Simon Sinek: You're Being Lied To About AI's Real Purpose! We're Teaching Our Kids To Not Be Human!
4238 segments
Let's say you have a fight with your
girlfriend. You want to do the right
thing. So, you go to chat GPT and you'd
be like, this is exactly what happened.
Tell me what to do. And you go, babe, I
just want you to know I want to take
full accountability and I care about
this relationship. And she says, did you
get this answer from chat GPT? And you
go, I did.
How's that going to go?
Now, you did everything right. But what
makes people beautiful is not that we
get everything right. It's that we get
many things wrong. And I think in the
modern world we live in, we forget that.
Simon Sinek is back.
He's the visionary thinker inspiring
millions to cultivate human connection.
Find their purpose and overcome any
modern-day challenges.
So, with AI and GPT, do you think it
really is cause for concern and deeper
thought?
So, I'm not in the AI business, but I am
in the humanity business. And here's the
problem that we never talk about. People
keep telling us, life is not about the
destination, life is about the journey.
But when we think about AI, we only
think about the destination and its
remarkable ability to write the book,
paint the painting, solve the problem.
But we forget the importance of doing
the work yourself. And I think in our
modern day and age, we have
underrepresented the value of struggle.
I am smarter, better at problem-solving,
more resourceful, not because a book
exists with my ideas in it, but because
I wrote it. That excruciating journey is
what made me grow. But it's the same for
love, friendships,
conflict.
And I think that we forget that we give
up certain skills or abilities because
of technology, but it's like saying AI
will provide boats for everyone except
for the time there's a storm and you
don't know how to swim.
And unless we take personal
accountability to teach and learn human
skills, they will disappear. Sure, you
can have an AI friend and train like the
best psychologist to affirm you, the
best listening skills that exist, but my
ability to know what to do when my
friend is struggling, my ability to
function in the world or my ability to
cope with stress. These very, very human
skills are suffering.
So, what are the other skills that we
need to equip ourselves with based on
the way that the world is heading?
Two things. One is
This has always blown my mind a little
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much.
Simon.
Good to see you again. We are live.
It's just familiar.
Familiar.
It's so interesting cuz when I sit down
to talk to you, you're one of the very
few people that I don't come with a
preconception as to what we're going to
talk about. But but I I come with a
feeling.
And the feeling that I bring forth is
the feeling of change and transition.
I have lived for 32 years, but I don't
think I can ever think of a time where
the future has felt
unclear, uncertain, scary, exciting, and
I guess unknown. And I don't just mean
with with technology, but technology is
one protagonist in the story, and
there's many other social stories
playing out from politics to
relationships, to all of these things.
So, my first question to you, Simon, is
what are those things? What are the
biggest forces of changes that you see
happening at the moment in all of our
lives that you think we should probably
talk about today?
That is a big question.
And I think one of the mistakes we make,
and this is in general,
is we like things to be very neatly
organized. We like them to be black and
white, yes or no, right or wrong.
And as you know, the world is messier
than that. It is more nuanced than that.
And nothing operates in a vacuum,
everything is connected to everything.
Especially in a in a world that's filled
with
this rising technology called the
internet and this burgeoning technology
called the social media and desires and
feeling like belonging become more and
more important. We're struggling to find
them. Loneliness epidemic, stress
epidemic, suicide epidemics. These are
all feelings of disconnection, lack of
control, and loneliness.
And so that only exaggerates our feeling
of loneliness and despair and wanting
more and etc. etc. etc. And then you add
in AI.
And now those feelings of insecurity are
just exaggerated like crazy.
Right?
So now I find AI there's an irony to AI.
Right? So if you go back to the 70s and
80s, right? You had the rise of
robotics. And so robots are now coming
into our factories and we're able to cut
employees by dramatic amounts
and we put people out on the street who
they're they worked in a factory, their
their father worked in a factory, their
father's father worked in a factory.
Like this is this is what they know. And
they say, "But these robots are changing
they're taking our jobs."
And the ruling classes and the and the
Wall Street classes and the CEO classes,
they go, "Yeah, I know. Technology.
You're going to have to find a new
skill. Reskill. Reskill. That's what
you're going to do. Reskill." Okay,
flash forward to AI. Here's where the
irony comes in. Cuz the world is always
nature pours vacuum and life seeks
balance at all times, right?
Not always immediately, but it seeks
balance at all times. It's always
seeking equilibrium. Okay, so flash
forward to AI.
Now you hear
the knowledge workers.
It's the knowledge workers who are
going, "My job." It's the coders.
It's the
finance people. "My job."
The plumber is not worried about AI
at all.
The baggage handler at the airport cares
zero about AI.
And so maybe the right response is
it's the future, man. It's technology.
Reskill. Reskill. You know? Maybe maybe
become a plumber. You you
By the way, money's really good. You get
to work for yourself if you want, you
know?
Um so, I just find the pendulum kind of
funny.
With AI, do you think it's overblown or
do you think it really
is cause for
concern and deeper thought?
The honest answer is
I don't know.
Mhm.
Everybody falls on one side of you're
over you're over you're you know, the
sky is not falling chill chicken little
or the sky is falling and we're all
going to die, right?
The The truth like most things is
probably somewhere in the middle.
But the the real answer is I don't know
and neither does anybody else.
Yeah.
And it seems that we should have some
sort of controls cuz we didn't put any
controls on the internet.
Mhm.
They did put controls on the internet in
China.
Like children don't have the same access
to
uh social media like kids do here.
Europe has controls on the internet.
And America doesn't.
And we're the ones that seem to be
suffering more because of the lack of
controls on the internet.
Mhm.
So, I think some some And by the way,
when people you know, talk about
deregulation and no controls, I mean
they make us wear seat belts in our
cars.
Yeah.
You know, there's nothing we have speed
limits.
You know, and and it's for the greater
good and yeah, sure your seat belt's
uncomfortable but you'll get used to it.
Like
and it's fine, you know? So, I I think
the call for no reform is is wrong.
Um there are
correct limits to keep things safe.
Mhm.
I'm fascinated by AI, both the benefits
and the weaknesses of it.
But it is revealing to me
something
more important than
what other people are talking about.
Which is we're
we're a results obsessed society, right?
Yeah.
We care about output, we care about
performance, we care about numbers, we
care about final product more than
anything. Right? And when people talk
about AI, they talk about its remarkable
ability to write the symphony, paint the
painting,
write the book, write the article,
uh solve the problem. Like it it is And
by the way,
the technology is incredible. I asked it
only a few months ago
to please take this and put it in the
style of me. And it was
it was fine. I did it with a friend of
mine who's also an author, and we both
did it for ourselves. We did it on each
other. It was really fun.
And it was fine. I don't think it was
good. It was
It was It gave me a good start and I
could edit it.
I did it recently. We both did it.
It was damn near flawless.
It was
it was scary good. Right?
Now, AI doesn't know the thing I'm
thinking about. It doesn't know that the
next book I'm going to write about is
friendship. It doesn't know the point of
view I'm going to have on friendship. If
you ask it, "What would Simon Sinek say
about friendship?" It's going to be,
"Why this and why that?" You know? So,
it's derivative, right? We know that.
It's not original. We know that.
But at the end of the day, the work is
good. The symphony's good. The art is
good. The article is good. The book is
decent. Like it's getting better and
better and better. But here's the
problem that we keep not talking about.
People keep telling us that life is not
about the destination. Life is about the
journey. That's what we keep being told,
right?
But when we think about AI, we only
think about the destination. We only
think about the output. We never think
about the input, right? I can tell you
that and you and I can both say the same
thing,
which is I am smarter,
better at problem-solving,
more resourceful,
better at pattern rec- pattern
recognition, not because an a a book
exists with my ideas in it, but because
I wrote it.
The excruciating pain
of organizing ideas, putting them in a
linear fashion,
trying to put them in a way that other
people can understand what I'm trying to
get out of my brain, that excruciating
journey
is what made me grow.
And sure, you can have an AI friend. And
that AI friend has been trained like the
best best psychologist to affirm you,
the best listening skills that exist.
Tell me about your day. Mm, that sounds
difficult. Mm, boy, it's hard being you.
Oh my god, it's so great being you. Have
you you know, like it's it's a it's an
affirmation machine built by a
for-profit company that wants you to
stay on. Can't neglect that.
But for the fact that nobody's learning
how to be a friend.
It'll feel good. You'll feel like you
have a friend, but you're not learning
to be a friend.
Right? And it's the
what made you a great entrepreneur is
not that the company exists.
Is that you built it with your hands and
you got the scars to show for it.
Yeah.
It was when things went wrong and you
were forced to fix them and think that
now, when problems show up,
you're quick, you're smarter. You're a
much smarter businessman now than you
were 5 years ago.
6 years ago.
Yeah.
Because you did it. And I think what
we're forgetting is that there's
something to be said for And by the way,
I'm a fan of AI. I want AI to make
things.
But I would hate to lose out on becoming
a better version of me.
And I think that um
to really learn to grow. And by the way,
I used to have a steel trap for phone
numbers. I knew everybody's phone
number.
And then all of a sudden my phone
my PDA
God, I don't need to memorize a phone
number anymore. I don't know most of the
people that I love, I don't know their
phone numbers. I type their name in.
Right? I just have to know their name.
And so, my brain literally went on
strike. It said, "Fine.
Fine. You no longer have the capacity to
remember phone numbers." And I can't
remember phone numbers to save my life.
Right? So, we give up certain skills or
abilities because of technology
regularly. Right? That's fine. I don't
have a problem with any of those things
because whether I can remember a phone
number or not will not affect my
relationships, my ability to function in
the world, or my ability to cope with
stress.
But my ability
to know what to do when my friend is
struggling.
My ability to know what to do when I
have a fight with my spouse
my or my partner.
My ability to know what to do when my
boss yells at me, but I don't want to
escalate it, or
my employee is acting out and I don't
want to escalate it or fire them.
Well, how do I resolve this?
I've missed out on those skills. And
simply asking AI, "How should I resolve
this thing?" It'll give you an answer
and it may work, and you've learned
nothing.
Right? And so it's the difference
between It's It's It's like saying AI
will provide boats for everyone.
Except for the time
there's a storm
and you don't know how to swim.
And
I'm okay use the boat.
Mhm. Also learn to swim. So I think
there's something to be said for writing
your own symphony,
painting your own painting,
building your own business,
you know,
writing your own book. Not for them, not
for the output. Not for the output.
For your personal growth.
Before I got here today, I was writing a
post for LinkedIn and I was trying to
make the case that
everybody using ChatGPT to write their
emails, their social media posts, their
investment pitches that I received
had is now making the internet feel
really inauthentic because
people that I want I knew for many many
years are now sending me these perfect
cookie cutter emails with words that
I've never heard them use before.
course.
And so when I read it, my brain mentally
discounts it as not being their opinion,
not actually being them.
Yeah.
And when you feel like you're speaking
to someone's AI
the meaning is gone. So I was I was
writing this post about how actually now
there's this premium on human written
language. Like if you make a couple of
mistakes and you use the old words, you
don't use words like forged and robust.
I'd like to forge a partnership with
you, Stephen.
Furthermore, can we I'm like you you
never said that to me, mate.
You know the the end dashes.
Oh my gosh.
It's funny, right?
It's crazy.
Yeah.
But you but you you're talking about
what you're talking about. Have you ever
heard of the Japanese concept of um uh
uh
wabi-sabi?
No.
So, wabi-sabi is a Japanese design
concept, which is beauty in that which
is temporary or imperfect.
Okay? So, have you ever seen Japanese
ceramics?
Yeah.
They're wonky.
Or the the the glaze is not even.
Yeah.
And they're beautiful. You know why?
Because they're handmade.
Tree bark, trees. You know, when you
have a wooden bowl,
wood is beautiful. Why? It's imperfect.
Right? Think and unique. Things made on
a machine
are the same
and less beautiful. And things made by
hand are beautiful because they're
imperfect. What makes people beautiful
is not that we get everything right.
It's that we get many things wrong. And
what makes us fall in love
is not the person who's perfect. It's
the person who accepts our
imperfections, and we know we're in love
when we learn to accept theirs. Not
learn to, want to.
Right? And you're 100% right. I now know
in the art world, artists are being
asked to sign affidavits
that say, "I painted this.
I made this.
Not AI. Not because it's better or
worse.
It's because I want to know it was
touched by human hands.
And so, I think you're right. What will
happen is everything will be so perfect
that it'll be as if we're all
driving or using things that everything
came off a conveyor belt.
Mhm.
And what we will start to desire is
things that are made by hand because by
the way, we think Rolls-Royce, Ferrari.
You takes 39 months to get a Ferrari.
You know why? It was made by hand.
Yeah.
Right? And one of the things that makes
it expensive is the technology and the
carbon fiber and all that. But the other
thing is it's slow and was made by
people.
Human error, the value of human error.
The value of human error.
Scooter Braun said to me the other day,
he said um
we could watch a computer play chess
with another computer. He goes, "But the
the chess games that have the highest
demand are one human versus another
because when a computer plays a
computer, the moves are predictable and
they're the same and they're perfect.
But it's the human error of two human
chess players who are worse, objectively
worse at chess, that makes it so
fascinating."
Yes, it's
and that's any sporting event. Any
sporting event. It's not the perfection
of the game, it's the error that loses
the game that adds the drama. And
and and it's like trying not to make a
mistake is as powerful as trying to get
everything right. And it's the humanity
of the sport, the humanity of the
competition. It is the imperfection and
I think that we forget as people what
makes us beautiful. Like when you go on
a first date
Mhm.
or a first interview,
Mhm.
all you do is present perfection.
Mhm.
Put on my my best clothes,
you know, dressed up. I know I don't
dress like this every day. I dressed up
on my date, right? My interview, I don't
wear this. This is what I wore for my
interview cuz I want to put out a good
impression. And I practiced and I and I
make myself confident I've got a great
job and I've got a great personality and
I love my mother and my goodness and
everything's great. And then you get in
the relationship, you get the job and
you become a slob.
Right?
This is what AI is. It's it's
it's to your point, it's
it's fake.
Mhm.
It's on the interview example, the
minute you start describing that, I
immediately flash back to an interview I
had last week at our company where a
young kid walks in wearing a suit and I
thought, "Now I I have no idea who you
are
because I know that's not you. I know
that you don't wear a suit. You're 22
years old. You do not wear a suit. So, I
have no indication, I have no clues as
to who you are, and therefore, it's
harder for me to figure out if you fit
here. And I think of because what he
tried to do that was show up perfect how
he what he thought perfect was,
and in some ways to hide who he actually
was. Whereas, this is why I like now on
the internet sloppy text. I like
grammatical mistakes.
But you at the same time you don't want
him to show up and put his feet on to
kick his shoes off and put his feet on
the table, either.
In the same way that
There's an element of respect you want,
and you want somebody in their first
interview to put on some effort. Now,
too much effort
Yeah.
is
pretty inauthentic, but too little
effort
what's that?
This is my diagram. You've got perfect
Yeah.
on one end, which is low, and then
you've got poor, which is also low. The
sweet spot
Yeah.
is right here in the middle.
Yeah, well, I think there's some truth
to that. And so,
there's a level of you know, like it's
the same thing as like we all want
vulnerability in our relationships, but
not on the first day.
Like I don't need to know that quite
yet.
You know?
What are the other skills that you think
we need to equip ourselves with based on
the way that the world is heading?
Because with you know,
like the calculator came along, and we
no longer needed to be able to do
complicated math.
I've completely forgotten my times
tables.
I can't spell anymore. It's all fine. I
said to my friends, "The most I can do
is 9 * 9. That's like the top end of my
range."
But with spelling, it's the same. I get
like half the word correct, and then I
don't know what they are, and it doesn't
But but again, uh you know,
So, what are those skills that
I think it's all human skills. I think
there needs So, I think where the world
is going to go, and at least this is
where I'm taking a bet,
is that as the end product becomes
easier to produce,
it's the humanity that's going to
suffer.
And unless we take personal
accountability both as individuals and
organizations to teach and learn human
skills, they will disappear for all the
reasons we're talking about. So, how do
I listen?
How do I hold space?
How do I resolve conflict peacefully?
How do I give and how do I receive
feedback? Those are all two different
skills.
How do I have an effective
confrontation? You pissed me off.
Do I know how to approach you as a
friend, as a colleague without creating
a massive fight or losing a friendship
over it? Um how to take accountability,
how to express empathy. These skills,
these very, very human skills are the
things that we're already starting to
see
just with the internet and social media
um are suffering. And so, I think AI
will only exaggerate the loss of those
skills, and those skills are more
important than learning how to spell.
One of the concerning things was I heard
Sam Altman, who's the founder of OpenAI
and ChatGPT, launch this thing called
Worldcoin a couple of years ago when
ChatGPT really started taking off. And
it has been closely tied to the concept
of universal basic income.
Mhm.
The idea, the overarching idea is that
in a world where AI and automation
eliminate many jobs, UBI may be
necessary. Worldcoin is one way to help
implement it. That was stated by the
founder of ChatGPT, Sam Altman.
Yeah. I just again, I'll go back to my
ironic statement before. Isn't it ironic
that they want to do a a universal
income, a standard universal income, now
that the knowledge workers are losing
their jobs, but when the factory workers
were losing their jobs,
those same people were massively against
uh
uh these kinds of things. So,
I mean, yes.
What happens to purpose
it's ironic.
and meaning if we're being cuz for
anybody that doesn't know what universal
basic income is, the idea is the
government, the state, whatever would
pay you a certain amount of money every
single
salary.
So, $2,000, $3,000, whatever it might
be.
Yeah.
Um because they don't think
many of us are going to have There's not
going to be enough jobs to go around.
And I wonder what happens to purpose and
meaning and pursuing challenge and all
these things
in a world where we're just being handed
money?
So, we're not being given wealth.
There's a difference. We're being given
survival money, right? And so, you know,
you know, we have to be very careful
that says, you know, everybody who's on
welfare is lazy. You know, that's not
true, you know? So, we have to be very
careful that just because we give
somebody something doesn't mean that
they cease to have ambition or purpose
or drive. It's like somebody who who
makes a a commission salary, commission,
you know, works on commission and they
make just enough to pay their rent and
buy food and that's it. Like, that's a
lot that's a lack of ambition, you know?
The cases,
at least the people I've heard talk
about it, they make a compelling case
for it, especially in a world where
there is plenty of wealth.
Um, but, you know, I don't know enough
about it to make an argument for or
against it, if I'm honest. Um, but I do
find it ironic
that
the Sam Altmans of the world are calling
for it, given the fact that it's there's
going to be so many job losses when it's
jobs of their kind. And like, I also
think that's funny. Like, what's going
to happen
when
Sam Altman's product gets good enough
that he can lay off most of his staff?
Just curious.
What happens?
He has made a point of having, I think
it's 100 people or less in his company.
He doesn't have like a big team. And I
think part of that is because when I
heard his TED Talk a couple of days ago,
he's saying, yeah, I think AGI is sooner
than we think, actually. And I think
we're going to have a fast takeoff,
which means it's going to arrive very
quickly and accelerate very quickly. So,
I think he's actually preparing not to.
Yeah, but when happen what happens to
the 90 people he lays off?
When he doesn't need 100, he only needs
10.
Th- This is the question.
I'm just curious. I don't know. And this
is why anybody who has an opinion about
it, the answer is we don't know. But, I
think people react very differently when
it's their job on the line.
Mhm. When it's their income on the line.
When it's their pride. When it's their
ego.
You know? I keep hearing from companies,
I mean, you we were talking about this
before we turn on the cameras. You know,
you know, you talk to if you want a new
website,
you I guarantee you I don't I don't care
which company you talk to, they will all
talk about how they AI this, AI that,
and you ask the question, are you using
AI? Yes, we're using AI, we're doing it
differently, we're the future, blah blah
blah.
And then you ask them for a proposal,
it's going to look like all the other
proposals from 2015.
You know? And this is how many hours
it's going to take our people to program
this and code this. And I was like, what
happened to all the AI? Why is this
slow and expensive
when everything's supposed to be fast
and inexpensive?
Because they're taking the margin.
Of course they're taking the margin. And
and they've got a lot of people doing
things the old-fashioned way because
the business model, you know, pe- people
work very hard to put The status quo
exists
because there are people who benefit
from the status quo.
You know, that's why there is a status
quo.
And it's uh and you know, like I said,
everybody's into change the future, you
know, until it's until it's them
that's threatened.
Or their income.
The billionaires that I that I know, the
one consistent thing they've whispered
to me about AI is that
people are going to have a lot of free
time.
That's one of the things that's been
really consistent. You're so right when
you say that when I asked you about the
future of AI, you said, "I don't know."
The reason why I know that's probably
the correct answer generally is because
when I sat with the most advanced people
in AI, whether it's Mustafa who's head
of Microsoft AI, now CEO of Microsoft
AI, or people from Google, or the CEO of
Google, or Reid Hoffman who's the
founder of LinkedIn, they all had
different opinions.
Which made me to think actually the
right answer is nobody knows.
The right answer is nobody That is
correct. And and and you always be be be
aware of the messenger, right? Like you
won't have anybody who owns an AI
company talking doomsday scenarios.
It's not in their economic interest,
even if they secretly harbor that. It's
like people who
used to run cigarette companies didn't
smoke and let them they didn't let their
family smoke. It's like I remember
visiting Facebook in the earlier days
and they
I went into the cafeteria and they had
like
like picnic benches.
And I was like and they were telling me
with pride how they have these communal
eating areas to help people maintain
relationship. And I was like this is
hilarious. You literally have a product
that breaks relationships and yet you
understand enough to make people eat
together at lunchtime so that they'll
maintain relationship. I mean
the point being if your economic
interest, you know, show me how
someone's paid and I'll show you how
they behave.
You know.
One of the scariest conversations I was
privy to was one a friend of mine who's
a billionaire in London he knows the CEO
of one of the biggest AI companies in
the world who I can't name and he said
by the way what he tells me in private
is not what he's saying in publicly.
Yeah.
I he he said to me that what this
particular CEO thinks is going to happen
with AI is pretty horrific. And the CEO
of this big AI company is totally cool
with it. It's It's and it's horrific
what he thinks is about to happen. And
then when I watch this guy do his like
online talks and give his opinion he's
so nuanced and everything will be fine
and he's an AI optimist. Then I heard
this scenario at this kitchen table in
East London from his friend about what
he really thinks and it was
chilling.
Yeah.
Like actually the lack of empathy
Yeah.
That makes sense to me.
the the obsession with power
was shocking to me.
Yeah. The obsession with power and money
and all the rest of it. Yeah.
But this is because the internet has
done something really strange
and and challenged one of my theories
head-on, right? So I talk about in an
infinite game
you know, Jim Jim Carse his theory. You
know, in an infinite game there's no
winners or losers, right? And so like
nobody wins, you know,
fast food.
Nobody wins cars. Like
General Motors, Ford, Vauxhall they can
all exist at the same time, right?
And they'll have degrees of success or
not success, but they can all exist
simultaneously. No one is going to win.
The exception is in the internet. In in
the like like Amazon
it won.
Yeah.
Like you know, Google for search?
Yep, they won.
Right? And if you start going down like
the big big tech companies
there is only one. I mean, sure there's
competition, but not really, right? Who
you know,
Walmart is making a run of it to
threaten Amazon, but Amazon's still so
damn big. You know, all of these
companies that there's only one.
And
that's not good.
That you can't have winners in a in a
category. And so this is why I think the
the race for AI is so aggressive for AI
dominance is so aggressive and which is
why people are not being careful and
which is why they're not putting
controls is because the way that tech
seems to work is there probably will be
one dominant standard and then that's
it.
And the question is which one? Because I
don't think
it just seems to be the way it is.
Which is a very scary prospect to me
that the the fact that we can have
winners
is is a bad thing, especially if we if
we pride ourselves on being capitalists.
Then there cannot be there cannot be a
winner. And there cannot be one that is
so dominant that that nobody else can
even
compete except for scraps.
What are your emotions when you think
about AI and what's happening cuz
I I feel like the moment we're living in
is a profound one and that we don't
actually realize it. Because when these
tools come out, Open AI released
yesterday
3.0, it's the best model ever.
The day after my life was the same.
So we don't really notice it cuz we go
back to work, our clients ask for the
same thing, we have the same team
members sat around us. The it almost
seems like the sand timer is rotated
and we're on a clock.
And it's a slow disruption of our
everyday lives. Sam Altman the other day
on his TED Talk two three four days ago
he in the short term everything will
appear the same, but in the long term,"
he goes, "life is going to be completely
different."
that's right. I mean, and look at any
any technology like the like AI,
it was kind of the same until it wasn't.
And these are evolutions, not
revolutions. Like there's a
revolutionary bit,
Mhm.
you know? Like I remember when when the
internet showed up and like brick and
internet shopping showed up and all the
technologists were like, "It's the end
of stores. It's the end of bricks and
mortar. Like done. Like we'll never go
to a shop again."
Well, that didn't happen. Now, shops
struggle to compete against internet,
but that's a price thing. Right? That's
that's a business model thing. But we
like going shopping because again,
they've all of these companies always
forget, especially technologists,
they all forget that the end user is a
human being. And most of us
don't fully understand everything. Even
even our iPhones, most people use a a
small percentage of all the capabilities
of our iPhones. Most of us don't even
know how to change the damn settings to
make it do something we want. Right?
Even and you neither do your kids. It's
not an adult thing. Right? It's not an
old person thing. Like
and there's a few people who get more
out of it and good for them.
Some people use it just as a phone.
Fine.
And it's a bell curve. So, I think there
will be a few people and a few companies
that will get more value out of these
things than the rest of us. But I think
he's right. I think there'll be a
revolutionary bit
and then it'll settle.
I I I'm I find this whole thing
fascinating. When you ask me how do I
feel, you know, depending on what
subject I'm talking about,
absolute fear
and absolute amazement. I I I have I
have both and everything in between.
When I think about how it affects
democracy and the ability to make deep
fakes and and how it can manipulate
people and their opinions to vote one
way or another,
I have real fear.
Yeah.
Right? When it comes to like
productivity and the reshaping of
business, you know, technologists and
people who who are part of the internet
revolution, they love to say, you know,
20 years ago, 80% of the jobs we have
now didn't exist. They love to say that,
right? But when you ask them now,
they'll
they
they they'll
they seem to think that I think it's the
same, which is all those people who are
going to lose those jobs in
white-collar, you know, in white-collar
jobs and knowledge workers.
I they they're not they're not going to
not work. There's going to be new jobs.
The IRS digitized a whole bunch of years
ago, right? They got rid of all the
accountants and they put in all the
computers, right?
Do you know how much money the IRS saved
when it when it
cha- completely changed the the way it
looked?
No.
The answer is zero. Yes, they got rid of
all the accountants and they needed to
hire all the IT people.
Mhm.
So, the the the the workforce looks
different, but it didn't get smaller.
And so, I think it's the same thing.
What it's we're we also we already know
the massive, incredible amounts of
energy
that it takes for AI to work. Data
centers that use up massive amounts of
electricity like we've never seen in our
lives.
Like nuclear has to be a thing. There
isn't enough coal or oil or solar or
wind to power these things. It just
doesn't exist. So, nuclear has to be a
thing. So, go be a nuclear engineer. Go
You want to get an advanced degree? I
don't need you to be a coder. You know,
coding was a thing for a Go be a nuke.
Cuz by the way, you got to be just as
smart to be a nuke as you have to be a a
a a a So, you're going to start to see
that. You know, you're going to see
energy work. Um
I just think the jobs will change. I
don't think they're going to like it's I
I completely One thing I do disagree
with, you know, which is not like you're
going to be a bunch of people walking
around bored.
I just think the jobs will change.
If there was a a 10-year-old kid stood
here now and the 10-year-old said to us,
said, "Guys, what do you think I should
focus on?"
I would say two things.
Um
uh one is going back to human skills.
Learn how to be a good friend to your
friends.
Okay, how do I learn that?
You're going to really need that. How
does a 10-year-old learn that or how do
you and I learn that?
Both.
A 10-year-old learns it that when they
go and have a playdate at a friend's
house, a smart parent takes away all the
phones. I would hate that the
10-year-old has a phone in the first
place, but if they do, take away all the
phones
and make the kids go play.
That when they have a fight,
the parents make them say sorry, you
know, go over to your friend's house and
knock on the door and you're going to
say sorry for the thing that you did.
Um we're going to teach kids how to
resolve conflict. We're going to teach
kids how to take compliments. We're
going to teach kids how to take
accountability.
And these are all the skills of, you
know,
well, what did you do wrong versus what
did you what did what you know, like
it's not like
you know,
it's not always the school or the
teacher. Maybe your kid did is
disruptive, you know? And so
accountability is a real thing.
And so I think if we teach those things
to 10-year-olds and to adults,
um I think it makes for a better
society. And the other thing is go learn
a real skill.
And I don't mean like that, you know,
prompting isn't a real skill. That's not
what I mean. It's what I said before,
which is it's the excruciating like what
makes great relationships great is not
that you get along all the time.
The best marriages, the best
relationships,
they're not absent of conflict. It's
they know how to resolve conflict
peacefully.
By the way, I believe in world peace. I
don't believe in a world without
conflict. I believe a world in which we
can resolve our conflict peacefully
without the need to go to war to resolve
conflict. This is why I like democracies
cuz democracies can solve conflict
without bullets. So I the human skills
work, but I say a real skill mean like
go do something difficult.
Build something,
design something,
imagine something, write something,
and and and and by the way, I'm totally
fine even if you plug it into chat GPT
and say tell me what's wrong with this.
Your grammar's all screwed up. You know?
And like I said, I
I am smarter because I did it.
I'm
the reason I'm more confident than when
I was younger.
And I think that's one of the things you
do. People talk about you get wise with
age. You know, and like and you know,
you have more confident as you get
older. And yes, that's all true and
there's multiple reasons for it. But I
think one of the reasons is is the
things that are happening to me now,
I've gone through those things before.
They were scary and kept me up at night
the first time.
And now,
I know how to do it. I'm not afraid of
it anymore. And so, I think what happens
as you gain experience,
is you lose fear.
And if ChatGPT or whatever AI product we
use does everything for us,
I think you just end up scared.
One of the things that I'm contending
with at the moment,
with this new technology that's arrived,
being an entrepreneur,
seeing this huge opportunity, thinking
about the dot-com boom, and all the
great opportunity that that created,
people talking about the age of
abundance and all these things, is I'm
contending with the question on a
personal level, which is when is enough
enough? And maybe this question is more
pertinent now than ever in a world where
creating stuff, building stuff, starting
a company, launching a book, the cost of
creating these things, whether they're
good or not so good, has gone to
basically zero.
Yeah.
So, we can all theoretically from our
computers now become movie directors and
authors and software developers. And so,
with this possibility, this opportunity,
and the the thing we need to deploy is
intention. Like, what do I do? What is
the thing that's going to lead me to
happiness? Do I pursue all of these
things and start building and creating
and running off down that path to climb
some ladder?
Or do I take a second? When is enough
enough? And as an entrepreneur who is in
this moment has a lot of resources,
could roll the dice, could start all
these new companies, could do all of
these things,
when is enough enough?
No.
right? Like
we
there's something to be said for
gratitude.
And if you want to make it money, we
know the data on this.
Right? I think once you reach I can't
remember the number is $70,000 a year of
income.
Like you like when you talk about money
can't buy happiness, like it absolutely
buys happiness up to a certain level,
which is survival and then a little bit
more, you know?
But once you reach a certain level like
the there's no discernible increase in
happiness that comes with money. Now,
what money buys is options,
you know? What money buys is time,
you know?
Um those things are true, and you you
said it. Like some of the people that
you and I know who have
made generational wealth,
they're not discernibly happy. The ones
that are happier were happy before they
made the money.
And the ones who thought the money would
buy them happiness, or worse, the money
took away their purpose because when
they made the money they were driven by
something that they accidentally made
the money. They built businesses that
were
that those were their passions and their
cause, and then the money came and they
weren't building the thing anymore, and
you know?
This this is the this is the difference
is like why this
it's really interesting. It also gets
the question is why is it that small
companies are more innovative than big
companies? Right? Like you think about
it. When you say what's the secret for
for innovation? Well, you want to have
resources, you want to have great
people, and you want to have great
market opportunities, and then you can
have great ideas. Okay. So, big
companies have tons of money, they hire
have all the best people, they have
mature
marketplaces that people generally know
who they are, and they're the least
innovative organizations on the planet.
Right? Then you have little companies
that have no money, they're
bootstrapping it, they don't have enough
people, nobody knows who they are in the
[ __ ] market conditions, and yet they're
more innovative. And then big companies
innovate by buying the little companies.
You know, that's basically what happens.
My exit, your exit, big company can't
innovate, they just bought you, right?
Why is that?
Why is that the rule? And so, it goes
directly to this, I think. I think the
reason is is because when you're small,
your ambitions are bigger than the
resources you have to achieve those
ambitions. Every small business has
outsized ambitions.
Like beyond
objectively stupid. Like you look at
what they have and what they've got and
you they tell you where they're going to
be and you're just like,
"No." And yet some of them do.
And I think the problem with big
companies is their ambitions are well
within
their their capabilities, their
resources. In other words, their vision
isn't big enough.
And I think your vision has to be bigger
than the amount of money, resources, and
intelligence that you have to achieve
that.
And what that produces is creativity.
And so, it goes right back to this,
which is if if if we can do so much
with AI,
then we need bigger visions. And so,
when you ask me, "How do you find
happiness?"
I think that we need to set our sights
on things that are bigger than finite
success.
Um and I think we do need a gratitude
practice, regardless of how little or
how much you have.
To be grateful for what you do have
is a profound impact. I went through
this with the LA fires,
right? The
I was very lucky that my house survived
and I didn't have to get evacuated, but
the evacuations were getting closer and
closer.
And
two things happened that were profound
that live that I will that live with me
now. One which is resolvable and one
which is unresolvable. We were all
obsessed with this app called Watch
Duty,
which is how we tracked the fires. It
basically took all the publicly
available information and put it in one
place in a really amazing way, right?
Started by this amazing, amazing,
amazing entrepreneur named John Mills.
And we were all obsessed with Watch
Duty. We all were what on this app the
whole time. And one of the things we
were watching was the wind.
Cuz if the wind shifted, it could have
profoundly impact your life.
And I remember having this experience
like we were all watching the wind.
And the wind went away from me. And I
thought
Oh, thank god.
And in that moment I knew that somebody
was looking at the app going, "Oh god,
no."
And it's not like service where I'll eat
a little less so that somebody can eat
more. I'll give up some of my income so
that somebody has It's not one of those
I don't want my house to burn down so
somebody else's house doesn't burn down.
And I asked I had to live with this
paradox of how unfair the world is. That
simultaneously my relief and good news
was some was somebody else's stress and
bad news. And there was nothing I could
do to change that. So that paradox
I
it
is horrible and I It was It was right in
front of me. So that's one. But it's the
second part
which is
the evacuation zones were coming a
little closer and they were one zone
away from where where I live.
And we didn't know if we were going to
be woken in the middle of the night with
a with an alarm to evacuate. We didn't
know.
And so we had I had to go through the
process of packing up my car and making
my go bag. And I put as much stuff in my
car as I could. And I had to, you know,
we all play that game like, "If there's
a fire and you have to run out and grab
two things, what would you grab?" I had
to do that.
Right? A lot of people in LA had to do
that. Right? You actually had to make
the decisions. What am I going to take
and what am I going to leave behind? And
I found myself bringing things that I
never thought were important to me. And
I found myself leaving things behind
that
I thought I would take.
But the one thing that was amazing
was stuff that I couldn't fit.
But I still had love for it like my
favorite painting in the world. It's
just I couldn't fit it in my car.
I stood there in front of it. And I
said, "Thank you." And I said,
"Goodbye."
And it was like saying goodbye to a
loved one. You know, I hear this, you
know, somebody loses a parent. They go,
"Look, it was awful and, you know, he
suffered as on his deathbed, but I'm
glad I was with him to say goodbye.
And it was the most amazing thing to
have gratitude for something that I
don't want to lose, but accepted that I
I might.
And
it's made me a lot more disconnected
from my material things.
Especially the things I said goodbye to
cuz I've already said goodbye to them. I
had had I just sold some of my art for
for charity.
And people said, "How did you love your
art?" I'm like, "I know. Like my art's
like my babies." Like the how did you
choose? And I said, "I've already said
goodbye to everything here. I did it
months ago."
You know? And I think this idea of
gratitude, gratitude for what we have,
but also
um like you're going to lose your
parents.
All of us will lose our parents.
Hopefully hopefully hopefully
uh they don't ever have to say goodbye
to us, but we if things go well, we're
going to have to say goodbye to our
parents.
And
we can't be angry about it. We want to
say thank you for the times we had.
And I think to have that a level of
appreciation for everything in our
lives, how temporary all of this is,
I think that's it makes you happier. I
know it sounds
it's
it makes you happier to just look at
someone and be grateful.
You know, failed relationships,
you could be angry at the other person
or you can be grateful for the lessons
they taught you and or for the good
times you had.
And I think to change our minds to
gratitude,
and you can you know, it's it sounds
it's a little bit you know, hippy dippy
to have a gratitude practice and
that's fine. You know, if that's your
thing, lie in bed every night or keep a
journal and just say the things you're
grateful for.
But
I don't know if it works without an
evacuation zone approaching.
I don't know, but to go around your home
and just say thank you to the things
that you like
is a weird thing. How many of us How
many of us
When was the last time you called a
friend out of the blue
and just said thanks for being my
friend?
Like hey
just wanted to call and just tell you I
love you. Just tell you thank you. And
you know
that's all. No just a quick just 2
minutes just just want to say thank you
for being my friend. I think if I said
that to one of my best friends they'd
think I was losing my mind or something
or that something was wrong. They'd be
so concerned cuz it's such an unusual
thing for me to Okay. So you can do it
this way. So I had a guest on the
podcast and he came up with this thing
that is so outside of my personality but
I'm going to try it.
Yeah that would make sense.
And you can do that.
You know?
I'm I'm new to this. You know I I know
for years people have been like you
should have a gratitude practice and
keep a gratitude journal. And I tried
it. I was like
okay
I'm grateful for my sister, grateful for
what I've
for my family, grateful for my friends,
grateful for the life that I live.
All right good night. All right next
day.
I'm grateful for my sister, grateful for
my family, grateful for my friends. You
know and I found it so repetitive
that I was like is this worth it?
Like
sure like every now and then something
was different and new. And I've come to
come to the conclusion like
if it's the same three things every
single day
good.
I was thinking about this a lot the
other day when someone asked me
think about all the people in your life
and imagine if they were sick and
imagine if you had a billion dollars in
your bank and the billion dollars could
cure
their sickness.
Like who would you cure it for for?
Would you would you spend a billion
dollars to cure your your girlfriend's
sickness, your your mother's sickness,
your father's sickness, your
whatever. Even if it was the the the
risk to them was was low and you would.
I'd give every pet penny I had to cure
an illness that my girlfriend had even
if the risk was low.
And as I was thinking through that I was
like but then if you look at my calendar
and how I'm allocating my time against
these individuals and against my
priorities there's a real imbalance
here. And over the last couple of weeks
in particular, I've been on a bit of a
journey of realizing just how important
four or five people in my life are.
I I
and how much I neglect them.
Yeah, I mean like of course. I mean
we're
only when it's
and it's you're right. Like it's just if
you say give a billion dollars and you
can cure this disease that affects, you
know, 2 million people, 10 million
people, you'd be like,
"Eh,
I'll give some money, right?" But if it
was one family member, you would exhaust
every resource, you would quit your job,
you would do everything you can
for a 1% chance.
for a 1% chance. You know, and people
do. They quit their jobs when and like
all so many charities have been started
because my father died, my mother died,
my sister died, my brother died, and
I've devoted my life to duh, right? Like
like literally that's the reason.
And it's because it's personal. Of
course, that makes sense. It's why why
are some entrepreneurs good and some
entrepreneurs bad? Well, how personal is
the thing that you're working on to you?
Because then I only like to like the
entrepreneurs that I love,
I want to know that they are solving a
problem that they struggled with or that
somebody they love struggled with or
something. If they they read an article
in a magazine, "Oh, this is a great
market opportunity." There is no passion
there. That is driven by money
and power only. I want to know somebody
that is it's so deeply personal to them
that they will stop at nothing.
They will run through a brick wall and
find every creative solution. And it
goes right back to the small company
versus big company. It's it's passion
and a vision that is bigger than the
resources that I have.
Which you know,
I had a conversation with somebody
recently actually
where
they wanted to
uh we were we uh
it was a business problem
and they wanted to change the goals.
And I said, "We can't just change the
goals because they're difficult.
You know, so we might miss the goal.
It's true. Yes, we have a very
aggressive goal and the likelihood of us
hitting it is incredibly low, but
why would we lower it?
And they said to me,
you know, I don't like to fail, they
said. I don't like to fail, and I know
you don't either.
And I said, ah, that's where you're
wrong.
That's where you're wrong. I have spent
most of my life a failure.
And I'm very comfortable being a
failure, and I think of myself not as a
success.
I think of myself as a failure. And
that's because my ambitions are bigger
than my skills or my ability to achieve
those ambitions. And so, almost
everything I've done, with a couple of
exceptions, have fallen short of what I
had hoped for.
I'm very comfortable with that.
Because failing at 80% is really much
better than succeeding at 30%.
And I think this idea of fear of failure
and embracing failure, I don't want to
fail.
But I just
I I have
I think it's important to have dreams
that are beyond your skills or your
resources.
Because that's where creativity comes
from.
That's where
resourcefulness comes from.
You know, when you go, how am I going to
figure this one out? And you told me the
stories of your own team.
You know, it's the resourceful ones. And
now we go back to AI.
AI is not going to figure that out.
Right?
There's There's data on this. I have
actually never thought about this. This
is good. There was a book called Oh, it
was The Wisdom of Crowds. I think it was
that one.
I think it was The Wisdom of Crowds by
James Surowiecki.
Where people with experience knew what
to do versus people who were just
trained. So, I'll give you the example.
This is I can't I can't Again, I might
have the book wrong, but this was I
remember the case. So, there was a a
bunch of firemen fighting a fire in like
the in wildfires, right? And the wind
picked up, and the fire was coming
really fast towards these firemen. True
story.
And they all started running for their
lives as this fire was approaching them
unbelievably quickly. But the problem
was if they looked ahead,
there was a small hill, which means
you're going to slow down cuz you can't
run fast up a hill. And this fire is
coming fast, right? The senior guy on
the on the team started screaming, "Get
down. Get down. Get down." And they all
ignored him. They were all running for
their lives. And he just stopped running
and got down and put his hands over his
head and just lay in a ball
and the fire was going so fast that it
blew right over him.
And it caught up with the other guys and
burned them all to death.
Now, they didn't teach them that in fire
school.
It It was accumulated knowledge of
wisdom of that came from experience that
he knew the right thing to do in the
moment. He was able to read the tea
leaves in a way and his his gut,
whatever that means, his gut said the
right thing to do is to drop down.
You'll be okay.
And this is why I'm going to sound like
a broken record.
The importance of doing the work
yourself,
of writing the book, painting the
painting, choreographing the dance, you
know,
composing the symphony, building the
business, having the difficult
conversation, stumbling and bumbling,
right? The reason for it Like let's say
you have a fight with your your your
girlfriend.
You don't want to be in a fight. You
don't like being in a fight. You want to
do the right thing. So, you go to chat
GPT and you'll be like, "My girlfriend
and I had a fight. This is what the
fight was about. Okay? I think I did
some stuff wrong. I think she did some
stuff wrong. This is exactly what
happened. Tell me what to do."
And you go, "Babe,
I just want you to know I want to take
full accountability. I'm really I'm
really sad that this happened and I want
you to know that I care about this
relationship." And she says to you,
"Did you get this answer from chat GPT?"
And you go, "I did."
How's that going to go?
Right? Now, you did everything right.
You did everything right.
You did everything right.
But for the fact, and it goes right back
to what you said,
which is it removed the humanity, it
removed the personality. It's
artificial. It's fake. It's everything
you said about the job interview. It's
everything you said about all those
other things, about all the resumes, all
of the pitch decks.
It's not you telling me sorry, it's
ChatGPT telling me sorry. And even
though you went with good intention to
get it right, I would rather you get it
wrong and bumble and fumble it with me
and be like, "Babe, I don't know how to
do this. I'm an asshole."
You know, and then she fights with you
because you get it wrong and you
rumble through it together.
And what happens when you come You've
had this happen. I know because I have
and I know anybody everybody has.
When you come out of the fight, you're
closer.
Mhm.
Not cuz you got it right.
Because you got it wrong. And if you
learn the skill
and you get better and better and better
and better and you do learn the skill of
saying the right thing and you do learn
the skill. She knew it wasn't because
you asked AI in the moment because you
just wanted to resolve the problem and
remove the tension. It's because you
learned the skill for the time that you
don't know when it's going to happen
because you're equipped for this
relationship.
Mhm.
And it's that investment in the
relationship rather than trying to
transactionally solve the problem before
me. And that's the difference.
Mhm.
It's infinite versus finite. It's
transaction versus It's destination
versus journey. I'm in the journey of
this relationship versus I have a
destination. I got to solve this problem
now otherwise this is going to destroy
my relationship. And all of this is
coming full circle. And it comes right
back to everything we started this. I
think it's hilarious that you and that
you're having a conversation with me
about AI cuz I'm not an AI expert and
I'm not in the AI business.
But I I am in the humanity business. And
I think everything we're talking about
from every angle we're battle testing
this idea. And what we can't get away
from is human beings really want human
beings.
And human beings really want human
experiences.
Mhm.
And human beings really want things made
by human beings. And we are not only
okay with
we want imperfection.
Because imperfection is the sign
of human.
I was just thinking about how
how when I'm in an argument with my
partner
if she was perfect, if she was
completely composed, if she was looking
at me
without emotion, without expression, and
if she was spewing chat GPT-like
responses back at me
it would it would be a little bit
infuriating, but also it would be
completely dehumanizing as you say. And
it's funny how actually even in conflict
I want emotion. I want imperfection. I
want res- human resonance.
It's interesting cuz I've been like
thinking about my
Struggle is a good thing.
Yeah.
And I think in our modern day and age we
have under
appreciated and underrepresented the
value of struggle.
And if you ask anybody in their life
you know, tell me about a time in your
career
where
like you felt like boy, this is the most
amazing thing I've ever done. I'm so
glad I'm a part of this. It's not the
big win. It's not the big success. It's
not we finished everything on time and
under budget.
It's oh my god, this one thing went
horribly wrong.
Oh my god, it went so badly and yet the
way we came together like the most
important thing in my career was when I
lost my passion and went into deep
depression. Never want to go through
that again. Really glad it happened. And
all of our relationships, professional,
personal, romantic, whatever they are
right? All of our relationships
get better when we go through struggle
together.
And we know we know the way the human
animal works. We know that oxytocin is
released when you have shared struggle.
That's why when you put people in boot
camp and they go through [ __ ] together
or there's a a natural a national a
natural disaster. Like all of all of a
sudden I don't care who you voted for.
I saw your house blow down in the
tornado. I got you. Don't worry. We're
neighbors. Right? Like we can put aside
all the rational nonsense.
The the the intellectual nonsense. And
at the end of the day human beings
are are are good at helping human
beings.
Struggle also in many contexts is the
value. So when I think about a Simon
Sinek book, the reason why I value it is
because I know that Simon Sinek spent
years writing that thing and pulling it
together. The reason why
certain handmade things that we talked
about earlier are valuable is because of
the pain and the toil that went into
them. And when you think about the art
world and other creations through
history, the value comes from the fact
that human beings came together for a
prolonged period of time
and did something. And actually, the
investment is the value. Like the the
amount that went in the top creates
value.
We're not buying the product, we're
buying the story.
Yeah. Like the Mona Lisa is
You're not buying the Mona Lisa. You're
not buying a piece of art, you're buying
the story that goes with the art. The
story that it took to create the art.
What the artist was going through, what
they were thinking. You're not buying my
book, you're buying the story of the
making of my book.
And the Mona Lisa was stolen from what I
understand.
I mean, we don't even know if the the
one in the Louvre is the real one.
Cuz I had mentioned the reason why the
Mona Lisa is so valuable is because at
one point it was stolen and then they
like managed to find it again. And
actually, it's just a painting, but the
story of the
The story is amazing.
100 million, 200 million, whatever.
Whatever. I mean, and so this is what we
figure The reason famous artists are
famous is cuz you buy the story of that
artist, not not their talent.
There's a lot of
famous singers and actors and painters,
dancers who are a lot
less talented than the unknown ones, but
you buy into the story.
And this is why some celebrities,
as much as they talk about the paparazzi
and the tabloids, they want to be in the
paparazzi and the tabloids. They want
the paparazzi to follow them because it
keeps their story relevant. It keeps
them, you know, they're worth more
because they're in the zeitgeist.
Apple know this better than anybody cuz
you go to an Apple store and they've
laid out their products as if
it was an art gallery.
The
3 ft either side of the iPhone create
the impression in my mind that that this
is a piece of art and there's only one
of them. And the fact that they've
wasted all this space, which I know real
estate costs money and that must have
been expensive, pulls into the device
itself. If I go into an Apple store and
there was a thousand iPhones, like the
old electronic stops all stacked on top
of each other, I would assume the iPhone
was worth less, but the story, just by
the frame in which I see it, means that
oh my god, this thing is
It's theater. It looks like one of one.
Yeah, it's theater. And and some would
call it manipulative,
but we want things to feel
valuable. Not just be valuable.
Right? I could tell you I've got a
I I can I found a guy who makes cashmere
jerseys and he uses the exact same
cashmere as, you know, Loro Piana,
whatever, some fancy fancy ass brand.
You know? But the problem is it says
like Dave's Cashmere Shop.
You know? I could tell you everything
about where he sources the cashmere, how
he makes it, that's the same everything,
and you'd be like,
"Yeah,
Dave's Cashmere Shop?" Because you're
not buying the cashmere, you're buying
the brand. You're buying the story,
you're buying the association. That's
what's That's why brands have value.
Because it's irrational.
Yeah.
And humans are irrational. And that's
why companies invest in building brands.
For the story.
And so,
yeah, I I I think I'm
you know, as much as chat
AI scares me,
I still believe the thing that the
technologist the technologists don't
appreciate and won't appreciate, and
there there will be a rebellion.
And handmade will become more valuable
and handmade will become more expensive.
And
people will want to say that.
You know, it's like,
"You had that person write your speech
for you? You Wait, who did the painting
for you? They They did it themselves?"
You know? And I think
that's good.
You know, it's a pendulum, right? We're
going to get enamored with the
technology until we're until it's
boring.
This also just expands generally. I know
this sounds quite big and we're talking
about these big things, but just
everything that you create, it's very,
very tempting at the moment to just
create something with AI and throw it up
on your website, on your social media
pages, or present it to the world, a
presentation deck at work. But actually,
I'm I'm already noticing
I'm attributing huge value and interest
in things that I can identify as
human-made.
I had a flashback a second ago. So we're
talking about this idea of scarcity
to one of my favorite brands in the
world.
It's a clothing brand, and I was
obsessed with this clothing brand. I'd
spend a huge amount of I don't spend
money on clothes. I would spend a huge
amount of money every time they came up
with a new item. One day,
the founder of the brand, and everybody
knows this brand,
he posted a photo from his factory. It
was like a series of video.
And what I saw in the video was the
shirt I was currently wearing as I
watched the video in a massive bucket
with 4,000 others of the exact same
shirt. And in that moment,
fell out of love.
I fell out of love.
Exactly.
Because in my head, I'd painted this
like artisan picture of the of them
sewing it. These two guys sewing it in
their bedroom and then like sending
Probably what it was Probably what it
was on the ad, too. it was on the ad,
too.
I think that's what it kind of like used
to be. So I still had that image in my
head.
Yeah.
The one thing that I've always
understood, this is true for businesses,
this is true for absolutely everything,
scale breaks things.
You know, scale breaks things. In the In
the military, there the special forces,
special operating forces, Navy SEALs,
SAS, you know,
all those folks, right?
And there's this there's a saying
in the special forces that's basically
um special
you can't scale special.
Right? So you can take whatever training
skills, whatever you have for the
special forces, and you give it to
everybody, it's not going to work.
Special can only be small.
You know? And and so
scale breaks things. Scale always So I
mean like
Microsoft versus Apple, right? So, Apple
wanted the highest quality operating
system in the world, right? So, what did
they do? They They refused to clone,
right? They wouldn't They wouldn't They
wouldn't clone their their operating
system.
And
they
uh as a result of of refusing to
to do that, they they never at For
years, Apple had like, in the height of
the the PC wars, maybe 4% of the world's
operating systems.
Microsoft said, "We're happy to clone
our operating system." So, it was a
little bit different on Dells, a little
bit different on IBM. Wherever you use
it, it was slightly different. And they
had 90-something percent of the world's
operating systems.
It's because you have to trade quality
for scale.
Mhm.
Every time. There's a reason why buying
fancy goods for a lot of money
like, because as you said,
the way you make things has to change,
and you just have to start making them
in factories, and you have to
scale scale scale breaks companies.
Think about how beautiful companies are.
The number of companies that talk about,
"Oh, our company's like a family." Get
to about 150 people, 200 people, gets to
Dunbar's number,
not so much of a family anymore.
I think B2B marketers keep making this
mistake. They're chasing volume instead
of quality. And when you try to be seen
by more people instead of the right
people, all you're doing is making
noise, but that noise rarely shifts the
needle, and it's often quite expensive.
And I know, as there was a time in my
career where I kept making this mistake,
that many of you will be making it, too.
Eventually, I started posting ads on our
show sponsor's platform, LinkedIn, and
that's when things started to change. I
put that change down to a few critical
things. One of them being that LinkedIn
was then and still is today the platform
where decision-makers go to, not only to
think and learn, but also to buy. And
when you market your business there,
you're putting it right in front of
people who actually have the power to
say yes. And you can target them by job
title, industry, and company size. It's
simply a sharper way to spend your
marketing budget. And if you haven't
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linkedin.com/diary.
Is it harder now to find love? Cuz
there's lots of stats that say we're
having less sex, we're lonelier than
ever before. Um interestingly, this is
maybe an adjacent point, but I was
looking at Bumble share price.
I love
the founder of Bumble, the CEO is
really, really good friend of mine. I
think she's amazing.
Whitney?
Whitney, yes. I think she is amazing.
Has she come on?
She has. And I know her, and she's a
wonderful human being. But when I was
looking at the Bumble share price, it
painted a really interesting picture
because then you you overlay that with
some of these other dating apps, and you
see I mean this is the
Well, she's had to come back.
She's just come back in yet to turn the
company around. And actually,
interestingly, I saw her do an
interview, which is one of these ones
here, and in the interview she said
she's going to revamp Bumble
Yeah.
to make it not about finding love with
others, but falling in love with
yourself.
Yeah.
And there's also going to be this dating
marketplace, but her first objective is
going to be get people to love
themselves
Yeah.
through coaching and all these kinds of
things on the app, and then find a
partner.
Sure. Yes. I mean, I
I agree with that. I mean
it's like it's
I mean, we're all broken records, right?
I don't mean that as a like a like we're
all broken souls. Like
you know, you your customers will never
love you until your employees love you
first.
You'll never find somebody to love you
unless you love yourself first. And look
at failed relationships, right? Where
there's so much tension, it's somebody's
lack of self-love that contributes to
the failing of that relationship. I
mean, I have a dear friend who's going
through it right now. She just can't
find love, and she
it's it's just
but
it's cuz she doesn't love herself, and
and she knows it, you know, it's a hard
thing to to So, if Bumble can crack that
code, more power to him.
It's It's a But, this is the problem
with a lot of these things.
You know, they're common knowledge. We
just don't do them.
Everybody knows how to be healthy.
Everybody knows how to exercise.
Everybody knows what eating right means.
Don't do it.
Because wrong is easier.
And right takes effort. Everybody knows
what we're supposed to do in a
relationship. Everybody knows what we're
supposed to like
hold space. Everybody Everybody knows
philosophically what we're supposed to
do, but we don't do it. By the way, it's
the reason why most people I've written
all these lovely books, and it's the
reason why most companies don't use
them. It's because
my work is like exercise, which is I can
tell you every single If you want to get
into shape, "Hey Simon, how do I get
into shape?" Easy. Every single day work
out for 20 minutes. Every single day.
Okay? Can I take the occasional day off?
Yes, but not too many. Work out every
single day, and 100% of you will get
into shape. I know it. 100%. When? I
don't know, and neither does any doctor.
And that's my work. Yes, I can
profoundly help you find
purpose with Start With Why. I can help
you build trust on a team with Leaders
Eat Last. I can help you embrace the
infinite mindset and have this
incredible calm in life. And the reason
most companies won't do it this innova-
This is a book for innovation, right
here. You want to know innovate?
Infinite Game. The reason most companies
won't do it is because they need it to
happen by the end of the quarter or the
end of the financial year.
It may or may not. I have no clue, and I
cannot predict that it will or won't.
It'll work 100%. I just don't know when.
And the problem is, cuz right back to
the beginning of this conversation,
we're all so obsessed with the output.
We're all so obsessed with the result
that we've completely ignored the value
of the journey.
And people would rather hit the number
at the end of the year than build a good
strong company. Think about it. Right?
If I meet another entrepreneur, when I
say, "So, tell me about your company."
Like, "We're hypergrowth. We're a
hypergrowth company. We're a gazelle."
Right? Like, show me Then I always say
the same thing, cuz I'm an ass.
Can you please give me one article from
a reputable publication, just one, and I
don't care the publication that says
that building a hyper-growth company is
good for business.
Just
one.
And the answer is you can't, because
it's not.
And so, why are we so obsessed with
high-speed growth? It's because our
investors want us to be obsessed with
high-speed growth.
Right? Or our egos want us to be
obsessed with high-speed growth. Right?
And if high-speed growth happens by
accident, that happens for many of the
unicorns. Right? It was an accident. I
think building a good company is better
than building a fast company. I think
building a good relationship is better
than building a fast relationship.
And we're all so obsessed with speed
and immediate results.
Present company included. I've had to
learn this the hard way.
Then I think there's something joyful
and beautiful about
slowing down,
saying thank you, re-prioritizing
friends.
It's okay. I mean, by the way, cell
phones and so
But before cell phones, we went to work,
and then we went home.
And we didn't do work at home, because
we couldn't do work at home.
Because we didn't have computers at
home, and we didn't have cell phones or
people to call us. And so, you did work
at work,
and then you left.
And I remember when cell phones started,
I remember the advertising. AT&T had
this campaign
that they showed people working on the
beach,
you know, with their computers. I mean,
this is like the future, right? And they
said, "Now,
um well, I don't remember what was the
what was the tagline. It was really
funny. It was like, 'Now you can leave
work.'"
Right?
And that's not what happened.
Work came with us. We never left work.
Work came with us wherever This is the
problem with cell phones and computers
and the internet, which is we do not
leave work.
Work is with us in our pocket
every day, every vacation, every
evening, every weekend.
As you said that, I thought, "Do you
know what? That's so interesting because
that kind of means that friction
creates freedom in that regard, if you
know what I'm saying." So, the friction
of not being able to go home
and tap away on my computer all night
meant that I had a certain level of
freedom because I had to kind of wait
for things, right? So, in the same
context with AI coming along, now I can
build software throughout the weekend
whether the agency's working or not.
Now, I can build anything I want at any
time
Yeah.
using the phone in my pocket, the
friction has come down again. And
therefore, the pressure to do it now
because I can do it now
goes up. And this is kind of maybe what
I was alluding to earlier on in the, you
know, when I was thinking about how
you're going to get more stressed and
more overwhelmed and
That's good.
more isolated.
That's so good. That's so Right, it's
we're taking work with us. I mean, it's
like, you know, everybody has a story of
like where the battery ran out on their
phone and they ended up having the best
night. Yeah. Or the internet went out at
work and they actually got more done.
Like, you hear these stories all the
time.
You know? That that when when we're
forced not to take work with us,
forced.
It takes a bit of time sometimes to
relax,
but it's always better because you learn
to
stop worrying, stop checking,
you know?
You know, and you just I One of the
things I did,
I I I can't delete Instagram
completely as much as I'd love to,
but I hid it.
So, you know, you can do that on iPhone.
You can take it off the It's gone. It's
hidden. It says hide app. And then I And
when you go into the search, you know,
when you go to search, it suggests I
took it off the suggestions, which most
people don't even know you could do
that. So, I took it off the suggestions.
So, when I go to cuz I realized what I
was doing is I'm like, when I'm bored, I
just pick up my phone and I just like
and then I see Instagram like and I just
click it like a like a zombie and then
I'm done for an hour, you know?
So, I hid it. So, the only time I go to
Instagram is when I have to go to it and
I have to type in I N S T, you know?
And then it pops up and my usage of
Instagram has plummeted.
Plunged
because it has to be intentional.
And the problem with most social media
is it's unintentional.
One of the big things talking about
community Instagram AI that I think a
lot about is
is the
is the value of in real life community
going to rise? And I think we might be
on the precipice of the community
revolution. I say this because when I
think about what's going to remain in
the world where creating things goes to
zero. Like when you know, once upon a
time if you made a social network or if
you made built an app or if you built a
media a movie or a media company or a
podcast
that was half of the job and the other
half of the job is like getting it out
there in the world.
And so now the people that have the
other half of the job
which hasn't gone to zero, now have this
tremendous advantage cuz we can all
create but we can't all distribute. And
so having community and building and
fostering community I think now is one
of the things that remains. What are the
values of a community? Like how do I
build a community?
Well, I have a definition of community
and I think we said it before which is
the community is a group of people who
agree to grow together.
Interesting.
Community is a group of people who agree
to grow together and I believe friends
are at least two people who agree to
grow together.
In marketing this is the absolute
obsession at the moment community run
clubs and brands becoming
And offline is the new online, right?
Offline's the new black.
Like there's a there's a company called
Clicks and it was started by a
she's a talented entrepreneur and she
was in college and she suffered severe
depression and loneliness and literally
struggled didn't know how to make
friends. And
she
Oh, I'll just call her by her name. Her
name is Alix.
Um but her company Clicks she started it
to solve her own problem, right? My
favorite kind of company.
And basically to help her friends at
school, quote unquote friends, people at
school make friends. And she did it by
taking people offline and taking their
phones away. And she would come up with
reasons to come together, whether it was
running or this or that. Just like it
didn't matter what the reason was. Come
and just a reason to come that made you
that when you saw the ad hung up on a
piece of paper at college, you know,
that you'd be like,
I like
horror movies, whatever.
I like baking. I'll go to that. Right?
Just a trick.
And then basically just And so she's
built this business
predominantly for young people, but it's
available to everyone, but she's built
this business to just bring people
together to meet people
without phones offline. And she wants
She has a There's a great irony in it.
She has an app that she wants people not
to be on.
You know?
And what is it that holds a community
together? Is it so like sh- We want to
improve together, so we have to have
some kind of shared value that we we
want to improve on,
presumably.
It's like a community of runners.
They're trying to get fit together, or
they're trying to improve their
I don't think it matters. I mean, it's
like it's it's shared shared interests
is a is a is a way to start a a
relationship, right? Comic-Con,
you know, you know, nerdvana, you know,
Burning Man. All of these
larger-than-life events, big and small.
Going to the Going to the Going to the
football.
You know, it's like you're everybody's
friend when you wear the when you wear
the right when you wear the right
colors.
You know? You know, you see people on
the on on the tube who's going to to go
to the same game. They're wearing the
same jersey.
You're friends, yeah.
You're friends, right? So, I think
common interest is a is a is a trick.
It's a way of getting people to come
together, and it's a nice place to start
cuz at least conversation is easy.
Mhm.
Right? You know at least one thing about
this person that you have in common with
them.
Do you need a shared goal in a
community, do you think? Thinking cuz in
the football analogy, we have a shared
goal.
Oh, yeah, you want to win. I think
that's a very good question. You have a
shared goal.
Even in a relationship.
Yeah, I think so. That seems to make
sense.
The reason why I'm asking these
questions is I am building businesses
and brands, and I know that community is
one of the most important things that
everyone building a brand or business is
thinking about at the moment. So,
there's a big difference between having
an audience,
which is what you might have on like a
podcast or something, and having a
community.
And I'm as a brand leader and as an
entrepreneur, I'm trying to shift from
having an audience over to having a
community. And that's about like
relationships and
Shared values.
Shared values.
I mean,
I like to think the people who
really like my work, not the ones who
just like passively like it, but the
ones who really like my work.
Like if somebody says, "I love Start
With Why."
Or "I live my life by the Infinite
Game."
That
it says something about who they are and
how they see the world and that we share
the same values.
And that if
And
because I am, you know me, you know I'm
an idealist.
And
And my I
I'm consistent in the way I talk about
things from the day I started to to now.
Won't ever change.
And
And I think that's the value of values.
And the problem with the modern world we
live in and the pressures that people
face is money and fame and all the rest
of it and, you know, influencer status.
I think it sometimes forces us to
question our values or walk away from
them. I was invited to a a group of they
called it a mastermind group. It was a
bunch of folks like me, author speakers,
who wanted to This is what they told me,
come together to based on shared shared
goals,
shared values, how we can work together
and improve the world together. And I'm
like, "Oh, sign me up. I'm in, right?"
So, I went and we sat around and you
know who some of these people are, you
know?
And we sat around a room and they spent
all of their time talking about how they
can share their lists with each other
and how they can cross promote with each
other and what margins are you getting
on this? And I'm like,
"You guys are And I spoke up. I was
like, you guys are just talking about
making more money.
I What I thought we came here to like
do common good together.
They didn't invite me back.
But it was but the point is is like
the money and the fame is seductive, you
know? This is this is this is this is
Joseph Campbell's hero's journey, which
is you start off as the reluctant hero,
and you get called to your mission for
some reason,
and at some point in your journey, there
will be
something to seduce you away from your
mission, money or power.
You know, Luke Skywalker was nearly
seduced away
from the vision, you know?
From the journey. Like this is what this
is what the hero has to go through.
And
do you have the friends who will slap
you around and keep you in line and say,
"No, you signed up for this. You have to
stay true to what you're doing." Because
I think none of us have the courage or
the strength to stay true to our cause
by ourselves. Very few of us. We need to
have at least one person who believes in
us
to give us the strength to stick to it.
Because the temptation the temptation
you and I have both at various times
gone through it. Like when you start
making money and you start making money
for something you didn't expect. Like I
never expected to have a career from any
of this stuff, right? It happened by
accident.
And you get to the point where you start
thinking you're more important than you
are.
Do they know Do they Do they know who I
am?
No. No.
Get over yourself.
You know?
And you start becoming seduced. And I
think the seduction when we turn on
social media and we watch Kardashian
the Kardashian model
and like you have people who pursue
influence without knowledge or skill.
Like those two buckets. They have the
other three buckets, but they don't have
the first two buckets.
And it is temporary for some
or unfulfilling for others.
And you know, the funny thing about that
job, you know, I was I was I went to a
concert.
And
there was this
this woman who walked down the aisle and
some guy was taking pictures of her as
she was posing. And the person next to
me goes, "She's a famous influencer."
And I said, "You mean she's a freelance
employee of an algorithm?"
And
And there's somebody who chooses to be
an influencer, that's what you are. You
are a freelance employee of an
algorithm. And the minute they change
the algorithm, you might be out of
business.
Uh
You just lost like 170 followers.
I mean
Maybe.
You just lost like 170 blue ticks.
But
Like I don't have a problem with the
concept of being an influencer if you
bring something of value.
The only time I have a problem with it
is is if you make it about you.
And I have to get more of everything. In
the early days of influencing
there was a young couple that were
trying to get followers, and they would
do crazier and crazier things.
And so
Shh. What they did is he took a dick a
big book, a dictionary I think it was,
and he put it over his chest, and she
took a gun and shot it at the book
thinking that the book would stop the
bullet. And she killed him. She killed
him on camera.
Right? Now
They admitted She admitted afterwards
she he's dead, but she admitted
afterwards they were doing it to do
bigger and crazier stunts to get more
and more followers because the financial
pressures of driving at those YouTube
views
was overwhelming.
And so it's an extreme case, obviously,
of the the the the the
how we will lose our minds trying to
gain followers.
And I don't mind if people gain
followers by giving.
But to gain followers by taking, look at
me, look at me, look at me.
Versus I have something that I think
this will help you.
And
like there's not there's no I don't have
a problem with
what it's it's the it's the input,
right? It's the intention.
Um
Anyway. Anyway, it's not like an old man
complaining about No, but
You kids these days and your
influencers.
So, I'm going to print it off some
graphs which I think are absolutely
fascinating and dovetail into everything
you said today, but also into your work
generally. So, I'm just going to give
you all of these to give you a second to
look through them. And I want to get
your read and interpretation on them.
Okay.
Adults lack of meaning and purpose
overall only let's just say
Okay.
I mean, that makes sense.
To me, that didn't make sense. I
couldn't understand how if someone is
low in purpose, then they are lonelier.
I mean, it just makes sense that when
you have
lack of purpose
the likelihood that loneliness comes
nearby.
Like I think family gives meaning,
friends give meaning. Like you feel like
you're there for someone else.
Um but if you don't know why you're
showing up every day, I think it it it
it feels like a lonely existence. Like
you feel like you're searching. When you
have a sense of purpose, it gives you a
mechanism to meet people. It gives you a
mechanism to make decisions. It gives
you a mechanism to talk about yourself
in a way that's quite inspiring to
others. You know, when you say your why
and you somebody says, "So, what do you
do?" You say, "I wake up every single
day to inspire people to do what
inspires them. What do you do?"
You know? Like it's
it's I yeah, I do I do and I think it's
it's not the thing that makes you less
lonely. I think it's a mechanism to make
you less lonely.
Just as you said that, that why you just
gave, it becomes a magnet for me.
Yeah.
Because then I know who your people are
and I know what to talk to you about and
it throws down this bridge for me to
walk across.
Yeah. Versus, yeah, I'm a dentist.
Or I don't know.
Which is even worse.
Which is even worse.
Yeah.
Yeah. So, so yeah, that that doesn't
seem unusual. Distribution of people
feeling lonely worldwide by gender.
So, it's about 50/50.
Mhm.
Are you surprised by that? I thought
for some reason I thought men would be
more lonely.
Not at all lonely looks like women do
better.
I would think Do you think you thought
men were more lonely?
I thought
men would be more lonely.
I also don't know what the age groups
are. Cuz like
I want to know what how they like what
age are they to start are they starting
at? Is it 18?
I guess that if we just put that all
aside, I mean women being slightly less
lonely
than men
I think makes sense cuz I think women
are probably better at
making friends. Maybe I have that wrong.
What else we got here? Adults mental
health health ratings.
68% of people who have depression are
lonely and 67% of people who have
anxiety are lonely.
Do you think good mental health is a
foundation for being
uh not lonely, I guess.
No.
I think having somebody who cares about
you is a foundation for not being
lonely.
And when you're in a period of strained
mental fitness
it definitely can manifest as loneliness
and anxiety.
And the best way to manage through that
period of
is to lean on the people who you know
love you. That will help.
So I don't think you can separate the
two. So does it affect it? Of course it
affects it.
Can it make you withdraw from your
friends? Of course it can.
Um
So
I don't think you can separate the two.
I read um a couple of years ago that
when people are lonely, they fall into a
state of self-preservation because of
some evolutionary
uh sort of mechanism which meant that if
we were alone on the
Serengeti in Africa
we would sleep worse, we'd become more
selfish, we'd become more angry.
Cortisol levels would be up, which means
more inflammation. And this idea of
self-preservation basically means that
lonely people become more selfish, more
bitter, more angry. And that that's not
conducive, ironically, with finding more
friends, but it is conducive with
survival.
It is conducive with being able to fend
for yourself.
it's more conducive survival as an
individual.
Yeah.
So like if you're on a deserted island
Mhm.
and you're lonely and all those things
and the cortisol rises and you become
better at
being on edge.
Being on edge, which is a survival
mechanism, right?
Mhm.
But, if you live
in a community with other people, then
it is counterproductive, because we are
social animals. And I need you to help
me, and you need to help me.
So, if we live in tribe together, and
I'm the selfish [ __ ] I'm not going
You're not going to wake me and alert me
to danger tonight.
Mhm.
You're just going to leave me. So, so
it's a it's a it's a Though I think it's
100% true,
in a social environment, it becomes
counterproductive. And I think you're
right. When somebody feels lonely, they
do go into survival, and they become
paranoid, and they think everybody's out
to get them, and it's But, the problem
is is you don't live on a desert island.
And that's one of the reasons I think
it's up it's dangerous.
We're increasingly being living on on
islands. The islands are different now.
They're four walls in a in a white city.
And um
it's so funny that so many of my friends
are using this word loneliness.
When 10, 20 years ago, it wasn't it
wasn't something that I had frequently
from
from adults. But, now it seems to be
also common. In fact, my masseuse
yesterday was saying to me that
she's lonely.
And this is a woman that lives in Los
Angeles,
has people around her, but she's lonely.
Yeah.
And I remember when she went, and she's
cuz we had a conversation on our text,
and said, "Oh, thank you for for being
so open and stuff." I was thinking about
like what advice I could give her. She's
got no friends. She's in Los Angeles.
She's desperate for friends. She doesn't
have a partner anymore, cuz she's had a
divorce. What advice do you give
someone? Is it take more risks?
So, it's it's too it's easy to give the
obvious advice. Like, you got to put
yourself out there, right? But, when
you're in a period of loneliness and
stress, it you it's hard to find that
that energy and that risk-taking, right?
Especially when you're down on yourself.
We've all been there. I've definitely
been there. But, the
um I think for me, what I've learned is
um to put myself second. Meaning, don't
worry. Don't try and solve solve my
problem. But, do I have somebody else
who's lonely that I can help?
Like, how do I help somebody else who's
dealing with their loneliness?
And it's the act of service that is so
valuable.
If, you know, you guys are talking and
she has many clients and somebody else
like and her willing to admit that I'm
lonely, that one of her clients might
say,
"You know, me, too." Like, her ability
to admit her loneliness out loud creates
a safe environment for somebody else to
admit the same. And then once she learns
that they're lonely, now she can say,
"Tell me about it." And then she can
talk them through it and then hold space
for them. And her ability to help
somebody else manage or understand their
loneliness will will help her.
So interesting cuz one of the hallmarks
of her personality, if you met this
person, something she says to me every
single time she comes over
for the treatment, is that she doesn't
like sharing herself with people because
she thinks if people get to know her,
they'll change. So literally, she's been
my masseuse for many years now and
If people get to know her, they will
change?
She's scared about people knowing how
She's scared about people knowing the
details of her life, so she guards it
all. And it's it took me and I'm someone
that just asks way too many questions of
every stranger I meet.
It took me like 20 sessions just to
figure out she had a family. I had no
idea she had two kids. Took me She goes
And when I asked her, her body language
went like this.
"Yes, I have kids." And I was like,
"Why? Why are you so guarded with your
information?" "Well, if people knew who
really I really am and they knew more
about me, then they'll change or
um they may not like me anymore or
they'll think differently about me, so I
just keep it to myself."
But I mean, this is the age-old problem.
I mean, it's everything you said when
you when people who are driven only by
the thing that they want, you know,
versus the givers. And this
I mean, this is the age-old problem,
which is I'm never going to I'm going to
keep my walls up high. I never want to
love anybody because then I'll get hurt.
And then you just end up lonely and
hurt.
And this is This is goes This This is
goes back to struggle, which is
This goes Look, you and I both know that
uh that if somebody who chooses to go on
an entrepreneurial venture or adventure,
the statistics bear out that the
over 90% of all new businesses will fail
in the first 3 years.
Right? What idiot would ever start a
business? Right? You have to be
compelled by something
else to make you do something with
overwhelming
statistical chance of failure. Right?
And and it's opening yourself up to
failure
that is the thing that makes it work.
Mhm.
You know?
At least for a small small percentage.
Of course.
But it's the same for love, which is
or relationship or friendship, which is
it absolutely comes with risk. There's
nothing riskier. Like, yeah, they will
they some of them might change. Yes.
Some of them might not like you for that
Yes. Yes.
And the odds are equal that somebody
will fall in love with you and love you
and like you and think you're the best
thing and think you're amazing. And so,
if you can't take the risk, you can't
get the reward. If you don't play the
lottery, you don't win the you know, you
don't win the jackpot. If you aren't
willing to take I'm not telling you to
open up and tell everybody your deepest
darkest secrets.
But if you're not willing to give
somebody anything to latch on to to be
like if you can't give them anything to
to say, "Me, too."
Mhm.
then
then it's going to be a hard road. Or
it'll take somebody to chip away at you
20 times. You know? To before you open
up. But
but the fact that you did and she got it
to open up a little bit,
she could make a friend in you.
Now she's fully open and we've been
through everything. I know why she wants
the house to be on the list.
you go. You see?
That thing down
have to point out to her that this
friendship and that you know so much and
that she feels so safe with you only
happened
because
um you chipped away at her and she
finally wore her down and she opened up.
And it can happen in two directions,
right? Which is
sometimes we have to take the little
risk to just tell somebody some a little
something about ourselves to find
something. Or sometimes it's somebody
who's so curious about us that they chip
away and chip away and chip away and
chip away and chip away until we give up
and open up and they that person becomes
a friend.
Mhm.
You know? And so one of the reasons she
should be grateful for the friendship is
you kept trying. You could have just
tried it three times and be like,
"Forget it. I'll just lie here quietly
and have a massage." You know?
So,
yeah, I mean, all of this stuff comes
with risk.
I could see it in her face, though. I
could see
But, you're also curious.
Yeah, I could see this
lucked out because you're curious about
people.
Is this what connection is? You when you
said me, too. Finding something to say
me, too with someone. Is that the
essence of what like connection is?
I mean, that I can mean, it could be
values, it could be interests, it could
be many things. But, I think to find
I think, yes. Like, this is I mean, if
you want to go political,
you know, one of the problems in our
politics is both sides think they're
right and both sides think the other
side is wrong.
And neither side is willing to try to
even understand what the other person's
point of view is without thinking them
an idiot or thinking them wrong or
thinking them sheeple.
And
the ability to say, "Can you tell me
more about how you came to your beliefs?
I'm genuinely curious."
And to not agree or disagree,
but to be curious, to be an
investigator, you know? And I and I've
done this with people who have polar
opposite political views with me.
At some point, we will get to a level of
me just chipping away trying to
understand that they will say something
that I'm like, "100% I agree with that."
And then from that point on, there's a
there's a simple validation, not
agreement,
but a validation that your opinions do
matter and we do have common ground that
we can build from there. And on that on
that validation, they become vastly more
open to my point of view, also, and
curious to my point of view, also.
And so,
yeah, the person the person like
the ability to listen and be curious,
even if you disagree,
is one of the most underappreciated
skills on the planet. And yeah, I think
when you find
the ability to say, "I agree."
then you can find community you can and
maybe that's what we need to heal this
country or most of the countries in the
world right now, which is one group or
one person
to just be curious rather than agree or
disagree.
There's something about relationships
here as well because my girlfriend is
you've met my partner and um she's very
spiritual but also like all of us she's
emotional. So sometimes in those
interactions when we sit down and
there's a problem and we spend the first
60 minutes to 90 minutes trying to
figure out what the problem is, it
doesn't sound very logical to me.
And one of the things that I think
sort of is adjacent to what you're
saying is my job in that moment actually
isn't to like pass through truth and to
figure and to correct truth.
It is to sit and let someone
get it out.
Get it out.
So you and I have the same problem.
Yeah, we do.
Which is we live above our necks.
Yeah.
And you and I both have the same
struggle which is to learn to live below
our necks.
Right? Like you and I are head people.
And we have to learn to be more heart.
Mhm.
Right? And I want to understand
everything, explain everything,
you know, evaluate everything, analyze
everything. And when I come to my
emotions I'll give you an analysis.
You know, when it comes to your emotions
I'll give you an analysis. And so I have
to learn to be like I feel this
and that's it. And I feel the same way.
It's funny because I'm good at it with
art. You know, I always tell people you
don't have to understand art. I'll take
you to museum, I'll take you to gallery
and if you look at a piece
and I know you're intimidated come
because you don't understand art or you
don't understand music, whatever it is.
And all you need to do, this is the only
rule is
do you like it?
I do.
Why? I don't know, I just like it.
That's it. You're done.
You're done.
I don't like it. Why? I don't know, I
just don't like it. Great.
Excellent. And now we're going to look
at four, five, six, 10 pieces that you
like and I'm going to see four, five,
six, 10 pieces that you don't like. And
I'll be like
you like all of the impressionists and
you hate all the old masters. So, why
don't we just go see more
impressionists?
Mhm.
You know? And so, when when your
girlfriend opens up to you, you know,
you don't have to agree, you don't have
to disagree. You just have to And you
and I both have to learn to stop
thinking
and to just
like feel something. When somebody says,
"Where do you feel it?" I'm like, "What
That's the stupidest question I've ever
heard. Where do I feel it?"
And they've literally like I've had
somebody take me on this journey, and
she goes "You told me an emotion you
have, Simon.
You told me an emotion." Yes.
"Where do you feel it? In your body,
where do you feel it?"
And I'm sitting there going
"You've got to be kidding me."
You know?
But all right, we'll go through this.
All right. And she says, "So, you said
you feel X." I'm like, "Yes." "All
right, where in your body did you have
some sort of reaction?" I
here. "What happened?"
It got a little tighter in my chest.
"Okay." And I went on this journey with
my friend
with my friend Bea Bea Oche. She's
she's incredible.
And she took me on this journey, and she
does repair with couples, and she's just
incredible.
And she helped me recognize that my body
does react to my feelings.
Tension in my shoulders,
heavy breathing in my chest,
clenching my fists, you know?
Like my body does react.
Mhm.
And so, I'm learning to experience
feelings beneath my neck, when my
inclination is to do everything above
above the neck.
It's a hard skill.
Oh my god, it's hard. And so, I have
men.
And so, when you're when you meet
spiritual people, they are all below the
neck.
And
we think it's stupid,
but they recognize that we have an
ability to feel because we want to think
about everything.
And so, we both have a lot to learn from
each other, which is there Thinking
about things has value.
Not all the time.
And so, your girlfriend And I cuz I know
her
her ability to
know her body when she has feelings
I think is way more
is has a lot of value to you and to me.
I think it's like the biggest
opportunity that I have to form
relationships. Yeah.
Change in number of posts for automation
prone jobs
compared to manual intensive jobs.
So this is a graph that shows the drop
in job postings online for jobs
around automation.
It's yeah, the not knowledge work is
going to get hammered by AI. Um
I met a guy in Japan
who
he's one of the very few
guys left like a hundred of them left
150 of them left who make samurai swords
in the traditional samurai sword way you
make them you hammer the metal and he
folds his own metal and he makes
samurai swords they made them the way
they made them 200 years ago.
And we went to this little workshop.
And he's this little old guy
and he's telling us the story
like how did you do this? He's like well
I had a desk job I worked in a company
and I woke up one day I was like
I can't do this. Like this is this can't
be my life.
And I did I've always been enamored by
sword making so I found an
apprenticeship
and tried to learn
and you know I'm I I'm just starting to
get the hang of it and but I have a lot
of room for improvement. And we're like
how long have you been doing this? He
said 30 years.
But that's so Japanese. You know the
Japanese like they'll never be good at
this I'll just keep working at it. And
and like it's such hard work.
But he
I think there's something to be said for
I think a lot of us
like think about how many white
knowledge workers like ask them what
their hobbies are.
You know?
And like maybe there is an opportunity
to learn a skill.
I mean look at look at look at lockdown.
We all went through lockdown.
I mean, what skill did you practice
during lockdown? What did you learn?
DJing, running,
cycling.
DJing.
DJing.
Right?
I did Kintsugi.
It's the Japanese art of fixing broken
things with gold.
So, basically, you take a broken plate
or broken cup and you put it together
and with gold paint or gold epoxy, you
put it together and you make it The
whole concept is
you can make something more beautiful
like things can get more beautiful after
they're broken, right? I love the
philosophy of it.
I spent hours doing freaking Kintsugi.
Ask me how much Kintsugi I've done since
we came out of lockdown.
How much DJing have you done?
Zero.
And so, maybe all this free time
that we're supposed to get, which I
still don't think will happen,
maybe it's not such a bad thing.
Think about the joy you had DJing. I had
so much fun doing Kintsugi. I had so
much fun. I would spend hours just my
head down, focused. I was so
relaxed,
not thinking about work. So, why why
That's the other question. Peop- We're
talking about how we're all going to
have all the spare time. We've lost all
of our spare time. We have no spare time
because all we do is work and think
about work and talk about work. Like
if we go back 40 years, 50 years, there
was plenty of spare time. And people
went bowling and they went to the movies
and they went over to each each other's
houses for dinner and they cooked.
Isn't it a good thing that we're
getting time back? You know, a lot of us
got a lot of good things out of
lockdown.
And that's extreme. So, like, maybe
maybe it's okay that we get some time
back cuz it sounds like we've lost all
of our own time.
It fixed the loneliness. You have space
for relationships.
You'd have space for relationships.
You'd have space to try things. And we
couldn't bury ourselves in work and
escape from our lives that we hate by
just burying ourselves in work. Like,
maybe maybe AI doing some of the work
for us is the thing we've been desperate
for for the past 30 years.
Just saying.
This is quite embarrassing for me to
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What are you struggling with in this
season of life?
I think I've asked you this in every
conversation we've had and the answer's
evolved conversation to conversation.
Yeah. We'll both go.
I'm doing so much right now. By the way,
absolute joy.
And I wish I had more time in a day.
And not in the sense that I'm
deprioritizing my friends. You know, you
talked about how you you know, you you
would give them all your money to to
secure them, but you don't give them any
time. I actually treat a lot of I've
actually gotten very good at this. It's
probably when you write a book about
friendship, you start to like take
yourself on a little bit.
Where I I will schedule friends like
meetings
in the middle of the day. Haven't seen a
friend for a while?
Um 4:00 in the afternoon?
Tea with?
And I go and I leave the office like
I'm going to a meeting cuz nobody says,
"Hey Simon, where you going?" Well,
going to a meeting.
Where are you having the meeting? At
that restaurant. People like, "Have
fun." Nobody will give me any kind of
grief if I'm leaving to go to a meeting.
Now I go and see a friend.
And And when somebody says, "Can I
cancel this friend's tea with friend
because that you that you have a phone
call you've neglected?" I'm like, "No."
Just like you wouldn't cancel on my
meeting.
Don't cancel on So, I treat I I put it
in and I give them equal weighting
to things that I have to do at work
because I've become much more
discerning. Like, do I have to have this
meeting or this phone call today Mhm. or
can I do it next week?
I could do it next week.
And you realize we fake
we fake or we add fake urgency to
things.
And I I have a friend who's kind of
amazing.
He He's way busier than me. And he
he says, "I don't want to spend time
with anybody like I saw I saw it was
really funny. He came out of a meeting
and it was he had a meeting with a very
fancy person who's who's courting him
for business, right?
Or he should be courting the other guy
actually.
Very fancy person. And he comes out of
the meeting I'm like, "How was it?" He's
like, "Total waste of time." I'm like,
"You don't want to do busi- He doesn't
want to work with you?" He was like,
"No, he wants to work with me. He wants
to work with me badly.
Total waste of time." I'm like, "What
are you talking about?" He was like,
"He's just some rich [ __ ]
Like I learned nothing.
I didn't enjoy it. And I don't want to
work with him." And I was like, "Tell me
more." He's like, "I only want to work
with people who when I spend time with
them, they teach me something, I laugh,
or I feel inspired when I walk away. And
if somebody sucks my energy,
I do not want to I do not want to work
with them."
And I was like,
"That's amazing to have that level of
confidence that you would turn down
money in your business.
And And Now what if we applied that to
as much as possible in our lives? Like
what if we stopped hanging out with
friends who just sucked our energy?
Are they really friends?
Rather than spend more time with people
who we enjoy. What if we take meetings
from people we're excited to take a
meeting with, not that we just see
dollar signs and opportunity. And what
if we only partner with companies where
we really like the people who are who
work at those companies. Doesn't You
don't have to have a relationship with
the CEO, but I really they've got a good
culture. I really like working with
them. And we make a little less money
with them
versus that other company, but
I I really like them because when things
go wrong, I want to call that person.
And And people ask me this all the time
and they say, "How do I choose a
publisher?" And I've seen this mistake a
thousand times. I've seen people like
like former CEOs who are like, "I now
I'm going to write my book." I'm like,
"Great. You've got a lot to say." And
they've got multiple offers and there's
a bidding war.
And they always ask me, "Which one
should I go with? Which publisher should
I go with?" And I always say the same
thing. Choose the one you're going to
fight with best.
Choose the publisher you're going to
fight with best. They're like, "What?"
I'm like, "The goal is to make a good
book. There's going to be creative
tension. There's going to be fights.
Choose the the the publisher who
believes in your idea, believes in you,
wants to make a great book, who you're
going to fight with really well."
They Every single one of them ignores
me.
Every single one of them takes the
biggest bid, and every single one of
them has written a shitty book that
didn't sell.
Isn't that just relationship advice as
well, though?
Probably, yeah.
Choose the person you're going to fight
with best.
And the the the number of times that we
forget about the quality of the product
and we just want the
It's the same It's the same for job
interviews. You know, don't This is
especially true for for young people.
Like, when you're interviewing in in in
a relatively like junior job,
entry-level or slightly above,
don't worry about how much they're going
to pay you.
Like, just
as long as they pay you a livable wage,
you know,
choose the job
choose the job based on who you're going
to work for.
Choose the person I used to in early on
in my career, people, you know, HR
people would say, "What are you looking
for?" I would say I I'd always say the
same thing.
I'd said, "The thing that I'm looking
for is probably like looking for love,
but I'm looking for a mentor."
And every time I'd evaluate a job, I
didn't care how glamorous the brand was.
I didn't care how much money they were
going to pay me. And by the way, it's
not like I had money. I knew they were
going to pay me something. I knew I
could pay my bills. It's not like I've
got I'm not a I'm not a trust fund baby.
Like, I needed I needed an income.
But one company offered me, you know,
$5,000 more, and one company offered me
$5,000 less, but I really like the
person over here, I took that job. And
it was the If If I got one thing right
as a as a as a as a young person,
it's that I always chose jobs based on
who I would work for, not how much they
were going to pay me or what account or
what brand I was going to work on.
And that's the one thing I got right.
Cuz yes, I made less money than all my
friends in the short term, but I got a I
got a I got an education and a care and
a love from somebody who took me under
their wing. I am a I am I am I learned
leadership from Dennis Glennon. I
learned leadership from Peter and
Tomassio. I learned leadership from
Pamela Maffitt. I learned leadership
from these leaders who took a weird
liking to me and took me under their
wing. And they were exceptionally good
leaders themselves, and I got that
education.
And all of them in the early days paid
me less than I could have got somewhere
else.
And it's the same. Choose the people.
In my um in my book that I wrote the
first chapter in it talks about this
idea of these five buckets.
And I'm giving I'm trying to give young
kids advice on how to prioritize their
career, and it sounds somewhat similar
to you. So, I'm going to throw this
concept at you and see
see how how it lands with you. So, the
idea was that we all have these five
buckets when we're starting our career.
And the first bucket is your knowledge.
The second bucket is your skills. Now,
these are the
only buckets that
no professional earthquake in your
career can unfill. You can be fired, you
can be canceled, whatever. You still
have your knowledge and skills. But the
other three buckets I'm about to name,
they can fluctuate. Bucket number three
is your network. Can fluctuate. Bucket
number four is your resources. Can
fluctuate. And bucket number five is
your reputation. Can fluctuate. And the
idea is that focusing on those first two
buckets when you're young, opti-
choosing jobs based on how much they're
going to fill those two buckets, and
also what they're going to fill them
with, and how relevant that information
is. And when knowledge is applied, it
becomes a skill. So, you focus on fill-
filling your knowledge, you apply that
knowledge into skills, and that really
is the essence of career longevity. And
as I noticed over time with people that
I I hired and then watched them
throughout their careers and what they
did,
it seems to me that life over the long
term typically brings you back down or
up to the level of your knowledge and
skills. I had this one kid step down
from my company because he got a job
offer at 21 to be a CEO in America. And
as he departs, I'm thinking he has not
got the knowledge and skills to be a
CEO. Within 24 months, the company had
gone bust. He was back down to doing the
same job he did for me. And I thought
life just like resets you to the level
of your knowledge and skills over time.
So, what do you think of this? Are these
I think you we're saying the exact same
thing. You did it more eloquently than
me. You know, I think I think it's 100%
right.
Uh um and the people who will fill that
bucket with knowledge and skills are the
people who again, for some reason,
they're good people, they're good
leaders, they take a liking to you, and
they will give you they will put you in
situations,
and they will let you screw up and fix
your own problems, fix your own
mistakes.
Then that's what my bosses did for me.
They rewarded my behavior when I got it
right, as opposed to my results.
Never got rewarded for my results. I
always got rewarded for my behavior. So,
if I showed initiative, I got a I got a
reward even if the results didn't
follow, right?
And I could
I can tell you a great story on that.
And if I got things wrong, they would
say, "Hmm, well,
what are you going to do?
Really screwed that one up, didn't you?
Okay, what are you going to do?"
And they didn't
they weren't happy with me,
but they let me fix my own messes, and
they stood by, and I knew that they were
there if I needed them.
You know, Peter and Tomagio, one of the
best leaders I ever worked for,
annoyingly never answered a single
question I asked. "Hey Peter, what
should I do?" "I don't know. What do you
think we should do?" "Well, I think we
should do this." I'm like, "Okay, so go
do that."
You know? What do you think Peter I'm
asking you because I don't know. That's
why I'm asking you. He was like, "Ooh,
well,
you probably go think about that."
He was he was he was the worst, but what
he taught me was self-reliance.
Mhm.
What what he taught me was
self-reliance. What he taught me was
if I don't know, then I have to go keep
searching and keep talking to people. I
have to have a point of view.
Mhm.
And may not be right.
And I'll find that out myself, too.
And I also learned to have backup plans
from him cuz something went haywire on
me. And I went so wrong, it ended up
being okay, but they he made me sweat
it. I remember at the end of the day
at the end of this whole thing that went
wrong that was totally my fault.
The phone rings, I see his It's 6:00
p.m.
Phone rings, I see his name come up on
the caller ID, and I pick up the phone.
I remember the whole call word for word,
right?
I pick up the phone, I go, "Hello?"
He says,
"Close call today." I said, "Yep." He
said, "Better to get shaved by the
bullet than hit by the bullet." I went,
"Yep." He said, "Have a good night." I
said, "You, too."
That was the whole phone call.
And so,
since then, since that experience, I
always have a backup plan. Now, it
doesn't mean it's all ready to go, but
I've thought about if this thing that
I'm trying to do doesn't work, what will
I do?
And I have at least committed some
thought to it. So, if if something does
go wrong, I'm like, I'm a little bit
ahead.
You either have it planned or I'm like,
"Okay, okay. Don't worry. I kind of if
this happened, I thought about this
already."
And it's only because of these great
leaders.
And it goes This is this recurring theme
of this whole conversation, which is
it's the struggle, it's the journey, not
the destination, it's the human beings
that guide us, it's the human beings
that hold space for us, that make us
better at what we do, better better than
how we show up in the world. And AI will
absolutely make our lives easier like
most technology makes our lives easier.
That's kind of the rule the rule of
technology, which is to make life a
little easier, a little more efficient,
a little quicker, a little less, you
know, strain on the muscles. You know,
that's
kind of what it does, you know, from the
from the plow, you know,
all the way up to the internet and AI,
it just makes life a little easier.
But we're still human beings who are
forced to live with human beings.
You're writing a book about friendship
that we're all waiting for.
Yeah.
I'm not going to ask you when it's due
cuz I don't want to be your publisher,
but um
I know that they they chase and chase
and chase and chase. But my my as my
closing question is why? Of all the
things you could have written about
Simon, you're someone who's able to
traverse several subject matters across
business and life and everything in
between, but you've committed yourself
to the struggle
of writing a book about friendship.
There's an entire industry to help us be
better leaders.
Right? There's an entire industry
to help you have a successful
relationship or a successful marriage or
even find a partner, right? Industries,
books, companies.
There's very little on how to be a
friend.
And if you think about
if you're going to have a successful
career
and can and can survive the stresses of
career
and if you're going to have a successful
romantic relationship or marriage and
survive that, do you know what what you
need in both of those circumstances?
Friends.
Cuz when your marriage is falling apart,
you go to a friend. When your job is
falling apart, you go to a friend. When
and and there's a few things that I've
discovered about friends that I find
delightful. And I have been reorganizing
my life to as I as I mentioned it
before, like I've been reorganizing my
life to ensure that my friends aren't
taken for granted and that sometimes I
do deprioritize work in order to see my
friends and spend time with my friends
because I know it feels good to them and
I know it feels good to me.
And I know that the only reason I can
get through any work stress or personal
stress I have is because of those
magical human beings and I will not take
them for granted.
And um doesn't mean it's always easy.
I'm conflicted often,
but I'm trying. And I also know if you
look at the work the world today and
like there's so much conversation about
loneliness, depression, anxiety,
inability to cope with stress,
even the obsession with longevity. Like
there's so much about these subjects and
some people treat it with drugs and then
medication and vacations and burn like
there's so many theories. The one thing
that fixes all of those things
is friends.
Friendship is the ultimate bio hack. You
know, we've talked about this before. I
fundamentally believe that.
And if it's so valuable, like if I know
if you know vegetables are good for you,
you eat more vegetables.
If you know exercise is good for you,
you do more exercise. So if I say
friends are good for you,
shouldn't you do more friendships?
Right? Like shouldn't you Exercise is
not fun or easy and you have to get over
a hump sometimes.
Eating vegetables can sometimes be
boring and unsatisfying, but you do it
when you find new ways. And so maybe
friendship is not always easy or fun,
but it's still really really good for
you.
And it The best thing about friends is
it actually doesn't taste like spinach.
It's like you get the benefits of
spinach, but it tastes like chocolate
cake. If you get friendship right,
it's it's the healthiest thing in the
world. How do I know if someone's a
friend?
Have that conversation with them.
Cuz I know a lot of people.
Yeah, yeah, I mean like and you have
deal friends, you know, you have a lot
of deal friends, you know?
Yeah. Podcast friends.
Podcast friends, yeah. Uh
Work friends.
You know, and you and we have and like
look, I'm not talking about There's all
kinds of friends. There's friends that
you just like hanging out with. They're
just fun, but you're not going to go to
them with your problems or to sort out,
you know, issues. You're not You're just
not. Work or personal. They're just fun,
right? There's nothing wrong with that.
Um but I think you know, I'm certainly
guilty of spending time with people that
you know, they fill a space and they
make me feel not lonely, but at the end
of the day, I don't feel smarter,
inspired, brighter, lighter when they
when I say goodbye. I'm just like, all
right, bye. That was fun.
And I kind of want to spend more time
with people who lift me, teach me,
support me, love me, give me a
I give me a chance to serve. They open
up to me and let me serve as well. You
know?
I struggle to make friends.
And
I think
Do you know why?
I think
I
I think I'm lazy. With it. Lazy with
friendships. So I will meet someone.
I'll have
a great connection with them. And then
my follow up like I don't really know
what to do next.
So I'll meet
Your follow up is crap.
Oh [ __ ] hell.
This is what I mean. Like my I'll meet
someone
I'll text you and maybe I'll get a
response.
Vice versa.
I think YOU LEFT ME ON READ.
BUT YOU YOU'RE THE SAME. ARE YOU THE
SAME? Or is it just with me?
It's just with me.
It's just with you.
But I but I think my follow up game is
like crap. I'll meet someone I'll go Oh
my I'll see I'll see the potential for a
friendship. And then I won't know
what I have or maybe I'm just being
lazy. I'm trying to I want to be honest
Maybe I just didn't prioritize it.
I think also when you start having fame
and money
and you you just being the boss
you get away with stuff.
So you show up late everybody's like
pissed off and angry and then you show
up and they're like and you're like
sorry like no no no no don't worry don't
worry.
Right? Like you get away with stuff in
the world, right? And so I think what
that does is I I see this with
celebrities all the time, right? Because
everybody yeses them to death and they
get away with it and nobody ever holds
them accountable. At some point they
just get lazier and lazier and lazier
because they can.
Oh yeah.
You know?
Yeah.
And so you they don't have to put in the
effort because other people put in the
effort.
Yeah.
And nobody be like
like a a somebody who's a nobody won't
say to them
Yo.
[ __ ]
Not respectful.
Oh you think my schedule doesn't matter?
I've been waiting here for 3 hours.
Uh
you just because you're a celebrity you
think you can just keep me waiting? Not
cool. Nobody says that to them. And
somebody should say that to them. But uh
They should say to themselves.
They should say it to themselves. That
would be ideal.
And then some of them have the
self-awareness to know they're getting
away with it. That's even worse, cuz
then they're doing it on purpose. At
least blindness, I think, you know, they
can at least hide behind ignorance.
But, uh
Yeah, I mean, friendship takes effort.
Yeah, I there there'll be a lot of
people listening now, I know, that
understand I think they'll resonate with
what I'm saying, which is I'll meet
someone, I'll be like, we could be
really good friends. I see so much in
us. I love what you stand for. We We
have so much in common. And then, it
drifts because neither party have the
tools or the skill of like what to do
then.
We also live in a strange world where
I've met people where I have all of
that, and I follow up like immediately.
I'm like, "Hey, I had such a good time.
Let's make a plan." And they're like,
"What? Huh? What?" Or I call as opposed
to like texting. And people are like,
"What? Why are you calling?" I'm like,
"Well, we had we had a nice time. I
thought we maybe talk."
You know? And I think we live in a
strange world where people put it out
there, but they don't really want it.
Looping us right back to the beginning
of this conversation. As you said that
about the call, that made me think again
about how there's going to become a
premium on human.
Because calling is so archaic to me that
when someone does it, it's like a treat
now. And I was thinking what's what's
taking that even further would be
writing someone a letter.
Mhm.
If someone Do you know who wrote me a
letter? Evan from Snapchat came on the
podcast, the founder and CEO of
Snapchat. And then, by the time I'd got
back to London, there was a letter on my
desk from Evan. And it just said, "Had a
great conversation with you. Um thank
you for being so thoughtful with the
questions. Thank you for the research.
Here's my number. Would love to stay in
touch." And it blew me away.
AI wrote that.
No, it was with a pen.
he had he had an auto pen. He just did
it.
It was with a pen. Had a signature and
his phone number. And I thought, that is
so beautiful.
It's classic and classy.
There's a premium on being human.
Simon, thank you so much. Thank you for
being so generous with your time always.
Always. I always have fun with you.
my show. You're um you always move me
forward in my thinking in such profound
and unexpected always unexpected way
that I'll tremendous I'll value
tremendously for a very very long time.
In our friendship. I I'm going to text
back even faster. I'm you know, we need
to go on more dates.
Um and I look forward to that and I look
forward to our next date in London,
which I know is coming up sometime soon.
Yeah, we'll go out for sure. It'll be
fun.
We have a closing tradition which I
nearly forgot.
I do know the tradition.
Which is the last guest leaves a
question for the next guest.
Yes, what's my question?
Mhm. What are you doing in your life
to mentor someone coming up behind you?
And then, who is a person that you'd
like to mentor, teach, or coach that
needs your voice the most?
I It's
It's my team is everything right now.
Like I want to give everything I've
learned to my team. I want the folks on
my team to benefit from all the mistakes
I've made.
And one of the joys of
being in founder mode when it's not
the
the actual beginning
is I have way more in my skill and
knowledge bucket that I want to pour
out. And so, I One of the reasons I'm
having so much fun in founder mode
is because I want to give away
everything that I've learned so that my
team can be stronger and stronger and
better and better.
Cuz I want to leave something that can
survive me that, you know, if
if I you know, the whole school bus
test, you know, if the founder gets hit
by a bus, will the company continue or
will it will it not?
And I really want to build something
where they want to build it without me.
Feels like there's been a change here.
Mhm. What was the catalyst?
For the past couple years, I've been
just trying out a lot of different
things to find to to find uh a level of
excitement and energy that I think I'd
lost for a little bit and I found it.
Like this has been like the founder mode
my team are so great and they so want to
they so want to push boundaries and all
I want to do is take take the reins off,
like take the leash off, like I want
them to experiment. I want them to try
things. And I'm trying to create an
environment where they're creative, they
do things, half of them will fail. I
don't care. Let's try again. And I I
just love being around all the creative
ideas that they're coming up with.
My team asked you to bring something
that meant a lot to you, and you brought
me this, and I don't know what's in this
box.
Ooh.
Two medallions, medals?
Those are military challenge coins.
Um I brought the one the round one just
to show you what the traditional ones
look like.
Um uh
this is the one I care about. I mean, I
care about them both, but this is the
one I brought. So,
these are
uh
only generals or commanders will give
these out. They're hard to get. You get
them when you do something of service.
It's it's less formal than a medal. They
can give it out to whomever they want,
and it's their way of saying thank you.
And the challenge coins that I've been
given, I'm very very proud of it because
I feel like I earned them.
And the thing that I love is when they
give them to you, they don't just hand
it to you.
They put it in their hand like this, and
they shake your hand.
Go on.
And that's how they give them to you.
And they say, "Thank you, Simon, so much
for coming here and helping us out." And
that's how they give me the coin.
The reason why this one means a lot to
me
is because I did some work with the with
Air Force Top Gun. It's called the
Weapons School, but it's Air Force Top
Gun.
And this is their coin, and this is
their patch. That's And um I did some
work with them to help them get to the
core of their why, what their true value
was.
Just to make sure that their culture
stays clear and good for a long time.
And we came up with three words, three
actions that everybody who goes through
Air Force Top Gun is required to do,
which is build, teach, lead.
Which is the idea that you build a skill
set.
You teach that skill set to other
people.
And then you build leaders, and you
lead, right? This whole idea that you
have you have a responsibility to build,
to teach, and to lead. Accumulate and
give, and serve.
And the thing that is so powerful is the
commandant of the Weapons School, after
we he the work, he took those words, and
he put them on the coin.
Oh, really?
And they exist on the coin and they have
been on there for years since.
And I am so proud to have given
something that has longevity, that is
literally on the coin.
Build, teach, lead.
Yeah, that is such a beautiful mantra
for life.
Yeah. And they're they're wonderful
people who go there. And uh what an
honor that work that I did ended up on a
coin.
And so they gave me the coin out of
gratitude
for the work that I did and it had my
words on it, so it's not my words, it's
their words. I just helped distill them.
It's who they are when they're at their
natural best. I just helped them put it
uh codify it.
Simon, thank you.
Thanks.
Always love our conversations and long
may they continue.
Likewise.
This has always blown my mind a little
bit. 53% of you that listen to this show
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This conversation features Simon Sinek and the host discussing the profound impact of AI on modern society, focusing on how reliance on technology threatens essential human skills. Sinek argues that while AI offers efficient results, it risks devaluing the journey of struggle, which is where true growth and competence are found. He emphasizes that authentic human connection, conflict resolution, and the beauty of imperfection are irreplaceable. Throughout the talk, Sinek advocates for personal accountability in developing human skills, maintaining strong friendships, and being intentional about the technology we let into our lives.
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