You want to play soccer, but first

you're going to read all the textbooks

and get a master's degree and PhD in

soccer. And then you're going to

practice dribbling and penalty shots and

so on by yourself. And you want to

become as perfect a player as possible

by yourself before you ever actually get

on the field and play the game of

soccer. And you can start to believe

that you're playing soccer by yourself.

There's always more room for

improvement. You're never going to be

perfect. And if you get caught in that

trap, which is the partial trap of

self-help, you're always polishing this

self and you never actually [ __ ] play

soccer.

>> Tim Ferrris, welcome back to the show.

>> Thank you, sir. Nice to be back. Nice to

see you.

>> Likewise. Let me ask you a a a

ridiculously basic question, but I think

maybe deceptively um simple. I actually

never know how to say. Is it deceptively

complex or deceptively simple? Anyway,

um my question really is how are you?

Like how you doing these days? Um uh

you've you've

>> you've publicly kind of gone on a on a

ride um with your own uh talking about

your own stuff, some of it quite heavy.

So, I'm just curious like how how are

you?

>> That is a both deceptively simple and

complex question. My answer thankfully

is really straightforward. Better than

ever. I feel absolutely fantastic. We

could dive into how and why that's the

case if you'd like. But I would say

keeping it short and sweet for the

moment, I would say fantastic, better

than ever. mind, body, soul, psycho,

emotionally,

muscular, skeletally.

Uh really feeling uh holistically very

good, optimistic,

and

we could keep going. So, I'll let you

take that anywhere you'd like to.

>> I love to hear it. And uh seriously, I

really do love to hear it. And I would

be curious to follow up and hear from

you like what what has brought you to

this point.

>> Mhm. Yeah, I would say a few things. So,

one of the risks of

personal development or let's just call

it more broadly self-help is that it can

very easily become self-infatuation or

self-obsession.

And the

counterbalance to that, the bet that

offsets it isun,

it's very simple, relationships. Really

doubling down, tripling down on

relationships. We are evolved to be a

social species. And whenever you are in

isolation physically or simply in

thought loops in your own head, that

tends to catalyze or

worsen tremendously any type of

instability or OCD or depression or

anxiety or fill-in- thelank psychiatric

condition. So

my

policies that which were already in

place last time we spoke that I have

really

continued to invest into are doing a

past year review every year looking at

my top relationships that are nourishing

energizing energy in as opposed to

energy out and then blocking out time in

advance for the entire year for extended

periods of time with those people. Now,

extended will depend on your

circumstances. For me, that could be

anywhere from a long weekend to a week

spending, say, 5 days in the wilderness

in Montana with some of my oldest,

closest friends, etc., etc. And that

will do. Not to denigrate therapy in any

way, but sometimes talking more about

your problems if it were to solve all of

your problems would have worked already.

And there's a place for talk therapy.

There's a place for talk therapy, but it

is not, nor does it need to be the only

tool in the toolkit. So simply spending

time around your silly, dumb, amazing

friends and laughing, whether it's

around a bottle of wine or a meal or a

campfire really, really goes a long way.

So that's one piece of it.

Second piece is to maybe uh hit a

familiar thread is very consistent

meditation

typically twice daily 10 minutes very

very straightforward

in my case and then also if we're going

out to the edges a bit technologically

speaking

there is something that some of your

listeners may have never heard of which

is accelerated TMS. TMS stands for

transcranial magnetic stimulation. It's

a type of brain stimulation

that has existed for decades. But the

hardware and the software, everything

about these technologies has improved

dramatically in the last 5 to 10 years,

particularly in I would say the last 5

years thanks to certain researchers like

Nolan Williams out of Stanford who sadly

passed away in the last 6 months and

others. But what accelerated TMS looks

like is typically up to, let's just call

it maybe one or two years ago.

Accelerated TMS takes

what you might do in conventional TMS

over several months where you go in and

you you have this paddle put against

your head. It produces a magnetic field

that just to keep it very simple either

uh excites or inhibits certain parts of

your brain, certain types of circuitry.

And that can be applied to depression,

it can be applied to neurodeenerative

diseases. In fact, in some cases, it can

be applied to anxiety, OCD, and so on

depending on the target where where you

place these coils.

And in the case of accelerated TMS,

you're taking what you might do over 3 4

5 months and you're compressing it into

one week. So every hour on the hour, 10

hours a day for one week, you're going

in and getting, let's just call it a few

minutes, 3 to 9 minutes of pulses on

your brain. And then you take 50 minutes

off, you go back in, you get hit again.

And that has been referred to at least

in one format, the Saint protocol. S A I

N T. They've shied away from it, but it

was developed at Stanford. And the Saint

protocol in many, let's call them

patients produces

70 80% remission of depression that is

quite durable. It's not one shot, you're

done.

Typically, people will, let's just say,

do a 5-day sequence. Then they might go

in and have one to three-day booster

sequences 3 months, 6 months later. Um,

and

this technology has tremendous effects.

I've experimented with this over the

last handful of years, and the first

time I did it, it had near miraculous

results. I had I went from having

severe and I've been officially

diagnosed so this is not uh just

throwing it around loosely but you know

moderate severe OCD with lots of

rumination. I'm not flipping light

switches or washing my hands but I have

these ruminative loops that I get caught

in. People I'm sure some listening can

identify with this where you just can't

turn off these kind of compulsive

thought loops. Could be a grudge, could

be a fear, could be something you're

planning for, could be a conversation

you need to have. It just loops and

loops and loops, which causes insomnia,

which causes

uh fatigue and just general

uh the general wearing down of the

system, which leads to depression.

That's I've realized that's my sequence.

It actually starts with anxiety, not

depression out of the gate. And I was

having, let's just call it seven, eight

out of 10 symptoms when I went in to the

first treatment I did of 5 days. That's

really severe for people who are

not clear. Like, it's really, really

severe. Like, it's affecting every

aspect of my life. Had the treatment,

there was a delayed onset. And even the

scientists most involved with this don't

really have a great explanation for how

or why this would happen. But nothing

really happened for 2, three weeks. and

then

flipped a switch and had basically zero

anxiety, zero rumination for let's call

it 3 to 4 months. I've never experienced

anything like it. And that includes

psychedelic assisted therapies which I

know very well and have supported a lot

of science u underlying.

Now this is a bit of a long answer I

realize but for people who are

interested I really recommend the

conversation I did with Nolan Williams.

Then there are different types of

hardware. But I tried it then with

boosters several times afterwards. Null

effect. Zero. Didn't work.

>> And I started to

lose hope again because I thought this

was going to be a replicable,

reliable tool that I could use. I was so

excited.

And then I did a hailmary kind of last

ditch

round with the accelerated TMS recently.

I did this in Northern California. And

instead of doing 5 days, so keep in mind

it's like, let's just call it 3 months

of TMS gets compressed into 5 days.

Instead of doing five days, I did one

day, but I predosed with something

called descloer.

And descerion

or DCS as it's sometimes referred to in

the literature is a in many ways an

antiquated antibiotic that used to be

used for tuberculosis

uh and sometimes urinary tract

infections which affects the NMDA

receptors in such a way. I think it's a

partial antagonist. It might be an

agonist so don't quote me on it. But the

the point is this this little drug that

is not typically used anymore

is a catalyst for neuroplasticity.

And when you take this beforehand,

you can do something like one day of

accelerated TMS. And sometimes the

results are better than what you

previously, let's just call it seven

years ago, would get from 3, four

months. And I did one day and Dan

this time around boom it was just like a

switch basically the next day and it has

now been 2 or 3 months and I don't want

to set expectations that it'll be this

way for everyone. It seems to be

particularly effective

yes for depression but it seems to be

particularly effective in a very small

sample size at this point for anxiety

and OCD. uh and

man it's just it's just a different

life. It is a different life. So all of

those things in combination plus the

basics right the kind of basic

macronutrients of health exercise

etc etc etc diet and so on um are just

are just doing their job together. The

last one I'll throw in and then I'll

shut up because I realize this has

turned into a TED talk is um

intermittent ketosis. So, the ketogenic

diet and ketosis overall, which can be

achieved a few different ways, which I'm

in right now, is absolutely phenomenal

for addressing a lot of psychiatric

pains, psycho emotional pains that are

failing to be treated by medication. And

there's something called metabolic

psychiatry. Chris Palmer out of Harvard

and other have have looked at this very

closely. All right. Thanks for coming to

my TED talk.

>> I just want to assure you TED talks are

welcome here. Yeah, you're a podcaster,

you know. Uh um long answers are fine.

>> Um so please delete that sheep

sheepishness from from your mind. Um

>> all right, we'll do

>> I have a million follow-up questions.

Let me just say just high level,

a different life. Those three words

really

>> I just makes me very happy to hear that.

>> Thank you.

>> What's going on?

>> Thank you. Thank you, Dan. Yeah, it's it

is impossible, I think, to overstate the

difference between an 8 out of 10 of

nonstop ruminative

monkey mind with a fixation on things

that are anxiety producing to getting to

like a one or two out of 10. Like those

are two different lived experiences.

They are not

>> they they are so far apart from each

other. It's it's really remarkable.

>> So you mentioned transranial is it

magnetic stimulation? TMS

>> magnetic stimulation. Mhm.

>> I will drop a link in the show notes for

people who want to listen to Tim's uh

conversation with Nolan Williams. Um but

I with the caveat of course that you're

you're not the the the researcher doing

you know the the world's leading expert.

You're you're um more of the guinea pig

and the the patient. But can you tell us

like a little bit more about how is is

TMS widely available? Is it a thing that

average people can access? And also like

how strong is the evidence?

>> All right. I'm happy to tackle that with

as you said the disclaimer. I am not a

doctor nor do I play one on the internet

but I do spend a lot of time in these

waters. So what I'll say is that the

evidence for TMS broadly there decades

of evidence with different applications

of TMS

and then if as we look at accelerated

TMS there's actually I would say very

compelling body of evidence

once we get into the the vanguard which

is always risky right you don't

necessarily want to be one of the first

hundred monkeys shot into space but in

this particular case the pain was great

enough that I decided to opt in. Then

you're getting into the bleeding edge

which is this descloer

DCS plus TMS. That's very much at the

outer reaches. I would say at least

based on the clinic that I went to

and maybe overall for all I know I am

one of perhaps 60 patients with

OCD/ generalized anxiety disorder who

have been treated that way. So it's a

very small number. In terms of

accessibility, there are let me start

from the top in in no particular order,

but I'll just say that

there's a hardware stack. So, the the

two companies that I'm most familiar

with which make hardware that I've used

myself are Brainsway, that's one

company, and then another one is Mag

Venture. and the the hardware are

different, but I know people who have

responded very well to both of them,

right? So, you can

>> you can vet certain providers, I would

say. Not saying this is the only way.

I'm not saying it's fair. Perhaps there

are other technologies out there, but

there there, as you would expect, is a

is a fair there's a fair bololis of fly

by night operations that are promising

miracles and offering quote unquote TMS

that is actually not following any

protocol whatsoever. And u I I think

that's very unethical. But Brainsway,

Mag Venture are two types of hardware.

And then you really want to look it is

it is available is the short answer.

Accelerated TMS is available in a lot of

major cities. It is not as widely

distributed as I would like uh because

it is generally not covered by

insurance. Accelerated TMS is generally

not covered. TMS,

let's just call it conventional TMS is

often covered by insurance depending on

the indication. But accelerated TMS

where you're basically taking a week off

work and just getting your brains up 10

hours a day for five days straight

typically not covered. And uh part of

why I'm so excited about the

implications

if the data scale and are robust and

show

comparable or superior results with the

with this pre-administration of this

drug is that the ability of anyone

whether they are average

uh less kind of financially stable or

very well healed of taking one day off

of work is not only logistically so much

easier if they're able to pre-administer

with this DCS, but it should be much

less expensive. Right? So, I'm hoping

even if people have to pay out of pocket

that these breakthroughs, hopefully

they're breakthroughs with uh

combination therapies of TMS,

accelerated TMS and descarerian will

will really make it much more widely

available. That's my hope. It's going to

take a little while, but it it it is

available. I know there are clinics in,

for instance, New York. I know there are

clinics in California and Chicago that

are credible. Um, they may exist in

other places as well.

>> The other thing you mentioned in terms

of, you know, having a different life is

is your focus on relationships. I I saw

myself in that answer. You know, that

was a thing I there was a kind of

desertification or desertification, I

don't know how you pronounce that, of my

social life for many years because I was

such a careerist and such a workaholic

and then in recent years have really

turned that around and I see

>> such a massive difference in my mental

health. I'm curious like you mentioned

that in recent years you've at the top

of every year you kind of make a plan to

see the people who to use the cliche

fill your cup. Um,

>> had you gone through a period like I

like I did where there was a a certain

amount of isolation or um in in

attention to this to this lever.

>> Oh, for sure. And I think there were a

few different reasons for that. Uh, I

don't know if hindsight's 2020, but I

think it's easier to see from my vantage

point now that and it's a balancing act

because there's there's compulsive

socializing because you are

incredibly uncomfortable or afraid of

being alone or with yourself,

>> right? There's compulsive socializing to

distract yourself, like protect yourself

from yourself, which is problematic.

And then there's compulsive isolation.

And I would say I probably leaned far

more towards the compulsive isolation.

And there were two reasons for that. One

was workcoholism back in the day, for

sure. and I just

felt like I was more effective, able to

produce, more able to focus on business,

finances, whatever it might be in

isolation. And there might be some truth

to that.

Then I would say there was also this

belief

that I think at the time was really

implicit. I don't think I explicitly

grasped it, which was, and I've I've

written this incredibly long essay that

maybe I'll publish at some point, but

talking about some of the dangers of

self-help, and one of them is the

following, which ties into what we're

talking about and leaning towards

isolation.

this implicit belief or explicit that

you need to work on yourself and fix

yourself and quote unquote do the work

and then you'll be ready to interact

with other people and have a significant

relationship and engage with your family

if that is an option or you want it to

be an option etc etc. So, in effect, the

the analogy that I've drawn for some

friends is

you want to play soccer, but first

you're going to read all the textbooks

and get a master's degree and PhD in

soccer. And then you're going to

practice dribbling and penalty shots and

so on by yourself.

And and you want to become as perfect a

player as possible by yourself before

you ever actually get on the field and

play the game of soccer. and you can

start to believe that you're playing

soccer by yourself. There's always more

room for improvement. You're never going

to be perfect. And if you get caught in

that trap, which is the partial trap of

self-help, you're always polishing this

self.

And it can become this real recursive

dangerous trap, this fixation on the

self.

And you never actually [ __ ] play

soccer.

And at a point you start to believe that

you are but you're not. You're

simulating by yourself life but not

actually engaging with life. And I have

who knows maybe this is a function of

getting older. I don't think so

necessarily but for so many decades I

was interested in the cutting edge the

cutting edge of everything. and I still

am, but I've become interested equally

in things that have lasted millennia

or more than millennia. And

I recommend if you're trying to learn

how the latest LLMs differ from one

another, etc., You also spend some time

looking at evolutionary biology and

studying the things that we have evolved

to optimize for to experience and man

it's just like I think it was regonomics

right it it's the economy stupid it's

the relationship stupid right if you

don't have like physical contact with

people if you don't have these in real

life physical experiences if you model

that in animals they become a complete

disaster

Right? They exhibit the same types of

behaviors that we now see spiking in

humans. Anxiety, depression, lethargy,

sitting in a cage, not doing anything.

Like, we need this type of contact. Um,

so I I'd say that I've sort of offset

the bleeding edge with the very very

super dull edge of things that have

lasted a long time.

>> Amen.

Um, you you you mentioned and this may

what the question I'm about to ask might

bring us back to your unpublished essay

about the dangers of self-help. Um, but

you you mentioned the word optimizing

and in some way in some ways I kind of

think of you as like the protooptimizer.

Um, you know, 4hour work week and um,

and I'm just curious where you are on

self-optimization

now.

Yep. I would say that I still

focus on certain areas to optimize. I

still pull certain le levers. And

what I would say I have become

much better at and it takes practice.

It's gonna sound so rudimentary is

asking simply what are you optimizing

for before you optimize?

What why are you optimizing?

And it's easy I would say particularly

if you are being shaped by social media

which seems to basically offer you the

seven dead layer cardinal sins on a

silver platter. you get to take your

pick your poison.

If you're being shaped by that, then you

can end up optimizing without a

direction necessarily or a question. You

haven't interrogated the direction. And

that could be because you're following

someone online who's a multi-billion

dollar real estate developer/serial

entrepreneur/fill-in-theblank.

And the chase for money is on,

but that never really gets interrogated.

I think the 4-hour work week does a good

job of of breaking down kind of work for

work's sake and money for money's sake.

So for me, I have three relatives right

now with rapidly progressing Alzheimer's

disease,

including those who do not have the

genotype.

If we look at say APOE status, right?

They're APOE 33 whereas I'm ApoE34. So

that's scary. There are other factors to

consider for Alzheimer's.

I am doing things to

try not to die from something that is

hopefully preventable on the uh from the

perspective of cardiac health,

cardiovascular health and then also

trying to mitigate my risk of

neurodeenerative

uh disease and

that's why I'm in ketosis right now for

instance and you know jury's out on some

of this but very plausibly there are

mechanisms by

going into ketosis on a fairly regular

basis for a few weeks at a time. Let's

just say in my case, two or three times

a year

may have neuroprotective effects, also

anti-cancer effects. And people can

listen to my interviews with Dominic

Dagustinino, who's a researcher out of

Florida, or other people for the the

science behind this. And it's it's it's

a it's also an intervention. And this

comes back to your question about

optimizing that is very very wellstudied

in the sense that

I I have very high confidence that the

downside risk is low and very

manageable. Whereas if you're just

mainlining GLP1 agonists,

amazing results that we've seen in the

literature so far, but have we had

anyone on these for 10 20 years? No. Uh

at least not 20 years. Maybe some of the

one of the first monkeys shot into space

like me with the accelerated TMS and the

DCS has been on for that period of time.

And that doesn't mean don't use GLP1

agonist, but understand that there are a

lot of unknown unknowns. With the

ketogenic diet, it's like look kids, the

ketogenic diet and its modern

incarnation using heavy cream or other

types of fats was designed for epileptic

children, right? And this goes back

probably a hundred years at this point

if not 100 years close to it.

>> And uh humans have the metabolic

machinery to go into ketosis and have

had that machinery for millennia upon a

millennia upon millennia. So that would

be an example of something that

passes it passes the test for me of

this seemingly credible upside potential

even if we don't understand all the

mechanisms limited downside potential

uh that I can offset with certain

prescription drugs let's just say

because I'm a cholesterol hyperabsorber

and okay great we're going to do that

intermittent fasting would be another

one so e during ketosis is or outside of

ketosis. The one thing that has most

dramatically changed

my blood tests with respect to

specifically insulin sensitivity

and avoiding pre-diabetes which runs

rampant in my family. intermittent

fasting. In my case, that means I'm

eating within an 8 hour window each day,

typically like might be even a little

shorter, like 2:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. And

that's it. I just don't eat until 2:00

p.m. or 3:00 p.m. And for some folks,

it's probably argue arguably better for

you if you do like a 12:00 noon to 8:00

p.m. kind of eating window. It's also

called timerestricted feeding. There's a

lot of good science for this, not just

in animal models, but in humans. And the

results I've seen from that are just

absolutely incredible. And it's so

simple because you don't actually need

to change what you eat. You're just

changing when you eat. Um, so those

would be two that people might think of

as optimizing. And then I'm taking a

handful of prescription drugs to offset

the cardiovascular risk because it

doesn't matter if I am eating an all-fat

diet, an all-p protein diet, a vegan

diet, a fill-in-theblank diet.

There are certain biomarkers that are

just trash. They're so bad.

And that seems to be just straight from

the code, straight from DNA. And for

that reason, I'm like, "Ah, I'm no

spring chicken anymore. You know what? I

think I'll just bite the bullet and and

take some of these." And if it's helpful

for folks, the way I think about that,

because I think I I have, and I'm

partially to blame for this, cuz I did a

lot of really out there stuff in say the

4-hour body, which much of which most of

which stands up to scrutiny now, 15

years later. But I was pushing the

envelope with that.

When for instance I talk with my doctors

now and I'll this is only going to take

another minute or two but it might be

helpful to people. The first thing is if

you have a blood test and something is

out of range

my recommendation would be before you

get on 12 different drugs to deal with

it. And if it's an emergency, it's an

emergency. But if it's not an emergency,

right, like your triglycerides are are

high. All right. Well, it's probably not

going to kill you in the next week. My

recommendation would be talk to your

doctor, replicate the test, do the test

again the next week, maybe on a

different day, and see if you can

replicate the error. Because for

instance, if you had a heavy weekend of

drinking or ate a fatty meal the night

before and then you do your blood test 8

a.m. the next morning, fasted, well,

you might look like you're on the road

to having a heart attack in 2 months,

but actually it was just behavior and

diet. So, replicate replicate. And

uh that would be number one, right? like

don't base the outcome of the like the

basketball match on one photograph. Like

try to try to get tested more frequently

and pay attention to when you're getting

tested. So if you're for instance coming

back to the example I gave, if you're if

you're taking your test, your blood test

on Monday mornings, make sure your next

test that you're comparing it to is also

on Monday morning. If it's Wednesday

morning, it might be completely

different. By the way, if it's something

like cortisol, testosterone, etc., these

things have dural cycles, they really

fluctuate throughout the day. So, if you

get a test at uh 8:00 a.m. I've seen

this with friends of mine who male

friends who get a test at like 8:00 a.m.

Uh, and I have to interrogate how they

did things for them to Sherlock Holmes

this, but they do they do a test,

they're concerned about their

testosterone levels or the free

testosterone. They take a test at 8:00

a.m. looks great. They do another test

three months later, six months later.

They do it at 11:00 a.m. and it's

200 points lower. Looks crazy. And it's

not crazy. They don't actually, in this

case, this guy had no problem. He was

about to get on all sorts of hormone

replacement therapy and all this stuff

that is is pretty powerful. And I said,

"Go back, do it at 8 a.m. again, 2

weeks. Let's see what happens." Guess

what? It was the same as the first test.

So that that's step number one. And then

when I'm looking at possible

interventions for me, again, I'm not a

doctor. Don't play one on the internet.

But the way I approach it, and people

get very little guidance on this, right,

is most doctors are overstretched,

right? They get 11 minutes per patient.

The easiest thing for them to do is say,

"Look, this guy has a problem or this

gal has a problem. If we throw these

three drugs at it, it's probably going

to fix it. My job as far as I'm

concerned, as far as my time allows, is

to keep this person from dying. Okay,

start these three drugs.

But what I have tried to do, and I did

this with my own particular

uh cardiac situation,

and I think Boston Health is the testing

that I did to get a more granular

understanding of things with a little

higher resolution.

But since I am a cholesterol

hyperabsorber,

that affects that informs the type of

drug I might take. Doesn't necessarily

have to be something like a statin. And

there were three or four drugs that I

was was suggested to take. And I said,

what is the longest studied of these

with the best side effect profile that

is the most innocuous that I can start

with? And we can do another test in two

months. This is not an emergency. I'm

not about to have a pulmonary ambolism

or heart attack. Don't have any arteries

blocked. Like what is it? And it was in

my case, not everybody, something called

a zettobe, otherwise known as zedia.

Very well studied, very well tolerated.

I said, "Let me try this in case I am a

hyperresponder because sometimes you can

be a hyperresponder or a non-responder."

But I was like, "Let me just try it

out." And statistically very unlikely

that I would be, the doctor said.

Nonetheless, tried it. 2 months later,

retest. Guess what? I'm a

hyperresponder. So, I was able to use

the minimum effective dose for

medication and ultimately added one more

thing. But how many decades of possible

side effects did I just spare myself

>> by doing basically like one and a half

drugs instead of starting with four or

five and doing that indefinitely from

that point forward? when you're dealing

with your doctors, to what extent do you

consult AI? I have found personally that

talking to a chatbot has been incredibly

helpful. Now, with the caveat that they

hallucinate and they [ __ ] things up all

the time and so I'm not taking it as

gospel, but I am running I'm in because

your chatbot doesn't get bored of you

and doesn't have a um

an 11 minute window to talk to you. So

you you can really spend a lot of time

and then what I found is that I can then

run what I've learned by my doctors. Um

is is that an experience you've had?

>> Oh, for sure. And I do use AI and these

LLM a lot. Uh, what I would say is that

if you're going to do something like

that, my recommendation would be, and

I'll give a shameless plug just because

I'm involved with this company. I think

they're doing great things, but you

could use something like a chat GPT, but

there's some tools that are designed for

learning. Like there's there's one

called Obo, OBE.com.

Get some basic literacy, just the ABCs

of basic medical terminology

that would be helpful for understanding

things like blood tests. Just it's like

a hundred words, maybe 200 words,

perhaps at the very very tippity top. If

you want to be an overachiever,

develop an understanding of the basic

vocabulary

so that you can also discuss these

things in shortorthhand with your

doctors. Right? All right. So once you

develop basic medical literacy, you

could also use that to learn how to read

studies, right? Learn how to read a

scientific abstract in a study. Uh that

would be one of the best investments you

could ever make with your time.

spend an afternoon doing that or two

afternoons. Holy [ __ ] the ROI on that

is unbelievable. Like the number of

medical problems averted, the number of

medical procedures averted, the number

of

nonobvious solutions found that my basic

literacy has helped to to sort of uh

solve for is unbelievable. It doesn't

take very long. So, I would I would use

the tools to kind of do that first and

then I would say because that'll help

you with prompts like the answers are

only going to be as good as your

prompts. So,

>> once you've done that, then I use I use

AI all the time. Uh, and there there's

an expression which has been helpful for

me. Uh,

uh, I tend to I I can run pretty hot. I

think that's chilled out a lot, but I

can run pretty hot. I'm typically very

impatient. I have been since I was like

a toddler and uh the expression is don't

attribute to malice what you can

attribute to incompetence right but it

goes further than that right because

just because doesn't some you know

somebody doesn't reply to you doesn't

mean it's a personal fraud just because

someone does something stupid and they

answer one of your questions out of the

three you emailed them you can be like a

uh you can get really wound up but I

would go further than that which is

don't attribute to malice or

incompetence what can be explained by a

busy schedule, right? People are busy.

Everybody's busy. Nobody, by the way, AI

is not going to give us more free time

just to like this whole idea of like the

future of living in this leisure society

where everybody can crochet and do

sudoku all day and make you know

mandelas on the floor. It's just

compatently ridiculous for reasons we

can get into.

the what what you can do right is you

can after developing this basic literacy

you can go in and then you can ask

questions that your doctors may not have

time for. Uh I am always checking for

contraindications between medications

and also supplements because doctors

will miss these. They will miss them.

They might not miss the most obvious,

but there are some that are not as

obvious. For instance, like there are

sleep medications like Trazadone which

really affect the serotonin system. It's

effectively, this is an overstatement,

but it's effectively a failed

anti-depressant. So, if you don't know

that, and it's not technically exactly

an SSRI like a Prozac, but there are

some similarities. If you don't know

that

because you're quote unquote taking a

sleep medication and then you go out and

take something that's contraindicated

for this entire class of sort of uh

serotonin specific anti-depressants like

you can get yourself into trouble. So I

will regularly check for

contraindications.

That's one thing I do. I have friends

who have uploaded their whole genome to

some of these LLMs and asked for

insights and they've they've identified

some remarkable things. Um the risk in

doing all of this is that you may

uncover issues that if you are prone to

anxiety

for a lot of reasons I'm kind of

inoculated against this with medical

stuff because I've spent so much time in

the the medical and scientific worlds.

But uh I'll give you an example. Another

thing that I do once a year or twice a

year is a full body MRI. And there are

companies that do do this. I think

biograph is the highest level. Prenuvo

is also pretty good, but I've seen a

couple of people have cancers missed,

which isn't great. So,

if you get a full body MRI and you are

over the age of 40, you're going to find

something. You're probably going to find

some type of internal cyst. You might

find, if you had, as a friend of mine

did, like a small brain aneurysm. Like,

you you're probably going to find

something. And the question is,

can you handle that? Can you handle

either doing something about it, which

is presumably why why you're doing it in

the first place, or can you deal with

the overwhelming likelihood

statistically that the doc the doctor's

going to say, "Yeah, we found X, Y, or

Z. You don't need to do anything about

it. We'll just keep an eye on it."

Are you going to be able to handle that

without becoming a stress case who's

going combing through LLMs and WebMD all

day making yourself crazy? Anyway, I'll

stop there. But yes, I use these tools

all the time. If you're going to use one

tool, use another tool to fact check it.

So, if you get something from Chat GPT,

absolutely have that thing

cross-examined by Claude or another

tool, right? I do not trust these tools

with their first answers.

>> Just on the pan scan thing, the full

body MRI, I'm u the ultimate um this is

a bit of an aside, but I have figured

out the ultimate health hack, which is

marry a doctor um because she can't get

out of here and I ask her a lot of

questions. Um, but she uh she is really

against these pan scans for the very

reason that you just stated, which is

you will find something and it may

stress you out or it may put you in the

market for a procedure you don't need.

Um,

>> yeah. So, it's it's it's interesting the

the P the differing POVs on this. Um,

but let me

>> Oh, sorry. Did you want to say something

on that? No, I was going to say it's uh

it's like be uh one of my favorite

quotes is be suspicious of what you

want. That's a roomy quote going way

back. It's like we think that we want

all of the health information we can

possibly get, but you should be a little

skeptical and suspicious of that if

you've never dealt with a huge amount of

health information at high resolution.

So, yeah, it's it's it's a very personal

thing in my case.

you know, psychologically this

particular type of kind of data

overwhelm I'm pretty good with.

>> So, I asked before about where you are

with optimizing now, and you you you you

listed a bunch of you said you're more

surgical now and how and how you

optimize, and you listed a bunch of

areas, including um uh um how you eat.

Um,

you did put out a a podcast in August of

2025 talking about some of your

rethinking of optimizing. Um, I'd just

be curious like where are you at with

that now?

>> Yeah. I mean, I I think that

optimizing

is the how, right? Broadly speaking,

right? So, optimizing is how you do

something.

Much more important than how you do

something is the few somethings that you

choose in the first place to do. Right?

So this applies to learning quickly.

This applies to making a lot of money.

This applies to getting in great shape.

Like what you do in a sense matters a

lot more than how you do anything. You

can get very very very good, very

optimized, very efficient at doing

something unimportant. That does not

make it important. just makes you very

good at doing something that you

probably shouldn't be doing in the first

place. And I think modern productivity

porn is

sort of indiscriminate in how it applies

optimizing to everything and everything,

right? There's some very funny uh we

don't have to link to them, but kind of

morning routines that are these YouTube

videos that are like four or five hours

long, right? of people going through

their day.

There's a point at which your morning

routine just turns into like a 5 hour

warm-up uh for life each day. And

uh that's obviously a really extreme

example, but for me I if you were to

have a nanny cam like hidden in a little

stuffed like stuffed bear in my house,

my office,

this Airbnb where I am right now, and

you watched me on any given day, you

would just be like, "What is this guy

doing?" I mean, it's like a a poorly

programmed Roomba. Like I don't Is this

like the Blair Witch Project? like it

doesn't seem to be doing much work. Like

what is he doing? And the part of the

reason I can get away with that is that

I think I am very good at measuring

twice and cutting once. In this context,

what that means is I'm spending a lot of

time looking at doing 8020 analysis,

asking myself, you know, what can I do

that is not easily replicated by someone

else that I find easier to do than other

people, which is kind of a shortcut to

finding things that you're good at that

you will also have the endurance for

because you're kind of it's easier for

you or you're obsessed with it. Okay,

what am I obsessed with? What am I doing

at my off hours? Okay, let me try to

find a ven diagram of that and then

focus on those things. I'll test it for

a very short period of time to see if it

if number one I can sustain it if I am

actually as good as I thought I would be

and I don't I need to be the best in the

world but you know better than average

and then over time as I'm throwing a lot

against the wall and then I'm looking

back and saying okay I tried these three

things or I made these four investments

I had these assumptions at the time did

they pan out why or why not and then

course correcting. They're actually very

very very very few things you have to

get right

in my opinion to have an incredible

life. You don't need to be great at a

lot of things is my perspective. It's

like look if I remember talking to Jerry

Seinfeld

and uh one of his conclusions was if you

lift weights and do transendental

meditation that'll solve pretty much all

your problems. That's just, and I'm

paraphrasing, but it wasn't too far from

that. He's like, if you lift weights and

do TM, it will solve most of your

problems. And I like that because I

think there's a whole hell of a lot of

truth to it, that distilling down, and

it makes life seem

much more manageable,

right? If people feel like they have to

win this super ultra decathlon of life

where instead of 10 sports there are 150

sports you have to be good at. Who is

who's going to actually surmount that

and cope with it? Well, nobody. So for

me it's like look

if I had to just pull a rabbit out of a

hat right now to pick a few, I'd be like

read non-violent communication. Like

figure out how to talk to people without

sounding overly defensive or aggressive.

Okay.

like life

unless we're going to be a monk of some

type or a nun like and even then

probably there's some crazy internal

politics at the hamlet in China if you

want you know the abbot you're going to

have to deal with that abbot uh so work

on your communication right take that

very seriously as like the connective

tissue for everything

don't invest in things you don't

understand

it's like when in doubt like read a few

books on like

lowcost index funds in the S&P 500. Like

go look at the graph over the last 5,

10, 15, 20 years. Like you might have

some hard dips here and there, but if

you're trying to get fancy and invest in

like individual AI stocks, like wow.

Like maybe you'll pick Amazon and Google

out of all the trash there is right now,

but most of us won't. I don't think I

can do it. Uh lift weights, right? Try

to do some zone 2 training where it's

like you you could speak in single

sentences but you don't really want to

do that for like 30 to 60 minutes a few

times a week. Okay.

And then like don't eat processed crap

like Michael Michael Pollen rules,

right? It's like if your grandmother

wouldn't recognize the ingredients,

don't eat it. Okay. Try that. Like I

think I think you'll do pretty well.

>> Hard to argue with any of that. Um and

it and I think the question I'm going to

ask next is apppropo. Um

you one of your current projects is

called the no book. Um

>> and uh you uh the book as Tim has uh

pointed out may come out in 10 years

because he's working on it slowly but he

has released a couple of chapters online

and I've read at least one of them um

and it's really interesting. Um uh so

before I say too much, maybe you could

describe what is the notebook and and

why are you writing it if if only

slowly.

>> Yeah. Yeah. I have an 800page draft

right now. So it's going to need to get

whittleled down a little bit. But the

notebook started something like boy 6

years ago where I noticed a lot of

people in my audience, my listeners, my

readers struggling with focus and saying

no. Because fundamentally

like the the road to where you want to

be in life is

the sort of the Wizard of Oz, you know,

golden brick road is saying yes to a few

things. A few things, right? There are

really there are just a few things you

have to get right. And then the the

guardrails for that are that's that's

the yes road. And it's very few things.

the guardrails for that are no, you have

to say no the entire way. And

I was I was writing this book. I reached

out to a bunch of my my friends. These

are very accomplished friends in this

case to ask them for their

recommendations. I thought they would

help me write this thing and they were

like, "Oh my god, are you kidding me?

Like this is the biggest pain in my

life. Please send me an early copy when

you can." So my friends were there were

there were a few who were actually very

helpful, but the vast majority were

like, "Oh my god, I thought that life

was going to get easier. It has only

gotten harder with respect to saying

no." And uh and I it just became this

massive project. So I put it I put it on

the back burner. And then a friend of

mine, Neil Strauss, some people might

recognize that name. He's written

something like 10 New York Times

bestsellers. He wrote The Dirt. He's

written these biographies of Molly Crew

and like all these celebrities. and he

also wrote The Game and Emergency and

many other books. And he's terrible at

saying no, it turns out. And he was

busting my balls about not writing this

book. And he kept harassing me about

finishing it. And he was actually kind

of creating a kurfuffle over a group

dinner after a few drinks. And I was

just like, "Neil, if you want to read

this book so badly, why don't you just

help me finish writing it?" And I

thought that put it to bed. And then the

next day when he we all sobered up, he

was like, you know, if you're serious,

why don't we talk about it? And

at the same time, I was noticing with

social media, certainly with AI, it's

going to get a thousand times worse. The

ability, well, first of all, like the

external forces that want to distract

you are almost

unbeatable. I mean, it's it's it's

incredible how sophisticated they are.

Secondly, the way that enables self

interruption and distraction is

something that humanity has never seen

before.

And there is this incredible pain in

terms of paradox of choice, right? What

should I do? Who should I listen to?

What should I watch? What should I pay

attention to? That is fracturing the

psyches of people. And this, by the way,

does not discriminate geographically,

does not discriminate economically. It's

like up and down the chain, left, right,

front, center, everywhere. Uh, so I the

problems just seem to be getting bigger

and bigger and bigger. So wrote this

book with Neil basically as the the

student. And what's what's fun about it,

I think it's my most entertaining and

hilarious book in a way because

I'm giving Neil these assignments and

then he'll try them, but it'll be like

passive aggressive and he'll screw one

up or he like he'll he'll actually not

do 50% of the assignment and then I'll

follow up and he'll have all this guilt.

But we have real examples of like emails

he tried to send, text messages he's

trying to send. He's trying everything

in the book and learning as he goes. And

I would say uh there are a few people

who have proof read the whole thing and

they proof read it like a year ago and

they've they've come back and and these

are fans of my stuff who've read my

other books and they're like this book

has had a huge impact on my life and

they still give me examples. So to to

then answer the question of well what

exactly is the book talking about? The

book is talking about how to say no in a

world of compulsive yes. Right? But what

I've what I've what's important to note

about this is that this is also true

with the 4-hour body and like why that

worked for so many people when other

books kind of diet exercise books had

failed. It's not enough to just have a

couple of index cards or templates for

doing exercise for saying no. If that

would have worked it would have worked

already, right?

And sure, I can give examples, and I

give tons of examples of lines that are

helpful for saying no, like Martha Beck,

who is like Oprah Winfreyy's life coach

and is an amazing woman in her own right

for a lot of reasons. U she turned me

down for something and I include these

real nos, right? Cuz I kept my favorite

declines and people like rejections over

10 years and and so I share a bunch of

them. And she said to me, "I really wish

I could, but I can't do the life

Tetris." Right? I'm like, "Do the life

Tetris." And I was like, "Wow, that is

so good. You're not explaining. You're

not defending. You're not giving a bunch

of stuff that someone can try to

negotiate around. It's just like, hey, I

really wish I could. I just can't do

life Tetris." And so, I give examples

like that, but that is not enough. Uh

once you start really digging into why

people have trouble saying no, it's not

only because they lack templates. It's

because of certain core beliefs,

which are thoughts we take to be true to

kind of quote Byron Katy

and philosophies they have that they're

not even aware of that make it almost

impossible to say no. Right? And that

could relate to FOMO. It could be

related to a very scarcity-minded

limited number of opportunities, right?

A belief that you can't generate

opportunities yourself. You have to wait

for things to come as inbound. It could

relate to and I hit these very early on

and actually I think they're in the

sample chapters that people can get. Uh

if if people go to tim.blog/nobook

so tim.blog is the actual URL/nowbook,

one word. I think it's like 30 or 40

pages of the book that will get into

this, but a lot of folks will say, "I'm

too nice for that." Okay, we unpack that

because there's a lot there, right? Must

be nice for Tim or fill in the blank

because they're already successful. I

don't have that luxury, right? Okay,

well, let's actually double click on

that and start to interrogate some of

these beliefs and on and on and on. So

saying no in a durable way like really

developing a toolkit which as far as I'm

concerned is like a self-preservation

necessity. Now when I first started it 6

years ago I was like if people really

want to get kind of 10x results in their

life and continue to apply the things

from the 4-hour work like 8020 etc. they

really need to have a reliable tool here

for saying no. Now looking at social

media AI, social media enabled AI, blah

blah blah blah blah. What it's going to

do to inboxes, messaging, etc. with

personalization, spam, you fill in the

blank that are indistinguishable from

humans. Uh this is it's this is like

knowing how to breathe. As far as I'm

concerned, you have to have a toolkit

like this or you're just going to get

you're going to be roadkill, I think.

And I that sounds probably very

dramatic, but it's like I'm sitting in

Silicon Valley right now for my first

trip here for a few weeks um of in

duration in like 8 years. I'm telling

you guys, the stuff that's coming is

going to be amazing. It's going to be

incredible. It's also just going to be

it's going to be catastrophic for I

think a lot of minds that are unprepared

with the proper toolkits. So saying no

is important.

>> Agreed. And it's a huge struggle for me.

You have a beautiful phrase in your book

uh promiscuous over commitment and I um

am really really guilty of that. You

also there's another nice phrase you you

you say the book will help you build a

benevolent failank uh protective wall of

troops to guard your goals. Uh

we don't have time to talk about all of

the tools in there but is there a tool

in particular you think that is that

would be very very powerful for people?

>> Yes absolutely. Um, so there a lot of

folks have perhaps heard the apocryphal

story of and I think I I I give proper

credit in the book and this is one of

the chapters that people can get. Um, so

there's plenty of value that people can

get from the from the free stuff, but I

mean I'm not even selling it yet, so

maybe I'll give away more. But the uh

the the one of the culprits, one of the

biggest causal factors for why people

have trouble saying no is they don't

have big enough yeses to defend,

>> right? And for instance, if you don't

have like if you had a brand new child,

if you had or someone you loved, god

forbid, had a serious cancer diagnosis,

if you had tiger by the tail and knew

that you were working on a business, I'm

using an extreme example on purpose that

could be worth billions of dollars, you

would not have trouble saying no to

things,

right? And so then like we go back to

the other end of the spectrum. It's like

well if you don't have really clearly

defined big yes yeses

that get you excited that have the

potential for huge payoff not

necessarily financially

and you're kind of searching around your

inbox for things to answer. Right? When

people send you an invite to a dinner or

they want to have coffee to pick your

brain or it could be anything, a costume

party you don't want to go to. That's a

real example from Neil actually.

And

you're going to say yes because what's

scarier than having lots of little

promiscuous overcommitments? It's a big

void.

>> Right? So the apocryphal story that I

was hinting at um is the story of the

professor who comes in and this I I want

to say this was from originally Steven

Cvy or maybe Steven Cvy adapted it

>> the seven habits of highly effective

people I believe was the book

>> and it might have been in his teaching

and not in the books themselves but the

the story is along these lines.

professor goes in and he puts out on the

desk in front of the students like a

large mason jar, a handful of big rocks,

right? Like like three or four, a bunch

of gravel and then a bunch of sand. And

he challenges the students, asks them

first how they would fit as much as

possible into the mason jar. And they

try different approaches. And if you put

in the sand first, you get a little bit

of gravel. can't fit the rocks, right?

You put in the gravel first. Um,

actually, um, let me make sure I'm

getting this right. All right, we'll

we'll snip that part. So, let me let me

start that over again. Right. So, if you

put in the sand first, then you get a

little bit of gravel in, can't fit the

rocks. Okay. Well, ditto. If you put the

gravel in first, then you put in the

sand, maybe you fit one rock. Okay. And

ultimately

the lesson is you have to put in the big

rocks first, then the gravel fits around

that and then you can fit in the sand.

In the version that I tell, I make it I

I make a modification to that and I say

no matter what they do, there's still

sand left over on the table. And I think

the lesson is if you're looking at this

in terms of commitments, right, the big

rocks are those kind of life-changing

yeses, the few things you need to

protect on that golden road to get

really where you want to be. Then the

gravel to me are like the smaller but

critical things you need to do. Got to

file your taxes, got to do A, B, or C.

And then the sand is all that extraneous

stuff, mostly distractions. So you can

fit some of it, but if you schedule all

that stuff first, it's going to crowd

out the gravel or it's certainly at the

very least going to crowd out all the

big yeses, right? And so in the in the

sample chapters, I just walk people

through how I do this past year review,

right? and like how I actually pick the

big yeses because the the book on no

is equally a book on h to answer the

question how the hell in a world of

infinite options in a world of

temptation around every corner do you

pick a few things to focus on that are

really high leverage how do you do it

like that seems like a it's a simple

question, but it's actually a very hard

question to answer. Um, and so I would

say that if you're having trouble saying

no, underneath that probably is the fact

that you don't have a you don't have big

enough yeses that are worth defending.

Uh, and then there's a lot that leads

from that, right? There are ways how do

you commit to a yes and ensure against

reneggging or something else? Um, and

there's also like this is intended to be

hopefully like all of my books a very

practical book, right? So, what happens

when you screw up, right? There's an

entire chapter on how to renegotiate

commitments after you have already

overcommitted because guess what? If you

have that tendency, you're going to

overcommit. You're going to look at your

calendar for the next few weeks or month

and say, "Good lord, I'm screwed."

And then what do you do? you're going to

have to have some very potentially

uncomfortable conversations. So, we're

learning to renegotiate commitments is

also an art form that is going to be

included in it. Uh but fundamentally,

it's it's

big yeses worth defending.

Um I would say is another one. And sure,

there are lots of things that you can do

that you could do today. You don't have

to look at any of these chapters, right?

It's like I have not had social media on

my phone in 3 years.

>> Uh why? Because I feel like you are

bringing a butter knife to a gunfight if

you have these tools on your phone. Uh

and if it's too scary to unplug for

a, you know, 3 years, you don't have to

commit to that. I didn't in the

beginning. It's like do a one or two

week social media fast at least on your

phone. So I can still access social

media if I need a hit of the heroin. I

can still access social media through my

laptop, but it adds enough friction that

I'm not going to end up looking at

Instagram while I'm on the toilet and

wondering why I can't feel my legs 40

minutes later. Right? It's going to

avoid that type of thing. or the

compulsive sort of dopamine scratching

whenever you have free 30 seconds

jumping into social media. This is not

good for your ability to focus. It's not

good for your ability to single task.

It's not good for your mental health

when you always have that escape.

It's it's I mean, look, I'm telling

people things they probably agree with

but perhaps haven't implemented, right?

So, you can do something like that. You

can use an app like Freedom. There's an

app called Freedom that you can use to

block certain things for certain periods

of time. I mean there are these

technical tools that you can use. Uh but

at the very base

you can't use more window dressing

technical tricks to fix like fundamental

problems with goal selection. Big yes is

worth defending

and core beliefs. Right? If I say no to

this person, they're something bad is

going to happen

and they're not going to like me.

They'll stop inviting me to things. Like

if you have these and that is going to

what, right? You have to ask and then

what? And then what? Right? I'm going to

end up alone. Okay. Well, these are

these are sort of Rubicons you need to

get comfortable crossing in the sense

that my experience is this is also

Neil's experience. He had tons of fears

as did I in the beginning stages. It's

like when you start to stand up for the

things that are important in your life,

uh I think this is a Dr. Seuss quote,

but it's like the people who mind don't

matter and the people who matter don't

mind. Like you actually do a lot of

pruning in your life that you should do

anyway. And it's a it's a forcing

function for that.

>> That's so interesting. It really is

about courage in the end. Um

>> it is. And you can train that. You can

train that. It's not something you are

born with or without. Like that is

something

through actually understanding

what your fears represent and like

what's underneath them. It could be from

childhood. It doesn't necessarily have

to be. But when you start to actually

examine them, there's an exercise people

could do today also they can find. I did

a TED talk on this called fear setting.

You start to do fear setting around

these fears. You defang them. And guess

what? Suddenly you have this thing that

others might call courage. But what it

is is it's clarity.

It's clarity around the actual downside

which is limited versus the upside

of protecting these big yeses over a

year two or three. And I will say, not

to continue to beat this dead horse, but

with all of the noise that is here, but

that is coming with AI, it's going to be

10, 100, a thousand times worse within 2

years.

If you can single task on important

things for not even 4 hours a day, 2

hours a day without interruption, you

are going to be from the perspective of,

let's just say, an attention economy in

the top 1% of performers.

H

>> it's it's uh it's never been easier and

it's never been harder in a way.

>> I'm going to lose you in 9 minutes. So,

I do want to make sure I quickly ask you

about Coyote uh another projects. Uh

this is a game that you've uh um uh

designed. Can you what is it and why?

>> Yeah. Yeah. So, Coyote

is a is a it's a tiny little card game

that I designed with uh some of my

friends at Exploding Kittens, which

people might recognize. They have a lot

of very very popular games. And uh it's

a it's a fun family game. It's it's

something like, if you could imagine,

charades meets hot potato meets uh brain

teaser. something that I I hope uh at

some point I'd actually like to do a

clinical study on this but you know

makes you just a little bit smarter and

the people who play uh it is it is a um

casual card game you can learn in a few

minutes each game lasts about 10 minutes

and the reason I created it I always

wanted to make a game number one and

I ch this is actually a good

illustration of some of the stuff that

is in the book that'll come out in you

know 100 years uh but people can apply

it today which is uh I choose projects

based on

which projects will allow me to win even

if they fail. What does that mean?

>> Uh

I assume that any project could fail for

reasons totally outside of my control.

It's happened before. It'll happen

again. Happens to people every day. And

so how am I then choosing things to

commit to? Well, generally I'm, you

know, I'm doing all these two week

experiments on various things like the

diet and this that and the other thing.

With projects, it's kind of like a

six-month commitment, right? I'm looking

at like a 6 to 12-month project where I

really go allin. By the way, that makes

it easier to say no to things when

you're doing a sprint as opposed to a

very slow walking marathon. So, I'm

committing to something that I think

will be 6 to 12 months. And I am

optimizing for

what I will learn, right? the density of

learning

and also the relationships that I'll

deepen or develop. So it could be with

new people, could be with people I

already know

with the belief that those relationships

and those skills or knowledge will

transcend that project even if the

public hates it. Even if in my case, for

instance, China tariffs for a nine a

game that sold for $9 or $10 coming from

China, that that just kills the

economics, right? So, not that this was

ever a money-making thing for me, but

it's like there are things that came up

that made this suddenly much harder from

a kind of business perspective. And

thank God I checked those other boxes,

right? Because uh fortunately, it's got

like 9.7 or 9.8 eight stars on Amazon

and it's available everywhere and it's

doing really well. But what I really

care about is like Alan Lee, who's the

co-founder and CEO of Exploding Kittens,

has become a super close friend. He was

a good friend beforehand. We're even

closer now. This guy's one of the most

amazing polymaths I've ever met in my

life. Awesome, hilarious guy. And I have

learned so much about mass retail, you

know, the Walmarts and Targets and so

on. I've learned so much about how you

have to play the politics and the game

of thrones with that. I've learned about

overseas manufacturing. I've learned

about you name it, right? I've learned

so much. And those are the reasons for

me picking this. And if you look at, for

instance, there's a blog post people can

find for free. Angel investing, like

investing in early stage companies,

which is like 90% of my net worth, which

I started well before I could quote

unquote afford it. uh there's a blog

post called uh I think it's creating a

real world MBA which explains kind of

how I approached it which was the same

way I approached this learning and

relationships that I think will

transcend that project and snowball over

time so that it's very hard to lose long

term but the but coming back to the game

itself I mean look if if you've got kids

in between the ages of let's say I most

It says 10 on the box, but really it's

kind of like age eight if your kids are

pretty smart to like age 15. This is

kind of a no-brainer. Like the game

works really really well. Adults also

really like it. So, it's not just for

kids. But if you've got some kids around

or adults who don't care being a little

goofy, then um I think it's a really

simple, fun game that hopefully does

something cognitive for folks as well.

That was kind of the goal.

and Coyote. You can just Yeah. Coyote

game. You can find it everywhere.

>> It is always an enormous pleasure to

talk to you, Tim. And I know you say no

to most [ __ ] so thank you. Thank you

for saying yes to this.

>> Yeah, I love what you do, man. I love

what you do. Uh, one of my very close

friends who's a professor at a very

wellrespected university had pains in

his body. this just horrible pervasive

pain in joints in his body for years and

years. Started using 10% Happier,

meditating every day, and it was like

boom, within 4 weeks, pains went away.

Crazy. I have some theories on that. I

think it's actually might be

synchronized breathing and and vag nerve

stimulation, but that's a separate

conversation. Um, and uh, I just think

you put a lot of uh, you're very

thoughtful and you do a lot of good in

the world. So, it's always and I just

enjoy hanging out. So, it's always a a

pleasure to connect.