    0:16:58 I just said, I mean, I just see the wall
    0:17:00 and I see my door.
    0:17:02 And I was like, oh, that actually gives me an idea.
    0:17:04 I don’t know if it gives you the same idea.
    0:17:05 Like what would you need to jog your memory?
    0:17:07 And he goes, I mean, I guess I could just like
    0:17:08 put up a post on my door that says pick up my towel.
    0:17:11 I know it sounds so silly, but like I could cry.
    0:17:14 And I was like, that’s an amazing idea.
    0:17:15 Like, and he did it.
    0:17:16 And he just like, he did it.
    0:17:17 He literally just like wrote in his old handwriting
    0:17:19 ’cause he’s 12 and I don’t have to do that for him.
    0:17:20 And he put it on his door.
    0:17:21 And does he pick it up every time?
    0:17:23 He just not.
    0:17:24 Does he pick it up massively more often?
    0:17:26 Yes.
    0:17:27 But the only way we get there is
    0:17:29 by kind of assuming good intent, being on the same team.
    0:17:32 And together we were kind of looking at this towel
    0:17:34 on the floor problem versus me looking at my son.
    0:17:38 I have like, he’s an asshole who is the problem.
    0:17:41 Yeah, it’s kind of like you’re not doing what I want.
    0:17:43 Therefore we’re in this adversarial situation.
    0:17:47 But I don’t see what’s going on inside you, right?
    0:17:51 I don’t see, you know, the partner at work
    0:17:54 who’s worried about their job
    0:17:55 ’cause these are all things that are sort of inside somebody
    0:17:58 that aren’t communicated.
    0:17:59 And for kids and teens, especially,
    0:18:02 I would imagine they’re going through so much already
    0:18:04 in life with school, with friends, with their body changes.
    0:18:09 And we don’t see any of that.
    0:18:11 We’re just like, why can’t you pick up a towel?
    0:18:13 Like, what’s wrong with you?
    0:18:13 That’s right.
    0:18:14 But there’s nothing wrong with them, right?
    0:18:16 Yeah.
    0:18:16 And, you know, I think there’s so much more there too.
    0:18:19 Like my son probably doesn’t care about his towel
    0:18:20 on the floor.
    0:18:21 And I don’t know if something so bad
    0:18:22 gonna happen if his towel is on the floor.
    0:18:24 It’s probably not.
    0:18:25 Like, I don’t think the world’s gonna end.
    0:18:26 I don’t think his, you know, room is gonna be ruined.
    0:18:28 It just is my preference.
    0:18:29 And so really we’re saying,
    0:18:32 well, why would my kid start caring about something
    0:18:34 he doesn’t care about?
    0:18:36 And his mom does care about.
    0:18:38 And that actually has everything to do
    0:18:40 with just kind of the strength of our relationship
    0:18:42 in that moment.
    0:18:43 And, you know, it’s kind of why any of us do things
    0:18:45 we don’t wanna do, but other people care about
    0:18:48 because we just feel close to them.
    0:18:49 And like, we like, you know,
    0:18:50 taking care of their needs sometimes, right?
    0:18:54 And so, so much of that and approaching a teen in that,
    0:18:56 like, hey, I respect you.
    0:18:58 Like, here’s the situation.
    0:18:59 Let’s think through it together.
    0:19:01 That’s the only way you’re gonna get
    0:19:02 to a productive solution anyway,
    0:19:04 because teenagers inherently,
    0:19:05 they don’t care about their towel on the floor.
    0:19:06 They don’t care about their messy room.
    0:19:08 They don’t care about, you know,
    0:19:09 being on their phones longer than we want them to be.
    0:19:12 And so the status of our relationship with our kids
    0:19:15 and our partner, it’s really cordial, like everything.
    0:19:18 – Parenting teens is tricky.
    0:19:20 I’m just, what are the indications
    0:19:24 that you have a really strong relationship with your teen?
    0:19:27 And what are the indications that it’s going the wrong way
    0:19:31 and you should probably intervene before it gets really bad?
    0:19:35 – That’s a good question.
    0:19:36 You know, my first reaction,
    0:19:38 like the loudest thing in my mind,
    0:19:40 I think a lot of parents have a sense of like how they’re,
    0:19:43 like they just have like an inherent sense of like,
    0:19:45 how close am I to my teen, how are things going?
    0:19:48 You know, I guess in one way,
    0:19:50 it feels like every interaction is a ton of conflict.
    0:19:52 It’s just like a series of misunderstanding.
    0:19:54 And I think that doesn’t feel great to either.
    0:19:56 I guess in the middle is like,
    0:19:57 well, we don’t have any over conflict,
    0:19:59 but like, do we talk about things?
    0:20:01 Like, do I know about the things that are going on
    0:20:03 in their life?
    0:20:04 Would they come to me if they were struggling?
    0:20:08 Would they come to me if they were struggling with something
    0:20:11 that they worry could quote, get them in trouble?
    0:20:14 Right?
    0:20:16 You know, I think, I think a lot about attachment
    0:20:19 in relationships, right?
    0:20:20 Not attachment parenting,
    0:20:21 but the idea that how kids attach to connect to their
    0:20:26 caregivers, their parents really forms the foundation
    0:20:29 for a lot of different things in their life,
    0:20:30 for how they’re able to regulate emotions,
    0:20:32 for how they think about themselves,
    0:20:35 for how they build confidence and resilience.
    0:20:37 Actually, the model they take into adulthood
    0:20:39 about what a healthy relationship is, right?
    0:20:43 There’s so many things.
    0:20:45 And when our kids are teens,
    0:20:48 what’s really, really tricky is,
    0:20:51 you know, they’re like explorers in the world.
    0:20:52 I mean, that’s like how I think about teens.
    0:20:54 Like that’s what their job is.
    0:20:55 Their job is to explore.
    0:20:56 They’re trying to figure out who they are.
    0:20:57 Their job is to go through this kind of identity formation
    0:21:00 phase.
    0:21:01 And as we remember, when we were younger,
    0:21:04 the way you start to form your identity when you’re a teen
    0:21:07 is actually through a lot of separation from your parents.
    0:21:09 That’s actually though your job.
    0:21:10 Your job is actually to start to separate from them.
    0:21:14 And a lot of teens, most teens, they overshoot.
    0:21:17 Just like we did.
    0:21:18 But you have to kind of overshoot distance
    0:21:20 to be like, I am nothing like my parent.
    0:21:21 And if my parent tells me a rule,
    0:21:23 the quickest way to figure out my own person
    0:21:26 is to just like reject it.
    0:21:27 Even if it makes sense for me.
    0:21:28 It’s just like, you know, you kind of overshoot.
    0:21:31 But if I go back to the idea of like teens being explorers,
    0:21:35 ’cause they do, they try out so many things.
    0:21:36 They kind of need to explore away
    0:21:38 from their home country, right?
    0:21:40 I also think a lot about like the difference
    0:21:43 between like an explorer and a nomad.
    0:21:45 And I feel like the big difference
    0:21:48 is an explorer has a home base.
    0:21:50 And I have the chills as I say that.
    0:21:51 Like they have a home base to come back to.
    0:21:53 And just knowing they have a home base
    0:21:55 gives them a lot of confidence in their exploration.
    0:21:58 Or a nomad, it doesn’t really have a home base.
    0:22:02 And when I think about teens and parents,
    0:22:04 I think a lot about that.
    0:22:05 Like a teen’s job is to explore.
    0:22:07 A parent’s kind of in the home country.
    0:22:09 Like also feeling lost a lot.
    0:22:11 Like where’s my kid who like used to want to talk to me more.
    0:22:13 Who used to like be around more.
    0:22:16 I used to be their primary focus.
    0:22:18 But what I always want parents of teens to know
    0:22:22 is like your teen still needs you in the most intense way.
    0:22:26 Because they cannot be a nomad in life.
    0:22:28 Like that is not what they’re looking for.
    0:22:30 And they will come back.
    0:22:32 They need to know you’re there, right?
    0:22:33 Like knowing when you’re exploring
    0:22:35 that your home base is there.
    0:22:37 Like I think we all know feels very different
    0:22:39 than checking for a home base
    0:22:41 and feeling like it has dissolved, right?
    0:22:43 And that to me says so much about the connection
    0:22:46 of teens and parents during these really tricky years.
    0:22:48 – As you were saying that,
    0:22:49 I just had this thought that maybe it’s weird,
    0:22:52 but I want to check this with you.
    0:22:54 I’m home every day when my kids get home from school.
    0:22:57 I have been since they were in elementary school,
    0:23:00 I’d do the same thing now that they’re basically
    0:23:02 in high school, much to their dismay, right?
    0:23:07 This is like, and you were talking
    0:23:09 and you were like, they have to be away from their parents.
    0:23:11 They have to get this time away.
    0:23:13 And so when they come home from school, it’s like, I’m there.
    0:23:16 And is that a good thing or a bad thing?
    0:23:18 Or like, how do you think about that?
    0:23:20 – I mean, I don’t think it’s a good thing or a bad thing.
    0:23:22 First of all, they’re away from you.
    0:23:23 They’re in school, they have their whole world, you know?
    0:23:25 And so I think that’s a lot of the ways they start to explore.
    0:23:29 And kids also, by the way, they explore in their thoughts.
    0:23:31 They explore by engaging and listening to music
    0:23:34 that their parents hate
    0:23:35 or entertaining ideas, right?
    0:23:37 So it doesn’t just have to be physical separation.
    0:23:40 I feel mixed about a parent who’s always there.
    0:23:43 First of all, parents are like, I’m at work,
    0:23:45 I’m not there, am I messing up my kids?
    0:23:46 No, I frankly, often at my office,
    0:23:49 when my kids come home, there’s not one right way.
    0:23:52 I think it’s a dance, you know?
    0:23:53 And I think about this a lot with my own childhood.
    0:23:55 And I’ve talked about this a lot with my mom
    0:23:57 because we mom in very different ways,
    0:23:59 like I do now when she did then, she was always there.
    0:24:02 Like I feel like she was someone who was always there, right?
    0:24:05 And like down to, I remember days in like middle school
    0:24:08 or high school, even when I was older,
    0:24:10 I was like, oh, I forgot the lunch I wanted at home.
    0:24:12 And she’d be like, I am driving it to you right now, you know?
    0:24:15 Like it was just always there.
    0:24:17 And one of the things we reflected on a lot together,
    0:24:19 and it actually kind of relates to confidence
    0:24:21 so we can bring it all together as always happens,
    0:24:25 is I feel like I could have benefited a little more
    0:24:30 from like, mom’s not available right now.
    0:24:33 And kind of like, and I know like not having my lunch
    0:24:36 is just one example, it’s a tiny example,
    0:24:38 but even that small example, like I know I would have been like,
    0:24:40 oh, I guess I have to go to the cafeteria
    0:24:42 and I guess I have to like find something or I don’t know,
    0:24:44 maybe I would have remembered to like pack it the next day,
    0:24:46 like in even, you know, bigger way
    0:24:48 because I don’t want to have that happen again.
    0:24:50 I think on the other side, right?
    0:24:52 Especially as kids get older,
    0:24:53 it’s so easy to do what I call like taking the bait
    0:24:56 from teens, like you don’t understand me
    0:24:59 and I don’t want to be with you anymore.
    0:25:00 I just want to be my friends and get your own life
    0:25:02 and get out of my room.
    0:25:03 And parents are like, I guess my kids don’t care.
    0:25:05 So like, I’ll never be home when they’re home.
    0:25:07 And, you know, they slam the door on my face.
    0:25:10 And so it’s on them to like, you know, say something to me
    0:25:13 and I’m going to kind of give them the silent treatment
    0:25:15 till they do both extremes, I think can like any extremes
    0:25:19 can like hold kids back, you know?
    0:25:21 And I think we want to give kids at every age room
    0:25:25 to like be on their own and kind of the trust in that.
    0:25:28 And I think it’s benefit so much from that distance,
    0:25:32 but they only benefit from that distance
    0:25:36 when they kind of have internalized
    0:25:38 and still kind of have access most times
    0:25:41 to that kind of secure base.
    0:25:43 So I’m not trying to get out of the question,
    0:25:45 but I really do think it’s this dance.
    0:25:47 Because if I think about my own childhood
    0:25:49 and I think about like, I feel like my secure base
    0:25:51 is with me all the time.
    0:25:52 And as I got older, it was like, well, is that me?
    0:25:55 Was that my parents?
    0:25:56 Like, I think it took me longer to trust myself.
    0:25:58 Even now, amidst uncertainty and struggle,
    0:26:01 it’s still something I work on with myself
    0:26:03 because I feel like I did almost have this system
    0:26:07 so close all the time that I probably didn’t learn
    0:26:11 to like trust myself, that I could really figure things out
    0:26:14 and get through things in a way
    0:26:17 that could have been really helpful to me.
    0:26:19 – So that leads naturally into sort of confidence
    0:26:22 and specifically resiliency.
    0:26:24 What can we do as parents of teenagers
    0:26:28 to build that resiliency?
    0:26:29 Other, I mean, obviously giving our kids room to fail
    0:26:33 and opportunities to struggle.
    0:26:35 Aside from that, what is it that we can do?
    0:26:38 And like, are there specific things that we can do
    0:26:40 that you’re like, oh, this is a great way
    0:26:42 to let your 14 or 15 year old fail or struggle or?
    0:26:47 – I mean, I think there are kind of very,
    0:26:49 very related concepts, you know, confidence and resilience.
    0:26:52 But I’ll start with kind of framing up confidence
    0:26:55 because I think the way I think about it is a little different.
    0:26:57 And again, if we’re ever trying to build a trait,
    0:26:59 I think we have to be like so clear about what the trait is
    0:27:02 or else we’re gonna be building something
    0:27:03 in a direction that might not be so productive.
    0:27:05 – Well, let’s define them both then,
    0:27:07 confidence and resiliency, yeah.
    0:27:08 – So to me, confidence, I think people think about confidence
    0:27:11 as like feeling good about yourself.
    0:27:12 And like, I think that could not be further
    0:27:14 for what confidence is.
    0:27:16 To me, confidence is self-trust,
    0:27:18 which I think is very different
    0:27:20 from feeling good about yourself.
    0:27:21 And in a related way, you know,
    0:27:25 I think often like, confidence isn’t feeling
    0:27:27 like the best at something.
    0:27:29 It’s feeling like it’s okay to be you
    0:27:31 when you’re not the best at something.
    0:27:33 And it’s like trusting yourself in those moments.
    0:27:35 So like I said to you earlier,
    0:27:38 I don’t like to have ideas about actionable strategies
    0:27:40 ’cause I can’t operate that way.
    0:27:41 So let’s like play out some situations, right?
    0:27:44 And I think this will drive it home.
    0:27:46 So your kid comes home and they’re like,
    0:27:48 I’m the only one of my friends
    0:27:49 who didn’t make the football team.
    0:27:50 I don’t know making this up, right?
    0:27:52 I’m the only one of my friends.
    0:27:52 It’s so embarrassing.
    0:27:53 I’m the only one who didn’t make the football team.
    0:27:55 And I think we think that like what we need to say
    0:27:57 to our kid there or what they’re looking for,
    0:27:59 or even like, I want to build my kid’s confidence.
    0:28:02 They seem so not confident now.
    0:28:03 ‘Cause they’re like, I’m the only one who didn’t make it.
    0:28:05 I stink.
    0:28:06 And like, you know, is, well, like,
    0:28:09 you’re the only one who made varsity basketball.
    0:28:12 You know, they all made JV.
    0:28:13 And like, you’re the only one who was on varsity basketball.
    0:28:15 Or like, you’re an honors math.
    0:28:16 And, you know, we like say these things like that.
    0:28:19 And if we think about confidence as self-trust,
    0:28:22 then if we break down that situation,
    0:28:23 that kid is coming to us saying,
    0:28:24 I feel sad and disappointed.
    0:28:26 And we’re saying to them, no, you don’t, right?
    0:28:31 And I’m an imagery person, as you can see.
    0:28:34 So to me, this idea of like the feelings bench
    0:28:37 really, really like brings us to life
    0:28:40 and gets really concrete and palpable for parents
    0:28:42 to use then in their home.
    0:28:44 So our kids, you know, are feeling down like they often do.
    0:28:47 You know, they didn’t get a good grade in a test
    0:28:49 or someone broke up with them
    0:28:50 or now their friends dating the person that they liked
    0:28:52 or they didn’t make the football team
    0:28:53 or, you know, they’re gels to their brother
    0:28:55 who’s, you know, always doing XYZ and they can’t,
    0:28:58 whatever it is.
    0:28:59 And to me, the image I want parents to think about
    0:29:01 is like, my kid in life is like in a garden
    0:29:04 that’s full of benches.
    0:29:05 That’s like life, okay, is in this metaphor.
    0:29:07 And in this moment, they’re sitting on the bench of,
    0:29:10 and I don’t know, maybe this is the bench of
    0:29:11 I didn’t make the football team.
    0:29:13 Or maybe if we generalize,
    0:29:14 it’s the bench of something didn’t go my way
    0:29:16 or I’m disappointed or I’m embarrassed.
    0:29:19 You know, probably all of those things come up.
    0:29:21 And they’re sitting on that bench.
    0:29:22 And as parents, we often have two urges.
    0:29:24 One is one I named.
    0:29:25 We kind of tell them their bench isn’t their bench, right?
    0:29:28 Or we like see a sunnier bench in the garden.
    0:29:31 It’s like the bench of, well, you made varsity basketball
    0:29:34 and we’re like, just come, like come with me, right?
    0:29:37 Just come with me to that bench ’cause it’s sunnier.
    0:29:39 But that does a couple of very unintended things to kids.
    0:29:43 Number one, they have a feeling of being disappointed.
    0:29:47 The feelings already registered in their body.
    0:29:49 And when kids are young,
    0:29:50 they’re actually just learning about their feelings.
    0:29:51 They’re like, am I allowed to have certain feelings?
    0:29:53 How do I cope with certain feelings?
    0:29:55 And a lot of how they learn that
    0:29:56 is through their relationship with us.
    0:29:58 And then they actually take those lessons into adulthood.
    0:30:00 And so when our kids feeling disappointed,
    0:30:03 one of the things they learn
    0:30:04 when we kind of tell them their bench isn’t their bench
    0:30:07 or tell them they should be on some other bench is like,
    0:30:08 oh, I guess I’m not supposed to feel disappointed.
    0:30:11 And they also learn this feeling
    0:30:12 that feels very overwhelming to me.
    0:30:14 Like it’s actually very overwhelming to my parent.
    0:30:16 Like they don’t even want me to feel this way.
    0:30:17 I guess it’s dangerous.
    0:30:18 Like I guess I shouldn’t feel that way.
    0:30:21 Now, I don’t think either of us know any adult in life
    0:30:24 who’s gotten rid of disappointment.
    0:30:25 Like you’re going to feel disappointed when you lose a job.
    0:30:28 You’re going to feel disappointed
    0:30:29 when someone breaks up with you
    0:30:30 and you’re even you’re going to feel disappointed
    0:30:32 when your flight has a delay, right?
    0:30:33 And how you cope with those things doesn’t start in adulthood.
    0:30:36 How you cope with those things comes from your history
    0:30:39 of how you learned to cope with those things
    0:30:41 in your earliest years
    0:30:42 when you were wiring circuitry around your emotions
    0:30:47 in your body.
    0:30:48 And so the reason so many adults have so many difficulties
    0:30:52 regulating their emotions in their older
    0:30:53 actually comes from these early years.
    0:30:56 So if we go back to what is far superior, right?
    0:30:59 Or not far superior, it feels judgmental.
    0:31:01 If we go back to what I would encourage a parent to do,
    0:31:03 not only to build coping skills and resilience
    0:31:05 but also confidence, okay?
    0:31:07 As I think about three lines
    0:31:09 and I’m going to be super concrete to me.
    0:31:10 These are three lines that like parents should like write down.
    0:31:14 They should like commit to memory.
    0:31:16 They should also use it their partners
    0:31:17 because they’re just good relationship lines.
    0:31:19 When someone tells you something disappointing,
    0:31:21 like I didn’t make the football team sucks.
    0:31:22 I’m so embarrassed.
    0:31:23 I’m the worst football player.
    0:31:24 Number one, just I am so glad you’re talking to me about this.
    0:31:28 Like it is the most beautiful first line
    0:31:31 to say to someone when they’re upset
    0:31:32 because what you’re deeply saying to them
    0:31:34 and how they receive it is like I am interested
    0:31:37 in the part of you who’s feeling this way.
    0:31:39 The part of you who’s feeling this way is connectable to me.
    0:31:42 Like I want to hear more about it.
    0:31:43 I will attach to this part of you.
    0:31:47 And when you tell that to someone,
    0:31:48 they’re automatically willing to tell you more
    0:31:52 because it’s like an opening of a door.
    0:31:53 Like I imagine someone went to a boss
    0:31:55 and they were like, I really feel like I deserve a promotion.
    0:31:57 If the boss like, I’m so glad you’re talking to me about this.
    0:31:59 Like even if the boss says no,
    0:32:01 like you’re going to be like, wow,
    0:32:02 that was a great conversation, you know?
    0:32:04 So, and when you’re doing that,
    0:32:05 what I want parents to imagine is like,
    0:32:07 you’re just sitting on the bench next to your kid.
    0:32:09 That’s literally what you’re doing.
    0:32:10 You’re just sitting down.
    0:32:12 You’re not saying that bench is in their bench.
    0:32:14 You’re not taking them out.
    0:32:15 You’re just sitting down.
    0:32:16 And then the second line
    0:32:18 that I think is the ultimate confidence builder
    0:32:20 if confidence is self-trust is just, I believe you.
    0:32:24 Yeah, I went to the list and my name wasn’t on it.
    0:32:26 And like they literally were all high-fiving
    0:32:28 and then I was like the only one not, you know,
    0:32:32 not doing that.
    0:32:33 And they all looked at me with such pity
    0:32:34 and it was like the worst day of my life.
    0:32:36 I believe you.
    0:32:37 When you say I believe you to someone,
    0:32:39 you’re not saying I agree.
    0:32:40 That was the worst day of your life.
    0:32:42 You’re literally just saying,
    0:32:43 I believe the things you’re telling me.
    0:32:44 I believe your feelings are valid and real.
    0:32:47 And then the third line is just tell me more.
    0:32:49 And I think often with parents, they’ll say like, okay,
    0:32:52 and then what, and then what?
    0:32:56 And I love this question and I’m such like a fixer too.
    0:33:00 But like, and then nothing.
    0:33:02 And then you’ve done,
    0:33:04 you have literally crushed parenting that moment.
    0:33:07 You should be like, I’m done for the rest of the day.
    0:33:08 Might eat bonbons and watch some Netflix.
    0:33:10 I just, and you massively built your kid’s confidence
    0:33:14 because if we think about kids when they’re older,
    0:33:18 you want kids when they’re feeling tricky things
    0:33:20 to be like, yeah, I really do feel this way.
    0:33:22 I really am upset that my partner said that thing to me.
    0:33:25 I really am disappointed that I didn’t get that job, right?
    0:33:29 I really am angry that I was promised, you know,
    0:33:33 I don’t know a raise and didn’t get it, right?
    0:33:35 Learning that you can trust your emotions
    0:33:38 actually is the core of how you regulate your emotions
    0:33:41 and how you make good decisions
    0:33:42 because you can use your energy around, okay,
    0:33:44 what do I do next instead of all the energy
    0:33:46 of like trying to figure out what’s going on inside you.
    0:33:48 And so to me, that’s really what confidence is.
    0:33:51 And because if someone can feel like their parents
    0:33:55 are able to tolerate their disappointment,
    0:33:57 then what the kid really learns is like,
    0:34:01 I can still be me when I’m disappointed.
    0:34:02 I’m still like a valuable person.
    0:34:04 This feeling clearly is like an acceptable part of me.
    0:34:06 It’s not all of me.
    0:34:07 I don’t have to fight to get rid of it.
    0:34:09 That’s really how we build confidence.
    0:34:11 – One common thing that I see with my kids
    0:34:15 and I’m sure other kids, and it drives me insane.
    0:34:18 There’s like a few triggers I have
    0:34:21 and one of them is laziness.
    0:34:23 And the other is sort of in that situation,
    0:34:26 I’ll relate it to sort of like they come home,
    0:34:28 they get a bad score on a test or an assignment
    0:34:31 and they blame something exterior to themselves.
    0:34:37 The teacher didn’t communicate clearly.
    0:34:40 I saved the document, but it didn’t save my edits.
    0:34:45 And it’s absolving them of sort of responsibility
    0:34:49 and fault in that moment.
    0:34:51 And how do we deal with that as parents?
    0:34:54 Where it’s like, ’cause that trait, that single trait,
    0:34:57 if it takes root, can be so detrimental in life
    0:35:02 where you become a victim of circumstance
    0:35:04 instead of the master of your circumstances.
    0:35:07 – I’m so big on personal responsibility too.
    0:35:10 And so that’s like triggering for me too
    0:35:12 from like a personal standpoint, so I join you in that.
    0:35:15 So I think first, and I always think this is true,
    0:35:17 like we have to understand before we intervene.
    0:35:20 Like that to me, every workshop I do,
    0:35:22 that’s like about problem behaviors or sleep or, you know,
    0:35:26 rudeness, like that’s always the first section.
    0:35:28 And parents, it’s always so interesting
    0:35:29 ’cause they’ll take this workshop and they’ll say,
    0:35:31 “Oh my goodness, like everything feels better in my home.”
    0:35:33 And I’m like, “I don’t even get to the strategies yet.”
    0:35:35 Because we underestimate how many of our issues
    0:35:38 with our kids or any relationship
    0:35:40 actually comes from not understanding.
    0:35:41 And as soon as we understand something, it’s amazing.
    0:35:43 It’s like we immediately feel better.
    0:35:45 So I think first, it’s like, “Well, why is my son doing that?”
    0:35:48 Why is he saying, “Well, it didn’t save.”
    0:35:50 Or, “Well, the teachers asked all these questions
    0:35:52 that they said wouldn’t even be on the test.”
    0:35:54 Right, they say something like that, right?
    0:35:56 And I think it’s really important to get curious there.
    0:35:57 Like, why would my kid do that?
    0:36:00 And to me, the reason, like everything I do,
    0:36:02 the company, the membership, is called Good Inside,
    0:36:05 is ’cause to me, that’s like the principle
    0:36:06 that allows us to be curious about our kids.
    0:36:08 Our kids are good inside.
    0:36:09 So why would my good kid
    0:36:11 kind of like totally share responsibility?
    0:36:13 And it’s really separating who they are from their identity,
    0:36:16 they’re a good kid, from certain behavior,
    0:36:19 which is something that happened, right?
    0:36:21 When we are most frustrated with our kids,
    0:36:23 it’s because we’ve collapsed the two.
    0:36:25 My kid is just kind of like a shitty kid
    0:36:27 who doesn’t take undersensibility
    0:36:28 versus I have a good kid who is struggling with something.
    0:36:31 So I think one of the best ways
    0:36:33 I can be curious about my kids is I’m like,
    0:36:35 “Well, why would I do that?
    0:36:36 Why would I be in a situation where instead of being like,
    0:36:39 “Oh my goodness, I was late and I should have left earlier,”
    0:36:41 I was like, “You’ve no idea about the traffic
    0:36:42 and you’ve no idea about the car in front of me.
    0:36:45 Oh my goodness,” right?
    0:36:46 So I’m just making this up now.
    0:36:48 But oddly enough, I think I would do that
    0:36:50 when I felt so bad.
    0:36:53 I felt both simultaneously like so guilty
    0:36:57 and so unable to tolerate that guilt.
    0:37:02 And this is actually gonna circle back
    0:37:03 to the idea of separating identity and behavior.
    0:37:06 Oddly enough, kids tend to shirk responsibility
    0:37:11 and kind of seem unwilling to reflect on their role of things
    0:37:15 when they equate a certain outcome
    0:37:18 with kind of being an indication of who they are.
    0:37:22 So let me say that in a better way that’s clearer.
    0:37:25 So if your son thinks like, “Let’s say I got like a,
    0:37:28 “whatever it is, a 70 on this test.”
    0:37:30 If when he gets a 70, what happens inside him
    0:37:33 is like, “I’m so stupid, I can’t believe
    0:37:34 “like I got a 70 in math.”
    0:37:36 That will make him tell the story
    0:37:38 while my teacher asked about things that were unfair
    0:37:40 because he can’t tolerate the idea
    0:37:41 that he’s like a stupid kid in math.
    0:37:43 Nobody can tolerate that idea.
    0:37:45 And actually, so the first step is like
    0:37:47 trying to help our kids separate.
    0:37:48 Wait, like you’re a good smart kid
    0:37:49 who clearly like got a not so great thing,
    0:37:52 great on their test, right?
    0:37:53 And when we’re able to separate who we are
    0:37:56 from what we do, we’re actually remarkably able
    0:37:58 to take responsibility for our behavior
    0:38:00 because it’s no longer an indication of our identity.
    0:38:04 So, okay, if that’s part of the understanding,
    0:38:05 I know for me in my mind, I’m like, “Hey, so what do I do?”
    0:38:07 Like I don’t understand what to do.
    0:38:09 In that moment, what strikes me
    0:38:12 is what’s happening for our kid is actually shame.
    0:38:14 That’s what’s happening.
    0:38:15 A kid feels ashamed.
    0:38:16 Shame is actually when we use our behavior
    0:38:18 as an indication of our identity.
    0:38:19 It just all collapsed.
    0:38:20 It’s like this bad thing means I’m a bad person.
    0:38:23 And the hardest thing about shame when it’s present,
    0:38:26 and I write about this in the book,
    0:38:27 is like you have to change your goal.
    0:38:29 And it’s like, it’s so frustrating.
    0:38:30 ‘Cause if that’s my kid, what I want to say to him
    0:38:32 is, okay, stop saying that, just stop saying that.
    0:38:34 Like, okay, maybe that’s true,
    0:38:36 but like some kids did well in the test
    0:38:37 and like you probably could have studied.
    0:38:39 You probably could have gone to the teacher before
    0:38:41 and asked a few questions.
    0:38:42 And like, if you keep saying that, you’ll never learn.
    0:38:44 Like you just want to like lecture.
    0:38:45 You want to like just get through it.
    0:38:48 The thing about shame is it’s a freeze response.
    0:38:51 It’s like an animal defense state.
    0:38:53 Like we talk a lot about fight or flight,
    0:38:54 but there’s other animal defense states too, right?
    0:38:57 And one of them is freeze, right?
    0:38:59 And so if someone’s frozen,
    0:39:01 you can’t like get them out of that
    0:39:03 until it started to thaw a little bit.
    0:39:06 And so as a parent, instead of trying to go through it,
    0:39:09 your only goal in the moment,
    0:39:10 and this is gonna be like remarkably ungratifying,
    0:39:12 I’m just warning you,
    0:39:14 is to have to de-shame the moment first.
    0:39:16 You have to switch your goal
    0:39:18 from getting through to your kid and teaching a lesson
    0:39:20 to lowering shame.
    0:39:22 So your kid is actually in a place
    0:39:25 where they’re unfrozen, at which point they can learn.
    0:39:28 So if that’s my kid,
    0:39:30 I’m gonna tell you what I would do,
    0:39:31 except again, like, I don’t know if I’d really do this,
    0:39:33 but the ideal Becky would do this.
    0:39:35 My kid says this to me.
    0:39:37 I’d probably say in the moment,
    0:39:39 I hate when that happens.
    0:39:41 Oh, that’s the worst, right?
    0:39:44 ‘Cause I even think about me.
    0:39:45 If I showed up for this podcast with you late, Shane,
    0:39:48 I was like, you’ve no idea about traffic.
    0:39:50 Oh my goodness.
    0:39:51 Oh my goodness, it was so bad.
    0:39:52 And my commute was awful.
    0:39:53 If you’re like, that is the worst.
    0:39:56 Oh, I have that happen to me once too.
    0:39:58 I really do think the next thing I would say to you
    0:40:01 would be like, I’m sorry, I should have left earlier.
    0:40:04 Where if you’re like, I mean, Becky, look,
    0:40:07 we only have a little bit of time and like,
    0:40:09 maybe there’s traffic,
    0:40:09 but like you really could have just,
    0:40:11 I don’t know, left your apartment earlier
    0:40:12 and gotten to the studio.
    0:40:14 I know what I’d say back is like,
    0:40:16 he doesn’t even understand traffic.
    0:40:17 The traffic was so bad.
    0:40:19 I would have gotten, so it’s paradoxical,
    0:40:21 but it’s so effective.
    0:40:23 And you can de-shame by just actually saying like,
    0:40:26 oh, that’s the worst.
    0:40:27 It’s usually pretty simple.
    0:40:29 Or to me, like one of the most beautiful strategies,
    0:40:32 it’s hard to even call it a strategy.
    0:40:33 It’s just, I call it like, did I tell you about the time?
    0:40:36 But it’s just like leveling with your kid
    0:40:37 about a story from your own childhood.
    0:40:39 That was just like that.
    0:40:40 Oh, that makes me think about when I was in seventh grade.
    0:40:43 And it’s not the same.
    0:40:44 But like, I remember the science test.
    0:40:45 I was like, what?
    0:40:46 This question’s on and this question’s on.
    0:40:47 You can kind of watch.
    0:40:48 I’m gonna kind of like do a little trick here.
    0:40:50 And part of me was like,
    0:40:52 I guess I could have studied that,
    0:40:53 but the teacher never told me.
    0:40:54 And the teacher never even told me.
    0:40:56 And so, oh, something like that happened to me too.
    0:40:58 And so what you’re doing in the moment
    0:41:00 is you’re actually just reconnecting with your kid.
    0:41:02 You’re actually prioritizing connection.
    0:41:03 Connect first is like the principle
    0:41:05 we all want to try to do as often with our kids,
    0:41:08 not because we’re soft,
    0:41:09 but actually because it’s effective
    0:41:11 if you wanna get anything done, right?
    0:41:12 So I’m just connecting.
    0:41:13 I’m de-shaming, I’m connecting.
    0:41:15 And once I’ve formed that connection with my kid
    0:41:18 and they’ve kind of unfrozen a little bit,
    0:41:20 I can then enter into like a different conversation,
    0:41:23 but it just has to happen later than we want it to.
    0:41:26 – One of the things I wanted to come back to
    0:41:29 outside of the world of teens
    0:41:30 and maybe inside the adult world here is,
    0:41:32 you said earlier,
    0:41:34 how we think about someone affects
    0:41:36 how we communicate with them.
    0:41:38 I wanna relate that to how we think about ourselves
    0:41:41 and that inner voice we have
    0:41:43 and how the stories we tell ourselves.
    0:41:46 And what are the common ways
    0:41:48 that we sort of self-sabotage
    0:41:52 or get in our own way with these stories
    0:41:54 that we’re telling ourselves
    0:41:56 and we’re not being kind to ourselves
    0:41:57 and we’re not being gentle.
    0:41:58 And that has all of these other sort of implications.
    0:42:02 Like how can I treat you nicely
    0:42:04 if I don’t even treat myself nicely?
    0:42:06 – Yes, I mean, there’s so many examples of that, right?
    0:42:10 And I think most of us, we can get into the causes,
    0:42:14 but most of us have learned to wire struggles
    0:42:19 next to blame.
    0:42:21 They’re like very, very close in our circuitry.
    0:42:23 And I say blame ’cause it’s often a combination
    0:42:26 of other blame and self-blame, right?
    0:42:29 I think blame is often a two-way street.
    0:42:30 Like some of us maybe, you know,
    0:42:32 specialize more in self-blame.
    0:42:33 Some of us in other blame,
    0:42:34 but usually it’s a seesaw, like it’s, you know.
    0:42:36 And so when something’s hard
    0:42:38 or something doesn’t go our way, right?
    0:42:41 Maybe I yelled at my kid, right?
    0:42:43 And then all of a sudden I’m like, I’m a monster.
    0:42:45 I’m the worst parent.
    0:42:46 I messed up my kid forever.
    0:42:47 It’s just like huge spiral.
    0:42:49 Or I did a presentation at work
    0:42:51 and my boss said something like,
    0:42:53 I don’t know if it was critical,
    0:42:54 but it was kind of ambiguous.
    0:42:55 And I leave and I’m like, my boss thinks I’m so stupid.
    0:42:57 And like, oh my goodness, I’m gonna get fired.
    0:42:59 And we just, like you said,
    0:43:00 we start telling ourselves stories.
    0:43:03 And then those stories start to influence, of course,
    0:43:08 they influence how we feel.
    0:43:09 They influence then the next action we take
    0:43:11 that usually is just kind of further reifying that story
    0:43:14 or really that interpretation.
    0:43:15 And we can really get off to the races, right?
    0:43:18 Another image I wanna share, right?
    0:43:21 ‘Cause I think this is really one of my favorites
    0:43:23 and it really illustrates what we’re talking about.
    0:43:25 It’s like, if you picture yourself as the driver of a car,
    0:43:27 we all have multiple passengers in our car, right?
    0:43:30 So like some of us have imposter syndrome
    0:43:32 as like a very, very noisy passenger.
    0:43:34 Some of us have, it’s all my fault.
    0:43:36 Some of us have, the world is gonna end
    0:43:38 and everything is gonna go badly, right?
    0:43:40 We get into problems, not when those things
    0:43:42 are our passengers, we get into problems
    0:43:43 and those things take over the driver’s seat.
    0:43:46 And actually, a lot of us, when we’re aware of those voices,
    0:43:50 we try to get them out of our car, like we do.
    0:43:52 We’re like, I shouldn’t feel that way,
    0:43:53 or I know my boss doesn’t actually think I’m stupid.
    0:43:56 Why am I thinking that?
    0:43:57 We either fight the voice or it kind of takes over us.
    0:44:02 Like that’s usually what happens.
    0:44:04 When I actually think mental health
    0:44:08 is not about getting those voices out of our car.
    0:44:11 They’re there, they’re not going anywhere.
    0:44:12 But actually just like talking to them
    0:44:14 when they’re in the passenger seat
    0:44:16 to ensure that they don’t take over the driver’s seat, right?
    0:44:19 So for example, not first of yelling at my kids
    0:44:22 and maybe like, oh, there’s the I messed up my kid forever.
    0:44:25 Again, voice, hey, it’s unfortunate,
    0:44:28 but you do tend to come up
    0:44:29 whenever I make a little mistake with my kid.
    0:44:31 And like, okay, I’m just gonna come back to today,
    0:44:33 like it is 2024 and I don’t really know
    0:44:37 what the next 80 years kind of hold,
    0:44:39 but I’m pretty sure what I did today
    0:44:41 did not mess up my kids forever.
    0:44:43 And I know you’ll say that again to me,
    0:44:44 but I’m just gonna kind of keep you in the back seat, right?
    0:44:47 Or, okay, I don’t even feel great about my presentation
    0:44:51 and my boss did do this,
    0:44:52 but there’s that my boss hates me voice.
    0:44:54 And it’s true, whenever I even doubt myself a little bit,
    0:44:58 I do tend to also think that my boss is about to fire me, right?
    0:45:02 And all of a sudden now I’m actually in a relationship
    0:45:05 with these stories, right?
    0:45:07 Or with these parts, I would call them these parts.
    0:45:10 And as soon as you’re in a relationship with a part of you,
    0:45:12 inherently that part of you can’t take over you
    0:45:14 because you and the driver seat are like talking to it.
    0:45:19 And to me, that’s what I actually teach adults
    0:45:21 and parents like all the time.
    0:45:22 It’s honestly like some of my favorite interventions
    0:45:24 to teach kids how to do that when they’re young.
    0:45:25 I think it’s like one of the most important skills
    0:45:27 I could take into adulthood with them
    0:45:29 because I think those are some of like
    0:45:30 the ultimate coping skills in life.
    0:45:33 – One of the other things we talked about earlier
    0:45:35 and I’m sort of like going down a couple of rabbit holes
    0:45:38 ’cause we sort of covered a lot of ground really quickly
    0:45:41 was regulating emotions.
    0:45:44 And not only do we as adults and parents
    0:45:47 have to teach our kids or help them
    0:45:49 better regulate their own emotions,
    0:45:52 we have to often learn how to regulate our own emotions.
    0:45:55 How do we do that?
    0:45:57 – I get this question from parents often, right?
    0:45:59 Because the way kids learn how to regulate emotions
    0:46:04 is through their relationship with their parents, right?
    0:46:08 It’s not something you could get taught in a textbook.
    0:46:11 And it’s not to say when we get older,
    0:46:13 if we didn’t have a lot of those early experiences
    0:46:14 that helped us learn how to regulate our emotions,
    0:46:16 which most adults, I know a lot of them didn’t,
    0:46:18 doesn’t mean we can’t get there.
    0:46:20 But our kids, right, they kind of borrow our regulation
    0:46:25 in a moment and they kind of absorb it.
    0:46:27 And like I was saying before, they kind of over time learn,
    0:46:30 oh, my emotion inside me that feels so scary to me
    0:46:33 is less scary to someone else.
    0:46:34 And they kind of absorb that hope
    0:46:36 and they absorb that kind of tolerance.
    0:46:38 And that really forms the foundation
    0:46:40 for so many of their coping skills.
    0:46:42 So parents will say to me, okay, I actually get that.
    0:46:44 How can I do that for my kid if I can’t,
    0:46:48 if I really do struggle to regulate my own emotions?
    0:46:51 It seems like I’m teaching my kid and myself
    0:46:53 at the same time.
    0:46:55 And we are, and like that is just kind of the hand,
    0:46:57 a lot of us were dealt and it’s not an impossible hand.
    0:46:59 It’s not an easy hand, but it’s definitely a winnable hand.
    0:47:02 Like I know that and I’ve seen it now with millions of adults
    0:47:04 who are, you know, winning a lot of their hands.
    0:47:07 And so I think there’s a couple like concrete ways
    0:47:11 as adults that we can, you know,
    0:47:13 start to learn how to better regulate our emotions, right?
    0:47:17 Number one to me is just the word curiosity.
    0:47:19 Like being curious about yourself
    0:47:22 is a foundation to regulating your emotions.
    0:47:27 Because it’s the difference between saying,
    0:47:29 my kids whining, like who can stay calm
    0:47:32 when they whine all day?
    0:47:33 Like, are you saying people like whining?
    0:47:35 I have to get to a place where I like whining.
    0:47:37 No, nobody likes whining, literally nobody likes whining,
    0:47:39 but there’s a big difference between not liking whining
    0:47:43 and I don’t know, reacting and being in a state of reactivity
    0:47:46 with screaming at our kids,
    0:47:48 versus not liking whining and being able to regulate
    0:47:50 our emotions and respond to our kid
    0:47:52 from a place of groundedness and sturdiness, right?
    0:47:54 Still, nobody likes it, but it’s very different.
    0:47:57 And curiosity to me gets us from point one to point two,
    0:48:00 because instead of saying like, what’s wrong with my kid
    0:48:02 and why are they acting the way they’re acting?
    0:48:04 We might say, what’s going on inside of me?
    0:48:07 What’s going on for me?
    0:48:09 What is happening inside me?
    0:48:12 That is kind of a component of this reaction, right?
    0:48:14 The idea that my kid’s whining
    0:48:16 is an inherently making me scream at them.
    0:48:19 It’s a trigger, but there’s a story inside me.
    0:48:22 There’s something that happens inside my body
    0:48:24 that frankly predated my kid’s existence.
    0:48:27 So if I can get curious about that, right?
    0:48:31 Then I can actually make a lot of progress.
    0:48:33 And to me, I think it’s so easy to hear that
    0:48:36 and someone say, oh, so it’s my fault?
    0:48:37 No, like, I don’t know where,
    0:48:39 I feel like we’re obsessed with the word fault.
    0:48:42 Like it’s not your kid’s fault, it’s not your fault.
    0:48:44 Like why does that have to be anyone’s fault?
    0:48:46 Like I don’t know why it’s like, it’s just,
    0:48:47 this is happening, either we can be curious and like learn
    0:48:50 and through that learning, probably live in a way
    0:48:54 that’s more in line with our values,
    0:48:55 feel more in control of ourselves.
    0:48:57 Like your kid’s gonna benefit,
    0:48:59 but I promise you as the adult are gonna benefit
    0:49:01 in areas like way more, like everybody wins, right?
    0:49:03 And so I always say to parents,
    0:49:04 this isn’t a system of like saying this is your fault.
    0:49:07 It’s a system of saying like,
    0:49:09 this is actually a place for your empowerment
    0:49:10 and to like finally learn skills
    0:49:12 and skills always help us feel, you know, more powerful.
    0:49:14 So one of my favorite emotion regulation skills
    0:49:18 to teach adults is something I call AVP, okay?
    0:49:21 And it’s like the simplest thing
    0:49:23 and has the most profound impact on people, okay?
    0:49:26 So AVP stands for acknowledge, validate, permit.
    0:49:30 So I’ll teach each part.
    0:49:32 Step one to regulating emotions is acknowledging them.
    0:49:36 And actually this is a really good point of the conversation
    0:49:39 relative to what we just said about this image in the car.
    0:49:41 So let’s say, you know, my kid is whining.
    0:49:45 Step one, acknowledge like,
    0:49:47 well, I’m feeling really annoyed, right?
    0:49:49 Like in a way what I’m doing is like,
    0:49:50 I’m the driver of my car and annoyance in the backseat
    0:49:53 is like starting to kind of make its way to the driver seat.
    0:49:56 And I’m like, hey there, hey.
    0:49:58 And that’s literally what I’m doing.
    0:49:59 I actually use the word high a lot
    0:50:00 because it always makes me laugh.
    0:50:02 And to me, if I could add levity to like that process,
    0:50:05 it gets easier.
    0:50:05 So I’m like, hi, annoyance or high anxiety, right?
    0:50:08 Or something like that.
    0:50:09 So for step one is just acknowledge.
    0:50:11 You can acknowledge by using a quote feeling word
    0:50:13 like high annoyance or high sadness.
    0:50:15 A lot of people don’t like really know
    0:50:17 the name of their feelings and that’s totally fine.
    0:50:19 And you can also do it in a more general way.
    0:50:21 Like I’m feeling uncomfortable right now.
    0:50:24 Or I’m feeling about to explode right now.
    0:50:25 Or I’m feeling tight right now.
    0:50:27 Any acknowledgement.
    0:50:28 Two is validate.
    0:50:30 And to me, the best way that our body,
    0:50:33 I think likes to be validated.
    0:50:35 I don’t know why is the term makes sense.
    0:50:37 I think there’s something where feelings feel like
    0:50:39 accepted by logic in our body when we use that term.
    0:50:42 I don’t know.
    0:50:42 I haven’t asked, but I think that’s what’s happening.
    0:50:44 So I’d be saying, I’m really, really annoyed right now.
    0:50:48 Or when my kid was whining and I’d say to myself,
    0:50:51 well, that makes sense.
    0:50:52 Like whining is pretty annoying.
    0:50:54 It makes sense that I feel that way.
    0:50:56 That is a hugely helpful phrase
    0:51:00 in regulating our emotions.
    0:51:01 Because the reasons our emotions get unregulated, right?
    0:51:08 Is that they are exploding out of our body in our behaviors.
    0:51:12 They literally, if you think about these moments of reactivity
    0:51:14 when I yell or the emotion is like coming out of my body
    0:51:19 and like through my mouth, right?
    0:51:20 It’s kind of like a volcano, right?
    0:51:23 The opposite of that isn’t suppressing emotions
    0:51:26 because you just can’t beat them.
    0:51:27 So it’s always, you know, an unwinnable endeavor.
    0:51:31 But we’re kind of saying when you regulate an emotion,
    0:51:33 like it’s okay to live inside your body.
    0:51:34 Like it can just live there.
    0:51:35 It doesn’t have to explode out of you.
    0:51:36 It can live inside there.
    0:51:37 Like it has a place, it has a home.
    0:51:39 So if you think about those two steps already,
    0:51:40 like first I’m saying hi to it.
    0:51:42 Like if you’re saying hi to someone at a party,
    0:51:44 like maybe you don’t love them
    0:51:45 but you’re probably like okay with them being there
    0:51:47 because you said hi.
    0:51:48 And then you’re telling,
    0:51:49 you’re feeling like it kind of makes sense that you’re here.
    0:51:51 And then P is permit,
    0:51:52 which actually just involves saying to yourself,
    0:51:55 I give myself full permission to be feeling this way, right?
    0:51:58 So another example of going through an AVP
    0:52:01 would be like I’m feeling really anxious right now
    0:52:03 and really, really worked up.
    0:52:05 And you know, well, that makes sense.
    0:52:06 Like I am managing my kid’s soccer schedules
    0:52:08 and you know, I’m thinking about what they need for dinner
    0:52:11 and I didn’t respond to that email.
    0:52:12 And I think tomorrow’s gonna be a snow day
    0:52:14 and then my kid’s gonna have canceled school.
    0:52:16 And P permit, right?
    0:52:18 I give myself permission to be feeling this way.
    0:52:20 And I think a kicker at the end is just adding the phrase
    0:52:24 and I can cope with it.
    0:52:26 And I can cope with it.
    0:52:29 I, you know, interesting enough,
    0:52:30 you’re catching me on like last night,
    0:52:32 I was walking in Times Square and as I do,
    0:52:34 I film videos myself for Instagram
    0:52:36 when I’m like on the way to the subway.
    0:52:38 So I was like filming myself and this guy saw me.
    0:52:41 He’s this 28 year old guy, stop me.
    0:52:43 He goes, I’m a 28 year old man, I’m unmarried
    0:52:46 and I don’t have kids.
    0:52:48 And he goes, and I like, I’m so excited to see you.
    0:52:51 He’s like, you’re like a celebrity to me.
    0:52:53 And he goes, literally, he goes, AVP has changed my life.
    0:52:58 That’s what he said.
    0:52:58 He goes, AVP has changed my life.
    0:53:00 I’m reparenting myself.
    0:53:02 I know I never learned what some people learned
    0:53:04 in their childhood and I need to kind of reparent myself
    0:53:07 through those skills and AVP has like, you know,
    0:53:11 changed my life.
    0:53:12 And so there’s a couple of ways to use it.
    0:53:14 If regulating your emotions is new for you,
    0:53:17 you can’t expect yourself to start to regulate your emotions
    0:53:22 when you’re in your most heightened emotions.
    0:53:25 That would be like someone who has never taken a foul shot,
    0:53:29 taking a foul shot, game seven of the NBA finals
    0:53:32 when time has run out and the game has tied.
    0:53:33 Like that person is not making it.
    0:53:35 You take foul shots in practice, low stakes.
    0:53:39 And so the way I tell people to practice AVP
    0:53:42 is literally going to their phone right now,
    0:53:44 setting a random time that they tend to be alone, right?
    0:53:47 Not in the midst of things
    0:53:48 and just literally making a daily reminder that says AVP.
    0:53:51 And when it goes off, you just stop
    0:53:53 and you say to yourself, what am I feeling right now?
    0:53:56 And it can be like, I’m not feeling much.
    0:53:58 I don’t know.
    0:54:00 Well, that makes sense because this is a new thing
    0:54:02 for me to check in with my emotions.
    0:54:04 So it makes sense that I’m not sure.
    0:54:06 Permission, I’m giving myself full permission
    0:54:08 to not know how I’m feeling.
    0:54:09 Like there’s no way to get it wrong.
    0:54:10 That’s what I’m saying.
    0:54:11 And I promise you after a week or two,
    0:54:15 not only will you start to recognize more things,
    0:54:20 but already that skill, that coping skill
    0:54:23 will start to appear not in 10 out of 10 emotional situations.
    0:54:26 It will not, it’s not magic,
    0:54:28 but like in maybe two, three out of 10s.
    0:54:31 And I think that’s like one concrete thing,
    0:54:33 like all adults can do to start making progress.
    0:54:36 – Was earlier AVP in action when we said,
    0:54:40 I’m glad you’re telling me about this.
    0:54:42 I believe you, tell me more.
    0:54:45 That sounds like AVP. – Oh my goodness.
    0:54:47 Oh my goodness.
    0:54:48 I’ve never, Shane, I’ve never thought about that.
    0:54:51 But I’m so glad I’m telling you,
    0:54:53 I’m telling me about this is basically like acknowledging
    0:54:56 and like, yeah, like I believe you
    0:54:58 is like another ultimate form of validation.
    0:55:00 And actually, you know, it’s so interesting.
    0:55:02 This is crazy.
    0:55:03 My brain is firing in a million directions.
    0:55:04 Someone told me with AVP, they’re like,
    0:55:06 I don’t like to say it makes sense.
    0:55:07 I don’t want to cry.
    0:55:08 This one said, I just say to myself, I believe myself.
    0:55:13 I really do feel this way.
    0:55:14 So yeah.
    0:55:14 And then permission, like tell me more is permissions.
    0:55:18 Permission to feel, permission to keep going.
    0:55:19 Yes, I guess that is very profound.
    0:55:21 It will leave me with a lot to think about.
    0:55:23 I’ve never made that connection.
    0:55:24 Thank you.
    0:55:25 When we have an emotional outburst,
    0:55:27 we tend to react without reasoning.
    0:55:30 We say things that, you know, sometimes we can’t unsay.
    0:55:33 We do things that, you know,
    0:55:35 the best version of ourself would not have us be doing.
    0:55:39 And we all do this.
    0:55:40 And this is natural and normal.
    0:55:42 And I think it’s part of being human.
    0:55:44 And how do we repair with our kids or our partner
    0:55:49 after this happens?
    0:55:52 Okay, we’ve had this outburst or, you know,
    0:55:55 we have this fight or this argument.
    0:55:57 We’re not feeling good about it,
    0:55:58 but we really don’t know what to do now.
    0:56:01 How do we get back to a good place?
    0:56:04 I’m so glad you’re asking this question
    0:56:05 because I always like kick myself if I’m in a conversation
    0:56:10 and don’t get to talk about this
    0:56:12 because it’s the ultimate, right?
    0:56:14 Like to me, repair is literally
    0:56:17 the number one relationship strategy.
    0:56:19 Everyone should get good at whether you’re in a partnership,
    0:56:22 your relationships at work
    0:56:23 and definitely your relationship with your kid.
    0:56:24 And I wanna go through this in a way.
    0:56:26 It’s literally gonna come full circle to confidence,
    0:56:28 to behavior versus identity as everything.
    0:56:31 ‘Cause I really think of myself
    0:56:32 as like a first principles thinker.
    0:56:33 It always comes back to the same few things.
    0:56:36 So every single person, definitely me included,
    0:56:41 messes up, like I yell at my kids.
    0:56:43 And it’s not something I’m just saying, like,
    0:56:45 oh, that’s nice.
    0:56:45 She’s saying this, like, of course I yell at my kid.
    0:56:47 Like I’d be offended that you didn’t think
    0:56:48 I yelled at my kid.
    0:56:49 Like my kids, first of all, do not have Dr. Becky
    0:56:52 as a parent and I would not wish Dr. Becky on any child.
    0:56:56 I really wouldn’t as a parent.
    0:56:57 Like it’s just not, it’s not human.
    0:57:00 It’s not the way you can learn
    0:57:01 about how relationships work, right?
    0:57:03 If our relationship with our kids becomes the model,
    0:57:06 they kind of take into adulthood
    0:57:08 and how they think about relationships.
    0:57:11 Shane, I don’t think you and I want our kids
    0:57:12 going to look for a partner who’s like,
    0:57:13 who is perfectly attuned to my emotions all the time?
    0:57:16 Who always gets it right?
    0:57:17 They will be very disappointed.
    0:57:19 Nobody is like that.
    0:57:20 So everybody messes up.
    0:57:22 And when I say repairs, the number one relationship strategy,
    0:57:26 it’s because there’s very few things
    0:57:28 that can have as much positive impact on repair, okay?
    0:57:31 And what I always like to think about there is, okay,
    0:57:34 so if repair is one of the most powerful
    0:57:38 relationship strategies and I’m supposed to get good
    0:57:40 at repair, well, you can’t repair.
    0:57:43 If you don’t mess up, you literally can.
    0:57:46 And so really, okay, and I’ll go through how to repair.
    0:57:49 After I yell at my kid, I really do say this to myself
    0:57:52 because I used to be pretty bad at repairing
    0:57:54 until I like understood really the power of it.
    0:57:56 I’m like, oh, I messed up.
    0:57:57 And especially with this like Dr. Becky stuff.
    0:57:59 I’m like, what would people think if like, right?
    0:58:01 Like I was yelling at my kids and I was like, wait,
    0:58:03 I’m getting good at repair.
    0:58:04 That’s like my goal.
    0:58:05 So I messed up.
    0:58:07 Step one, check, like crushed it, crushed it.
    0:58:11 I messed up.
    0:58:12 I already did step one.
    0:58:13 Everyone says the first step is the hardest step.
    0:58:14 Okay. Well, first step is messing up.
    0:58:16 We did that.
    0:58:17 Second step is repair.
    0:58:18 Like you’re 50% of the way there.
    0:58:20 So I want to take this whole idea and like turn on its head.
    0:58:23 Repair is so important.
    0:58:24 So I want to explain why repair is so important,
    0:58:29 especially for kids and then get into the concrete way to do it.
    0:58:33 So I just yelled at my kid and now usually in my house,
    0:58:37 after I yell at my kid, like we’re separated.
    0:58:39 Like after I really scream, like my kid’s in his room,
    0:58:41 let’s say my son’s in his room.
    0:58:43 And let’s say it’s about screen time.
    0:58:44 I’m like, I told you to get off, you know, the video game
    0:58:47 and like, you never listen and you, you know,
    0:58:49 take advantage of me and like you said,
    0:58:51 and I don’t know if I can trust you.
    0:58:53 And, you know, when he’s like, you don’t understand me.
    0:58:55 And I was just with my friends and you embarrass me.
    0:58:57 And I’m like, you’ve seen nothing yet.
    0:58:59 Okay. And then he’s in his room.
    0:59:03 He’s like slammed his door and like, I’m in the kitchen.
    0:59:06 Right. So what happens next?
    0:59:10 Right. That moment already happened.
    0:59:11 Do I wish it didn’t happen?
    0:59:13 Yeah, I do.
    0:59:14 Right. But, but it already happened.
    0:59:16 So what goes on for a kid after a moment
    0:59:20 that feels really bad with a parent before repair has happened?
    0:59:25 So my kid is now, my son is now in his room.
    0:59:28 He’s overwhelmed and from like a somatic physical perspective.
    0:59:31 Right. He’s like agitated.
    0:59:32 He’s obviously on edge.
    0:59:34 I am too. And he’s even younger.
    0:59:35 He’s helpless.
    0:59:37 And right. Our kids are oriented by attachment with us.
    0:59:39 Attachments, the primary evolutionary mechanism for kids.
    0:59:42 They need us. They literally need us to survive.
    0:59:45 And so they’re always kind of paying attention
    0:59:47 to the status of their relationship with us, right?
    0:59:49 And figuring out how to be close to us again,
    0:59:53 figuring out how to get your body calm.
    0:59:55 So you can kind of proceed with something they have to do.
    0:59:57 So my kids alone, right?
    0:59:59 Having just gotten yelled at and they have to figure out
    1:00:02 how to feel safe again, like in their body.
    1:00:04 And if I don’t go help them do it,
    1:00:07 kids really only have two coping mechanisms
    1:00:09 at their disposal on their own.
    1:00:12 And those are self doubt and self blame.
    1:00:14 So my kid could be in his room
    1:00:16 and kind of engage in self doubt.
    1:00:18 Did that really happen?
    1:00:19 I mean, I don’t know, like if that happened,
    1:00:21 someone probably come talk to me.
    1:00:23 I don’t know.
    1:00:24 Maybe I’m making a big deal out of things.
    1:00:25 Maybe I’m overreacting.
    1:00:28 Maybe my friends wouldn’t have thought
    1:00:29 this was such a big deal and I guess I’m fine.
    1:00:31 Like, yeah, yeah, I guess I’m fine.
    1:00:33 Like just forget it.
    1:00:34 And then also my mom never mentioned it again.
    1:00:36 So maybe that didn’t even happen.
    1:00:37 We don’t want to wire our self doubt into our kids
    1:00:41 because it comes up in really in our opportune ways, right?
    1:00:44 When my daughter, let’s say, or my son is older
    1:00:48 and they have something, I don’t know,
    1:00:50 uncomfortable happen with the boss
    1:00:51 or with someone they meet in college.
    1:00:53 Like I really don’t think any of us want our kids self talk
    1:00:56 to be like, did that really happen?
    1:00:58 Am I overreacting?
    1:01:00 Would my friends have thought that was a big deal?
    1:01:02 That’s like so terrifying, right?
    1:01:04 And that’s not what we want.
    1:01:06 So that’s self doubt.
    1:01:08 And the other things kids do is self blame.
    1:01:10 They just say it’s my fault.
    1:01:11 They’re like, I did this.
    1:01:12 If I was like a better kid, I wouldn’t have done this
    1:01:15 and I ruin everything.
    1:01:16 They either say, you’re both, I’m too much.
    1:01:18 I’m not enough, right?
    1:01:19 And they kind of say this to themselves to calm down.
    1:01:22 And one of the reasons kids engage in self blame
    1:01:24 that I find really compelling
    1:01:26 to like share this idea more widely.
    1:01:27 It’s not mine.
    1:01:28 It’s by Ronald Fairburn, very, you know,
    1:01:31 early psychiatrist.
    1:01:34 What he says that I think is compelling is just,
    1:01:36 for kids, it’s better to be a sinner
    1:01:39 in a world ruled by God
    1:01:41 than to live in a world ruled by the devil.
    1:01:44 Meaning, kids have to feel safe in the world.
    1:01:48 And they have to believe that their parents are like good
    1:01:51 and like will keep them safe.
    1:01:52 And so when things happen with their parents
    1:01:53 that feel really bad,
    1:01:55 it’s actually adaptive for a kid to internalize fault
    1:01:57 and blame because at least then they can hold on
    1:02:00 to the idea that their parents
    1:02:01 and kind of their for the world around them
    1:02:03 is safe and good.
    1:02:04 And if we circle back to like,
    1:02:05 why do we all blame ourselves after we struggle?
    1:02:08 Well, if over and over after hard times in your body,
    1:02:11 hard time, thing that didn’t feel good self blame,
    1:02:13 hard time thing that didn’t feel good self blame,
    1:02:15 will you become an adult
    1:02:16 when you have a hard time and things that don’t feel good?
    1:02:18 Guess what happens next in your circuit, self blame, right?
    1:02:21 Adaptive when you’re young,
    1:02:22 very, very much holds us back when we’re adults.
    1:02:27 And so whenever I think about those two things
    1:02:30 that my kid would have to do if I don’t repair,
    1:02:32 it becomes extra compelling to repair
    1:02:34 because I really think, oh my goodness,
    1:02:36 my kid and I had this event.
    1:02:39 But here’s what people misunderstand.
    1:02:42 Events don’t mess up kids.
    1:02:44 Events aren’t even inherently traumatizing.
    1:02:47 What kind of like their mess up ’cause it sounds so final,
    1:02:50 but what really impacts kids is not an event.
    1:02:54 It’s the story they tell themselves about the event.
    1:02:57 That’s what gets encoded in their body.
    1:02:59 That’s actually what memory is, right?
    1:03:01 It’s events and every time you’ve remembered that event.
    1:03:04 – Is it the same for relationships too?
    1:03:06 In terms of like what gets remembered,
    1:03:10 it’s the story we tell ourselves about that moment?
    1:03:13 – Well, I think there’s a lot of science on this now
    1:03:15 that like memory is in events.
    1:03:17 It’s events and every other time you’ve remembered the event.
    1:03:20 To me, that’s the best way to think about it
    1:03:21 because it actually speaks to why therapy
    1:03:23 is powerful for people, right?
    1:03:24 Like you don’t change the events of your childhood,
    1:03:27 but by remembering them in a different way
    1:03:29 in the context of a safer relationship,
    1:03:31 actually your memory changes.
    1:03:32 Your memory’s literally change.
    1:03:35 And so if you go back to like you’ve yelled at your kid,
    1:03:37 you don’t feel good.
    1:03:38 Your kid’s alone in their room.
    1:03:40 You don’t want them to engage in self-blame,
    1:03:41 self-doubt, right?
    1:03:42 You don’t want that.
    1:03:44 Not only that, to me like I often really,
    1:03:46 I feel like I’m a magician when I go prepare with my kid.
    1:03:49 I’m like, oh my goodness, what happens next
    1:03:53 after the yell is going to have the most impact
    1:03:58 on what you end up encoding about the event.
    1:04:02 Like if I can go in and do a true repair,
    1:04:06 you’re gonna, you’re not gonna be messed up by that.
    1:04:09 You’re gonna learn that wasn’t your fault.
    1:04:11 You’re actually gonna watch an adult take responsibility
    1:04:13 for something that didn’t feel good to them.
    1:04:16 You’re gonna learn that after hard moments
    1:04:18 can be new understanding
    1:04:20 and people kind of working on themselves.
    1:04:22 Like what’s a better lesson to my kid than that?
    1:04:26 That’s why I say it was an amazing opportunity.
    1:04:29 And so to actually engage in repair, there’s two steps.
    1:04:34 And I think the first step is one that’s not talked about
    1:04:37 a lot and it’s why so many of us
    1:04:38 have a hard time repairing or apologizing.
    1:04:41 And the first step, and this is gonna be full circle,
    1:04:43 is really repairing with ourselves.
    1:04:45 If someone says like, I have a really hard time apologizing
    1:04:47 or my husband, my wife, my mom really can’t apologize.
    1:04:52 What they probably mean is they actually,
    1:04:55 and chance is very similar to why someone
    1:04:56 wouldn’t take responsibility for getting a bad grade.
    1:05:00 They’ve equated the thing they did
    1:05:02 with the type of person they are.
    1:05:03 And so as long as me yelling at my son
    1:05:07 means I’m a monster and a bad mom,
    1:05:10 there’s no humanly possible way I could repair.
    1:05:13 My body wouldn’t even let me.
    1:05:15 I can’t face the idea of being an awful person.
    1:05:20 In fact, if I stay in that place
    1:05:22 when I repair with my kid, probably not repairing.
    1:05:24 I’m probably going to ask my kid to do me a service.
    1:05:26 You forgive me, right?
    1:05:27 You forgive me, right?
    1:05:28 You still love me, right?
    1:05:29 You love me.
    1:05:30 I’m actually like asking my kid
    1:05:31 to like give me back my goodness.
    1:05:34 That’s like so not their job.
    1:05:36 Repairing with ourselves really means,
    1:05:39 and I really do this.
    1:05:40 Some people are like,
    1:05:41 what does that really mean practically?
    1:05:42 I’m like, no, literally.
    1:05:43 Like I go into a bathroom, I sit on a closed toilet,
    1:05:46 I put my feet on the ground, I put a hand on my heart,
    1:05:49 and I’ll say to myself like,
    1:05:51 I’m not proud of yelling at my kid,
    1:05:55 and that yelling doesn’t define me.
    1:05:57 And I think this exercise is powerful
    1:06:00 for a million reasons,
    1:06:01 but like in general, I put up my two hands
    1:06:03 and I look at one and I’m like,
    1:06:05 this is who I am.
    1:06:06 This is my identity.
    1:06:08 And I look at the other hand,
    1:06:08 I say, this is what I did.
    1:06:10 This is my behavior.
    1:06:11 I’m a good person who yelled at my kid.
    1:06:15 I’m a good parent who was having a hard time.
    1:06:19 And I’ll notice, especially after like the bad moments,
    1:06:21 those hands start to come closer together.
    1:06:23 And I’m like, no, I’m not like,
    1:06:24 this is the worst.
    1:06:25 And I can’t repair with my son from that place.
    1:06:28 I won’t.
    1:06:29 But if I like stay in that place,
    1:06:30 I’m like, no, like nobody’s perfect.
    1:06:32 I didn’t mess up my kid forever.
    1:06:34 And there is something to me to saying like,
    1:06:36 you know, my latest behavior doesn’t define me.
    1:06:39 I’m a good parent, Becky.
    1:06:40 I’m still a good parent.
    1:06:41 And I’ll look at one hand
    1:06:42 and I’ll look at the other hand
    1:06:43 who is having a hard time.
    1:06:44 I feel something like release a little bit in my body.
    1:06:47 And then really what’s happened
    1:06:48 is I’ve re-accessed really my own good inside-ness
    1:06:52 separate from this behavior.
    1:06:54 And if anyone thinks it’s important
    1:06:56 aren’t you letting yourself off the hook?
    1:06:57 The only way to let yourself off the hook
    1:07:00 is to conflate your behavior with your identity.
    1:07:03 Because as long as you’re in a place of self-blame,
    1:07:05 it’s actually a very like egotistical place
    1:07:07 and you’re kind of like descending into this abyss.
    1:07:09 You can’t reflect.
    1:07:10 You can’t change.
    1:07:11 You can’t wonder, what coping skills do I need?
    1:07:13 What do I need to do differently the next time?
    1:07:15 It doesn’t make an excuse,
    1:07:16 but what was going on in my day that left me so fried
    1:07:19 and overwhelmed and how could I change that next time?
    1:07:21 The only way you can reflect and learn
    1:07:23 is by repairing with yourself.
    1:07:25 – Yeah, it’s sort of basically you’re saying,
    1:07:27 I’m not gonna be defined by this behavior.
    1:07:30 I’m not gonna let that define who I am
    1:07:33 even though they can both be true, right?
    1:07:35 I did this thing.
    1:07:36 I don’t wanna be the person who does that type of thing.
    1:07:39 And yet I did it.
    1:07:40 And yet it doesn’t have to define who I am or my future.
    1:07:44 – That’s exactly right.
    1:07:46 And then you’ve kind of like, I do think about that.
    1:07:49 You’ve like re-accessed this thing inside of you.
    1:07:50 Like I’m kind of, I’m still like,
    1:07:52 I haven’t lost that good inside in this.
    1:07:54 Now I don’t need my kid to find it for me.
    1:07:56 Now I don’t need them to validate it.
    1:07:58 That’s, you know, not the point of a repair.
    1:08:00 That is the opposite.
    1:08:01 And now I can actually go and do a true repair with my kid.
    1:08:04 And to me, a repair, you know,
    1:08:06 I don’t think there’s an exact formula,
    1:08:08 but like to some degree, you name what happened.
    1:08:10 You take responsibility
    1:08:13 and you state what you would do differently the next time.
    1:08:15 And I think, I think especially that,
    1:08:17 I think all those components are pretty important.
    1:08:18 So I might say, hey, I’m thinking about yelling at you
    1:08:23 when you were, you know, playing video games earlier.
    1:08:26 The reason I want to name it specifically, again,
    1:08:29 I always think that kids had the tendency to self-doubt
    1:08:31 just to again, make themselves feel better.
    1:08:33 And I always want my kids to go into adulthood
    1:08:35 being like the things I see
    1:08:36 and the things I noticed really are true.
    1:08:38 And so I think just like validating that
    1:08:40 when I yelled at you and you were playing video games
    1:08:42 is a way of my son of being like,
    1:08:43 okay, I didn’t make that up, like that did happen.
    1:08:47 I’m really sorry.
    1:08:48 And to me, this line matters and it’s controversial.
    1:08:50 So I want to talk about it with you.
    1:08:51 It’s never your fault when I yell, you know,
    1:08:55 I’m really working on managing my own frustration,
    1:08:57 even my system around how you do video games
    1:08:59 because it is important you end at the time we said,
    1:09:02 and there’s definitely a smoother way around that.
    1:09:05 And even when you don’t, like it’s my job
    1:09:07 to like, you know, approach that in a calmer way.
    1:09:09 And that’s, you know,
    1:09:11 and then I think a couple of things can happen.
    1:09:13 It depends on your kid’s age too, you know,
    1:09:15 but most of the time kids will look at you
    1:09:17 and they’ll say like, whatever,
    1:09:19 or they’ll say, can I have my snack now?
    1:09:22 Or you’re so weird if it’s new, you know,
    1:09:24 they’ll say something like that.
    1:09:25 And I think it’s easier to walk out of the room
    1:09:26 being like, oh my goodness,
    1:09:27 like I just like did such major internal work
    1:09:29 to make that happen and my kid didn’t even care.
    1:09:31 They cared, do not take the bait,
    1:09:33 especially if it’s new,
    1:09:33 it’s a lot for them to process,
    1:09:35 to be treated like someone who’s deserving of a repair.
    1:09:39 And whenever any of us are kind of experienced something
    1:09:43 emotional, a lot of us kind of push people away
    1:09:45 to like have enough distance
    1:09:47 to like try to like retake it in in our own time.
    1:09:51 And so I know with 100% conviction
    1:09:54 that it will make a difference to your kid,
    1:09:56 even if they don’t gratify you
    1:09:58 by saying something back, that’s kind in the moment.
    1:10:00 – Is it different or where is it different
    1:10:03 when it comes to repairing with a partner or spouse?
    1:10:06 – Great question.
    1:10:08 I think it’s both different and it feels totally different
    1:10:10 and we all be included,
    1:10:12 can get into such a state of willfulness
    1:10:15 instead of willingness, with our partners.
    1:10:18 You know, I think it’s the same thing.
    1:10:22 It’s like you’re taking responsibility for what you did.
    1:10:26 You’re owning your side of the equation.
    1:10:28 You know, I think a lot of us,
    1:10:29 let’s say y’all at your partner,
    1:10:30 it’s easy to be like, well, if you didn’t do this thing,
    1:10:32 you know, or, you know,
    1:10:34 if you had said this instead,
    1:10:35 I wouldn’t have reacted that way, right?
    1:10:37 But at the end of the day,
    1:10:39 we own our reactions and we’re responsible for,
    1:10:43 you know, how we cope with things.
    1:10:45 – Maybe it’s embarrassing,
    1:10:46 but this is something I really struggle with sometimes
    1:10:51 in particular moments when somebody
    1:10:54 tells me how they’re feeling
    1:10:56 and the implication is that I did something
    1:10:59 that’s caused them to feel that way.
    1:11:02 I catch myself saying, I’m sorry you’re feeling that way.
    1:11:07 That doesn’t seem like a good way to respond or lead to.
    1:11:14 – Did your partner want me to help you with this?
    1:11:18 – Yeah, well, it’s sort of like,
    1:11:20 because it’s like I’m insulating myself
    1:11:22 from any accountability,
    1:11:24 but in some cases, I might not agree with it, right?
    1:11:27 So this is where my mind goes where it’s like,
    1:11:28 well, I don’t agree that you should feel that way, perhaps,
    1:11:32 or I don’t agree that I did anything that caused that.
    1:11:35 How do I acknowledge and validate and repair?
    1:11:39 And yeah, what’s a better way to respond in all of it?
    1:11:43 – No, so let’s just like go further into that.
    1:11:46 So, ’cause you said like, I don’t,
    1:11:47 what you said I thought was compelling, like,
    1:11:48 I don’t agree.
    1:11:49 Is that the word you used?
    1:11:50 – Yeah. – I don’t agree.
    1:11:52 So could you, is there a situation
    1:11:54 that we could delve into with a little more detail?
    1:11:57 – Well, if somebody’s like, you did this thing
    1:11:59 and it made me angry.
    1:12:00 You know, in my mind, I can be like,
    1:12:03 I don’t agree that you should be angry
    1:12:05 or I don’t agree that you should be feeling that way.
    1:12:08 It’s sort of like what I catch myself thinking.
    1:12:11 Yeah, and when I catch myself thinking that,
    1:12:14 the words that sometimes come out of my mouth
    1:12:17 is I’m sorry you’re feeling that way,
    1:12:21 which means I get to walk away without acknowledging
    1:12:27 that I have any contribution to this.
    1:12:29 And I’m not really, I’m sort of validating your feelings,
    1:12:33 but not quite validating your feelings at the same time.
    1:12:37 And it’s that dance between like, in some cases,
    1:12:40 like I just don’t think I did anything
    1:12:42 that would warrant that.
    1:12:44 And so like, I don’t want to apologize for something
    1:12:46 when I didn’t really do anything.
    1:12:49 – Yeah. – What do I do in the,
    1:12:50 am I crazy in this? – No, you’re 0% crazy.
    1:12:53 And so much of this resonates with me too.
    1:12:55 And I can get like this too.
    1:12:56 So there’s a couple of things that you said
    1:12:58 that I think we need to like,
    1:13:00 not like break down, but like poke around,
    1:13:02 that’s what I would say.
    1:13:03 So, first of all, most of us when we’re married,
    1:13:05 like right, or partnered, whatever we are,
    1:13:07 like the way we react to our spouse
    1:13:09 when they bring us up something they’re feeling,
    1:13:12 is we do, we get very like kind of egocentric.
    1:13:15 I do this too, where it’s like, well,
    1:13:16 I wouldn’t feel that way.
    1:13:18 Like, right?
    1:13:19 And I think most fights, partners get in,
    1:13:22 are kind of, they’re both saying to the other person,
    1:13:24 why can’t you be more like me?
    1:13:25 And then I’m like, well, why can’t you be more like me?
    1:13:26 Why can’t you be more like me?
    1:13:27 Right, we all find our partners,
    1:13:29 inherently we’ve attracted to them,
    1:13:31 because of all the ways they’re kind of different from us.
    1:13:33 And then over time,
    1:13:34 we become a little bit repelled
    1:13:36 by those exact same things.
    1:13:37 That’s like marriage, right?
    1:13:38 And so, those differences, I think are at the core, right?
    1:13:43 And so I actually think this relates
    1:13:46 to that feeling bench a lot, right?
    1:13:48 So, your partner is coming to you essentially saying,
    1:13:53 I don’t know, I’m gonna make up a situation,
    1:13:55 and tell me if it’s close enough.
    1:13:57 Like, you didn’t text me and tell me
    1:13:59 that you weren’t gonna stop at the store.
    1:14:01 And like, I’m really mad,
    1:14:02 ’cause I would have then gone by myself, I don’t know.
    1:14:05 Is that close enough?
    1:14:06 – Or you didn’t text me for two days,
    1:14:07 and I thought you would text me in between,
    1:14:09 or you know, like you were traveling.
    1:14:10 – Great, you didn’t text me for two days
    1:14:11 when you were traveling,
    1:14:12 like you didn’t even reach out to see
    1:14:13 how the last two days were going,
    1:14:14 like I’m really mad, right?
    1:14:16 Okay, great.
    1:14:17 So, I know this sounds silly,
    1:14:18 but I think I should really slow this down.
    1:14:20 Because what your partner is saying,
    1:14:23 what your partner’s not saying is a couple things.
    1:14:26 They’re not saying you did anything so important.
    1:14:29 They’re not saying I’m right to feel mad
    1:14:32 because like that’s the right feeling in the world.
    1:14:35 That’s like the right feeling in the world.
    1:14:37 And they’re not saying you’re a horrible person.
    1:14:40 And they’re not saying you’re at fault.
    1:14:42 I think the first thing that really helps
    1:14:45 when our partner shares how they feel
    1:14:47 is my partner is inviting me
    1:14:52 to get to know more about them.
    1:14:54 This is an invitation.
    1:14:57 They’re getting,
    1:14:59 they’re showing me another part of themselves
    1:15:00 that’s very vulnerable.
    1:15:02 And they’d like me to be in a relationship
    1:15:05 with that part of them.
    1:15:06 Now, I know this is tricky ’cause you’re like,
    1:15:08 but my partner’s also saying
    1:15:09 that I did something to relate to that part.
    1:15:11 Well, we all do this,
    1:15:12 but they’re also saying almost like more zoomed out,
    1:15:14 like, hey, now that that thing already happened,
    1:15:17 like I’m coming to you.
    1:15:18 And this is, I think the Gottman’s called,
    1:15:21 this is like a bid for connection.
    1:15:22 This is like an invitation.
    1:15:24 – Yeah.
    1:15:26 – Does that, as a start,
    1:15:27 does that shift things a little bit?
    1:15:29 – Totally, ’cause it’s like,
    1:15:30 I’m reaching out because I care.
    1:15:32 If I didn’t care, I wouldn’t be reaching out.
    1:15:33 I wouldn’t be engaging in this conversation.
    1:15:35 I would just ignore it
    1:15:36 and sort of like build resentment slowly.
    1:15:39 So the fact that you’re reaching out is a bid.
    1:15:42 – That’s right, is a bid, exactly.
    1:15:43 And you know, almost, and we don’t communicate this way,
    1:15:46 but it’s almost like what a partner’s saying is like,
    1:15:49 look, you and I are different.
    1:15:51 And if I was traveling for two days,
    1:15:53 you might not even notice that I didn’t text.
    1:15:56 Or I might come home and be like, wow, you were really busy.
    1:15:58 Tell me about how those days traveling were.
    1:16:01 And for me, when you don’t text for those two days,
    1:16:05 I spiral a little bit.
    1:16:06 I feel unseen.
    1:16:09 I feel like maybe you forgot about me.
    1:16:11 You know, maybe that’s dramatic,
    1:16:13 but that’s in somewhere inside me.
    1:16:15 And my need is for more communication from you
    1:16:19 than your need would be from me.
    1:16:21 I think if someone said it to us, we’d be like,
    1:16:23 okay, when you lay it out that way,
    1:16:24 like I guess when we say I don’t agree,
    1:16:27 what we’re really usually saying is,
    1:16:29 I wouldn’t feel that way if I were you.
    1:16:31 Which I don’t think anyone would disagree with, right?
    1:16:34 I think one of the hardest parts
    1:16:36 about being in a relationship
    1:16:37 with someone who’s inherently different
    1:16:39 is that like, wait, I wouldn’t feel that way.
    1:16:40 But you do feel that way.
    1:16:42 And I do love you.
    1:16:43 And I am choosing to be in a relationship with you.
    1:16:46 So we have this choice.
    1:16:47 It’s like, I can kind of lean on,
    1:16:50 and I think like there’s my righteousness,
    1:16:52 I wouldn’t feel that way.
    1:16:54 Or I can be curious about getting to know more of you.
    1:16:59 And I think you’re right then,
    1:17:00 same thing with our kids.
    1:17:01 I’m sorry you feel that way.
    1:17:03 Probably something we should always catch ourselves
    1:17:04 if we can before we say it,
    1:17:05 because it feels like it’s like neither here nor there.
    1:17:08 And so many of the lines we talked about honestly,
    1:17:11 if you think about a partner, right?
    1:17:12 Who says this, right?
    1:17:13 You were gone for two days.
    1:17:15 Like, it’s the same thing.
    1:17:17 They’re like sitting on a bench, right?
    1:17:19 And they’re like sad.
    1:17:21 They’re sad.
    1:17:23 Or they’re mad, usually under mad is sad.
    1:17:26 Also, you know, so it’s probably a little bit of both, right?
    1:17:28 I’m mad, I’m sad.
    1:17:29 And if you think about sitting down, right?
    1:17:32 You’d say like, it’s actually a great first line.
    1:17:34 Like, I’m so glad you’re telling me that.
    1:17:36 Like, right?
    1:17:37 And it’s so interesting how much that diffuses mad
    1:17:40 right away, because like most people,
    1:17:42 when they’re angry, they’re ready to fight, right?
    1:17:44 And like they’re gearing up, right?
    1:17:46 And actually, under mad usually is
    1:17:49 some more vulnerable emotion.
    1:17:50 And I think like, I’m so glad you’re telling me about that,
    1:17:52 is it usually starts to get a little closer
    1:17:55 than actually that next line, like, I believe you.
    1:17:58 Like, I believe you that you were really hurt.
    1:18:00 And again, you’re not saying,
    1:18:01 and I think this is actually so important in parenting too,
    1:18:05 understanding how someone feels in a deep way
    1:18:10 is not at all the same thing as agreeing
    1:18:14 or saying, I would feel that way too,
    1:18:17 or saying that some way is to feel is right in the world,
    1:18:19 like in some grand way, it’s just understanding.
    1:18:22 It’s not condoning, it’s just understanding, right?
    1:18:26 And then like, oh, so tell me, tell me what that was like for you.
    1:18:28 Like those three lines, I think are actually
    1:18:31 like such an amazing guide in that situation.
    1:18:34 I think the problem with me is like,
    1:18:36 I don’t, I want to know more deep down inside.
    1:18:40 I also don’t want to necessarily,
    1:18:44 like my brain just goes to this place where it’s like,
    1:18:46 do you agree with this?
    1:18:48 Do you not agree with this?
    1:18:49 And like, that’s what I want to get out of is this.
    1:18:52 Like, I don’t want to be in that sort of binary mode
    1:18:54 because if I agree with it, I’m one person.
    1:18:57 And if I don’t agree with it,
    1:18:58 I’m a completely different person,
    1:19:00 which is like cold and distant.
    1:19:02 And if I do agree with it,
    1:19:03 well, then I’m sitting on that bench with you
    1:19:05 and I’m like, oh, totally, like I hate it when that happens.
    1:19:08 And yeah.
    1:19:09 And I would actually go so far, Shane, to say like,
    1:19:12 I actually don’t think it’s great to agree with it either.
    1:19:14 Like, I don’t know, you probably,
    1:19:15 maybe you wouldn’t feel that way.
    1:19:17 Like in my relationship,
    1:19:18 my husband says stuff to me all the time that I’m like,
    1:19:20 my first reaction to is like, oh, like, oh my God,
    1:19:22 because I wouldn’t feel that way.
    1:19:23 But I’m like, wait, like I’m in Becky mode.
    1:19:26 I know, okay, I want to feel that way.
    1:19:27 Like almost like who cares?
    1:19:28 Like he’s sharing with me how he feels or, you know,
    1:19:31 same thing as the opposite.
    1:19:32 So I actually think,
    1:19:34 I think it’s so helpful when we’re in relationships
    1:19:36 to get out of agreeing or disagreeing.
    1:19:40 I actually think, I don’t know,
    1:19:41 I’m just thinking about this now.
    1:19:42 Like when you’re curious about something,
    1:19:43 you’re not sure if you agree or disagree.
    1:19:45 You’re actually just like learning.
    1:19:47 – So in talking to you today,
    1:19:49 I think that’s the conclusion
    1:19:51 that I’ve sort of drawn for myself,
    1:19:52 which is just like approach it with curiosity and non-judgment
    1:19:56 and just try to understand the other person.
    1:19:58 And it’s sort of like I do with the podcast.
    1:20:01 Like I’m not judging what people say.
    1:20:03 I just want to see the world through your eyes.
    1:20:05 And I want to smell what you smell.
    1:20:07 And I don’t want to agree or disagree with what you’re saying.
    1:20:11 I just want to see what the world looks like
    1:20:12 through your lens.
    1:20:14 – I love that.
    1:20:15 And again, that idea of is it me against you
    1:20:18 versus me and you against a problem is helpful.
    1:20:20 Because if someone’s like,
    1:20:21 I tend to get kind of judgmental
    1:20:23 when my partner shares their feelings.
    1:20:24 And I tend to be like, well, I wouldn’t feel that way.
    1:20:26 And so I’m sorry, you feel that way.
    1:20:28 If you know that and you want to work on it,
    1:20:30 it’s an amazing thing to first share that with your partner
    1:20:32 to be like, this is something I’m working on.
    1:20:34 It’s like, you know, it really is.
    1:20:35 And this is totally not your responsibility.
    1:20:37 But again, because I see it as me and my partner
    1:20:39 against this problematic dynamic.
    1:20:41 I might say, look, the next time you do share
    1:20:44 when you’re mad at me, this is so not your responsibility.
    1:20:46 But if you’re able, right?
    1:20:49 If you could like say to me, like,
    1:20:51 I don’t need you to agree, just be curious.
    1:20:54 Whatever it is, it almost just would like
    1:20:56 bring up that part of you.
    1:20:58 Like, I just like that, I don’t know.
    1:21:00 And again, you don’t have to because it’s like,
    1:21:02 if my partner doesn’t, it doesn’t mean I’ve justified
    1:21:05 that I’m allowed to, you know, react with judgment.
    1:21:07 But to me, again, it makes us feel like,
    1:21:09 let’s together figure out where our conversation goes off
    1:21:13 and work together so we can, you know,
    1:21:16 move in a more productive direction.
    1:21:19 – I want to switch gears a little bit here.
    1:21:21 There’s so many other questions I have
    1:21:22 and some including from friends.
    1:21:24 I want to talk about something that a lot of my friends
    1:21:27 seem to be struggling with with their kids.
    1:21:29 And I’m going to use the term addiction,
    1:21:31 but I’m not using it in a clinical sense.
    1:21:33 I’m using it in the sense of like,
    1:21:35 teenagers specifically being addicted to screens.
    1:21:38 And I’m going to specify screens as their phone
    1:21:41 or video games.
    1:21:42 And that addiction shows some classic signs
    1:21:46 of an actual addiction, including behavior
    1:21:49 where you’re sneaking around, you’re hiding your phone,
    1:21:52 you’re doing things that you shouldn’t be doing.
    1:21:53 And maybe you’re missing school assignments
    1:21:56 because you’re at school and you’re playing video games.
    1:21:59 And so like it’s the baby steps towards an actual addiction
    1:22:02 and maybe a clinical sort of,
    1:22:05 what can we do as parents with the lying,
    1:22:09 the sneaking, and this is not,
    1:22:12 I mean, my kids exhibit this from time to time.
    1:22:15 I think most teenagers is just sort of like part
    1:22:18 of being a teenager as well.
    1:22:19 You walk in your kid’s room and maybe they have their phone
    1:22:22 and they’re trying to hide it and they’re covering it up
    1:22:24 and they’re lying about it.
    1:22:25 And how do we deal with screens specifically,
    1:22:30 borderline addiction where it’s causing other problems
    1:22:34 and the kids can’t self-regulate in terms of,
    1:22:37 I need to get off my phone, I’ve been on it enough today.
    1:22:41 – So first of all, the deck is stacked against us here.
    1:22:44 I just want to say this, like,
    1:22:45 I think back on the days where, I mean, I think this is true.
    1:22:48 Sorry, my history isn’t amazing,
    1:22:49 but like I’m guessing at some point kids could buy cigarettes,
    1:22:51 you know, and it’d be like, how do I stop my kids?
    1:22:53 How do I stop my kids?
    1:22:54 At some point the government’s like,
    1:22:55 we can’t leave it to parents.
    1:22:56 Like these things are awful.
    1:22:57 Like for kids, we know that they’re not in a place
    1:23:00 to make good decisions.
    1:23:01 And so there has to be legislation to make change.
    1:23:03 I really believe kids in screens like are the same
    1:23:06 and like we’re living in a time now
    1:23:07 where it’s just all on parents
    1:23:09 and I just feel for every parent.
    1:23:10 So it’s just, if it feels really hard
    1:23:12 and you’re struggling, like,
    1:23:14 I think that’s the best it gets, right?
    1:23:16 So I have a few more ideas than that.
    1:23:17 But so second, kids cannot self-regulate with phones, period.
    1:23:23 I would also say adults cannot self-regulate with phones.
    1:23:26 They are stronger than us.
    1:23:27 I have a very hard time if my phone’s anywhere near me,
    1:23:30 not grabbing it and thinking about something to do.
    1:23:32 So the idea that a kid won’t self-regulate
    1:23:35 or isn’t listening or isn’t getting off
    1:23:37 when they know their time is up,
    1:23:38 I think we have to actually say like,
    1:23:39 they are literally incapable of doing that.
    1:23:43 And I think that’s actually a really important foundation
    1:23:45 because it changes the types of interventions
    1:23:48 we would even think to use.
    1:23:50 So that’s two.
    1:23:52 Three.
    1:23:53 Our number one job as parents is to keep our kids safe.
    1:23:58 And maybe that’s obvious,
    1:23:59 but it’s also, it’s a line I’ve said to my kids
    1:24:01 since they were young when my issues weren’t screens,
    1:24:03 but it was like, I don’t know,
    1:24:05 throwing sand at another kid in the sandbox
    1:24:08 at which point I’d pick my son up.
    1:24:09 And he’s like, no, no.
    1:24:10 And even though he’d thrown five times,
    1:24:12 I’d say, I’m picking you up, I’m bringing you to the car.
    1:24:14 My number one job is to keep you safe.
    1:24:16 And I will keep you safe even when you’re upset with me.
    1:24:17 Like I used to like,
    1:24:18 and it’s so interesting how I think about that now.
    1:24:21 Our number one job is to keep our kids safe.
    1:24:23 And we love our kids so much that we will keep them safe
    1:24:25 even when they’re upset with us.
    1:24:27 And putting that into practice is messy for sure,
    1:24:30 but I still think the principle really matters.
    1:24:32 My number one job is not to keep my kid happy.
    1:24:35 It’s to keep my kids safe.
    1:24:37 I actually say that to make it a lot.
    1:24:39 What’s my number one job to keep you safe or happy?
    1:24:41 I’m gonna be like, I know I was safe.
    1:24:42 Right, but it’s really true.
    1:24:44 Okay, next.
    1:24:46 As parents, we can change our rules any time.
    1:24:50 Like to me, this is one of the biggest things
    1:24:52 I would talk about with parents in private practice.
    1:24:54 They’d be like, these are the things that aren’t working.
    1:24:57 And it would be like, their bedtime is too late
    1:24:58 or screen rules.
    1:24:59 I’d be like, okay, talking about changing them.
    1:25:00 They’re like, oh, it’s too late.
    1:25:02 It’s like, it’s been like this.
    1:25:04 You know, I don’t know, like imagine,
    1:25:06 imagine being on a plane, flying to California.
    1:25:09 And like, it’s not just turbulent,
    1:25:11 like major issues and you have to make an emergency landing.
    1:25:14 And the pilot’s like, well, I don’t know.
    1:25:16 We’ve got to go to Los Angeles.
    1:25:18 So I guess there’s nothing we can do.
    1:25:19 It’s like, what, like change course.
    1:25:22 And if the pilot was like,
    1:25:23 we’re going to make an emergency landing in Denver.
    1:25:26 And all the passengers are like, what, that’s so annoying.
    1:25:29 And the pilot was like, you know what, forget it, forget it.
    1:25:34 Everyone seems pretty upset.
    1:25:35 We’re just going to keep going.
    1:25:37 Like, I don’t think anyone would want that pilot.
    1:25:40 You’d actually probably be pissed at your pilot for,
    1:25:43 even though like, you believe maybe it’s dangerous,
    1:25:45 but maybe you underestimate it.
    1:25:46 You’re like, we have to lend a Denver.
    1:25:47 I’m so annoyed, but like, you’d be so freaking grateful
    1:25:50 that the pilot knew what their job was,
    1:25:53 even though people were putting up a protest.
    1:25:56 And like, we are that pilot for our kids.
    1:25:58 You can change altitude, change course, change rules.
    1:26:02 And if you know your kid has their phone in the room
    1:26:04 when they’re doing their homework, period.
    1:26:06 Like, our kids should not have their phones in their room
    1:26:08 when they’re doing their homework.
    1:26:09 And let’s even take that and play it out.
    1:26:12 Well, my kid always does.
    1:26:14 And they’re like, not just 13 anymore.
    1:26:16 They’re 17 and how could I change that?
    1:26:18 I’m going to walk through how to change that.
    1:26:20 Hey, sweetie, I have something to tell you
    1:26:21 and you’re, I know you’re not going to like it,
    1:26:23 but look, I’ve been thinking about certain things.
    1:26:26 And my number one job is to like help make good decisions.
    1:26:29 Even when you’re upset with me,
    1:26:30 that’s actually how much I love you.
    1:26:32 That I’m willing to make decisions
    1:26:33 that I really do believe are good for you,
    1:26:35 even if you’re going to be really, really mad at me.
    1:26:37 And I’m about to share one of those decisions.
    1:26:39 When you come home from school,
    1:26:41 we have a box to put your phone in.
    1:26:44 And it’s not walking it away.
    1:26:45 That phone comes back to you
    1:26:47 as soon as you finished your homework.
    1:26:48 And I know you’re used to having your phone in your room.
    1:26:51 And I know I’ve allowed it.
    1:26:52 I know we’ve argued about it.
    1:26:53 Starting tomorrow, it’s not happening.
    1:26:55 I just want to be fair, it’s not.
    1:26:56 And if you yell at me and if you’re mad, it’s not happening.
    1:26:59 And the reason it’s not happening
    1:27:01 is because it’s not like you have bad willpower.
    1:27:03 It is literally impossible to focus on schoolwork.
    1:27:07 For even adults, it would be.
    1:27:08 While we have in a device
    1:27:10 that has so many fun games on it right next to us.
    1:27:12 And I know that’s a change.
    1:27:14 And I know that the first couple of days will be hard.
    1:27:16 And I actually know that at some point after,
    1:27:18 it’ll become a lot easier.
    1:27:20 And I know in my modeling of that first of all,
    1:27:25 it’s really easy to say that to you.
    1:27:27 Like you’re not my kid
    1:27:28 and you’re not about to yell at me, right?
    1:27:30 But what parents say to me all the time is they’re like,
    1:27:32 the way you said that sounded like actually nice,
    1:27:35 but like no nonsense.
    1:27:37 Like I didn’t doubt that you meant that, you know?
    1:27:40 ‘Cause I think our kids smell our doubt.
    1:27:42 And also what we do, and I just wanna model this.
    1:27:44 I know you noticed your grades have been slipping.
    1:27:49 And I’m just thinking about your phone in your room.
    1:27:51 And I know you know that’s not a good idea, right?
    1:27:54 You know that’s not a good idea, right?
    1:27:56 And I think today we should try.
    1:27:58 That literally is like a pilot coming on
    1:28:00 and being like, you guys know it’s a good idea
    1:28:03 to land in Denver, right?
    1:28:04 Like can I just get a vote out there?
    1:28:06 Don’t you think it’s a good idea
    1:28:07 to have an emergency landing?
    1:28:08 You’d be like, where is my leader?
    1:28:10 This is crazy talk.
    1:28:11 Just tell me, you know?
    1:28:12 And I think that metaphor matters so much
    1:28:15 because what I would tell parents to do,
    1:28:17 and I really mean this concretely,
    1:28:18 get out your phone, first write a script for yourself.
    1:28:21 You can read it to your kids if this is new for you
    1:28:23 to kind of embody your authority in an appropriate way, right?
    1:28:27 Not in a mean way, but an appropriate way.
    1:28:28 Get out a voice recorder and read the script
    1:28:30 into your phone and then play it back to yourself.
    1:28:32 It’s amazing.
    1:28:33 You’ll be like, wow, I really sounded
    1:28:35 like I was asking my kid.
    1:28:35 I didn’t even believe myself.
    1:28:36 I didn’t even believe myself.
    1:28:38 And then say it again.
    1:28:39 And you’d be like, wow, that sounded like mean
    1:28:41 and harsh and critical.
    1:28:42 OK, OK, so I have the two ends.
    1:28:44 Let me try it again.
    1:28:45 Literally, just like we said, it’s like practice, right?
    1:28:50 And it goes back to boundaries.
    1:28:52 I can’t ask my kid to be doing my job for me.
    1:28:57 And I think we do that a lot with kids, and they smell it.
    1:29:00 And it’s why they act out more, not to take advantage of us,
    1:29:02 but because they don’t feel like they have a sturdy leader.
    1:29:06 Do you think that’s– that happened or more
    1:29:08 prone to happen when we want them?
    1:29:11 A lot of parents seem to want to be friends with their kids
    1:29:14 first and sort of the pilot second.
    1:29:16 And do you think when we conflate those two things
    1:29:19 that we tend to be like, get in trouble?
    1:29:22 Yeah, it’s interesting.
    1:29:23 I think about how important it is to be connected to our kids.
    1:29:26 And let’s say friends is a form of connection.
    1:29:28 I don’t know, though.
    1:29:29 In my close friendships, I’m not boundaryless.
    1:29:32 I don’t think a good friendship is always
    1:29:33 making my friends happy.
    1:29:35 So if that’s someone definition of friend,
    1:29:37 then I guess then they’re trying to be friends with their kids.
    1:29:39 To me, that’s never how I try to be friends with my friends.
    1:29:41 Definitely not with my kids.
    1:29:42 To me, any good relationship comes from both being
    1:29:45 connected to someone else and connected to yourself.
    1:29:50 Yeah, maybe it’s more like you want your kid to like you,
    1:29:53 I guess, which is a very human sort of need, right?
    1:29:55 And I think, though, we know also from so much research,
    1:30:00 how much teens find so much comfort when their parents are
    1:30:05 protecting them.
    1:30:06 They don’t gratify you.
    1:30:07 Like, by the way, if I said this thing just about the phone
    1:30:10 thing, my son, even if I deliver it the way,
    1:30:13 it’s not going to be like, mom, you are such a sturdy leader,
    1:30:16 and I feel so taken care of by you.
    1:30:18 I just want to tell you that.
    1:30:19 No, no, he would not.
    1:30:22 That would be crazy down my son.
    1:30:23 My son, too, would be like, that’s not fair.
    1:30:25 And all my friends do.
    1:30:26 And you’re saying, you know, trust me.
    1:30:27 Oh, are you saying, you don’t trust me?
    1:30:28 That would be like, sweetie, this is not about trust.
    1:30:30 This is actually just about me making a decision
    1:30:34 that I know is the right one.
    1:30:35 That’s really all it’s about.
    1:30:36 I think this also relates to something we aren’t taught
    1:30:40 and therefore don’t expect as parents,
    1:30:42 that two things that are totally independent
    1:30:44 is us making a good decision as a parent
    1:30:46 and our kid having a big emotional reaction.
    1:30:49 They’re both equally true and equally valid.
    1:30:51 We kind of fool ourselves into thinking,
    1:30:54 like, if I make an amazing decision as a parent,
    1:30:56 my kid’s going to be like, that sounds good.
    1:30:59 But we also do the opposite, is that when we see our kid be
    1:31:02 very mad at us, we think it means we made a bad decision.
    1:31:05 And to me, the idea of like, two things are true.
    1:31:07 I’m allowed to make decisions.
    1:31:09 And my kid is allowed to have emotional reactions.
    1:31:11 Neither is more true than the other.
    1:31:13 Neither is more right than the other.
    1:31:14 They’re just two truths I have to hold at once.
    1:31:17 Can really prepare us.
    1:31:18 And so if you’re going to have a conversation like this,
    1:31:19 we can go through other things about this too.
    1:31:21 Actually, going in as a parent, and I always call this
    1:31:23 emotional vaccination, right?
    1:31:25 Like, vaccinating ourselves.
    1:31:27 Like, I would actually go through this.
    1:31:28 This was me and I was nervous.
    1:31:30 And this was like a new thing for me to do.
    1:31:32 I’d probably like, play this out with a partner or friend.
    1:31:35 I’d be like, can you be our son?
    1:31:37 Like, can you do it?
    1:31:38 I’d give myself a rep.
    1:31:39 Like, it is like taking foul shots in the gym.
    1:31:41 Like, I find sports to be like the most useful metaphor.
    1:31:43 Like, you know, we take foul shots in the gym,
    1:31:46 so we can do it in the game.
    1:31:47 Like, well, you’re going to do something for the very first
    1:31:49 time to your teenage son, who you know is going to be upset.
    1:31:51 And you think that’s going to feel great or feel even
    1:31:53 successful, of course not.
    1:31:54 Like, do a drive run, do it with your friend, and have them.
    1:31:56 I would really have my husband in the case, because like, no.
    1:31:59 And like, it will feel a little funny because I know he’s acting.
    1:32:02 But my body will start to develop like a little bit of a circuit
    1:32:06 for saying it, for tolerating it.
    1:32:08 So then at least with my son, it’s my second time.
    1:32:11 And not like the first time.
    1:32:13 No, I think that’s a beautiful way to sort of tie it together.
    1:32:15 Do you think a lot of my friends sort of like try to,
    1:32:20 I don’t know, resolve this issue is the right word.
    1:32:22 But it’s like, well, if you get above, you know, 80,
    1:32:26 you can have X amount of video game time per day.
    1:32:29 And if your report card has your grades above 90,
    1:32:32 you can have X times two.
    1:32:34 What is that doing?
    1:32:36 Well, I think now we’re talking about so many different things
    1:32:38 about like grades and about our focus on them and kids building
    1:32:44 intrinsic motivation versus extrinsic motivation.
    1:32:47 And, you know, the part of that that I think is well-intentioned,
    1:32:52 OK, is I mean, everything’s well-intentioned.
    1:32:55 But the part of me that strikes me about that in a positive way
    1:32:57 is I think to some degree we’re saying,
    1:32:59 I want to make sure you’re like doing the developmental tasks
    1:33:03 of your age, like you’re supposed to be going to school,
    1:33:05 you’re supposed to be doing your work.
    1:33:06 And if I think you’re– and we both
    1:33:08 think you’re kind of capable of performing a certain way,
    1:33:11 not for some outside reason, but just because it’s
    1:33:13 in line with your abilities, like I
    1:33:14 want to make sure you’re progressing in that way.
    1:33:16 And maybe these are markers that you’re kind of completing
    1:33:20 those developmental tasks.
    1:33:21 I get that.
    1:33:22 I don’t think that’s how kids receive it.
    1:33:24 I think it feels like grades are the thing that matters.
    1:33:27 And, you know, that’s all.
    1:33:29 I mean, I don’t think there’s a perfect system.
    1:33:33 So that’s why I think we’re all like muddying around in this.
    1:33:37 I do think when it comes to, you know, screen time and how much
    1:33:42 and when, to me, this is like actually a great time
    1:33:45 to call kind of a family meeting of sorts.
    1:33:48 That’s what I call them, where especially as your kids get older
    1:33:50 to say, hey, I think we should have a meeting, you know,
    1:33:52 and really talk about screen time and when it happens
    1:33:55 and where it happens.
    1:33:56 And I’m going to have some ideas.
    1:33:58 You’re going to have some ideas.
    1:33:59 We’ll kind of get them all down on paper.
    1:34:00 And then we’ll probably agree on some ideas
    1:34:02 that each of us don’t totally love, but can agree to, right?
    1:34:06 And then actually doing that and to be like, OK.
    1:34:09 So when should you– let’s talk about when you’re
    1:34:12 going to do video games.
    1:34:13 Other things related to that are homework.
    1:34:16 Are, you know, playing, you know, with your sister, you know,
    1:34:21 or, you know, like general, how are you doing in school?
    1:34:25 I don’t think that’s the only thing that matters,
    1:34:26 but maybe it’s one data source that we think about.
    1:34:29 OK, let’s go through it.
    1:34:30 And then what I think is really key, OK,
    1:34:33 is when you start to brainstorm, first of all,
    1:34:35 to literally write things down.
    1:34:36 That’s not, like, just something I’m saying.
    1:34:38 When you write down things other people are saying,
    1:34:41 especially if they’re topics that are kind of conflictual,
    1:34:43 the other person immediately feels respected, right?
    1:34:45 Like, imagine your boss being like, wait,
    1:34:47 you want to raise me, write down all the reasons.
    1:34:49 You’d be like, wow, I feel very seen, you know?
    1:34:51 So to actually write it down and to start this off
    1:34:53 in a productive way, it’s really helpful to, like,
    1:34:58 break the ice a little bit as a parent
    1:34:59 with, like, the first thing.
    1:35:00 So it’d be like, when can you play video games, right?
    1:35:04 And maybe, like, I would start off saying, like, you know,
    1:35:08 I’ve actually totally changed my mind,
    1:35:09 and I kind of feel like you probably only need three hours
    1:35:12 of sleep, and so I think you should play video games from,
    1:35:15 I don’t know, probably from, like, 10 p.m. to, like, 4 a.m.
    1:35:18 OK, so I’m just going to write it down.
    1:35:19 And, like, my son would be like, whoa.
    1:35:21 But, like, if I get the eye roll, he thinks he’s rolling his eyes,
    1:35:24 and I’m like, I just won there, because, like, I’m just,
    1:35:26 like, starting.
    1:35:26 So I’d write down, literally, one, video games from,
    1:35:30 you know, 10 p.m. to 4 a.m. OK, two.
    1:35:32 And as soon as you start that way,
    1:35:34 your kid’s going to be a little more engaged, right?
    1:35:36 And then I would write it down, and then you review, oh, 12.
    1:35:39 You know, oh, not many hours of video games.
    1:35:40 Oh, you know what, I don’t know.
    1:35:42 10 p.m. to 4 a.m., it’s like, it’s kind of a lot, you know?
    1:35:44 And I don’t know, maybe you need more than three hours.
    1:35:46 I’m just going to, like, kind of put an X in that one.
    1:35:47 That’s probably not our best idea. And, again, what you hear in this example
    1:35:50 is this is me and my son against kind of the video game schedule.
    1:35:56 It’s not me against my son.
    1:35:59 I love that, because you’re sitting on the bench in your word,
    1:36:02 and you’re like, here’s the problem.
    1:36:03 We’re on the same side of the table,
    1:36:05 and we’re trying to address this problem together.
    1:36:07 I think that’s a really effective way to do it.
    1:36:09 How do you think about currency?
    1:36:11 And I think that’s what it is, right?
    1:36:12 People are trying to find a currency to control a behavior.
    1:36:16 Yes.
    1:36:16 And it has implications on long term, but, like, half the time,
    1:36:21 and, like, I feel like I deserve an Olympic medal just for the kids,
    1:36:25 you know, not dying that day and making it through the day.
    1:36:29 And I imagine other parents feel the same way.
    1:36:31 You know, it’s like, oh, my God, you know, I just did this normal day,
    1:36:36 but it feels like an Olympic-level effort.
    1:36:38 I just need to, like, find these little things that I mean,
    1:36:42 there’s trade-offs, right?
    1:36:43 Like, I need to figure out today before I can figure out long term.
    1:36:48 How do you think about that in terms of, yeah,
    1:36:51 we want our kids to be intrinsically motivated.
    1:36:54 We can’t let them regulate their own screen time.
    1:36:57 For many parents of teens, it’s one of the few currencies they actually care about.
    1:37:03 I mean, I remember myself as a teenager.
    1:37:05 My mom would be like, you can’t have this.
    1:37:06 I’d be like, whatever.
    1:37:08 I don’t need anything, you know, like, that whole attitude.
    1:37:10 And at one point she took everything out of my room.
    1:37:12 She literally, this is my mom, right?
    1:37:14 Like, we’re going to have a power struggle.
    1:37:16 You are going to lose.
    1:37:17 I come in my room.
    1:37:18 There’s, like, a mattress on the floor.
    1:37:20 There’s no nightstand.
    1:37:21 There’s no alarm clock.
    1:37:22 There’s no nothing.
    1:37:24 And, you know, in that moment, I was like, all right, it’s probably not.
    1:37:29 But of course, I’m, like, lying there just, like, looking at the ceiling.
    1:37:33 I will show no weakness, right?
    1:37:35 Well, I’m trying to get to the bottom of your question,
    1:37:37 because when I think about currency, to me, and maybe it kind of goes back
    1:37:42 to your question of, like, the status of our relationship with our kid.
    1:37:46 To me, if we’re thinking about our relationship with our kid
    1:37:49 in terms of what we could give or take away that they care about,
    1:37:53 we’re not in a great place.
    1:37:56 Because I think if someone heard my husband being like,
    1:37:58 what can I take away from Becky or give her?
    1:38:01 If she just, you know, did the dishwasher more?
    1:38:04 They’d be like, wow, I don’t know if I can answer your question
    1:38:07 as much as I’m struck by this disturbing nature of your question.
    1:38:12 Well, so this is super interesting.
    1:38:13 So I was at the gym before this, and I was actually thinking about this.
    1:38:15 And I was like, I wonder if a good indicator that what I’m doing as parenting
    1:38:21 is probably not ideal if I wouldn’t do it to an adult.
    1:38:25 I mean, I think that that’s, you know, like, here’s a great example of that.
    1:38:28 Like, I think one of the number one things people tell me is there’s a lot of things.
    1:38:33 But it’s, my kid doesn’t listen.
    1:38:36 My kid doesn’t listen to me.
    1:38:36 They don’t listen to me, right?
    1:38:38 Like, it’s so common.
    1:38:40 And, you know, I think about this.
    1:38:42 Like, if I was sitting on my couch and I was just like, you know,
    1:38:45 in the two minutes I have before my kids go to bed and I go to bed,
    1:38:47 my two minutes, I’m like reading a book and my husband was also on the couch.
    1:38:50 And he’s like, hey, can you go to the kitchen and get me water?
    1:38:53 And I was like, I’m like reading my book.
    1:38:55 Like, sorry, like you can get water.
    1:38:57 And if he was like, you have a listening problem
    1:38:59 and I’m going to take away your phone.
    1:39:01 OK, I just, I feel like if someone was watching, I feel like they’d be like, Becky,
    1:39:06 like, I feel like that’s gaslighting at best, maybe abusive.
    1:39:08 Like, I feel like that is, that is, if anything, like that is his problem.
    1:39:12 You just didn’t get him water, right?
    1:39:14 And we do that to our kids all the time.
    1:39:16 And if you’re like me and you’re where’s the moment you’re like, turn off the TV.
    1:39:18 You’re not even near them.
    1:39:19 You’re just like, yeah, it’d be like my husband in his room being like, go get me
    1:39:22 water and bring it to the bedroom.
    1:39:24 And I’m like, WTF, no.
    1:39:27 And then he punishes me.
    1:39:28 And we do that to our kids all the time.
    1:39:31 So listening, cooperation, like why would I get my husband water?
    1:39:36 Really, I’d either get him water because I was scared of him.
    1:39:39 I would.
    1:39:40 Wiring fear next to love is not something I recommend.
    1:39:46 Because, yes, what that means, I’ll lay it out is your kid will go into their adult
    1:39:49 relationships, thinking loving relationships are one in which you fear your partner.
    1:39:53 And that’s who they’ll be attracted to, literally.
    1:39:55 That’s what their attraction will be.
    1:39:56 I don’t know any adult who wants that.
    1:39:58 So I do not recommend for a lot of reasons.
    1:40:00 Why else would I get my husband water?
    1:40:01 Well, first of all, I probably wouldn’t have yelled at me across.
    1:40:04 But if he was like, I know this is annoying and we’re both like kind of
    1:40:07 trying to do our own things or any way you get me water.
    1:40:08 The reason I’d say yes is because I felt close to him.
    1:40:11 Maybe early in the day, he listened to me.
    1:40:13 Maybe he’s been really supportive.
    1:40:14 And that’s why, because I feel close to him.
    1:40:17 And if he said to me, if you get me water, if you get me water, I’m just
    1:40:20 laughing, if you get me water 10 days in a row, I’m going to give you a diamond necklace.
    1:40:23 Okay.
    1:40:23 I’d be like, okay, I probably will.
    1:40:25 But I would also feel like our relationship is probably like not in a great place.
    1:40:30 It’s transactional.
    1:40:31 It’s transactional.
    1:40:32 What’s so tricky is teens will get to the age where like they don’t have to hang out
    1:40:37 with you and like they’re too big to put in a time out and they don’t care about
    1:40:44 sticker charts and they don’t care about rewards.
    1:40:47 And I think about this teen who, you know, him and his parents came to see me, you
    1:40:53 know, in my practice and they came only because he had stopped going to school.
    1:40:56 So like it was, you know, that’s pretty intense, like school refusal, right?
    1:40:58 Like, then you’re like, shoot, like, what do I do?
    1:41:00 My 14 year old stopping.
    1:41:01 And I got the whole history and this was a kid and the parents were always getting
    1:41:05 all these recommendations.
    1:41:06 Like the kid was quote, difficult.
    1:41:07 So he did a lot of time outs and punishments and sticker charts and rewards
    1:41:10 and ignoring and power struggles.
    1:41:11 And they missed out on 14 years of having a relationship with him.
    1:41:15 They’d never relationship with him.
    1:41:17 And now he was big and old and never too late.
    1:41:21 We did so much work.
    1:41:22 There was a lot of repair and moving forward in a very different direction.
    1:41:25 But yeah, it’s like, it sounds so obvious, but it’s like, our kids are human.
    1:41:30 Like they’re human.
    1:41:31 They’re closer to adults than they are to animals that you’re trying to train
    1:41:35 and shape their behavior.
    1:41:37 And yes, I think the way to think about your relationship with your kid and
    1:41:41 the place it’s at is like the way we relate to each other and the way I relate
    1:41:45 to my child, like it’s not the same.
    1:41:47 But is it based on the same principles at least in which I would engage in my
    1:41:52 like healthiest adult relationship?
    1:41:55 No, I think that’s a really good approach to it.
    1:41:58 I mean, I haven’t really thought of it in that way.
    1:42:00 I mean, I sort of like am I worst?
    1:42:02 I catch myself using that as a currency.
    1:42:04 And you know, it’s a currency when I say you can’t have it until you do your homework.
    1:42:09 Right. And there’s a way in which I think that could be shifted.
    1:42:12 So like, let’s say it’s like, you can’t have your phone until you do homework.
    1:42:15 I mean, this actually is all about that mindset.
    1:42:17 Am I looking at you on one side of the table or are we on the same side of the table?
    1:42:20 Like my son, my right has a phone.
    1:42:23 OK, my oldest.
    1:42:25 And like he doesn’t get his between getting home and doing his homework, right?
    1:42:29 He doesn’t have his phone and then he gets it after.
    1:42:31 But not because like versus like not because like I’m not going to give it
    1:42:35 to you until after it’s like out of again, like this is a problem.
    1:42:38 We’re both in together.
    1:42:39 Like it would it’s hard to have your phone and perform well.
    1:42:42 And like, I know he wants to do well inherently.
    1:42:46 I also know phones are addicting and playing a video game or looking up
    1:42:49 stats on ESPN is inherently more fun than doing hard math homework for anyone.
    1:42:54 So I’m helping him, I’m protecting him, but through this boundary.
    1:42:59 So hey, sweetie, just a reminder, your phone goes here.
    1:43:01 It’s just too hard for any of us to focus, you know, with our phone
    1:43:04 right there when we’re doing hard work.
    1:43:06 And yeah, as soon as it’s all done, this will come back to you.
    1:43:08 Like, and that’s also the way I would want, again, like my partner
    1:43:12 or another adult to talk to me.
    1:43:14 That’s a big takeaway for me from this conversation is just approaching it
    1:43:18 like you would approach an adult that you’re in a long-term relationship with.
    1:43:21 You can’t win the day at the expense of the decade and you have to approach it
    1:43:26 in a way the mindset really matters by which you approach the conversation,
    1:43:30 even if the outcome is likely to be the same.
    1:43:33 And I think that that’s fascinating.
    1:43:35 I have a couple of quick questions, perhaps before we wind up here.
    1:43:39 Great.
    1:43:40 One question that one of my friends had was about when adolescence is actually over.
    1:43:45 It seems like it’s become a prolonged life stage.
    1:43:48 And there’s even been formal proposals now to increase the end range from 19 to 24.
    1:43:54 Do you agree with this?
    1:43:56 How should parents and societies sort of like gear themselves up for this?
    1:43:59 So I don’t know if that’s like it actually just makes me think like, again,
    1:44:03 if I’m sitting on the same side of the table as my kid, would I be like,
    1:44:06 hey, you’re an adult now, like, I don’t know, I feel like it doesn’t roll off.
    1:44:09 I see you like, OK, but I think I’m relying this question is like,
    1:44:12 when does my kid become a more independent?
    1:44:14 And like, when do they start to take care of themselves?
    1:44:16 Right. And I actually think this gets back to something we didn’t touch on,
    1:44:18 but you mentioned earlier, which is the idea of like letting our kids struggle, right?
    1:44:22 To me, one of the things that I think
    1:44:25 for some reason is getting increasingly hard to do in parenting
    1:44:29 is just it’s just letting your kid live the results of like their actions, you know?
    1:44:35 And to me, that’s not like the word consequence, but to me, a great example.
    1:44:39 And it does relate to prolonged adolescence versus I think when we say launching
    1:44:42 into adulthood, it’s just like feeling capable and feeling more independent
    1:44:45 is I think we have to ask ourselves like when my kids are young
    1:44:49 and entering adolescence for getting prolonged, am I setting them up for that?
    1:44:52 Right. Am I setting them up? What is the circuit?
    1:44:55 I’m always thinking about this. What is the circuit I’m building with my kid?
    1:44:58 So, for example, my kid recently had swim in middle school
    1:45:02 and I saw he forgot his bathing suit, right?
    1:45:06 And like, I probably could have like jumped in my car or something.
    1:45:08 And I’m just like, OK, what’s the circuit?
    1:45:10 And this is not have to be like all the time.
    1:45:12 But in general, it’s like, OK, he forgets, you know,
    1:45:15 and then someone remembers for him, OK, right?
    1:45:18 He forgets he doesn’t have his bathing suit.
    1:45:23 His swim, his gym teacher is like, oh, like, you need to have your baby.
    1:45:27 Whatever happens.
    1:45:28 And my guess is then he’d be more likely to remember, right?
    1:45:32 As long as I’m stepping in and doing the remembering for my kid,
    1:45:37 I don’t know why we think our kid is going to start doing the remembering for themselves.
    1:45:41 It actually reminds me of the towel.
    1:45:42 Maybe I’d say seems hard to remember.
    1:45:44 How could you remember how?
    1:45:45 And he’d be like, oh, maybe I’ll do the towel thing.
    1:45:47 I’ll put it. I think a great idea, right?
    1:45:49 So I think one of the things you have to think about
    1:45:50 if we don’t want to have this like prolonged adolescence in our kid is this.
    1:45:53 How am I scaffolding skills that my kid can have?
    1:45:58 How am I helping them build independence?
    1:46:00 And in what ways am I picking short term gains?
    1:46:04 But at the expense of maybe long term skills.
    1:46:08 And we all have to give ourselves permission to do that sometimes.
    1:46:09 Sometimes you’re like, I just have to make it easy.
    1:46:11 Like, don’t forget your homework or something, right?
    1:46:13 But I think in general, the pattern, I think that’s something we can really reflect on
    1:46:17 and then maybe shift, you know, a little bit with our kids.
    1:46:20 What do you think about competitive sports?
    1:46:23 What do I think about competitive sports?
    1:46:25 I mean, you know, I’m not sure how exact I had to answer that.
    1:46:28 But I don’t know if you’re there’s a lot of things that I start thinking about.
    1:46:32 I think about how early kids are, you know, I think pushed into these
    1:46:36 like super intense sports where I feel like when I was going up,
    1:46:39 kids did a lot of different things.
    1:46:40 And then I’m also thinking, I don’t know if this is where you’re thinking about
    1:46:42 about parents, parents’ relationship with their kids, athleticism and what,
    1:46:48 you know, goes on in the sidelines and kind of, I think, in a way, like our
    1:46:52 unlived dreams, you know, translated into pressure
    1:46:55 and identification with our kids, you know, and it’s almost hard to separate
    1:47:00 who’s engaging in the competitive sport like my kid or me.
    1:47:06 And so I think, you know, I think what’s important as much as possible
    1:47:11 is to try to really like center our kids in this.
    1:47:13 Like, what are they like?
    1:47:15 What are they interested in?
    1:47:16 Are they seeming to get something out of this?
    1:47:18 What’s their wish? What’s my wish?
    1:47:20 Is it their wish because they’re interested?
    1:47:21 Are they just trying to like they kind of notice how happy this seems to make me
    1:47:25 and they want to be like a good, you know, daughter in my eyes?
    1:47:28 Like those questions are helpful.
    1:47:29 Two final questions before we wrap up here.
    1:47:32 Why do we as parents wrap up so much of our identity?
    1:47:39 And this goes back to a few things we talked about earlier in our kids.
    1:47:43 And we sort of like want to live vicariously through them in some ways
    1:47:49 or one up other parents or think our way is better.
    1:47:52 And it’s sort of like the worst part of ourselves.
    1:47:55 And, you know, I noticed this a lot with other people, probably not myself.
    1:48:01 And I’m definitely I’m sure I do it sometimes.
    1:48:03 But we wrap ourselves up in our kids’ successes or failures.
    1:48:07 And we think we’re good parents if they’re doing good
    1:48:11 and we’re bad parents if they’re doing bad.
    1:48:12 And I think probably for a number of reasons,
    1:48:15 I think we’re just like very unprepared psychologically
    1:48:19 for what happens when we become a parent, you know, our kids come along.
    1:48:24 And so many of our on the dreams are insecurities, things we never got to do.
    1:48:30 We don’t even realize how we see our kids as like a channel to like achieve those things.
    1:48:35 And we think we can like heal ourselves, you know, through through our kids.
    1:48:41 As opposed to the opposite journey, which is like pausing and instead of gazing outward
    1:48:46 like to our kids to fix them almost gazing inward, like, wait, what’s going on for me here?
    1:48:50 I think everyone who’s becoming a parent should probably take time
    1:48:54 to reflect on like, what are my insecurities?
    1:48:55 What are the parts of life that I, you know, regret or didn’t get?
    1:48:59 Or, you know, did I never become a D1 athlete?
    1:49:02 And what would that become?
    1:49:03 What would be like if I had a kid, like what’s probably going to come out, right?
    1:49:06 I think we’re kind of unprepared for the amount of self reflection
    1:49:09 being a like very present parent who’s actually centered on our kid requires.
    1:49:13 Yeah, that’s so fascinating.
    1:49:15 As you said that, it’s sort of like jogged this thought, which was,
    1:49:19 you know, at some point in our probably 35 to 50 age range, we’re like, OK,
    1:49:26 well, this is where I’m at in life.
    1:49:28 But now there’s this do over, right?
    1:49:30 Everything is possible again with with children.
    1:49:32 And so I might not have got all the things that I wanted to get out of life.
    1:49:36 But now all of a sudden I can put all of my pressure on you as a child in some ways.
    1:49:42 I’m always, you know, I don’t know if you read Far from the Tree by Andrew Solomon,
    1:49:46 but to me, the prologue, the first page, like, I think every parent should read.
    1:49:49 And it just starts with him saying there’s no such thing as a reproduction.
    1:49:53 Like the word reproduction is a fantasy.
    1:49:57 That’s like you produce, you produce.
    1:50:00 And what he says about parenting, he goes,
    1:50:03 what parenting really is is being forever cast into our relationship with a stranger.
    1:50:07 And every time I just think I just think so many of our struggles
    1:50:10 as parents come down to that, like we don’t reproduce, we produce.
    1:50:13 And this kid is a stranger and our job is to kind of get to know them.
    1:50:15 But the word reproduction brings like right from the start,
    1:50:19 brings up very different fantasies for us.
    1:50:21 That’s beautiful.
    1:50:23 And the final question we always ask every guest is,
    1:50:26 what is success for you?
    1:50:28 I think about success as I’m being able to like live in line with values.
    1:50:34 And to me, that’s like feels good.
    1:50:36 Like when you’re aware of what your values are
    1:50:39 and you’re able to kind of act and behave most of the time
    1:50:42 in a way that’s really in line with them.
    1:50:45 I think this really circles back to our conversation.
    1:50:47 I think our ability to do that really depends on our emotion,
    1:50:51 regulation skills, on our strong relationships, you know,
    1:50:54 about reflecting and being curious about why we do the things we do.
    1:50:58 But to me, like I feel really successful
    1:51:01 in days when I feel like, oh, and like I’m living in line
    1:51:04 with the things that I value, I’m showing up in the world in that way.
    1:51:07 It’s a beautiful way to end this.
    1:51:09 Thank you so much.
    1:51:11 Thank you.
    1:51:13 What an incredible conversation with Dr.
    1:51:17 Becky, I think the two biggest things that I took away from that,
    1:51:23 the three biggest things actually were her solution
    1:51:27 to approaching challenging conversations
    1:51:31 when somebody brings something up, which is I’m glad you’re telling me about this.
    1:51:36 I believe you and tell me more that three steps, those are amazing.
    1:51:41 AVP, it relates to AVP, which we sort of hit on on the podcast,
    1:51:46 which I thought was incredible.
    1:51:47 The second one that I thought was really interesting.
    1:51:50 The second point, the big point that I took away from this was
    1:51:53 it’s me and you and me and my kids, me and your partner,
    1:51:58 whoever you’re with against the problem.
    1:52:01 And that mindset shift is huge, which is you’re not the problem.
    1:52:06 We have a problem and we’re trying to solve this problem together.
    1:52:10 That mindset shift is incredibly powerful.
    1:52:14 And the third thing I really took away from this.
    1:52:19 Was just how much we’re putting on our teens
    1:52:23 when it comes to self-regulating around video games,
    1:52:25 which is something she mentioned casually.
    1:52:27 And I had never really thought about it in this way, which is silly.
    1:52:30 Because when I go to work, I usually leave my phone in a different room
    1:52:34 if I need to concentrate.
    1:52:36 And I do that because I’ve developed this physical solution
    1:52:39 and environmental solution to this problem.
    1:52:41 I don’t want to focus on my phone, I want to focus on work,
    1:52:43 so I’m not going to have my phone with me.
    1:52:45 I can’t even control my impulses around my phone,
    1:52:48 which is exactly why I’m doing that.
    1:52:49 Yet we expect our kids to be able to do that.
    1:52:52 And I thought a little bit about the currency thing.
    1:52:55 I’m going to have to chew on this a little bit.
    1:52:57 I do that sort of in my worst moments, I guess,
    1:53:00 where I’m like, you can have this, if you do this.
    1:53:02 And I don’t think that’s the I want to get away from that as a parent.
    1:53:06 So I hope you took away something super valuable from this conversation.
    1:53:10 If you’re watching this on YouTube, leave a note below.
    1:53:13 Let me know what the most valuable part was for you.
    1:53:16 If you’re listening to it, send me an email, Shane@farnhamstreetblog.com
    1:53:21 or and just let me know what you thought
    1:53:24 was the most useful part of this conversation.
    1:53:26 It’s something I want to explore more.
    1:53:28 So if you have questions, let me know.
    1:53:30 Hopefully I’ll talk to more people about this stuff.
    1:53:32 And I really appreciate you listening.
    1:53:34 And as you can tell, when I say let’s listen and learn,
    1:53:37 it’s time to listen and learn.
    1:53:39 You’re learning with me on this journey and I appreciate you.
    1:53:43 Thanks for listening and learning with us for a complete list of episodes,
    1:53:59 show notes, transcripts and more.
    1:54:02 Go to fs.blog/podcast or just Google the knowledge project.
    1:54:07 The Farnham Street blog is also where you can learn more about my new book,
    1:54:11 “Clear Thinking – Turning Ordinary Moments into Extraordinary Results”.
    1:54:15 It’s a transformative guide that hands you the tools to master your fate,
    1:54:20 sharpen your decision making and set yourself up for unparalleled success.
    1:54:25 Learn more at fs.blog/clear.
    1:54:28 Until next time.
    1:54:30 [Music]
    1:54:41 (soft music)
    1:54:44 [BLANK_AUDIO]

    Dr. Becky Kennedy shares the crucial life and parenting skills you need but didn’t get taught on regulating emotions, setting boundaries, and the best sentence you can say when a partner tells you something difficult.

    This episode applies to EVERY relationship in your life, not just your kids.

    Get ready to parent more effectively with less stress, repair after a disagreement, regulate emotions, and unlock the next level in all of your relationships. 

    Dubbed the “The Millennial Parenting Whisperer” by TIME Magazine, Dr. Kennedy is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Good Inside: A Guide to Becoming the Parent You Want to Be. She also hosts “Good Inside with Dr Becky,” the top kids and family show on Apple Podcasts.

    Follow Becky
    https://www.instagram.com/drbeckyatgoodinside/

    Watch the episodes on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/theknowledgeproject/videos

    Newsletter – Each week I share timeless insights and ideas that you can use at work and home. Add it to your inbox: https://fs.blog/newsletter/

    My New Book! Clear Thinking: Turning Ordinary Moments into Extraordinary Results is out now – https://fs.blog/clear/ 

    Follow me: https://beacons.ai/shaneparrish

    Join our membership: https://fs.blog/membership/

    Sponsors:
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  • #186 Tom Gayner: Invest Like The Best

    Tom Gayner, CEO of Markel Group, reveals the lessons he’s learned from Charlie Munger and Berkshire Hathaway, how he invests, and the specific way he thinks about opportunity cost.

    Gayner shares the difference between good debt and bad debt, where he disagrees with Munger, and why he focuses on the basics.

    This intimate conversation offers a level of insight and honesty that Tom hasn’t offered anywhere else.

    Gayner is currently the CEO of Markel Group and the Director of The Coca‑Cola Company. He also serves as chairman of the Davis Series Mutual Funds board and on the boards of Graham Holdings and Markel.

    Listen and Learn.

    Watch the episodes on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/theknowledgeproject/videos

    Newsletter – Each week I share timeless insights and ideas that you can use at work and home. Add it to your inbox: https://fs.blog/newsletter/

    My New Book! Clear Thinking: Turning Ordinary Moments into Extraordinary Results is out now – https://fs.blog/clear/ 

    Follow me: https://beacons.ai/shaneparrish

    Join our membership: https://fs.blog/membership/

    Sponsors:
    Eight Sleep: Sleep to power a whole new you. https://www.eightsleep.com/farnamstreet
    Sidebar: Accelerate your career. https://www.sidebar.com/shane
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  • #185 Blake Eastman: Learn to Read Anyone

    Blake Eastman has dedicated his entire life to psychology and nonverbal behavior.
     
    In 2009 he founded The Nonverbal Group, a  behavioral research and education company in New York City which conducts large scale studies on human behavior and uses a wide range of technologies to systematically deconstruct and improve human communication.
     
    Eastman dives deep into how we communicate with one another, including the ability to read nonverbal cues, his thoughts on big talkers vs. silent types, how we can communicate with our partners without complaining, the value of watching ourselves communicate on video, understanding the power structures and social dynamics at work, and so much more.
     
    Eastman has also served as an adjunct psychology professor at the City University of New York for six years where he taught General Psychology, Developmental Psychology, and Group Dynamics. He is also a former professional poker player and the founder of School of Cards, the first brick-and-mortar poker school in New York City.
     
    Listen and Learn

    Watch the episodes on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/theknowledgeproject/videos

    Newsletter – Each week I share timeless insights and ideas that you can use at work and home. Add it to your inbox: https://fs.blog/newsletter/

    My New Book! Clear Thinking: Turning Ordinary Moments into Extraordinary Results is out now – https://fs.blog/clear/ 

    Follow me: https://beacons.ai/shaneparrish

    Join our membership: https://fs.blog/membership/

    Sponsors:
    Eight Sleep: Sleep to power a whole new you. https://www.eightsleep.com/farnamstreet
    Sidebar: Accelerate your career. https://www.sidebar.com/shane

     

  • #184 Best of 2023: Conversations of the Year

    The Knowledge Project closes 2023 with a look back at some of the best conversations of the year. Featuring interviews from nine of the most downloaded and acclaimed episodes of 2023, this collection of conversations offers a variety of insights into the power of intention, how to become a better listener, how to give and receive feedback at work, the Four Pillars of Integrity, facing the realities of life, the importance of having deadlines, taking responsibility, building trust in a large organization, and when to double-down on your plans for success.
     
    Guests on this episode include: Mindfulness expert Jack Kornfield, executive coach Carloyn Coughlin, organizational expert Aaron Dignan, leadership expert Jim Dethmer, venture capitalist Ravi Gupta, author and Wired co-founder Kevin Kelly, doctor of psychology Julie Gurner, veteran CEO Frank Slootman, and performance psychologist Gio Valiante.

    Want even more? Members get early access, hand-edited transcripts, member-only episodes, and so much more. Learn more here: https://fs.blog/membership/

    Every Sunday our Brain Food newsletter shares timeless insights and ideas that you can use at work and home. Add it to your inbox: https://fs.blog/newsletter/

    Follow Shane on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/ShaneAParrish

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  • #183 Paul Assaiante: Learning to Face Your Fears

    When Paul Assaiante announced his retirement from coaching the men’s squash team at Trinity College in Connecticut earlier this year, it marked the end of the most successful run for any coach in the history of college athletics.

    During his tenure, Assaiante guided Trinity to 17 national titles, including 13 consecutive championships and 252 wins in a row from 1999 to 2011.

    On this episode of The Knowledge Project, Assaiante draws on his 30 years of coaching to discuss the lessons he learned during his career. These lessons include how to conquer fear and anxiety, why safety is actually found when facing adversity, the importance of practice, and what’s keeping you from reaching your goals.

    Assaiante is also the author of the 2012 book, Run to the Roar: Coaching to Overcome Fear. Listen and learn.

    Want even more? Members get early access, hand-edited transcripts, member-only episodes, and so much more. Learn more here: https://fs.blog/membership/

    Every Sunday our Brain Food newsletter shares timeless insights and ideas that you can use at work and home. Add it to your inbox: https://fs.blog/newsletter/

    Follow Shane on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/ShaneAParrish

    Our Sponsors:

    MetaLab: Helping the world’s top companies design, build, and ship amazing products and services. https://www.metalab.com

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