If you have Netflix and a hot shower,

you're kind of living. Warren Buffett

said the the average middle-class person

lives a better life than the wealthiest

person in the world 100 years ago. He's

right. I'll take Netflix and Novacaane

versus being the Duke of Earl in the

late 19th century. Hands down, that

middle class person has a much better

life right now.

In today's office hours, we discuss men

and body image, why life feels

unaffordable, and how to stay present in

relationships. Our first question comes

from Neat Extension

6877 on Reddit. They say, "Hi, I had a

question in regards to your recent

procedures. I was wondering how you

would address the rise in male

augmentations and things including

eating disorders and body dysmorphia

with young men. The topic is usually

targeted towards females. I know you've

mentioned your body dysmorphia and was

curious if you had discussions with your

sons about the condition. How can we

help young men navigate these issues

from a different perspective? I hope

you're healing well and happy with the

results. Okay, so my quote unquote

procedure and body dysmorphia aren't

really connected. I got kicked in the

face playing soccer when I was in high

school. My nose has always gone to the

right and I wanted to fix it. I'm vain

enough to have it done, but I'm not vain

enough to really I don't know if it

really did anything quite frankly.

Unfortunately, my iPhone still

recognizes me on face recognition. So,

and most people who see me don't see any

difference. Uh, that's not where my body

dysmorphia has manifested. My body

dysmorphia was growing up. My mom was

British and not home a lot. So, that

meant food was a punishment. She didn't

cook a lot and when she did cook it was

shephardd's pie. No joke. She would on

Sunday make a giant vat of shephardd's

pie and that night it was actually

tolerable even good. And then we'd

freeze it and for the next seven nights

I had the delight of crusting off a

piece of frozen shephardd's pie, putting

it into a microwave that sounded like

Chernobyl right before it blew and then

eating this kind of wet shephardd's pie

thing. And so food was not something

I've ever enjoyed. I'm not a foodie.

Food quite frankly, no one feels sorry

for me. Food is a tax for me. If it were

up to me, I wouldn't eat a lot. My

assistant will call me at 2 p.m. and

say, "I can tell you I haven't eaten."

And she's right. I haven't eaten since I

got up. I could drop 10 or 15 pounds, no

problem, in about 2 months. And again,

see above. No one's going to feel sorry

for me. But I grew up painfully thin.

When I got my driver's license, I was

5'10", 120. When I got to college, I was

6'1,

140 lbs maybe. And with bad acne, and I

was just very self-conscious about my

looks. Now, in some ways, that was good

because it taught me that if I ever

wanted to have any social capital, I

would need to develop other skills. and

I developed I think a really strong

sense of humor and that was key for me

and it's serving me well my whole life

but it was comical in high school and

Steve Martin I'm dating myself in

college I started lifting weights and

started taking protein powder went on

Accutane my skin cleared up and by the

time I was kind of end of my sophomore

year I was 6'2 190 lbs and quite frankly

I was ripped and to be blunt I started

getting laid and I really like that I

really enjoyed that and just a lot of

confidence a lot of self-esteem came

from being strong if you will, or not

being skinny. And so I associate good

things with not being skinny. So even

though I'm still 6'2, 187 lbs, you know,

everything's kind of shifted a little

bit. But when I look in the mirror, I

see someone who's emaciated. And I know

that my brain's been rewired and I don't

see the real me. But I have tremendous

or when I was a young person, and I

think most people have body dysmorphia,

but for mine, it was more about weight.

Uh so back to cosmetic procedures about

2 million men a year undergo cosmetic

procedures. I would bet that within 10

or 20 years people who have money that

twothirds of a men and women will

undergo some sort of cosmetic procedures

and there's different levels. You can

get Botox, you can get fillers. I bet a

lot of it will be non-surgical. But it's

kind of that that saying you're not

you're not ugly or poor. And we have

such a looks this age society now. I

think the emphasis to look young it's

always been there for women. Women are

disproportionately evaluated on their

aesthetics. Men disproportionately

evaluated on their economic viability.

But now economic viability is as you get

older kind of your ability to come

across as vigorous and youthful. So I

think a great place to invest or work is

in I don't know what you call it the

aesthetics industry. Uh it used to be

men were only about 5 to 6% of patients.

Now they're pushing 10% I believe. So

their shares doubled. I believe that'll

go to a third. But I'm now doing, you're

talking to someone who never took a I

literally never took a pill or had

caffeine until I was 45. Now I'm just

this guy that cliche with a pill box. I

do NAD treatments, vitamin A, B, D. Do I

do E? I think I do E. Um I do all sorts

of [ __ ] I'm on testosterone therapy. Uh

so I'm doing kind of everything. I

haven't had a lot of cosmetic

procedures. Mine were pretty PG-13, if

you will. I don't know if they worked or

not. I don't know. Anyways, I'm kind of

fascinated with the technology, but I

think you're going to see a the pretty

big increase. I think body dysmorphia is

something that most people suffer from.

And what I would say is I don't even

feel qualified to talk about it.

Supposedly, eating disorders are the

hardest to kick. Uh men make up only

about 10% of eating disorder patients,

but community uh studies suggest they

may represent closer to 25%.

Because there's more of a taboo and men

don't talk about it. So there's a big

gap between how many men are affected

and how many men actually talk about it.

It body dysmorphia affects according to

research about 2% of the general

population. I think that's [ __ ] I

think it's much more than that. 2025

study found that nearly 3% of young men

show signs of muscle dysmorphia. That's

what I had. I could never be big enough.

I now look back when I was working out a

lot in my 30s. I got pretty big and even

then I thought I wasn't big enough. So,

you can see how it happens. And I can

relate to young women who see Instagram

and think that they can never be thin

enough. And that's what girls and young

women are seeing as their aspirational

figures. I think it's actually very

unhealthy. But in terms of body

dysmorphia, mine's gotten a lot better

as I've gotten older. Uh, simply put, I

just am more confident, more experienced

in relationships. I'm sort of ready to

go full ugly. Trying to hold on to

being, you know, I always say to my

friends, it's not easy to be a four on a

scale of 1 to 10. I'm kind of ready just

to just give up and go to the 3, two,

and the one of what it means to be old

and just kind of ugly. I'm ready for it.

I'm sort of here for it. I've come to

grips with that and I'm no longer trying

as hard. Although, having said that, I

just had a cosmetic procedure. Anyway,

uh body dysmorphia, obviously, if you

feel like you suffer for from it or

would benefit from therapy, I think that

would that's a great idea if you have

the money and access. But I think it's

something a lot of us I think very few

people look look in the mirror and think

nailed it. So, I think it's a big issue

and this is all a long-winded way of

saying I'm not qualified to speak deeply

to the issue other than to say I had it.

I felt like I was never big or muscular

enough. It's something that's haunted me

my whole life and slowly but surely I've

grown out of it and just try to

rationally think about my height, my

weight, staying in shape, exercising a

lot, eating well, and as I get older

trying to cut down the alcohol and do a

[ __ ] ton more THC. That's the dog. He's

back. He's oxygen deprivived. Oxygen

deprivive. Oxygen deprived at 6,000 ft.

Thanks for the question.

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Question number two. Question two comes

from a listener who emailed us. They

say, "Total fan here. We'll totally

thank you. A recent economist article

downplayed affordability as a crisis,

noting that wages for the working class

and working poor have kept pace with

inflation or better. Do you agree?" My

understanding is the percentage of home

ownership in recent decades has ranged

between 60 and 70%. Is that still the

case or are those 30% of us do not own

homes just coming to the sad realization

there in that 30%. Appreciate your

thoughts on all of the above. Okay, so

there's some data here. I saw that

article. I thought it was really

interesting. The economist article this

question refers to is titled the

American affordability crisis is mostly

a mirage and it was published in late

December. The economist loves to be

provocative. Hm. It claims that real

wages have risen across much of the

income distribution and purchasing power

are still relatively strong, undermining

the idea that Americans on average are

dramatically worse off than previous

generations. So, a direct quote from the

article, real wages are close to record

highs across the income spectrum, but

are strongest of all for the poorest.

Never has life been so affordable in

America for so many. The argument there

is that much of the feeling of a crisis

is driven by psychology. people focusing

on price levels rather than inflation

rates and politics rather than actual

deterioration of fundamentally

affordable metrics rather than

fundamental affordability metrics. Okay,

so some additional context here with

respect to wages. The economist isn't

totally wrong but I think they missed

part of the picture. According to the

article, price levels are up around 25%

versus before the pandemic which means

people are actually paying higher

prices. But it points out that nominal

wages have risen by around 30% over the

same period. Real wages, meaning wages

adjusted for inflation, have also

recovered since the pandemic.

inflationadjusted pay today is slightly

higher than 2019 and lower income

workers actually saw faster wage growth

but that's an average story where's the

real pressure so I I think a couple

things are happening here and I think

the key is psych or the key word is the

psychology or psychology and that is

when you think about the things that get

you ahead and maybe help you build a

family it's education and it's housing

and housing plays a big psychological

has a big psychological impact on people

also I think families are really

struggling with um the downside of what

is a corrupt cartel called higher

education of which I'm a member of where

we purposely arbitrage great kids or

good kids down to an average school that

engages in price collusion such that an

average school charges what a great

school charges even a little bit more

because most great schools have more

donors and financial aid so you get

arbed from Princeton and NYU or whatever

down to a second tier school I won't

name a second tier school because people

are so sensitive about their schools but

that school even though second tier,

you're paying a Mercedes uh price for a

Hyundai product, making education just

unaffordable for most middle- class

households. So, the means of getting

ahead, the means of establishing a

family have outpaced, and this takes a

real psychological toll. Now, even

bigger than that, even bigger than that.

Okay, if you I love Jimmy Carr. I don't

know if you he's my new Yoda. He points

out that if you have Netflix and a hot

shower, you're kind of living Warren

Buffett said the the average middle

class person lives a better life than

the wealthiest person in the world 100

years ago. He's right. I'll take Netflix

and Novacane versus being the Duke of

Earl in the late 19th century. Hands

down, the middle class person has a much

better life right now. Uh the problem is

that's not the way our brain works. The

way our brain works is we pull up

Instagram and we see that our friends

are at the Amani in Utah having $40

cocktails after buying, you know, ETH

and making millions of dollars and are

buying a condo in Miami and just bought

a brand new, you know, Range Rover. And

you think, okay, that's my benchmark.

Oh, and by the way, she has a boyfriend

with ripped abs and my boyfriend does

not have ripped abs and is not making

millions of dollars. I'm a failure. And

so the 0.1% dominate 90% or the image of

the 0.1% dominate 90% of our social

feeds and create just unrealistic

expectations and it depresses us. And

that is happiness is a function of your

prosperity minus your expectations. And

our expectations have just been taught

to vastly outpace any reasonable

increase in our prosperity. I even find

this just on a basic level. the

difference between men and women. Men

are, at least in my generation, were

raised to believe that they should earn

enough money to have a family, that

that's their right. And so, when they're

not making a [ __ ] ton of money, they

feel angry and entitled. Whereas, I

think a lot of women were brought up to

think that, oh, you just want to make

the same as a man. That's your goal. And

so, I have universally found in

compensation discussions that it's

always the white dudes, and I'm playing

identity politics here, who always like

pissed off about their compensation. And

again, it goes back to one thing. kind

of goes back to expectations. So, I

think one, the key markers of

prosperity, your ability to get

certification, you need to move ahead,

buy a home, outpace inflation. And two,

I mean, I just want stat first-time home

buyers now just make up 20% of home

purchases. That's down from 40%

historically. So, now only one in five

home purchases are first-time buyers.

The average age of a first-time home

buyer is now 40 years old. That's the

highest it's ever been. Or put, you

know, wages may be keeping up with

inflation, but they're not keeping up

with the price of of entry into wealth.

And that is your ability to start

building a life and saving money. Some

things have gone down in price. The

average price of retail price of clothes

has gone down 50%. Uh cars has gone

down. The college tuition has gone up.

Also uh medical care. And you want to

talk about something that really weighs

on the psych and the anxiety of America.

40% of American homes uh have some sort

of medical or dental debt. Imagine

you're a single mother and your

daughter's in screaming pain from a root

canal. You have to go into debt such

that she I mean you got to get that root

canal, right? So this really attacks

people's self-esteem and uh also child

care is dramatically increased. So what

do you have? It's hard to go to work and

get ahead because of child care. It's

really hard to get the certification you

need to substantially step up in your

career because of college and if you get

sick, God help you. You're kind of out

on your own. And then you layer in all

of that an expectation that if you're

not a millionaire by the time you're 30,

uh you [ __ ] up. So definitely some

truth to the notion that the

affordability crisis on some metrics has

not panned out. But psychologically what

we have is a nation that is more fearful

and more anxious and feels less secure

about their position in the world

relative to everybody else. Thanks for

the question. We'll be right back after

a quick break.

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Welcome back. Our final question comes

from Moonlight Climber on Reddit. I'm in

my late 20s in a serious relationship

and trying to balance ambition with

partnership. My partner is a position

tied to one location. I'm starting a

company and travel frequently for work

and family. You've built a big career

that requires a lot of travel. How did

you maintain a close relationship with

your partner? Specifically, when your

kids were younger, was your travel a

source of tension? If so, what actually

worked? Setting up a communication

cadence, boundaries, traveling together.

Looking back, what would you do

differently? Well, given that I'm

divorced, I'd probably do a lot

differently. I may not have relevant

experience here because I didn't have

kids till I was 42. And one of the

reasons I didn't have them was I wanted

to be focused on my career, my work, and

not being present and not investing in

my marriage and my selfishness. All

didn't help. See above divorced, but I

can't blame that on a lack of balance

and not having kids. I just think I was

kind of me me all the time. Also, I

think generally it's tough to get

married when you're young. I think I

think between the ages of 24 and 34,

you're a pretty different person. So,

unless you're investing a lot in the

relationship and time with each other,

it's pretty easy to kind of grow apart

and have different priorities. Hey,

let's move to New York where I can be a

[ __ ] master of the universe. Hey, I

want to move closer to my parents in,

you know, Santa Clarita. What? What?

What do you want to do? What? You didn't

tell me that. Um, you want our kids to

go to church? What the [ __ ] Anyway, how

do you balance, brother? There is no

balance. I think if you have the right

partner and you're aligned, I'd say it's

more about alignment than balance. And

that is, is it important to your partner

and you that you have a certain level of

economic or influence capital by a

certain age? If so, it's just going to

require a massive amount of commitment

that will involve you not spending as

much time together. And is your partner

aligned with that? Uh, one thing I will

give to my ex-wife was she was on board

with that. She was she was a securities

analyst. We were working all the [ __ ]

time. So, I think it's more about

alignment that you have the type of

conversation with your partner, right?

This is the life we want and in order to

get the life we want, it's going to

require a certain amount of sacrifice

for both of us. My sacrifice might be

that I have to molest the earth every

year. And I spent for the last 30 years,

I've spent 180 days plus a year on the

road. I'm at [ __ ] Jackson Hole right

now. I was in Davos 3 days ago and then

before that I was in New York and all I

mean I've been invell

it's going to take a sacrifice. The key

is just having an open and honest

conversation and then also maybe being

open and honest about all right maybe I

need to dial it back and we need to

temper our expectations around what's

attainable for us. Technology does play

a role. What I do now that is really

helpful I have alarms that go off my

phone and I FaceTime both my boys every

night at the same time. So, I'm in

Jackson Hole. It's Mountain Central

time. So, my alarm is set to 2:30 p.m.

uh Mountain Central time, which is 9:30

their time. And then I usually call them

or FaceTime them. And uh even if they

don't pick up, I just leave them a quick

note. They usually call me back. But I

just want them to know I'm thinking

about them every day and I want to see

them, say hi. And I find that is really

helpful. And it beats when I was living

with my father sometimes in the summer

after my mom and dad got divorced and

I'd have to shuttle downtown in Chicago

to use his Watts line because my dad was

too cheap to let me call my mom from our

phone. Yeah, breakups uh monopolies

aren't a bad thing. You have to send a

kid to downtown [ __ ] Chicago to call

his mom on the Watts line. Anyway, anywh

who uh yeah, I think it's alignment with

your partner and I think leveraging

technology and also just it sucks to be

a grown-up. I I didn't see my boys a lot

when they were young. I remember coming

home and getting all bummed out because

I'd be gone, sometimes I'd be gone for 3

weeks at a time when I was building L2

and traveling to Europe during

Thanksgiving because we thought we could

lap the competition. And I'd come home

and I'd see with my oldest Alec who was,

you know, five or six, I'd be like,

"Jesus Christ, he's grown." Like I'd I'd

pop my head in at night and I'd look at

him and he'd grown and it would just

really bum me out. But the bottom line

is I now get to do wonderful things with

my kids. As I got older and I got more

economically secure, I was able to spend

a disproportionate amount of time with

them. So boss, you know, there's no

balance here. There's just trade-offs.

And you have to get alignment with your

partner and decide, you know, what

sacrifices are you willing to make or

not make now and uh just be honest about

the consequences of those sacrifices or

the upside of those sacrifices. Thanks

for the question. That's all for this

episode. If you'd like to submit a

question, please email a voice recording

to office hours of media.com. That's

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Or if you prefer to ask on Reddit, just

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just might feature it in an upcoming

episode.