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happiness is a trap and most people
waste their entire lives chasing it as
today's guest says happiness is a
direction not a destination and the real
destination you should be chasing is far
more interesting and potent than mere
happiness so join me today with Arthur
Brooks as we explore the joys of an
honorable life lived in pursuit of
pleasure power and success instead
why is it a trap to think that you can
be happy because happiness is not a
destination happiness is a direction
happiness is the idea that you can be
Blissful and happy all the time is it's
not just unrealistic it's unhealthy it
would be terrible if you were happy all
the time you'd be eaten by a tiger
immediately you would be you'd be you'd
have no
negative feelings which keep you alive I
mean the idea of you know the limbic
system of your brain that's producing
sadness and anger and disgust and fear
these are the the emotions that have
kept you alive I mean your pleistocene
ancestors would have been eaten by an
animal immediately you'd be run over by
a car you need these things that
actually make you at least temporarily
unhappy or you can't put one foot in
front of the other therefore happiness
is the wrong goal the right goal is
happier
so that's really what we're trying to do
and to get happier is a process all
throughout your life and to be on the
path toward what Oprah Winfrey calls
happierness
you you actually need a system that
makes it possible and so that you can
pursue it and you need to pursue it's
reason people need to watch impact
Theory by the way is because this is a
Pursuit of Happiness show this is all
about Pursuit this is all about
achievement it's about trying it's about
making your life better it's about it's
about progress this is one of the most
important points of human flourishing
this is about progress you know if
people often ask why is it so relatively
easy to lose weight been impossible to
keep it off it's because when the scale
goes down each day it gives you this
incredible reward but when you hit your
goal the reward is never eating anything
you like ever again for the rest of your
life
everything in life is progress and
that's why the pursuit matters so that
you can actually be on the trail toward
happierness and that's the right goal
for all of us it's really interesting I
like that a lot I think a lot about the
traps so when I think about what impact
theory is and what I'm trying to make it
it started out pretty simplistic so
we're in phase three of impact Theory at
this point because it it's really me
trying to figure out okay how do you get
out of the spiritual entertainment and
into the real thing that people need to
actually do and understand in order to
make progress in order to be happier in
order to be more fulfilled is how I
think about it
um but the way that people get trapped
is very counter-intuitive to me and
you're the only person that I've ever
heard bring it up
I don't know if you consider the the
central thesis but you've talked about
how people get stuck in their
perceptions yeah and that to me is very
interesting and there's really I think
two ways that people get stuck by their
perceptions one is they confuse them
with objective reality so they just
think oh the thing I believe is true
right and so if you don't believe it you
just don't see the truth and then the
other way that people get trapped by
perception is they identify themselves
with it and so they love that they are
on the left or the right and so you end
up with this vicious cycle of I'm proud
that I have recognized the truth and I
feel good about myself for noticing how
wrong you are yeah and so we end up in a
pretty gnarly situation where they're
not actually happy that's the freaky
thing so how do people begin to unwind
that well so there's a lot there's a lot
in what I mean I agree with everything
you said but there's so much in what you
said too that that helps us understand
the the bad situation or the conundrum
our country is in the world is in it has
everything to do with our inability to
to to stop seeing ourselves in terms of
the things that we think
this is a classic kind of attachment so
Buddhists talk about this a lot so tick
not Han the great Vietnamese Buddhist
monk who you know one of the one of the
most important uh Buddhist teachers of
the last 50 years died just a couple
years ago and he used to talk about the
worst kind of attachments that we have
in Modern Life is the attachment to our
views the attachments to what we think
that's just as bad as being attached to
your watch your car your television to
say you know like I love my I love my
car I mean what's wrong with you you'll
love your car it's a thing you shouldn't
you you only use things and you only
love people and that's an iron law of
happiness but the thing is all that we
we do a version of this ideologically
where we say that we we we're so
identified with the things that we think
that it becomes an attachment that it
becomes almost a love attachment in our
lives now that's really alienating
that's incredibly alienating because you
are not your views and I am not mine and
and that's incredibly important for us
to be able to learn for this Pursuit of
Happiness for progress in and of itself
is to not be the things that we we think
and to recognize that we think many
things that are wrong we just don't know
which they are the reason people watch
this show and listen to this show is
because they want to learn more so they
can update their views which is an
acknowledgment that their views weren't
perfect to begin with that their
knowledge wasn't perfect to begin with
now when you're being taught by a a you
know baby boomer culture Warriors that
are trying to conscript child soldiers
into their culture War they will say if
you don't think these things something
is morally defective about you and you
will have the perfect truth you will
have the the secret Gnostic truths if
you do believe these things and at that
point our beliefs including political
beliefs have just become a religion
there's just because not cult and and
that's really what we see and so people
are inducted into these competing Cults
all the time and you know it's like I
have a traditional religion and I
identify with my religion
but I don't know if I'm right even on
that I don't know the things that I
either that are right and that's been
incredibly freeing for me and that's
ultimately what we all have to
acknowledge I think these things
but I'm willing to be corrected if I get
better information and the only way I'm
going to do that is to go to people who
disagree with me people who think
differently than me people who threaten
my preconceived notions and and to take
it in and say you disagree with me Tom
come sit next to me yeah I gotta hear it
why is that freeing why is it freeing to
acknowledge that you almost certainly
are wrong and to invite people to
challenge those ideas for most people
that that's like arresting yeah well
that's a hard thing to do because that
actually goes against that that
contravenes Evolution evolution is tells
us that we need to believe particular
things and to defend them and the ego
threats are actually dangerous to us
because if you know if we're if we show
ourselves to be wrong to others then
that makes us look incompetent then
we're less likely to survive we're less
likely to thrive in a community we're
less likely to rise in a hierarchy we're
less likely to find mates and so the
result is that you defend defend defend
defend but we don't have to do that
that's hugely maladapted in modern life
particularly with modern technology I
mean think of the technology that we're
using right now to record this show and
that people are using to watch us right
now that's an updating learning
technology and if you're stuck in the
static the stasis of of here's this body
of information that I have and it must
all be right you've basically said that
you can't grow and learn so you have to
relax that evolutionary imperative you
have to fight back against what Mother
Nature is putting into you that's and
you know this is the way the
philosophers Allah always talk about
sort of the animal path and the Divine
path the animal path is going according
to your evolutionary imperatives these
are the things that I've it's like if it
feels good do it the best way to ruin
your life the Divine path is to stand up
to the things that feel unnatural you
know we do this all the time I mean you
and I work out every day right and and
that's a it's the the Nature's Path is
sit on the couch
right Nature's Path is eat that sweet
thing right and and the Divine path is
to do things that are hard that don't
feel natural because you know you're
you're you've been given a prefrontal
cortex where you can make conscious
decisions that are better than what what
your feelings tell you that they should
be so mother nature says defend your
opinions at all costs because if you
don't it's an ego threat and they could
have you know could have catastrophic
consequences for your position in the
hierarchy but you know that if you don't
defend your positions if you admit to
the possibility that you're not right
that you'll learn and you update when
people say things that you think are
crazy you say tell me more that you're
actually going to get better and that's
a conscious decision yeah so one the
fact that it's a conscious decision I
think is really important for people
something you talk about in the book
that uh when people have Collision of
values they can really run into a
problem one of the things going back to
the question I was asking one of the
things that I think think really causes
problems for people is they have a value
system they've never articulated it to
themselves they've never documented it
written it down so they know these are
my actual values and then they don't
realize that those were choices again
they're mistaking them for this is how
the world ought to be
and when they collide with other people
they just assume you don't recognize the
way the world ought to be you are bad
you're a whatever and now you get
these conflicts and you said in the book
that uh families break up because you
didn't say Collision of values but
that's how I read it to mean and people
expect it to be something else I forget
what you said people expect it to be
well they think it's because of a
behavioral discrepancy it's usually a
values discrepancy it's the way that it
works out so the way that families tend
to break apart and again no joke one in
six Americans is not talking to a family
member today because of politics which
is
craziness for happiness it's great
there's one reason of a Schism with
family and that's abuse and political
differences that there should be yeah
that's the only legitimate reason to
have a Schism in your families because
of abuse and and differences of
political opinion are not abuse at least
they weren't they didn't used to be
abused but if you're being convinced by
you know by leaders who are trying to to
bring you into their culture War trying
to make you a soldier in their culture
War they'll say if somebody disagrees
with your view on you know Supreme Court
decisions or something that they're
somehow uh erasing your value as a human
being I mean that says this wild leaps
of logic and we hear about this on
college campuses where I spend a lot of
my time obviously that we're telling
people that if people disagree with you
that they're erasing you that they they
they they they disagree with your
existence or something it's just this
crazy existential language that we're
using that's way out of proportion to
everything so the only reason to have
these schisms is is actual abuse and
again people disagree with what abuse is
but it's not that okay now what do we
find with when when people tend to
really have a bad problem in their
family people think that you know for
example I deal with a lot of students
and they're they're building their lives
and figuring out how they're going to
live their own lives and it turns out
that they disagree with their parents on
a lot they come home from college saying
different things for example they you
know they're living in a particular
different way things that their parents
might really disagree with it turns out
that how you live your life doesn't
matter it almost never matters and
almost never leads to schism
what you say about somebody else's
values is what really matters so if you
want to have a really big so all the you
know all the people in college who are
watching us and you have I know you have
a huge audience in their in their late
teens and 20s or impact three fans which
is great if you want to have a live your
life but have a relationship with your
parents live your life but don't kill
tell your parents that their values are
stupid that turns out to be a direct on
attack and that leads to bigger problems
one thing that's become really popular
though is
um tell your dad or your uncle who says
the racist thing at Thanksgiving what
you think should they not do that no
it's perfectly fine to do that but don't
freak out don't freak out you say I you
know I see it different yeah hey Uncle
Mark you know I see it differently and
and and and as you do say to yourself
before you begin I love Uncle Mark and
I'm going to use my values right now as
a gift and not as a weapon
anytime you use your values as a weapon
you've denigrated their moral content
you've eviscerated the effectiveness of
your approach but if you use your values
as a gift it might not always be taken
in a charitable way but you're using
them for the right reason and you've got
the odds on chance of actually having a
good impact
okay this is really interesting
um I had Sam Harris on the show who I
have a great deal of respect for he's
become very unpopular in certain circles
for the way that he is approaching the
problem of free speech right I want to
be abundantly clear yeah that my value
system tells me that free speech is
worth dying for and so it isn't the
thing that I would expect anybody to
reach for and say okay we're gonna clamp
down on that now Sam sees it differently
and as I try to tease out when a smart
person
when I I learned one immutable truth
when two smart people who are sincere
think each other are stupid right then
odds are that they have different base
assumptions yeah and when I look at Sam
and I say okay Sam's base assumption is
that if something is an existential
threat then it's worth
stripping away any right to make sure
that we don't succumb to set existential
threat and then I was like okay because
I don't know that I would disagree with
that if I knew there was an asteroid
hurtling towards Earth and it was life
or death and we were all going to have
to get on the same page and do XYZ thing
if I really knew that it was do X
survive do y everyone dies then I would
for sure say do X right it makes sense
but I don't think people know how to
agree on what is the right course of
action nor do you have perfect knowledge
right so no perfect knowledge you don't
know if it's actually an existential
threat and so I'll take it out of that
realm for a second that's the problem
right people don't have perfect
knowledge they don't know but and now
I'll take it in the realm that I do
understand very well when you're
building a business you must give your
team certainty right so what I call
intoxicating them with certainty it's
the only way to get them to follow you
right now the catch is as a leader you
have to balance you know that your team
has a need for certainty it's the only
way to get the moving in the same
direction right but you have to balance
that with what we were talking about
before what I call the physics of
progress that the only way to make
progress is to constantly hunger for how
am I wrong so you have to okay I was
wrong here I need to update my thinking
I need to update my Approach if you
don't do that you're screwed but now
there's tension between I need to
present to my team hey this is the way
but I also need to beg my team to tell
me at all times how I'm wrong right
because they're the ones that are going
to recognize the flaw in your thinking
that are going to show you a better way
right so it's this absolutely
fascinating tension now when this plays
out in the bigger world with the speed
of information that we have today thanks
to the internet and social media you get
this right which I would say has a level
of pathology in it that scares the life
out of me right so how do we manage that
tension of its imperfect knowledge
but I must give certainty in order to
get a country or a globe moving in the
right direction and an easy way to get
people certainty is to say we're all
going to die right right which is the
thing that people reach for right but if
you don't give people certainty meh
everybody runs in weird directions well
the the answer well the Buddhists would
say the answer to that question is
intention without attachment okay so
certainty is this is the direction that
we're going this is the goal this is the
target as far as I can see it but I'm
not attached to that because this is
this is subject to updating so you'll
find for example you look at the ancient
navigational course of Columbus or you
know the Explorers you know that had
very imperfect tools they had a concept
of the direction that they were going
and they had a particular goal and they
were going toward that goal with
complete certainty it was you know
Columbus was an entrepreneur and he was
he was taking his team the Nina pinton
Santa Maria toward this particular goal
and it turned out to be completely wrong
but the point is that the certainty was
the intention the fact that they got
something else that was arguably better
was the lack of attachment to the object
of the intention and this is what we're
trying to do in our companies in our
families and and indeed in the
Enterprise the ultimate Enterprise that
we need impact which is our lives I mean
it's like you're Tom Inc that's the real
Enterprise of you I mean just manifested
itself in all sorts these other cool
businesses and things are really
successful but all those were just
expressions of the of the real
Enterprise and each of us is an
entrepreneur in startup of Our Lives
that's what really matters and what we
need is to always have a clear intention
but not attachment to the object of that
intention because that makes you
dogmatic and the problem that we have
right now is we have fuzzy intention and
strong attachment we have exactly the
opposite of what we need in our politics
today and the way that people talk to
each other the way that people debate
and so if I have a strong intention of
the things that I believe even
politically but a lack of strong
attachment I can have a conversation in
Sam Harris and I had a similar
conversation except it was about
religion
and you know I'm I'm a traditionally
religious person and he's an atheist and
the way that we went at it we before we
we you know hit record on a show we said
we're going to talk about this to learn
we're not going to talk about this to
argue we're going to talk about this to
learn right and so when he would say
something I thought was like whoa I'd be
like Dude tell me more right and he
would say explain this to me because
this sounds crazy to me so truly explain
this to me so what is that that was we
both had this intention but we didn't
have the attachment and so we were
willing to update and so doing we got
better now when you're running a team if
you've got a company and I've been a CEO
so I've had I've I've made all these
mistakes over the years if they see that
you have this very clear intention we're
running this direction this is what we
think this is my best judgment but my
attachment to these things is not is not
absolute you can throw me off this if
you actually bring the best possible
information to me and you can tell me
that that the way I'm thinking about it
is not quite right then I'm going to
change the intention but in the meantime
this is the direction that we're all
going that turns out to be the way to
square the circle this turns out to be
the way to to solve this problem
personally in families and communities
and in companies is intention with that
attachment
all right that's amazing but how do you
do that how do you I I have a feeling
that a big part of the problem is people
have
accidentally constructed their identity
around that which they think they are so
I am in fact oh God if I can remember
this is maybe a paraphrase but it's
really damn close to something you said
we need less
activists and more volunteers
and when somebody you were like Hollow I
I have tried to immerse myself in your
world one for the this and two you are
incredibly helpful for navigating people
trying to do extraordinary things in
their life in a way that makes their
life better and not worse so the the
Strivers curse I forget the exact words
but perfect yeah you're good so if
people identify as an activist or a
volunteer that that simple like even you
just giving me the language I was like
oh whoa I get what you're trying to say
helping others versus like my identity
is this thing and I'm going to fight to
the death for this
um but how do you begin to extricate
your identity from the things that you
believe so that you can have
non-attachment to begin with we have to
ask who am I
and you're going to Define that or
you're going to discover we well you
ultimately discover that but you have to
have an understanding of that that's
that's not brittle and that's not based
on the outside world so there's a
philosophical concept that William James
talked about but the Eastern
philosophers talk about this a lot too
which is what William James called the I
self versus the me self the I self is is
say you're looking at a mirror and when
you look in the mirror there's actually
there's two of you there's the one who's
looking in the one who's being looked at
the one who's looking is the I self The
Observer of the world the one who's
being looked at is the me self which is
the observed you're going through life
as I self and me self you need me self
to know who you are and how you store
you stand in society and where you know
where you are on the team and where you
are in the hierarchy and you know where
you are in traffic for that matter but
you need the I sell so that you can
learn and you can exist we are all too
heavy on the me self on The observed and
none of us almost none of us is heavy
enough on the Observer part so one of
the exercises I'll give my students at
Harvard Business School they take this
happiness class which is about the you
know it's called leadership and
happiness the serious science of of the
business of you and and I'll say we're
going to go through an hour you're gonna
take an hour where you're not going to
be observed You're simply going to
observe and now this means a lot this
means for example you say like you don't
say yeah this coffee is bitter you say
hmm this coffee has a bitter flavor
nothing more than observation there's no
mirrors there's no notifications on
social media there's no judgments
there's just observation of the world to
get better at that and this is
incredibly important if we want to learn
and we want to update this also gets us
away from this whole concept of my
identity in my ideology because what
that fundamentally is is just me me me
me me me me me me me me it's like who am
I I am the things that I think if
somebody disagrees with me then they're
attacking me that's Insanity that's pure
vanity that is just looking in a mirror
all day long saying mirror mirror on the
wall who's the most beautiful of them
all it's me and my political beliefs
that's craziness there's no there's no
way to live and by the way that's the
fastest way to become a truly unhappy
person why the reason is because you
need the Grandeur of the world to
actually give you what you need the
experience of day-to-day life and living
in the the the image of yourself is just
boring it's just tedious if you know
thinking about me and what they think of
me and whether or not they agree with me
and whether or not these things are
going to satisfy me me me me it's like
watching the same episode of the same
season of Better Call Saul every single
day for the rest of your life
it was okay the first time it was not
that great the second time and it's
awful every time after that and being
forced to do that that's identity
politics that's the world of identity
that's the world of mirrors that's the
world of social media notifications
that's the world of the me self is what
it comes down to so if we really want to
be happy get into the I self the
learning space the observation the awe
of the outside world and your life will
change it'll just change and it's fast
you can reboot your life your health
even your career anything you want all
you need is discipline I can teach you
the tactics that I learned while growing
a billion dollar business that will
allow you to see your goals through
whether you want better health stronger
relationships a more successful career
any of that is possible with the mindset
and business programs in Impact Theory
University join the thousands of
students who have already accomplished
amazing things tap now for a free trial
and get started today
so in the book you say that uh basically
exactly what you just said that
happiness isn't the feeling but the
feeling is evidence of the happiness
right so then what is the happiness what
is the meat and potatoes yeah that's a
good analogy because it's the either the
courses or really the macronutrients in
the the thing that is happiness this has
three parts to it we know this from from
you know measuring people who have high
levels of well-being versus those who
don't High well-being is associated with
high levels of enjoyment satisfaction
and meaning in life those are the three
things that we need to actually pursue
the pursuit of happiness is the pursuit
of enjoyment the pursuit of satisfaction
and the pursuit of meaning and there are
three different goals with three
different sciences and three different
strategies to it when somebody only
pursues one they're not going to be
happy you need a balance and abundance
across this macronutrient profile for
happiness if you're going to get it I
meet people all the time who have great
enjoyment in life but very little
meaning and they're not happy I know
people hard-working entrepreneurs who
have tremendous meaning and no quality
of life no enjoyment they're not happy
and so I have to coach people in
different ways about this satisfaction
is the hardest of them because it's
going to ask because you can't keep it
you know and so they each have a son you
keep satisfaction because the brain is
something has a tendency to be
homeostatic homeostasis is the tendency
of the brain to always take you
emotionally back to equilibrium so
you'll be ready for the next set of
circumstances interesting can I push
back on that yeah so why and obviously I
agree with homeostasis but uh the way
that I've always thought about how
transient satisfaction is going back to
understanding the science is from an
evolutionary standpoint
if you ate a meal and it was satisfying
forever you would starve to death right
because you would only eat once right
and so
knowing that Evolution will conserve can
serve conserve if I have this mechanism
that make sure that I go do the thing
again that is basically this
um rise and fall of satisfaction that
happens with everything that I would be
in trouble if I only did once right so
uh thirst satisfaction gonna rise and
fall hunger rise and fall sex Rise and
Fall Right consumption consumption
hierarchy Prestige the watch the car the
house all of it well now it's
interesting now I wonder the sourcing
exactly the same homeostasis that is
homeostasis because the the watch losing
its thing although it's probably the
same mechanism is because it's trying to
get me to go do more and but here's the
thing about it the reason we don't we
don't ever realize that when you think
people say should I moved to California
because then I'll be primarily happy
because of the sunshine no the big
benefit that you get from mood benefit
from Sunshine is six months but the
taxes
so I'm gonna try to hurt you man so um
the key thing to understand about
homeostasis is that mother nature
doesn't want you to know it exists
Mother Nature has homeostasis so that
you'll be ready for the next set of
circumstances but fools you again and
again and again into thinking that this
time the satisfaction will be permanent
and it never is by the way this is
physical too so you step off the
treadmill and your your heart is going
135 beats per minute which you're doing
for good cardiovascular health within 15
minutes your heart rate has gone back to
its base rate so you don't die well the
same thing is true with your emotions
homeostasis has to reset you but when it
comes to the satisfactions that we seek
you know caloric or you know propagation
of the genes through mating and all the
stuff that we want to do we always think
that that relationship will give me
Permanent satisfaction because if you
knew if you knew then you'd be like
that's going to give me 10 minutes of
Happiness I'm not even going to do it
and you'd stop being it's you stay you
wouldn't be in the hustle you wouldn't
be in the fight fight anymore you
wouldn't go get the banana off the top
of the tree and risk your life you
wouldn't trudge across the Savannah to
get that meal you would lose your
motivation and mother nature wants you
to be motivated and she does that by
fooling you
so that you think that this time I'm
really going to love that car forever
and it's like a month it turns out so
that's so satisfaction is a real
conundrum
only when you understand the science of
can you short-circuit the science only
when you when you understand the Matrix
can you find a glitch and can you find
the glitch in The Matrix that's why it's
so incredibly empowering because there
is a way around that for satisfaction
the same thing is true for enjoyment by
the way everybody thinks they enjoy it's
listening a pleasure wrong
pleasure is not the secret of Happiness
pleasure is this is is the is the short
way to get addiction and nobody ever
says you know yeah man you know the
secret to my happiness
methamphetamine never nobody ever says
oh yeah it's like partying away my
entire paycheck in Vegas and then my
wife leaving me that's that's not the
secret of Happiness that's the secret to
pleasure and pleasure is not connected
to happiness unless you take pleasure
and you add two things people and memory
if you add pleasure plus people plus
memory you get enjoyment those must be
stand-ins for something what are the the
people and the memories and
Consciousness so just uh you have to do
it in the social species and I'm gonna
get tremendously rewarded this uh this
is a good time to bring up so
I'm really obsessed with this idea that
running in the back of your mind are
evolutionary algorithms right and
there's no escaping them and so there
are just certain things you are going to
have to do if you want to
I don't know if you're going to agree
with this framing but if you if you're
going to feel the way you want to feel
you must be aware of these algorithms
you must acknowledge them right so I've
always tried to migrate people away from
happiness
not as you define it as the smell of the
turkey right stop worrying about stop
worrying about how she feelings right
exactly because they're so transient
correct and get to fulfillment correct
and fulfillment for me has a formula be
interested to see if you agree with this
um these are based on what I consider
the evolutionary algorithms running in
your mind that there is no escape from
so you are going to have to work hard
anything that comes easily will just not
it won't resonate that's a satisfaction
issue by the way satisfaction is the joy
that comes after struggle that's what
satisfaction is
so you get satisfaction you just have to
come from struggles you have to do
something and it's a sense of earning
something so for example can I if you
you cheat on the exam and you get an A
there's no satisfaction true but I feel
deeply satisfied after good sex
do I feel like I earned it I don't know
I have not investigated this feeling
yeah but that's that's actually that's
that's not satisfaction that's enjoyment
that's what you and satisfaction I feel
sexually satisfied well that's a word
that we use but it's different than what
we're talking about here so it's again
we're defining the terms which I think
is important super important because you
may be about to have me separate two
ideas that because I don't have words
for it yeah people talk about sexual
satisfaction where they're talking about
sexual enjoyment so an enjoyment is a
better word done so when I am overcome
with desire right the right way to think
of it for me is hunger it feels the same
right I've got to have this thing I
really want it anticipatory chemicals oh
my God and then I get it right and so
like I'll differentiate between
masturbation and sex right when I
masturbate I don't necessarily feel
satisfied that's one of the things that
makes that such a whatever Pursuit
whereas when I have sex I feel satisfied
yeah like there's some deeper thing in
me yeah and and it it is an
extinguishing of The Hunger but because
I have oxytocin and vasopressin it's
like oh man I feel so good so it's this
combination of the calming of that like
seeking Behavior right with like and I
feel so bonded and connected to this
person
now this is just terms so the way to
think about it in in this particular
framework is pleasure versus enjoyment
got it okay so pleasure is you know
something that pornography is associated
with pleasure
um sexual activity in a in a in a
pair-bonded relationship is is
associated with enjoyment because it has
people and memory and so one of the
things to keep in mind a strategy
especially for a lot of young people a
lot of young men is to is to do is if
you like something it's best if you're
not doing it alone
because then you're probably gonna stop
it not necessarily this is just kind of
a rule of thumb this is not this is not
an iron law but it's a rule of thumb
doing it alone is associated with
pleasure so you know
um Anheuser-Busch doesn't do ads about
beer where they show a dude pounding a
12-pack alone in his apartment right why
not because yeah that would be yeah
because a lot of people use alcohol for
pleasure right which leads to addiction
and misery they talk they see you know
you and me cracking open a Bud Light and
clink and talking about how great it is
and because we're friends and we're
making a memory and that's enjoyment
which is associated with happiness so we
have a we have a basic idea that the
same thing is true with the example of
sex that you talked about a minute ago
you could it can be pleasure or it can
be enjoyment and everybody knows the
difference between sexual experiences
that are pleasurable or enjoyable and
joy enjoyment is the goal because that's
one of the macronutrients of Happiness
we talk about in terms in the terms that
you define about satisfaction but it's
really a in this terminology and again
you know you have to just defining terms
these are just words but the concepts
underlying them are are critical in the
book you give a really good example of
pleasure without enjoyment yeah uh would
you mentioned obliquely a minute ago but
when you think of a drug addict yeah
they're doing the drug right they're
theoretically getting the pleasure but
they're not getting any of the enjoyment
right they're getting tons of pleasure
it's because they're loading only on
pleasure but no enjoyment because it's
not social and it actually is not
engaging the prefrontal cortex and the
hippocampus to create memory and so you
you will you simply will have a
transient experience and the transient
experience will be unsatisfying until
you'll hit the lever again and again and
again and again and it will lower your
quality of life so that's the key thing
if there's something you really really
love so for example I'll ask people will
talk about because I've done a lot of
work on the on the science of addiction
it's a very interesting subject people
say how do you know if you're addicted
because these are behavioral constructs
you know you can't take a blood test to
know if you're if you're an alcoholic if
you're you know so it's these are
behavioral and the big behavioral thing
is do you prefer to drink alone
do you prefer to actually become
inebriated alone that means you're
looking for pleasure versus enjoyment
and that is a that is has a lot that
will lead you more to addiction more
toward addiction and away from happiness
is the way that that works that's the
reason that people say never drink alone
they don't know what they're saying is
they're saying enjoy it
don't have it be a source of pleasure
because that's dangerous so that gives
you an idea so we've talked a little bit
about satisfaction talking a little bit
of enjoyment these are heavy heavy
topics in terms of the social science
and Neuroscience for sure and we haven't
even touched on meaning which is the
heaviest of them all which is the
hardest of them all so you can become a
what I really want is I want people to
be to be obsessed with to have their
hobby be the science of happiness and
how they can get it and spread it to
that would be a really meritorious
movement if people are like yeah more of
the science more understanding it I want
to be excellent at this I'm going to be
most excellent my hobby is getting
better at happiness and it's changed my
life it's a good hobby it's really been
a good hobby for me yeah I made it into
a career that you most certainly did
um so I want to close the loop on the
Fulfillment recipe and give you a take
on that so uh you have to work really
hard
because that's just nature reassures
that you're going to do that so that
you're out doing the hard things like
getting a meal protecting your family
Etc uh to acquire a set of skills right
that's a big lean on progress because I
agree progress I think is a foundational
pillar of human happiness right uh so
you're going to work really hard to gain
a set of skills that allow you to serve
yourself and others right and it needs
to be in a way that you find exciting so
that to me is those are the things that
nature is going to ensure that you do
and if you're the doing it for not only
yourself but others is the meaning
portion of this right
um
why do is it that people never stop to
identify what gives them meaning is it
that they confuse meaning is that
they're stuck in the me self why do so
people so few people end up cracking
that code part of the reason is because
they're not specifically trying to find
meaning they don't make it a goal they
just they they a lot of people believe
that if I do what I'm really really good
at and I can be successful at that it's
going to give me a ton of meaning
automatically and that's not right like
anything else you have to do things on
purpose did you get meaning when you
were a classical musician no that was
the reason that's the reason I'm not a
class would you have gotten meaning out
of it many people do but here's the
thing I I my favorite composer is Johann
Sebastian Bach maybe the greatest
composer who ever lived great story yeah
I mean uh uh 1685 to 1750 20 kids he had
20 kids yeah he was a he was productive
as a composer I would say I was a
Catholic he wasn't he was Lutheran but
um but he was uh I say that because I
know you're Catholic yeah you wonder why
I made a joke it was just a sexy
Lutheran but and and Bach
was asked near the end of his life while
he wrote music
it's the why question you know our
friend Simon sinek he always talks about
start with Y and it's fantastic I mean
it's been because it really is you know
people are going around asking what and
hoping to get the Y for free and Simon's
entrepreneurial twist is start with why
and then the what will come
automatically and you'll be a lot more
satisfied because you'll find the source
of meaning so box y when he was asked
why do you write music was the Eamon
Final End of all music is the
refreshment of the soul and the
glorification of God okay not bad not
bad at all but I read that in my late
20s when I was still I was in the
Barcelona Symphony in those days it is a
good job and it was you know I love the
music it's really into it it's kind of a
high Prestige job you know playing the
greatest show sounds cool it sounds cool
sounds cool yeah
but I couldn't I couldn't answer like
that I couldn't answer like that I
didn't feel like I was refreshing Souls
particularly I certainly didn't feel
like I was glorifying God I was even
built that in though because this is one
thing I was saying people think they're
gonna find me it wasn't my thing it just
wasn't my thing and so I went in search
of something where I could answer my why
question like Bach
I became a social scientist that was
that was it because you know when I I
because after that you also you you go
on to run the think tank after that
right right yeah so I got my PhD I
actually finished College a month before
my 30th birthday my correspondence so
this is not a typical path to you know a
professorship at Harvard obviously this
is not typically the way it gets done
this is a great country isn't it yeah
um be a kid from Puyallup can do this
it's fantastic crazy I love that so um
and then I went and I I got so
interested when I was doing my my
bachelor's degree in the in human
behavior and the fact that you can model
it and you can study it that I I went
back and got my Master's in PhD as a
social scientist as a quantitative
social scientist I was doing for a
living I was doing military operations
research at the Rand Corporation for you
know like secret stuff for the Air Force
and all that but you know using and you
felt the sense of meaning and all that I
was what I felt a sense of Minion was I
was learning so much that was so
critically interesting and I had a
strong sense that I was gonna I was
learning how to
ask and answer original questions about
human behavior they're going to push the
boundary of what we knew so that
people's lives could get better I had a
very strong sense that it was gonna it
was in the offing it was going to take
decades was the part about so people's
lives could be better was that a
critical part of that it was a critical
thing to earn my success I needed to do
something where my work creative value
in my life and the life of other people
that I think that that is so big and
look you cover this in the book so I
know this is a mysterious to you but uh
focusing outward like if you want to be
happy we don't need this is me
paraphrasing you again we don't need
self-care we need other care right and I
just have learned uh through unfortunate
trial and error that if I'm doing
something only for me it I'll run ashore
on the me me probably totally until you
get into me self-world it's all me self
you know other care is I self that's I'm
going to look outward at whether people
need I'm going to be thinking more about
them which gets me away from the
the boring repetitive tedium of the me
Me soundtrack to begin with I mean it
has I mean it's just simple you're
you're distracted from the stuff that's
so boring and yet so
um you look at so obsessively over the
course of your life so that's critically
important and you find I mean again
there's tons and tons of studies that
actually show that the more you give the
happier you get the more you give the
Richer you get the more you give the
better looking you are is it it's a
wonderful study it's all perception so
there's this one study where These Guys
these social psychologists they they
bring men it's a men into the lab who
are partnered and it's all heterosexual
couples and they bring them in some have
been dating for six months and some have
been married for 50 years and that the
guys in white lab coats and they say
okay it's a simple experiment I'm gonna
sir I'm gonna give you these coins put
them in your pocket you and your wife or
girlfriend you're gonna walk down this
little path to that other building down
there and my colleague is going to
interview you and then you get to keep
the money that's it
as I walk down this little path outside
and there's an Alleyway between the
buildings and this homeless guy comes
ambling out
of the alley and panhandles the husband
or boyfriend he's a Confederate to the
experiment obviously
he says hey got some change he does they
know he does because they put the money
in his pocket and he has to make a
decision in front of his wife on whether
he's going to help the homeless guy they
get to the other building and the first
question in the interview is did you
help the homeless guy how much did you
give him and then the second question is
to the wife how attractive do you find
him right now
the more you support the homeless guy
the hotter she finds you that's so
interesting that's the reason on a first
date you're like I love Humanity I
support you know I build houses for the
poor I love dogs I love babies you're
trying to look like you know Albert
Schweitzer on a first date that's
hilarious because you're more handsome
that is very interesting okay so
um we know that being outward focused is
going to be beneficial but you were
talking about
um you needed to find the answer to your
why what is going to be that thing that
I could answer in the way that Bach does
I find in life basically nobody finds
that like that that is so rare and when
they do find it it ends up being very
transient so how did you navigate
because you're for people that don't
know we we did another interview which I
highly encourage them to go watch and so
we covered this I don't want to tread a
ton of the same ground but I think it's
worth telling people you've would you
say that your career has been spiral
yeah for sure okay you gave me the
language mine has for sure yeah um I I
it's interesting you make me question
whether that's just my personality and I
was going to end up there no matter what
or if it really was what I the story
I've told myself my entire life which is
I did all of this just to get into
storytelling and I needed to control the
assets maybe maybe we'll get into that
well those are that's those are
endogenous to each other yeah maybe yeah
but what I want to know now is did your
why run out and that's why you
reinvented yourself did it just migrate
like how have you kept that alive in
your life I I took opportunities that
were put in my path that I thought were
in line with this vision of how I was
trying to grow so I had a intention but
I didn't have attachment
so when I was a French horn player
leaving that becoming a social scientist
I I had an intention to do this work on
human behavior to as to help myself and
others to make life better to increase
love and happiness in other people's
lives but I was not attached to what
manifestation that was going to take and
that's what I urge all young people to
do to have a virtuous beautiful
intention without attachment with
respect to the the expression that it's
going to take at any particular time but
taught for a number of years I loved it
super great then I thought I should run
something that I think is going to be
good for Humanity and for society you
know and so I ran this think tank this
big think tank in Washington DC had 300
employees mostly just raised money I had
to raise 50 million dollars a year to
keep the doors open and it was a
thrilling experience it was exhausting
to be sure but what I was trying to do
was to use my background as a social
scientist to create better public policy
to hire really good people that was
going to to make the country in the
world Freer and better with an emphasis
us on opportunity for people at the
margins of society which is what my
Think Tank was engaged in after about 10
years I knew I was getting stale man I
was getting stale so I had the same
intention but I had no attachment to
Arthur Brooks president of the American
Enterprise Institute that was a that
would be a disordered attachment because
that's not who I am I'm Arthur Brooks
I'm a husband I'm a father I'm a child
of God and I am put on Earth to lift
people up in bonds of love and happiness
using science and ideas what's the next
assignment what's the next assignment
and the next assignment was to do what I
do now which is I have a company that
teaches writes speaks and teaches widely
and does media on the science of
Happiness to popularize to see the world
as a classroom and an enormous course of
study of the science of Happiness to
lift people up and that you know so I
can I have I have a call on the Atlantic
and I read books and I get to talk to
you and I get to travel around speak I
teach at Harvard and it's phenomenal but
that's no I'm not attached because I
know this is not the last assignment I
have intention but the attachment no no
no no no the attachment's the killer of
all these things and you too it's like
next assignment please
but here's the direction we're going in
I need to do this thing this thing is
going to serve and when you're really in
the zone it's it's a thrill it's a
thrill you just can't get it off of it
when you're really in the zone too but
it's not because you're going for the
thrill it's because you're going for the
value you want the you want to hit that
vein of value right and when you run
that vein out then you go look for it
you dig a new mind what does it mean to
run the vein out though so
um
okay how pure was your move into the the
think tank because you talk about idols
I've listened to enough of your content
I know what your idol is uh I think we
share
an idol
um so
I I nothing is either good or bad but
thinking makes it so yeah so I don't
know that having an idol is bad I have a
feeling that it's Nature's way of
getting us moving and making us an
active species and it is good right
exactly but if it's the end goal if an
idol of money or power or pleasure or
fame is the end goal will be unto you
and will be under the world but if it's
an intermediate goal
to lifting people up and bringing them
together if you can use the prestige
that you have in your job and the
admiration of other people to get them
interested in something that's truly
generative and good and improve their
lives which by the way you're doing with
the show right I mean you've got lots of
prestige your famous guy but you're
using it so that people will watch it
and change their lives so this is the
end goal it's a problem if it's an
intermediate goal then it's good I want
to uh restate this in my language to see
if I really understand this
okay so the me self is getting caught up
in my emotions I'm confusing the emotion
for the
perception of the emotion so knowing
that in the brain
pain and suffering are two separate
spaces knowing literally two different
regions of the brain not making that up
for people listening uh and then in
meditation I am to your point earlier
about uh the bitter coffee there's a
difference between my knee hurts and
witnessing that I'm having a sensation
in my knee that one might artificially
hurts versus I don't like how my knee
feels right
because you know it's my knee hurts so
that's a statement of facts right right
it's a signal and the one last thing
I'll wrap on that to see if I really get
this so uh Victor Frankel talked about
the gap between stimulus and response
now for people that haven't heard that
name he was in a concentration camp lost
his wife mom dad I mean just
unimaginable amounts of loss and
came out of it psychiatrists came out or
actually I think a psychiatrist and he
was a psychiatrist and and a
psychoanalyst okay which is an
interesting combination very interesting
writes a book about that time basically
saying if you could find meaning
in your suffering that you could make it
but if you lost that sense he was like
you could literally predict when
somebody would die because once they
gave up and they could no longer
associate meaning with why they were
going through the suffering that was it
right and so that idea of there's this
gap between stimulus and response and
you get to decide how you interpret that
thing is everything right is that we
talk about when that Gap goes away
You're now in me territory yeah so so
there's there's so much in this and and
you know we've referred to the you know
the new book and there's the whole front
part of this new book is emotional
self-management based on the science of
how your brain gives you signals that
are called emotions getting away from
the idea that bad emotions are
unfortunate we should get rid of them
and or that unhappiness for them is bad
and we should get rid of it so
understanding the science of how this
works and what these things are for and
then being able to learn grow and manage
the feelings that we want such that we
can adapt best to the current world and
we can make growth toward happierness
that's that's the whole uh front part of
this book the back half is okay now that
you've done that the life you want build
the life you want yeah co-authored with
Oprah Winfrey exactly right exactly
right by the way I'm glad you like it
thank you it's um it was a joy to write
it there's a joy writing a book with
Oprah Winfrey too what an experience it
was really an interesting experience to
and and
recording the book The audiobook too
because you keep thinking oh I know that
voice
not mine so um so emotional
self-management comes down to number one
understanding that emotions that you
have are not just nice to have and bad
to have all they are are signals they're
like a machine the machine of your brain
perceives outside stimuli and turns it
into a universal language that can that
can send signals to the neocortex of
your brain the out outside wrinkly area
of your brain especially the prefrontal
cortex which is the most modern part of
the human brain to send a signal so that
you can decide how to react according to
them and it doesn't matter what language
you speak or where you grew up you
everybody gets the same signals they get
the basic emotions of Joy Of Interest
which is the two positive basic emotions
the negative emotions which doesn't mean
that they're bad just means that they're
negative anger disgust sadness fear and
all those things are then Blended
together into these complex emotions so
anger and disgust you blend them
together you get contempt which is the
conviction of the worthless
is this multiplicity of emotions that we
get they exist to send signals Universal
signals and then we get to decide how to
react here's the problem most people
don't take that opportunity most people
take their emotions as given regret them
like them and act according to them
without doing that last trick that last
entrepreneurial trick which is deciding
how to react you get to decide this is
Victor Frankel's point the book Is Man's
Search for meaning and what he learned
in the concentration camp was that all
these bad things are happening and good
things happen in life you decide how
you're going to react to these things
that's the ultimate entrepreneurial task
of human life is deciding how you're
going to use the resources under your
control and the first set of resources
you get are your emotions okay so the
time between the stimulus and response
the time between the emotions and the
reactions that you decide that's the Gap
that Victor Frankl is talking about you
want that to be as wide as possible
that's why every time you have an
emotion the most important thing to do
is to not react is to get is to practice
not reacting when you feel something
good or bad
wait tell tell me why because this is
where I see people get lost all the time
they trust their emotions they think
their emotions are right they are a map
of actual reality and that if you feel
angry you should acting yeah and that's
that's that's that's a great way to live
an unhappy life and make other people
unhappy around you I agree so violently
yeah I can't even tell you yeah and
think about all the times when you're
building your companies that that you
you felt something negative and if you
just yelled you snapped at somebody or
said that was on your mind you would
have done
catastrophic brain damage to your
company it would have been terrible and
instead or you get that email you know
you get an email and it's like I want I
want to I want to answer right now don't
never answer a bad email in the day you
get it never just have an automatic as a
matter of fact have somebody who's
managing your email for you so you don't
see them you you see them and you think
about it but you can't answer it because
it disappears from your inbox for 24
hours make a deal with somebody why
because you want to you want to your
your prefrontal cortex to be in charge
you don't want your limbic system to be
in charge it's a two-year-old you know
when kids when you have little kids and
you know I have I have grown kids but
now I have grandchildren and they yell
and and what you tell little kids always
is use your words what you're telling
them is put more time between stimulus
and response and choose the response
that you want you're not going to say
that to a little kid you're going to say
something that's truncated like use your
words and people who are reactive what
we say is social scientists we call them
limbic people because they're they're
acting according to their limbic system
this is the most unentrepreneurial thing
to do that's basically like I got a
dollar I spent a dollar no no or Revenue
comes in you decide what to do
should you invest it should you
distribute it should you buy something
with it what should you do that that's
what good entrepreneurs do with their
lives but that's how we need to see our
emotion so that's the most important
point now what you do in that Gap is
called metacognition and this is where
it gets really really interesting in
that Gap the best thing that you can
possibly do is to think about the
emotions that you're feeling what they
mean and how best to use them
so that and this is this is really the
engagement of prefrontal Cortex that's
what meditation practices tell you to do
this is what prayer helps you to do this
is what walking in nature helps you to
do so all these metacognitive practices
this is what therapy is supposed to do
too by the way it's supposed to give you
expertise in expanding that Gap
then on top of that there's all of these
ideas that you can use once you you've
got this time you can make these
decisions you can you can substitute
emotions you can say that's not the
right emotion here's a better emotion
you can literally do that how's that not
just faking it it's not it's what it's
so for example
um I work um I've talked a lot and and
I've been paling around lately with you
know Rayne Wilson who's the you know I'm
on the show he's terrific and and we
grew up he grew up in Ballard yeah yeah
and so five miles away from me is this
just same age as me he was a classical
musician just like I was I didn't know
him but we haven't played like bassoon
you play the bassoon we probably
overlapped an All-State band or
something as we were kids but we have
the same childhood basically and so it's
interesting and so we really connect on
this but for example he talks about the
fact that most uh he believes that most
comedians suffer from depression and one
of the reasons they're such good
comedians is because they choose the
substitute emotion when they're feeling
sadness of humor which is also an
appropriate response to things that are
making you sad you make them into a joke
and people think of it as a defense
mechanism no it's an emotional
substitution
you know it's the when you drink coffee
the the the caffeine molecule it looks
just like the adenosine molecule which
is a neuromodulator that that is
inhibitory it makes you feel tired it
goes into the slot and the neuro the
receptor for the adenosine and so you
don't get it insane that's what makes
you feel peppy it blocks the thing that
makes you feel tired that's how caffeine
Works emotional substitution works in
the same way the humor molecule goes
into the sadness receptor but you can't
do that unless you're taking time you
cannot do that unless you actually
expand the time between stimulus and
response until you understand exactly
how the science works and and getting as
much time as you possibly can was that
the angle that you took to understand
the science or did you come at it from a
God says that this is the way to go
about life I'm a scientist you know and
one of the reasons that I'm religious is
because of my because what I've learned
intellectually so for me that was the
the thing that freed me as well was so
I'm calling at 22 I am very unhappy like
really scary sliding towards depression
and happy and I started reading about
the brain now I don't remember what gave
me that impulse it was probably
something I learned in college plus
taoism whatever but it like really made
me think about the way the brain worked
and I started reading about how brain
plasticity was this hotly debated thing
and maybe you really could teach an old
dog new tricks and one day I just
decided I'm going to act as if brain
plasticity is real right and then the
more studies came out the show that it
really was real like the more I felt
like I could grab a hold of that but it
was it was a science based Insight that
allowed me to really change the tenor of
my entire life for sure for sure I mean
it's interesting because people back
when when I was a kid I'm you know 10
years old little 10 years older than you
when I was a kid or even when people
were older than me were coming through
the the whole idea was that biology is
just psychology you know that you can
you can think bad things away and that
was supposed to be really incredibly
empowering now really what we believe
with the Advent of you know the advances
in Neuroscience you know as a social
scientist I have to know tons of
Neuroscience teaching happiness is 30
Neuroscience when I teach I'm talking
about the brain constantly it's much
more the case we believe that psychology
is actually biology and and that sounds
like it's not empowering like this is
all determined is super empowering
because once you actually understand the
process you can intervene in the process
I talked to for young Executives for
example and I say one of the biggest
threats to your career is an
inappropriate sexual relationship in the
workplace it's one of those hilarious to
me it's and and so we say so let's
understand how this is going to work and
you can psychologize it and say you know
you need to be and get get some therapy
what happens is the first thing when you
have a when you have attraction towards
somebody who's a potential romantic
partner there's the first thing that
happens is sex hormones which
testosterone and estrogen and in
combination in both males and females
this is happening the second thing that
happens in the neurochemical Cascade of
falling in love is there's an up um and
there's a an increase in norepinephrine
and dopamine so that you get the sense
of euphoria and anticipation the third
thing that happens is a drop in
serotonin now what happens when
serotonin drugs and serotonin
interesting when serotonin drops it
makes you ruminate that's the reason
it's associated with clinical depression
because of the rumination procedure it's
it's a there's a part of the brain
called a ventral lateral prefrontal
cortex which is incredibly active when
you're ruminating it's one of the things
when you're ruminating on a business
plan on an opera on a poem on somebody
who's rejected you on you know so it's
it's it's you see it incredibly active
in depression and creativity and falling
in love and all of these things that all
have rumination you know iterative
rumination involved in it so and it all
is involved with a drop in serotonin
which is why you don't want to have that
early stages of falling in love for the
rest of your life because you'll want to
die and then and then you want to die
the early stages of Love made me feel
like I'd never get anything done again
yeah yeah it makes you feel out of
control your brain looks suspiciously
like an MRI in the brain of a
methamphetamine addict yeah yeah you
know that's how it felt I legitimately
felt like I was on drugs and then you
get the tide the warm tide that comes in
of the increases in oxytocin which is a
bonding neuropeptide that functions
reciprocated you you well I mean what it
happens when you have eye contact with
somebody in a love connection and eye
contact so you're both getting it the
biggest bolus that you get of that is
when you first lay eyes on on eye
contact with your newborn baby
real yeah it's just like Fourth of July
in your head but anyway so it's one two
three four that's the neurochemical
Cascade and the reason I bring this up
is when I'm talking to young people in
business I say if you do not intervene
early enough in this neurochemical
Cascade
you're gonna be in trouble because it'll
be out of control it'll be like you know
no breaks on the roller coaster
and and then it's like I have this
incredible career and this incredible
job I don't know what happened we slept
together and now I'm fired and you see
it all the time like Harvard Business
School case study uh what happened well
they let the neurochemical Cascade go
too long and you have to intervene
number one don't put yourself in a
position where you go to step two don't
put yourself in a position where you go
to step three what are you doing you're
managing your brain and if you don't
know the brain science you can't do that
that's why the stuff is so incredibly
empowering when you read that stuff for
the first time you're like
oh I have something I can do here now
there's something I can use it's not
just psychology now it's something
that's more tangible than that because
the the Grandeur of this entire
experience has a biological basis and
one that I can understand and one I can
I can actually manage yeah for me being
able to picture the thing
that helps a lot sure yeah once I could
understand
um the myelination process I was like
okay now I get why this is something I
need to repeat once I understood that
the the brain is a caloric hog and from
an evolutionary standpoint that means
anything that you do repeatedly it's
going to hardwire just to make it more
efficient and so all of that coming
together really allowed me to begin to
improve your habit well yeah because
your habits what they were doing was
improving the management of the organ
and and that was affecting your
psychology and your Effectiveness and
your happiness and and the whole you
know the progress that you're making in
your life that's why in the information
is so critically important that's why it
can be so life-changing to learn science
actually for sure so what are then the
habits of happiness or maybe a better
way this is a language to use in the
book the macronutrients of Happiness
like what are those things that we want
to begin building our lives around if we
really want to thrive so people define
happiness in a lot of different ways but
the biggest mistake that people make is
thinking that it's a feeling that
happiness is a feeling oh
it's not a feeling
no happiness has feelings associated
with it okay but to say that my
Thanksgiving turkey has a smell is
different than saying that the smell of
the turkey is the Thanksgiving dinner
right so that's a really big distinction
that it's important to make so your
Thanksgiving dinner is protein
carbohydrates and fat that's literally
what your Thanksgiving dinner is it also
has a delicious smell that attracts you
to it and that you want and if it didn't
have that or had the wrong smell it
smelled like your you know microwaving
trash when you walked into Mom's house
for Thanksgiving you'd be like
something's wrong here so but getting
past the feelings on happiness is what
will set you free to be able to manage
it appropriately
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Theory what I want to understand when
you started the think tank and when you
stopped obviously because we did the
other interview and I know you're the
book from strength to strength and I
know the two big movements of somebody's
life where you go from fluid
intelligence to crystalline intelligence
where you're really bringing wisdom to
the table and that was your transitional
moment right between those two so I
understand all of that but at the same
time I do wonder if
um there there were just other things
caught up in it and that maybe the
either
I've heard you say you were no longer
making progress when you were a French
horn player right and that's what made
you want to leave that I'm wondering if
you felt like you were no longer making
progress in the think tank and that's
why you wanted to leave that like is
that the moment where
we all go oh that's my cue now to find
that next assignment that's what we
should use as a cue the natural Cadence
of you know the value that you're
creating you don't very very few people
get to create more and more and more
value and one exact thing over the
course of their lives and we have an
economy that accommodates change so it's
really incumbent upon us to have our
antennae up and pay attention to that
because we want to be able to create
that value and be open to the next
assignment so yeah I mean my motives are
never pure because you know I'm just a
guy and but I do have a process of
discernment every philosophical
religious tradition has a process of
discernment discernment is when you
don't know what to do how you figure it
out
this is hard you know the
decision-making process and so I'll have
students are like I don't know should I
do a startup or go work in Investment
Banking or should I marry this person or
not or should I go to law school or stay
at work or or something some things are
even more personal and and delicate and
difficult but at any particular time a
third of the people who are watching us
are agonizing over a particular decision
so the question is how do you make these
difficult decisions and every
philosophical tradition has a process on
how to make a decision and here's the
key thing that they all have in common
you got to do the work and to do the
work it means you need to think about it
it doesn't mean you need to think about
a particular thing you need to think
about that decision process every day
what are you thinking about so when I
have students that have haven't even
begun this process I'll say Okay 15
minutes a day I want you to start by
sitting alone at your desk no music no
phone is not there write lists of things
you like
you guys just start getting in touch
with the things that are attractive to
you because some people are completely
even divorced from that they have no
they're so far away from being able to
discern what they want to do they don't
even know what they like and so just
starting to write places I've gone that
I really enjoyed and not because you're
deciding where to go next but just
because you're trying to get that in
order in your head what are the things
that are attractive to me what are the
things that I actually like I'll tell
people that they have that they should
to be thinking about just a process to
let the discernment happen you have to
be very quiet and very concerted in the
effort to do so to walk for an hour
before Dawn every day with no devices
and to do that so people who are really
religious I'll say 15 minutes a day
praying about this to be given the
discernment to be given proper
discernment 15 minutes a day on your
knees
so and or meditation practices lots of
ways to do the difference between prayer
and meditation is there one well there's
lots of forms of prayer and lots of
forms of meditation so there's a lot of
meditation techniques single point
meditation analytical meditation
um uh meditation of compassion all
different sort of in
theravada Tradition are you trying to
make your best case to God or are you
just repeating an idea in your head like
please grant me the discernment to
understand what I should do in this
moment so there are different ways to do
it there are different forms of prayer
even Christian prayer even Catholic
prayer which is what I engage in so
every night I pray 25 minutes What's
called the rosary a thousand-year-old
meditative prayer before I go to sleep
every night and that's and that's the
thing that you repeat while you're
meditating on particular Mysteries that
happened in biblical tradition and what
are you doing you're focusing you're
you're seeing your life through the lens
of these great stories and what that
does is helps you understand yourself
better in all kinds of insight Insight
comes to you over the context of this
process that's a kind of a centering
prayer there are other prayers that are
called uh you know mental prayer which
the Buddhists call analytical meditation
the Dalai Lama wakes up every morning
and the first two hours are analytical
meditation where he'll just think deeply
about a passage in tibetan Buddhist
scripture he's thinking about he's not
reading it he's written down a few lines
and he's looking at it and thinking
about it for two hours I think that's 88
and he's doing that for the first two
hours of every day that's analytical
meditation that's not just like looking
at a flame or doing Soul cycle or
something that's not he's and that's
that's also meditation incredibly
important mental prayer is the same
thing where you'll read a passage of
scripture whether your scripture is the
the suit does or the New Testament or
whatever your thing is and you read it
and you say and you say what does this
meaning to me where am I in this how is
this impacting my life two sentences 15
minutes more it's crazy how much Insight
you can actually get from that there's
compassionate meditation or
compassionate prayer where you you bring
into your mind the people that are
giving you struggle and you think about
you visualize good things happening to
them and you ask God or you ask the
cosmos that good things that that
blessings be rained down upon them and
you change the nature of your
orientation toward them the biggest
reason that you have enmity with other
people is because of your enmity toward
them not theirs toward you typically and
you can literally change that and this
is one of the techniques for doing so so
different kinds of prayer and meditation
they have different functions but we
have to use them as such and not just be
kind of like all right like
like a little kid like God I sure hope I
get an A on that exam can you please
help me get an A on that exam you have
to be a grown-up about this stuff and
it's super exciting and it so that's the
process of discernment when you're
trying to figure out what to do is you
have to concentrate on it the the
ancient Greeks called it sunnisis in the
Pali Buddhist tradition in the Mahayana
Buddhist tradition it's called Panna
and in this discernment of spirits and
ignatian Catholic spirituality every
tradition has it where you're focused on
it focused on it focused on it for a
particular period of time if you do the
work or you're focused on the decision
looking for the insight for 15 minutes a
day for two months
you'll have Clarity that's the guarantee
it's amazing but the reason that people
can't get clarity is because they don't
do the work they don't do the analysis
yeah for sure
um okay uh walk me through the idols
what what are the idols and how do we
use them well instead of being used by
them so this is a tradition that comes
from um neoplatonism it's from Plato as
best stated by his great pupil Aristotle
and then translated into the Islamic
Jewish and Christian traditions in the
Middle Ages so Ava Rose who is the you
know the the the Muslim philosopher for
me from from southern Spain
um uh uh
maimonides and Thomas Aquinas so these
are the you know Saint Thomas Aquatics
these are the great figures of this and
they really they translated Aristotle
into saying that who Aristotle was the
greatest of all the social scientists I
mean to I realize I'm cheapening
Aristotle in this way by saying it but
it's it's kind of a conceit that
everybody you love is like Tom you're a
great social scientist that's like the
ultimate compliment from a social
scientist so by the way you're very good
social scientist so kind and he and so
for example Aquinas said that there's
four substitutes for God
that he he believed as did Ava Rose and
and maimonides and all of the the
monotheistic religious leaders that what
we ultimately want is God now atheists
watching us or agnostic disagree with
that but we all want something can you
define what that means then to Define to
want God yeah because I I have a feeling
even atheists want a thing to fit that
god-shaped hole but I've never taken the
time for myself to Define what the
god-shaped hole is so I'd love to know
yeah so this is the thing for example
you're looking for something that's
defined by your craving
you know when you're when you're really
really hungry it it proves the existence
of food when you're really really horny
it proves the existence of sex right and
so when you really really are seeking
the complex Singularity the source of
all Truth The Cosmic Oneness it's proof
it exists
what is it but what is it okay so that's
what different Traditions have been
trying to explain for the longest time
this is really interesting though by the
way I don't want to just let that roll
past yeah hunger is the proof that there
is food you desire for sex it's a proof
that there is sex the desire for it or
it's evidence that there is sex it's not
a proof in the classical sense but it's
evidence that it exists evidence and so
it would be really really really weird
if you had a craving for something and
the object of the craving didn't exist
it doesn't really make sense yeah and so
if you have a craving for the Oneness oh
Arthur Brooks this is good yeah and this
is by the way this is one of the reasons
that when all the conversations that
we're having about AI they're all
misguided AI can't give us what we want
it can't because all it does is gives us
complicating engineering solutions for a
similacrum for the thing that we're
for a simulation for the thing that we
really really want which is a different
species of problem you know what we
really want is the is the object of all
the complexity of the universe
complexity is simple to understand and
impossible to solve complication is hard
to solve but possible all of the reasons
that all these things that we do in Tech
that are that promise everything and
deliver nothing but loneliness the
reason is because they're complicated
solutions to complex needs
love is complex it's very easy to
understand and impossible to figure out
your cat is complex very simple but
impossible to know what it's going to do
all the things we really want in life
all of our deep desires are complex all
of our Solutions are complicated and
we're throwing complicated Solutions and
complex problems and we're not getting
happier
and so the only way that we can do this
is to take quiet time in contemplation
of the complex that's the solution now
are you going to find it no no but it's
just like happiness you're not going to
find it you're going to make progress
toward it the goal the the the the the
metaphysical the transcendental goal of
a spiritual or philosophical life is the
approach to the complex Oneness to the
ultimate truth that We crave and you got
to do the work stop distracting yourself
with social media stop distracting
Yourself by saying if I make the money
then everything will be okay or if I
have the Precision this gets us back to
the idols
Aquinas said that we crave God
but will but God is complex and hard to
understand and has all kinds of Demands
and and winds us up in all sorts of
one-sided conversations and uh
and so we take a complicated solution to
the complex problem and things that are
kind of god-like you know social media
is kind of social life like which is why
when we're lonely we'll binge it but it
doesn't help and the social media
equivalent for what we want in God
according to Aquinas is four-fold money
power pleasure and honor by which he
meant fame or admiration or prestige
that's what he said to the four things
and those are the idols and everybody's
got their Idol that when they're not on
their game looking for the cosmic
Oneness despite the fact that they'll
never find it they'll say okay fine I'm
tired I'm gonna go do that thing that's
a that's a simulation for it and and it
always runs you in the wrong direction
it runs you in the wrong direction and
only when you know what your idol is can
you actually manage yourself so you say
I'm doing that again
I'm doing that again I'm looking for
money again when I really wanted was
love
I'm looking for admiration again when I
really wanted was enlightenment
because you didn't want to do the work
for enlightenment so you went and did
the easy thing which was getting the
idol so is Enlightenment a stand-in for
God yeah yeah I mean the whole the whole
point is that these are Enlightenment is
something
Enlightenment would be
what Christians or Muslims would call
the beatific Vision which is the late
finally layer eyes on the face of God
which is actual truth if you're a
Buddhist it means because you finally
understand you're sitting under the
Bodhi Tree and you you finally have this
you finally get it is what it comes to
you know we in the monotheistic
traditions we don't believe you get it
on this side of death Buddhists think
that you actually can achieve it but be
that as it may
I mean I don't know I have my hypothesis
but I am I do know that we're all move
we all need to move toward it we all
need to do the work toward it and
getting it getting the AI is not going
to do it
any more than Facebook interesting that
you're linking because I don't think of
AI as
God but I hear a lot of people talk
about that that it will end up being
Godlike so it's interesting if they
really are
looking for that in AI I think what I'm
trying to fill the whole Godlike hole
with it so I will grant you that for
anybody doing that that would be a
tremendous mistake and I'll give you my
thesis on what I think all this is in a
second but AI I think for me anyway it
is it is to finally get answers to the
complex which may be your entire
definition oh my god well you that's a
that's an exercise in futility that's
interesting I don't know that I would
agree with that so I feel like and look
I don't have uh the data that I have to
back up the following is is merely
physics right as we that's not bad grow
huh well we don't understand physics
yeah the the reason I bring that up is
because as we
strip layers off that onion it unlocks
things that we couldn't do before right
and all of us have grown up in a world
where Einstein einstinian whichever way
you would say that physics already
exists yeah and not realizing that
before that it was Newtonian physics and
that the shift between the two unlocked
right the modern world right and you
know we think of him as just sort of
this crazy-haired guy and we forget that
so many of the things we rely on in the
modern world required us to understand
that breakthrough but it isn't the
universal principle yet we haven't
gotten there we've got Higgs Bulls on
which will
which will show which will render
Einstein physics obsolete in all kinds
of ways fingers crossed so as we begin
to unlock these things and truly
understand them it really does open up
Avenues of
um technology now one has to be careful
not to view technology as a God but
if we can use AI to either augment our
own intelligence or for it to itself be
intelligent now I'm wildly conflicted
about yeah let me be abundantly clear we
all are yes we're pulling it as fast as
I can and at the same time I'm terrified
uh but I want those answers have real
world implications that's the moral of
my story yeah yeah for sure absolutely
they do but the point is that they that
Ai and all of these particular tools
they solve a different species of
problem yeah they are not going to
answer the gods they're not going to
because they can't and the whole idea is
that there's always this concept that we
could understand everything if we had
sufficient computational horsepower but
that's not right because you can't solve
complex problems which are
mathematically different than
complicated problems yes give me an
example of so for people that don't know
you did Applied Mathematics for a while
so it's not me asking some random guy
off the street give me an example of a
complex and a complicated problem yes
because in math the only thing I can
think of because I am wildly ignorant I
would like to be abundantly clear but
from my just not knowing math at all
perspective the only category of thing
in math that I know as being complex
would be something like the uh pie so Pi
is uh fiosha Bach is correct better
understood as a function rather than a
number because you can never know the
final digit of pi it's a relationship
interesting yeah it's a relationship but
but so I'll give you an example is that
complex yeah well that's a good question
whether or not it's complex or I think
about it in a slightly different way so
I'll give you an example that might um
that might make it clearer so a
complicated problem is one that has
you know 75 equations and 75 unknowns
it's a highly dimensional mathematical
problem that it would just take tons of
computational horsepower to to figure
out but there is a solution
designing a jet engine is an incredibly
complicated problem making a toaster is
a complicated problem you know if you
try to do one out in your garage with
you know stuff that's sitting around
your house you'll probably burn your
house down if you try to make toast with
it it's a very complicated thing to do
but once you do it you can do it over
and over and over again with almost
complete accuracy that's these are
complex complicated problems a complex
problem is a football game a football
game is a complicated problem where I
don't care how good your computer is
you're not going to be able to tell me
the outcome because that's complex it's
complex I think I misspoke you said
complicated once in complex ones but
complex it's a complex problem a complex
problem is incredibly simple to
understand the outcome you know the
Patriots
score higher than the Broncos that's uh
you know the natural order of things
that they that it's just one team has a
higher score than the other and wins
very simple incredibly simple
um but it's unbelievably the
permutations are so vast that you can't
you can't simulate it you don't think
that's Noble with enough computation
it's not knowable it's enough
computation but actually and even if
that one turns out to be that turns out
to be not a complex problem but a
complicated problem there are complex
problems like the problem of love
the problem of Love is very simple and
yet it's not something you can simulate
in any real way and some people will say
well you have your AI girlfriend that's
a that's a you've you've cracked the
code of love no you haven't there's no
there's nobody watching us right now
it's like yeah AI girlfriend just as
good no no AI girlfriend a substitute
because I can't get the real thing is
what it would come down to that's the
difference between pornography and and
and and sex with your wife all right
when two smart people who are
well-meaning think the other person is
crazy you know they have different base
assumptions yeah so to me that sounds
crazy uh and the reason is that I
believe we're in a deterministic
universe yeah I'm guessing you do not I
don't believe we're in a deterministic
universe I believe in a stochastic
Universe okay it defines the stochastic
means there's Randomness in the universe
my father was a biostatistician a PhD
biostatistician and he was a devout
Christian I said what gives dad you know
I'm an adolescent what gives and he said
you understand
he said you know what Miracles are and
and I said what he said events that are
five standard deviations of way from the
mean they're way out on the Tails of the
of the of the curves you know the
greatest gift that God ever gave the
world was was a distribution a random uh
distribution of events
he believed and I think it's actually
more than plausible I think it's most
likely that the universe is actually has
Randomness in it which means it cannot
be you can't get to a single point on
most of the or any of the complex
problems you can't and so you can
simulate a kind of a version of a curved
fit but you can't actually get
underneath them and simulate them
properly because we have a stochastic
universe and we live with deterministic
brains our brains say that this happens
to this and this happens to this we have
a super computer that's good enough we
could figure out all how it all hangs
together and that's the the supposition
behind Einstein physics or or Newtonian
physics that these are there's a
deterministic structure underneath that
we're we're simulating we're doing the
best that we can to put a model on top
it's a map
but that's actually probably not the way
the universe works and if that's the
case and if we have a craving for the
source of that then it's some thing
someone some entity that can be the the
origin of that complexity per se what is
it what is it you know it's like maybe
my model which is yeah I got the Bible
and I got God and I got that whole thing
maybe that's nuts maybe it's nuts but
it's it's a hypothesis
and it says that we can't get it from
the stuff we can't get it from the stuff
you can only get it by looking for it
looking for the true thing and that's
the reason I think that really great
intellectual life requires that we have
both a an intellectual Pursuit and a
spiritual Pursuit and that we need to
undertake these things in parallel I
think that's the only responsible course
of action what's happening when you're
looking for it like I can give you I
don't know that Buddhists would agree
with this but I think they would uh what
you're getting by looking at it in a
Buddhist or looking for it in the
Buddhist tradition is you're getting out
from under the illusion of uh perception
right that that's definitely a western
look at it but that feels pretty
accurate that's a good way of explaining
it that's a good way of explaining
Buddhist thinking on it that you're no
longer bound by the illusions
what what in their language that we're
developing here you're no longer bound
by your models you're actually able to
see the road as opposed to staring at
the map all the time it's like you know
we're looking at that we got our devices
and we're looking at the GPS if you just
stare at the GPS you're going to crash
in your car you're actually driving on a
road in real physical life but you're
more and more and more divorced from
that when you're stuck with the with the
with the models and those are the
illusions that would say that you're
trying to free yourself from by actually
imbibing some of the the oxygen in the
in real life around you okay so if
that's the Buddhist take on it what is
the Catholic
take on it the Catholic take on it is
very similar which is that there is
underlying reality but that underlying
reality is not always apparent
and for all sorts of reasons and that
the underlying reality is
um made by God and yeah it is the realm
of God and that we're not we just don't
have the capacity or the you know the
preparation to be able to experience no
Plato talked about this he was
pre-christian Plato talked about this
about his analogy in of the the Shadows
on the cave wall the closest that we can
get to actually seeing what's going on
is the shadows of what's going on behind
the fire in the cave wall
um the a lot of the the German
philosophers from the 17th and 18th
centuries and 19th centuries would talk
about this too so the schopenhauer for
example Arthur schopenhauer is obviously
one of the greatest early 19th century
mid 19th century philosophers would talk
about villa which was you know the sense
of will that the reality exists but we
can't see it because we're just not
competent and we're trying to put One
Foot In Front Of Another and so we
create an edifice that that allows us to
live but we can't actually see the
reality that the complex real is
happening behind it these guys were
struggling with and maybe you're from
your perspective the obvious answer is
just God but I don't know if it's just
God that's a word for it they were
struggling for something they had a
craving because here here is the modern
take on that uh you're in a simulation
right now some people believe you're in
a literal computer simulation and other
people like me I don't necessarily have
evidence that you're in an actual
computer simulation but I do have
evidence that your brain is simulating
reality as a wage so that you can
grapple with it because instead of
seeing blue if you just saw the number
of photons in a given wavelength that
are reflecting off that surface and into
your eye it's so complicated so your
brain is just taking this incredibly
complex Universe which by the way for
people that don't know the human uh our
ability to perceive the actual
electromagnetic spectrum is
.0035 percent yeah so you're like way
way less than half a percentage doesn't
exist yeah there's tons of things we
can't see so we've taken this
gigantically we know the things we can't
see yeah for sure and we boil it down
into something that is just an absolute
sliver of the reality
so okay in a modern context I get it but
like what were they coming up against in
whatever 2000 years ago when Plato's
describing the Shadows on the cave wall
what is he grappling with like it's as
far as I can tell he's he's getting
underneath like realizing oh my
perceptions do not equate to reality and
once you accept that like everything
begins to unwind well it doesn't begin
to unwind it begins to free you to this
understanding that you're that you begin
to see its Illusions you begin to see
that you are living in a world of
Illusion now how is this the the
we can militate against that by saying
it's all of an assimilation and part of
the simulation is that we're simulated
the simulation creates the illusion that
there is something bigger even though
there isn't
but that's just explaining something
away so in a philosophical basis the way
I talk about this with my students I
said okay we got three we got three
choices three doors to go through Monty
this is for you know for those who are
the that's the the Monty Hall game in
economics is based on let's make a deal
this old game show that was on when I
was a kid right and you get the the
contestants would have to choose one of
these three
doors and then the door would open up
and it would turn out either got a car
or you got a living room set or you got
a goat yeah or something like that so
there's three there's basically three
choices about that about how you're
gonna see the the existence of of an
underlying reality that you can or
cannot perceive and you can or cannot
get closer to and make progress toward
it has to do with the two concepts of
essence and existence
We believe We all believe that we exist
I mean you can relax that by saying it's
a simulation we don't actually exist on
it all but let's leave that for a moment
and let's just say that we all agree
that there's existence what we don't
agree on is the the nature of essence
essence is meaning so I'm alive and my
life has meaning okay now the the the
traditional philosophical understanding
the platonic understanding of this the
ancient Greek understanding of this the
Christian Jewish
um Hindu
um Muslim for sure understanding of this
is that Essence precedes existence let's
think about that for a second the
meaning of your life existed before you
were born
your job is to live up to that meaning
to find that meaning and live up to that
meaning it existed it's a cosmic thing
that's what comes from the cosmic
Oneness
the modern existentialist view modern
philosophy a lot of it would say that as
that existence precedes essence you're
born without any meaning you have to
invent meaning the best you can good
luck that's Sartre like go sit in a
French cafe and smoke filterless
cigarettes and feel depressed as
existence precedes essence now the third
the middle way the most depressing way
is the nietzschean way which is the
nihilistic way that says existence
exists and Essence doesn't there is no
meaning the only responsible course of
action in a life is to give up on
Essence there is no meaning stop looking
for God stop looking for enlightenment
stop looking for all of it that
creatives that you couldn't apply
meaning he said there is no meaning
there is no meaning life has no meaning
so you can't apply because the first one
is there is no meaning but you can apply
meaning that there though the first one
is that there is meaning you need to
find it and live up to I see so the
second is that there is no meaning until
you create it and the last is that there
is no meaning got it and you can keep
looking for it and you can keep trying
to create it but that's
childish Let It Go Let It Go that's
nihilism that's why we call you know
somebody who's nihilistic somebody who
believes that there is no meaning and
nothing matters that's the reason we
call it that in the popular vernacular
so these are the kind of the three
choices that we have to walk through
most for most of all of existence of
humanity it's been door number one
which is that there is Essence and then
we experience existence and the whole
point of life is to figure out and
pursue Essence and responsible and and
in a way that's a generative and
meaningful and that's what we're trying
to do that's that's what I think is most
compelling I think that's the most
compelling view I don't
I don't know the truth
you know and and by the way when I've
talked to Sam Harris about this he
agrees with me that there's things that
we don't see that there is Essence that
we we can only barely perceive
and and all of the things that I talk
about from Catholicism to the stochastic
nature of the statistical set of
circumstances which we find ourselves
from the science to the religion is my
understanding my best understanding my
fumbling around in the dark and looking
at Shadows on the cave wall
for what I'm trying to do to to find the
essence that will give me meaning give
meaning to my existence
that's the point of my life
it's very interesting so uh it goes back
to what are we grappling with here so uh
I mean I Define my version of what I
think the god-shaped hole is yeah and
I'm going to put it in the context of
the language we've been using here
so because I come at everything from an
evolutionary lens right and I'm very
much of a good lens by the way thank you
it really helps you understand a lot has
been very helpful evolutionary
psychology is just the best it's
bizarrely controversial which I will
never understand but uh nonetheless it
has been extremely useful in my life so
I come at it from that so I'm like okay
if we do have this hole and it is uh a
yearning and that yearning is evidence
that there is something what what is the
nature of the yearning and what is the
thing that I'm yearning for right and
again using the language of this
conversation
um I have a feeling that humans have a
um a very intrinsic evolutionarily
derived desire to kneel before something
and
now the question becomes okay if you
have this push to kneel before something
why what what is the evolutionary
advantage to those that kneel before the
thing and the best answer that I can
come up with is that you need to get out
of the me self and you need to get into
the eye self and you need to create that
distance and by kneeling before
something by put making something bigger
than you now one you're just you are in
the habit of living your life in service
of something Beyond yourself right
I don't think this is definitely just
ignorance so you will help me here I
don't think that any of the world's
lasting religions would compel you to
serve anything other than ah this would
be interesting I actually don't know the
answer to this question I will be very
shocked if you tell me that any lasting
religion has asked people to serve
anything other than either Humanity
itself or a God that loves Humanity
is there
no doubt there are no doubt there are
religions that that but I guess but you
stipulated to Lasting religions yes I
don't see how that would be beneficial
because what ultimately what I'm saying
is the proxy the god-shaped hole is
actually a desire to serve your fellow
man because that's going to be the thing
that keeps you alive because you're way
better off coming together as a group
evolutionary yes is my gut and then
religion like the specific whether oral
or written tradition is the thing that
allowed humans to come together in
gigantic swaths in a way that no other
species no other creature not ants
nothing can come together in the
flexible fashion that we can by using
ideas of religion like those just give
you an instant bond and I'm willing to
kill for and die for this thing that we
have in common yeah yeah so it's um
I also have a huge amount of time and
admiration for evolutionary psychology
but it's totally descriptive and it's
not it's neither prescriptive nor
deterministic so I don't believe that
the evolutionary psychology of the
things that actually set out our
impulses and imperatives that they that
they prescribe nor proscribe particular
Behavior I think that we have choices
way beyond our evolution
so let me get an example
um we talked about Mother Nature she has
really two goals for you and all of
evolutionary psychology comes down to
survival and Gene Gene propagation
that's what all of you know the
evolutionary psychologists and
evolutionary biologists they say that
all that they that any organism exists
for is to survive long enough to pass
honest genes and so it all comes down to
that but virtually everybody believes
that we can short-circuit that and make
decisions that go beyond that we can do
all and so people will say okay well you
laid down your life for a stranger but
that was because you had some
evolutionary impulse to behave in an
altruistic way that that dates back to a
time when that would have been better
for your tribe et cetera et cetera et
cetera I think that the better
explanation for that is that animal path
versus the Divine path the animal path
is incredibly powerful it's a it's a
wonderful model for understanding why
most things happen and why we have the
impulses that we do but the most
interesting questions of the Divine path
where we actually make decisions that
are that are that go beyond the what our
evolutionary Evolution would suggest is
the best path for us that go beyond the
things that we want to do that that that
help us to understand that there could
actually be something bigger and and
this is the really unique thing about
the human species is that we can make
this election between Divine and animal
Divine and animal and every day is this
election between Divine and animal and
in fact to look for the source of the
complex Oneness in a world of complex
Ingenuity a complicated ingenuity that's
to choose the Divine path ultimately the
Divine path of the animal path in the
biggest way
so not everybody agrees with me a lot of
really smart people disagree with me and
say all the things that we actually do
they still come back to Evolution even
if they don't look like this is an
evolutionarily Adaptive thing to do it
it sort of is you just need a more
complicated understanding of The
evolutionary impulse I agree I think
that there's man evolutionary biology it
just puts us on this track and makes us
act in particular ways yeah we got all
these habits the things that we want to
do and then we can decide not to do them
because we want something higher because
we're called to something higher because
we have a a dim perception of something
that's bigger that's something that's
better that we're drawn toward
and that's the the Oneness that we're
distracted from when we're basically
just sitting on the animal path and
doing money power pleasure fame money
power pleasure Fame
and so instead of getting on our knees
and contemplating the the nature of
Enlightenment we'll you know scroll
Instagram
that's interesting so as somebody who
believes that you can't be enlightened
prior to death
um what is it about the contemplation of
that knowing you will never be able to
actually understand it what is it about
the contemplation that makes your life
better I presume
the progress principle you're getting
closer you're getting closer and why not
why would God want it such that you
can't attain Enlightenment because well
according to Christian yeah theology I
mean so this becomes a theological
question it's because ultimately it's
the relationships the beatific vision is
the relationship with God him or herself
and you know the way that the Hindus
talk about this by the way is that the
transmigration of the Soul occurs as
people are getting closer and closer to
Enlightenment at which point the soul
will be reabsorbed into the godhead
so the idea of the soul for Hindus is
that your soul Tom soul is a little chip
of God
comes down enters a human being
corrupted by circumstance Etc becomes
perfected over a hundred or a thousand
lifetimes and this is reabsorbed into
the godhead and the ultimate goal of to
stop samsara the endless cycle of birth
and rebirth is to be reabsorbed into God
is the way that so their their
understanding of this is actually easier
to understand weirdly than just I got to
see God awesome you know I don't know
it's but it's all basically saying the
same thing getting closer getting closer
making progress this is the goal in life
this is the impulse and how do we do
that all kinds of ways that our lives
are generative and help us do that you
know as as silly as you know doing a
podcast starting a business all these
things that help other people they help
us understand ourselves they make life
they they lessen the burden for our
brothers and sisters in particular ways
this is the reason that it's so
profoundly unsatisfying for you to do
something it's all me me me me me
as opposed to others others others and
ultimately you get the juice of of the
of these generative things of these
creative things that you're doing when
it when it really does lighten the load
and and improve the lives of other
people because that's the process of
getting closer the process of getting
closer and the physical manifestations
of the things that we do every day and
it gets better and we hope and again
this is one Theory my whole religion I
might be completely off base I mean I
can't say because I have no data I can
only hypothesize at this point faith is
belief without data is belief without
evidence it's uh it's not a set of
non-testable hypotheses is what it comes
down to and it's just that the progress
per se is the point of what we're trying
to do on Earth that's what the certainly
the Dalai Lama would say
about the you know the from Life To Life
toward Enlightenment that's what the
Hindus would say about the
transmigration of the soul for the
reabsorption of the godhead that's what
Hindus or that's what Buddhist sorry uh
Muslims and Christians would say about
trying to actually go to live in heaven
with God but it's all saying the same
thing fundamentally about the progress
the progress is the point
of life
thank you
I don't know why at this point in my
life this has become such a fascinating
question you're writing schedule by the
way yeah no no seriously what you you
throw off Superstition and you you look
for the pure oxygen of enlightenment
and what looks like you know Jesus and
Santa Claus what's the difference you
know when you're 20 when you're 50
you're going ah big difference
yeah it's interesting there is
um there's something about the way that
the world is moving so my goal in life
is to in a really practical way help
people
um live a life
live a life of fulfillment and I I never
quite know how to put words to it it
fulfillment survives grief and so I'm
trying to
um
I have thought a lot about in my own
life and have found tremendous easing of
suffering in recognizing what I call
that there is an evolutionary impulse to
get me to do the things that will align
myself with having kids that survive
long enough to have kids right and so
while I don't have to do that literally
I have to understand what the algorithms
are that are running in my mind to make
that happen and
um
the more I explore this space of like
how one clicks into fulfillment I do
find myself grappling with it as you get
under perception and you really start to
say okay what what is the Bedrock here
um it does become I'll say
quasi-religious because I don't find
myself going oh I'm getting closer and
closer to God that isn't what it feels
like from my perspective from my
perspective it feels like there is
ground truth and you can get closer to
it and the more you understand how the
illusion is created the less you are
trapped by it and the less you are
trapped by The Matrix to use a very uh
fun word evocative way of thinking about
it it's one of the most profound movies
for the past 30 years notwithstanding
the cinematography it has to do with the
it has to do with the concepts
underneath it a hundred percent it it
for me it is the most useful metaphor
for the human existence and so once I
understand how the Matrix works then
then I start seeing it in everything I
start seeing it in
politics which is not something I
thought I would ever engage with I start
seeing it in the culture War another
thing I never thought I would engage
with but as I I forget what this is a
reference to this is a an allusion to
something as I set aside childish things
I really come to realize that you're
just quoted St Paul is that what it is
that's hilarious I can't even tell you
where from but uh that you begin to
realize oh this is one problem yeah and
once you understand it's one problem
that manifests in all these weird ways
helping people get deeper on that ladder
because helping people get deeper on
that ladder becomes is is very
meaningful to me
it's obviously also self-serving in that
the deeper on the letter I go the more
grounded I feel the more I feel
resilient to the slings and arrows of
Life the more I feel like facing death
isn't scary
um just all the things all the things
but
I am
I don't know what to make of the fact
that when I started all of this it was a
lot easier to have conversations about
think like this act like this and then
finding people wouldn't do it and every
time I tried to scratch as to okay where
were all my own Hang-Ups that it it has
led to me circling around this problem
of the god-shaped hole over and over and
over it's uh very fascinating yeah no it
is and this is
I'm a psychologist sociologists have
found that pattern that it tends to
occur particularly with people who are
who live in their heads people who are
questioners that they start asking
bigger and deeper questions and the
answers they typically come to them even
with a with a um with the greatest
horsepower that the world can provide
doesn't give them the truth that they
seek it just doesn't give you full
flavor it doesn't give you you get lots
of interesting Solutions like yeah I got
a good morning routine you know it's
really good a ice bath you know work out
whatever happens it's just not good but
it's not the thing that I'm seeking you
keep finding answers to questions that
you weren't asking and you're not
finding the solutions to the questions
that you really were asking that are in
Kuwait you know you don't even know
quite how to put words to these
questions because the complex is so hard
to apprehend that you don't even you
can't even you don't even know the
questions let alone the answers but
that's what you're grappling toward and
that's I believe that's what humans are
grappling toward that's what Aquinas was
saying that we all want the thing but
well like all right I'll take the
substitute all right I'll take the
substitute and people start to freak out
about dying if they've been taking the
substitute the counterfeit money power
pleasure Fame their whole life because
they're running out of time and they
haven't made any progress because
they've been you know eating
non-nutritious food
and not getting and they're starving to
death and and it's just they get people
get into a panic in their life and they
realize they get into this deep
existential dread this on WE that comes
from you know the depression of the
world that comes because there aren't
any answers and maybe Nietzsche was
right and and they were just looking in
the wrong place so that's what I see I
mean I'm I'm endlessly interested and
enthusiastic about the about the promise
of AI but I'm not kidding myself for a
second to think that it's going to
answer the real questions that I have
and that real people have and the Really
the real things that people want is
funny because you know the one thing
that we really all want we don't have
the technology for we're not getting
closer to it you know the the happiness
that everybody really wants it's not
sold on the Internet it's not provided
by the government you know we've got
lunar Landers and Tick Tock videos and
you name it we can invent anything the
Ingenuity is almost boundless but we're
not getting closer to the thing that we
want because the Ingenuity is being
deployed toward complicated ends as
opposed to the answers to complex
problems
we're answering the wrong set of
questions is what it comes down to and
that's why you can find people who have
everything in the world and are still
miserable
they couldn't get it there they couldn't
buy what they wanted in that store it's
the way that it works interesting the
Dalai Lama and I had a conversation
about this because he and I worked
together in various projects for the
last 11 years wow anyway this
conversation about he says you know he's
musing this one point when the Dalai
Lama Muses you listen it's like
it's funny because you know that you you
westerners you know you've done
everything to create economic value and
tremendous businesses and incredible
wealth and it's so wonderful to give
people all this opportunity so they
don't starve to death and you know the
world is richer and all that but
but you spent no time actually trying to
understand the nature of what really
matters the most
he says we're poorer yeah our societies
are poorer in the East but we spent all
our time and all our Ingenuity trying to
get the source of pure truth
did they make any more progress than we
did I'm not sure but also it's
interesting because
a lot of Buddhists will look at
Christianity and they'll be like yeah
yeah we used to believe that 4 000 years
ago
that's a that's a rudimentary
theological technology
you're on the right road but you're way
way back compared to where we were yeah
we used to have a guy yeah we used to
have a guy you know and the whole thing
as opposed to these are different
religions trying to get the same ideas
in different ways they think there's a
natural progression of Enlightenment
that happens to people and societies and
we're thousands of years behind where
they are it's back despite the fact that
we're hundreds of years ahead
economically or thousands of years
behind in terms of spiritual
enlightenment complex versus complicated
same idea I don't know if it's true
that is the question uh-huh all right
let's re-ground this for a second this
has gotten pretty heavy man I've never
had a conversation like this before yeah
this is uh in in media this is amazing
well thank you yeah
um assuming that the audience is still
with us let's uh let's reground this so
in the book you talk about
um what it is exactly that people need
to
um come back together so you talk about
the four pillars to build the life you
want right
um what are those four pillars and if I
can contextualize this why does modern
technology seem to move us in the exact
opposite direction yeah so what we want
is love
that's what we want
um and and and once again the world
gives us complicated things we want
complex things love is complex
how do you get love love of the Divine
or love of you know truth love of your
family love with friendship the the
point of intersection between family and
friendship is romantic love so that
crosses both those categories and love
of everybody is instantiated in the way
you earn your daily bread which is work
so the way that we needed the portfolio
the pillars or the Investment Portfolio
for happiness that we all need is to
spend every day thinking about the way
that we're going to make progress in our
faith or philosophy whether it's
religious or not family life
friendship real friends not deal friends
you know and and the modern world gives
us lots of deal friends but not very
many real friends quit your you know
real friends deal friends are useful
to us real friends are useless
that's and that's why we don't spend a
lot of time on them and then work that
serves is what it comes down to and so
those are the silos those are the
deposits those are the accounts that we
need to put investment in every single
day and if we don't we're going to be
we're going to be missing things we're
going to we're not going to be as happy
as we could be and we're not going to be
building a stable and steady
um happiness that will that will improve
our lives and help us make progress as
we go through life so those are the four
things it's just a very practical matter
I set people on I can actually set up a
course of action most people watching us
are
very good at working nobody's watching
impact Theory who's a total slacker it's
like yeah I don't think I'm just going
to sit around all day but I'm watch
impact Theory no you want to be better
at what you do so everybody watching us
has got his work is pretty on point and
okay and it's creating value and it's
cool stuff generally speaking is going
to be cool stuff you're you know you've
got a cool stuff audience good
but are you working on your
philosophical life are you reading the
stoics are you walking in nature without
devices are you studying the work of
Johann Sebastian Bach are you engaged in
meditation practice are you practicing a
religion of your youth you need to do
something like that every day I
recommend at least 15 minutes of wisdom
reading every day stuff you don't need
to read but you your soul needs it 15
minutes a day and I have a whole you
know list of books to say toss out a
couple well I'll toss out a couple um
depending on what what what tradition
you want to start in you know somebody
who is interested in all eastern and
western and very questioning and open to
all different ideas I would I would
recommend the way of a pilgrim which is
written by a an anonymous Russian
Orthodox monk in the 19th century way of
a pilgrim the way of a pilgrim and what
he is he's just walking around Russia
having Adventures saying one prayer over
and over and over again it's a
meditative book you're reading in it's
just like the more you read it turns
into a page Turner it's the most boring
book ever and turns into a page Turner
Zen In The Art of archery which actually
explains Zen through the activity of
archery Through The Eyes of a Westerner
so that's a very good way to begin to
understand
Zen thinking Zen is the most I sell
thing ever because there's nothing more
than an attitude of observation that's
what Zen really is is a stripped thing
compared to Tibetan Buddhism all the
Buddhists are gonna you know put in the
comment section how crazy and wrong and
wrong-headed I am on that
um I would recommend the miracle of
mindfulness by tiknot Han
which talks about what is mindfulness
it's being alive right now and how you
can actually do that and there's
countless numbers of these things and
there's any number that we could if you
want if you want fiction that falls into
this category is dostoevsky's brothers
karamazov that is the most spiritual and
intellectually psychologically Rich book
I've ever read
Dostoevsky is philosophy right so it's
kind of like people were reading Atlas
Shrugged because they wanted they wanted
objectivist philosophy in the form of a
novel if you want
the essence of the search for the
complex Oneness and the force of in the
form of a novel Brothers karamazov by by
Fiona dostoevski is great and so there's
there's reading second thing is family
life again we talked about that before
there's one reason to have Schism in
your family that's abuse everything else
requires work the big reason that people
drift away from their families is
because they're just
just lazy they're just lazy they just
like I gotta call Mom I was one of the
last time I saw mom do the work it takes
two to tango like if the person is just
not investing like you're you're trying
to engage with your mom and oh my God
yeah I know but the the point is that it
generally speaking it's an iterative
process where you don't and she doesn't
and you don't and she doesn't you don't
and she doesn't it's got to get
restarted and doing the work actually
though even the even even unilateral
work even one-sided work is incredibly
enriching for your happiness because the
part about relationships that's best is
the giving
is not the getting it's better if you're
giving and getting I get it I mean
there's an equation it's a dynamic
situation but even if you don't it's
better to do it than not to do it
friendship is critically important real
friends not deal friends and that means
the work that you have to do is not
pecuniary I have people I work with who
are real friends
but they started as real friends and we
just looked for an excuse to spend more
time together and that's how they became
dear friends too but the whole point is
you know the people that you grew up
with often people went they went to
college with if they went to college and
you know my I have a son in the military
and his buddies in the military they're
his real friends I mean they've
literally saved his life and and he
can't lose touch with those people
I guess that's the ultimate deal right
is saving and saving your life and then
and then last but not least making sure
that your work serves others and you
earn your success
and that you're working to make sure if
you're an entrepreneur or a CEO like you
or me
that you're the people who work for you
can earn their success and serve others
because they deserve to earn the success
and serve others and that's in the hands
of the boss to a very large extent
that's the that's the portfolio and are
you either you're doing those things
every day or you're not either you did
your reading and called Mom and your
best friend or you didn't
right and every day that you don't
you're just you're you're weakening the
pillars of your happiness you're you're
getting
you're getting less competent in the
serious business of building your life
I think you may have even said it in
this episode but life is an
entrepreneurial game it's a startup
um so when I think about those different
pillars
um they're not necessarily like they
don't seem like big scary things uh so
how do we approach those from an
entrepreneurial standpoint like how do
we make these more than just oh I
checked in with my friend I touch base
with Mom I read a passage in the Bible
like how do we go beyond going through
the motions and really do something
meaningful yeah well to do to be more
entrepreneurial about it you have to
actually induce risk you have to inject
risk into the proposition see one of the
things about willingness and ability to
take risk for outsized return you can
tell I've written a textbook on
entrepreneurship and it's like this is
what they all have in common is this
willingness and ability to take risk in
exchange for outsized returns now
usually for entrepreneurs the way
they'll denominate it is green pieces of
paper
but the truth is for the startup of your
life it's usually the denomination is
love
as you're willing to take risk for love
you you said uh either in the book of
the interview I wouldn't invest in an
entrepreneur that was afraid to fall in
love that's exactly right so that's one
of the greatest examples for a lot of
people who are watching us
disproportionately people are watching
us are going to be people in their 20s a
lot of guys in the 20s the audience
unless I dreadfully misperceive the
audience yeah and you know I know a lot
of guys my students my graduate students
at Harvard who are willing to put 10
million dollars of other people's
capital or risk or even their own if
they've got it they're willing to to
take a big scary job but they're not
willing to ask a girl out on a date
like what and the answer is
to that conundrum to that mystery that
riddle is that they're not
entrepreneurial in the part of the life
that matters the most which is their
heart
you know this is like if you're willing
to put money at risk but not love at
risk and self-esteem at risk you're not
you're not an entrepreneur and you're
not gonna have an exciting life you're
just not and and here's the interesting
thing you know I had this
I was talking to this guy
here's how it worked I was given a talk
and I and I gave the analogy of
Entrepreneurship in the business of
romantic love
and I said
I gave him a it was a group of a big
group of of 20-somethings in Washington
DC I remember the day distinctly and and
I said here's your assignment you got
two weeks to tell somebody you love that
person who doesn't know it and if it's
not scary it's not the right person whoa
and maybe by the way maybe maybe it's
your dad maybe it's your dad
unfortunately I love my dad to death
yeah yeah yeah but but for a lot of
people they have relationships with
their families like I've never told you
this but I love you it does like scary
and weird and awkward and Etc so it
doesn't have to be a romantic love
but the whole point is if it's not scary
it's not entrepreneurial enough okay so
this kids kid in his 20s
um Finds Me on an airplane a couple
weeks later says I was at that speech in
Washington DC
and I can't get it out of my head like
you know he says so I'm literally on my
way right now to Philadelphia
to confess my love to a woman I've been
secretly in love with for two weeks wow
for two months two no two years two
years I've been in love with this woman
I've never told her because I'm too
afraid and I'm going there right now
because of your speech and I'm like wow
it's only a speech man bro be careful I
don't want to ruin his life and and did
you get a follow-up on this I did okay
because I know I'm already engaged I did
I know and um but not immediately I gave
him my email and I said a prayer for him
and the girl and I said girl and yeah I
said let me know and then I didn't hear
from him so I thought that was a bad
sign I run into him at a holiday party a
few months later and I say remember me
he's like yep
and I said how'd it go and she said she
shot me down
and she introduced me to the man she was
in love with and it was awful it was
awful I said I was very contrite I said
I'm sorry I didn't mean to I didn't mean
to mess you up you know the whole thing
says no you understand I've been meaning
to email you to thank you I said why he
said because that was the thing I was
most afraid of in my life and it
happened and I didn't die and I'm Never
Gonna Be Afraid again wow how did you
he's also not gonna waste time on her
how I mean you're you you're very
successful entrepreneur not on your
first venture
you know I don't you need it it's like
they there's work out of uh Northwestern
Kellogg the you know the management
School Northwestern it's a Leicester
University and they they work shows that
the average entrepreneur has about four
failures
before their first success and they
learn from each one of these failures
and that's the basis of the success you
need to have
at least four substantial heartbreaking
rejections
that I mean on average if that if
startup data or any indication of the
startup of life
and that's an entrepreneurial life man
put your heart on the line get it
stomped on get rejected you need it you
need to learn is what it comes down to
and by the way life is more exciting
when it actually does work out
if you took a risk tell if you took a
risk and you failed in the past um you
know it's like it's not that good if you
didn't take a risk and got rich and you
never tried anything hard before that
that didn't work
you know part of the process is the
adventure and part of the adventure is
the pain
that's life and and we need to
understand that in love which is the way
way way more important than business
that's well said yeah I think a lot of
people uh these days so going back to
the framing of the question where you've
got modern technology is pulling us away
you've got the celebration of business
you've got money money money as a metric
of success and the thing I try to
convince everybody is look somebody
that's had the kind of success that most
people only dream of
nothing has come close to giving me as
much joy fulfillment anything protection
from the downside all of it other than
my marriage my marriage is the thing
that I protect most fiercely I am not
worried about losing my money I'm not
worried about losing uh accolades I am
terrified of losing my wife yeah yeah
and and Market can have a horrible day
and you don't like it but your wife is
really mad at you
and you're bummed yeah yeah even if you
know she's not going to divorce you
you're bummed because you don't want the
person you love the most to be upset
with you you want her to be happy with
you because what's happened it's
basically like your stock market
radically tanking the stock market of
what really matters in your life is the
way that works out it's actually a
really interesting way to think about it
okay so if that is the thing if that's
the thing that's going to really the
thing that we're pursuing is love and a
bunch of different guises but the
relationship is going to be most
important to us is the relationship with
our spouse how do we do that well yeah
and let's start at the beginning so one
thing you've said is delete your dating
apps yeah yeah yeah or or you know there
are some people who you know wind up
meeting their partner and getting
married based on dating apps but dating
apps the evidence suggests that it's
making dating harder it's actually true
because it's making it harder to find
somebody with you with whom you can have
the complex connection
that's appropriate for a couple
different reasons number one is the
Paradox of choice so dating apps give
you too much choice and so what that
means is that there's always something
better so are you saying subtle yeah
yeah well part of the reason is because
you're not going to find the perfect
person you're gonna make the perfect
relationship
that's the way relationships really work
you know people think I'm gonna find I
mean I mean magical thinking is a huge
problem love at first sight doesn't
exist and soul mates don't exist right I
mean I I believe that God wants me to be
with my wife but that's an entirely
different thing than saying that there
was this there was one woman in the
world and she lived in Barcelona and she
was a little girl and I was growing up
in Seattle no no
circumstances were such that I met the
person that was going one of the people
that could have been perfect for me if I
worked to make it perfect and your wife
is cool with that framing yeah because
she knows that that's what God wants us
to do she you know we believe that this
is what God wants us to do God puts
people together and then puts a lot in
our hands we have free will and we have
to you know part of making Cosmic Love
based progress is the things that we do
in our relationship this is the way that
we work out the stuff of love in life is
is not it's all perfect then you're in
heaven automatically well boring that's
boring no no progress man and you got to
make progress one of the ways you make
progress is the imperfect that you make
as perfect as you can using your
imperfect tools and that's the that's
the exciting Adventure that is a
romantic relationship and if and if you
start off with the idea there's always
something better because of magical
thinking and I'm gonna find the perfect
one if I keep swiping right or left or
whatever it is what is it left or right
I don't know never used it that's right
because you and I have been married men
for a long time but that I'm 21 you're
how many years 32. man it's impressive
32 yeah congratulations I I am in awe of
that my wife's like it's like 10 minutes
underwater
[Music]
that's good yeah no that's like being
married to an old-time comedian from the
Catskills it's nice they accept she's
Spanish yeah yes Spanish Jackie Mason so
anyway yeah it's a good reference that
no one in the audience got but that's
okay Google them anyway so he's probably
on YouTube yeah uh black and white maybe
yeah yes Jesus everything so that's
number one the second reason however is
that is that it and again I'm not down
on dating apps I'm just not I'm not down
I'm not down with how people use them
typically and people use them feels like
you're caveating I am caveating for sure
because there's nothing that's good or
bad but that thinking makes it exactly
right and so the big thinking error in
apps is finding somebody who's who's
completely compatible with us the
technology enables compatibility the the
technology is enables you to find to
find people who are more and more and
more compatible that you couldn't on the
on the human market and so that
matchmakers your parents wouldn't find
for your certainly blind dates or
somebody you meet in a bar you just you
know it's a crap shoot for compatibility
which is actually what you need we're
too compatible this is something that
most people don't understand that sounds
crazy yeah I know and so it but but
people will sort on their political
views and their likes and their dislikes
and you know physical characteristics
what you find is that people that match
up on compatibility X you know um X
Auntie uh priori in the dating Market
they even look alike right and and and
that's a problem you know it's basically
you wind up looking for somebody who's
effectively your sibling which is my
adult kids say is not hot not hot not
hot and so when people are looking for
excess compatibility they like the
person less they find them less
attractive what you need is a base of
compatibility which is lower than you
think and then tons of complementarity
which is interesting and sexy okay you
want difference yes agreed
opposite on a track where do you want
you're now confusing me where do you
want things to be where do you want to
be compatible you need Basics on
non-negotiable values preach right
non-negotiable values negotiable values
doesn't matter people think that too
many values are non-negotiable that are
actually negotiable politics shouldn't
be in there you should not sort on
politics now 71 of political liberals
say they won't date a conservative 41 of
conservatives say they won't date a
liberal which just shows that
conservatives have lower standards
politically than liberals and or maybe
it's men versus women or something like
that I'm not going to look into the data
more but the whole point is that that
that's a that's that's a ridiculous
barrier that's a ridiculous barrier
that's just that's basically like
classifying being a Democrat a
republican like being Jewish or Catholic
or atheist
it's interesting man like this is one
area where
I'm with you in the abstracts but
political stuff's gotten so weird people
are so devout about it that that isn't
interesting in the moment I don't want
to be like even even I try not to be
dogmatic but even if I were I'm not
being dogmatic if they're dogmatic like
that's not interesting to me yeah I get
it and one of the best ways actually is
what I recommend to my students for
example is that they don't talk at all
about politics for four dates to see if
yeah
until we get into that thing exactly
right so you don't actually so the Dogma
or something and if you can start to
fall in love suddenly you're less
dogmatic yeah you're less dogmatic about
politics and the person you're falling
in love with when they say something
that you would have previously thought
was a non-starter was a deal breaker it
no longer is are you and your wife
politically aligned kind of now just
because we've been together for so long
that you weren't in the beginning no she
was Spanish I mean she was right okay
and it says you know what a hard red
atheist family
you know really really you know it's
like complete socialists you know
they're on the losing side of the
Spanish Civil War and they were all
atheists she hadn't been to church since
her first communion and interesting and
she quietly assumed that was the first
thing you guys bonded no way that was
just like that was a 10-year project for
me wow totally 10-year project for me
but you know she when I met her she's
like no I don't believe in marriage
that's an Antiquated institution doesn't
make sense we'll see
we'll see I mean I moved to Barcelona to
try to convince her to marry me how long
were you guys together before you got
married uh it well I hoped that it would
be very short but it took me two years
to close the deal okay from me to
married no from from moving to marriage
okay from me to marry three so we were
apart for a year and I was you know
right and she didn't speak any English I
didn't speak any Spanish or Catalan and
and so I thought I'm gonna the only I
had a premonition I mean I met her for a
week and I told my dad I think I think
I'm gonna marry this girl whoa he's like
can't wait to meet her like I got some
problems and she doesn't
uh speak English he doesn't live in the
United States and she doesn't believe in
marriage but I think I think it's
surrounded than that yeah and uh and so
you know we kind of stayed in touch for
a year and then I'm I just quit my job
and I moved to Barcelona took a job in
the Barcelona Symphony because I had
this I had this very strong sense and by
the way maybe it didn't work out it was
an entrepreneurial thing to do and I was
24 and it was okay and then I worked on
it and worked on it learned the language
um and we were in love and when I was 26
and I said we have to get married you
have to marry me
she said yes
and you know and then little by little
by little and you come together to see
the couple's chain people change over
the course of their lives for sure and
couples change together
and the couples that don't do well
change apart because don't change
together there's too much pride is what
comes from it so what will happen is
tons of difference at the very beginning
lots of love glue glues you together and
then you start to change together the
ultimate goal by the way for a marriage
a relationship that lasts tons of
passion we talked about the
neurochemical Cascade of Falling in Love
of you know love addiction
but within five years what you need to
be left with is what we call
companionate love your goal within five
years is to be best friends with a
person that's your goal there's lots of
passion in companionate love that also
sounds not hot you know here's my
companion Mrs Brooks you know no
companion in love is this is the person
that you'll be looking into her eyes on
your dying day and then who knows all
your secrets with whom you can be truly
yourself who really has your best
interests at heart that's what companion
and love is and not every relationship
can get to that but that's what do you
think that what's the importance of
keeping sex alive
so because that's the that's the you
know a physical bond that is the most
intimate understanding of the of your
relationships it's an expression of your
greatest intimacy so it's also super fun
yeah A and B yeah but yeah
because you can have sex with people
you're not in love with you know people
do that all the time too Carfax it's way
way way more satisfying when it's in the
expression of your greatest intimacy
that's why the happiest people have one
sexual partner in a given year it
doesn't mean one in your whole life
interesting I mean there's actually been
a study there's a study on that using
the General Social Survey of the
University of Chicago yep is that to me
that just sounds like a proxy for
committed relationship yeah it is and
and the greatest expression of the deep
deep intimacy and commitment is usually
sex because when people ask Lisa and I
like what's the secret to a long
marriage we always say like one of our
top things obviously communicate but
have a lot of sex like you don't want to
become roommates right and there is
something also and I don't know what you
think about this but there's something
about
there's uh an electricity to Crossing
that line and there's one person that
you cross that line with and not having
that like one for that just entire part
of your life to die and for you to never
have that thing
ah well there's tons of oxytocin that
happens during sexual activity that you
don't get otherwise as well and that
bonds you together again and again look
there are other ways to get it too by
the way so sex is not the only way
people often ask is it bad that couples
fight and the answer is it's bad when
they don't and I mean some people fight
a lot some people fight a little my wife
and I fight a lot we fight a lot we have
a lot of arguments in Spanish because
yeah I mean it's for them it's just a
form of communication you know and
there's nothing that's not on the
surface and and so that was hard the
first five to ten years I was very
because you're not built like that I'm
American you know we didn't do that
growing up Civic Northwest did we I mean
it was like ah yeah that was nice
learning to fight well was a big thing
but the key is about about that couples
that never never fight they're missing
out on some of the greatest source of of
of intimacy because the friction is
there and yeah you're saying things you
that you think that you weren't saying
before that's interesting will you take
a second to say that very clear
of intimacy through fighting yeah
people often say it's so weird you know
after we have a big fight then we then
we make love as if it were never once
done that yeah I never do that are you
in the mood for sex after you've been in
a fight well it depends on how the fight
resolves but I don't think is that a lot
of people do that and the reason is
because they're raw and intimate in
their communication sometimes for the
first time in a long time for the first
time in a long time so if you're the
kind of couple that has that you're not
seeing each other very much because
you're working really hard and you're on
the road and and you're not talking
about things a lot of tension is
building up inside and then finally you
have a knock down drag out fight and
you're saying things that you think that
that that are deeply intimate that are
your deepest feelings that you would
never say at work because you don't have
the kind of relationship with other
people you know and demoralize them you
don't have trust you have enough trust
and you say things that might be it
might be cutting they might be wounding
but they're deeply intimate you have a
an intimate Bond you have a a spiritual
bond with that other person because of
the intimacy of the communication even
though it was wounding that's really
interesting so I will say this I have
had moments where I was completely
uninterested in sex until we had I won't
even necessarily say fight because fight
implies that it's like really fiery
um there was one big disagreement that
my wife and I got into and it was really
interesting the when we when I brought
up the thing we happen to be in a
swimming pool and so my wife likes me to
hold her and walk her around the pool
and it ended up being this amazing way
to have this argument because it was
really like hey I've been meaning to say
this thing for a few days now here's how
this thing made me feel like let's
really get into it and we couldn't see
each other's eyes
and it made it way easier to have the
conversation so we were like cheek to
cheek but we couldn't see each other's
eyes so there it just became easier to
like get those things off of our chest
it was really wonderful but I and so I
didn't want to have sex until we had
that conversation but it wasn't like I'm
gonna run you upstairs and like I've
never had that response like I don't
people are different for sure but it's
important that you have those
relationship moments and those might be
as bonding your fights might be as
bonding for you as when done well are
you yeah for sure and there's technique
yes talk to me about so so my guess is
that you're in a 21-year marriage and
you're going to be married till you die
yes you're gonna die yes I mean till the
death of your part for sure and
um so my guess is I could probably write
a script for your fights based on that
and when when something's not right
the the accusation is that we are having
a problem
now when you look at a couple that's
tenuous and have really having trouble
and be really in danger it's like you're
doing something and it makes me feel a
particular way so important super
important and just changing the language
because language change has very strong
cognitive impact so if you you want your
fights to be you're gonna fight and it's
important that you relate to each other
and you're honest with each other but
you want it to stop actually creating so
much brain damage just change the just
change the the pronouns that's the first
thing to do is to change the pronouns
and the fights don't say I and you start
saying we and us we and us we have we
have to do this thing I mean when
whenever we do this thing we have a
problem and and you'll find you're
stumbling across it at the very
beginning you'll find it because it's
because and you did we have this problem
we have this breakdown in communication
because then you're trying to solve a
problem together and it's a joint
problem you're trying to solve and when
you solve it you've made progress
together as opposed to I won and you
lost that's really super important and
just using different pronouns starts it
can actually repair
a multitude of problems and something my
wife and I do and this has been really
powerful for us as we talk in
insecurities when we get into an
argument yeah so if one of us is getting
angry it's like we have a shared
understanding if you're angry it's
because your insecurity has been tripped
so confess like what's the insecurity
what's the thing that's bothering you
right so that you can get off of the
surface level argument which is usually
very fruitless and you can get down into
something stupid it's like you finish
the milk or something right you finish
the milk without talking to me and it
makes me feel unseen whatever and once
you get down there like oh whoa why is
that making you feel unseen and also
that the person isn't just I have an
insecurity you triggered it shame on you
it's like okay I have an obligation to
work on my insecurities you have an
obligation to care enough about me that
you want to know but I can't just be
like you have to deal with it right I
have an insecurity and you better tread
around it forever you're doing a lot
right I can tell you that and this is
one of the reasons that you've you that
you States openly that your marriage is
the most important thing in your life
it's a it's a central institution of
your life I mean like this goes all
Boston and by the way this is going to
go bust it's all going to go bust yeah
right but the one thing on your Deathbed
there's Lisa I mean here's the problem
one of you is going to die first yes
although if you ask my wife she really
wants us to die
simultaneously yes that would be like
she's like I don't care if I die in a
plane class as long as you're next to me
and I'm like what what are you talking
about why are we both going down like if
I have to die in a plane crash I want
you to be safe on the ground she's like
no way I'd want to be with you
so yeah she says that out of love though
so it's yeah
I sure hope you die in a plane crash
yeah no I get it it's a it's but but
that's a you know this isn't is an issue
right because that you will be separated
yeah the data say that except under the
oddest of circumstances you'll be
separated yep but what typically happens
is really really happy couples except
under conditions of bad luck they tend
to live long time have a long marriage
and one of them dies and then the other
dies
that's crazy man uh-huh because you have
a joint life you have a joint life
together the Enterprise it's the the
startup it's a your co-founders the
other thing that's really interesting
too is that a lot of the relationships
that do best are startups not mergers
that's interesting yeah tell me more
because
no no well I mean second marriages are
sometimes they're really great but the
the marriages that that have the
greatest likelihood of success they're
entered into earlier when you're both in
life startup mode as opposed to I got my
law degree and you got your PhD and you
got your startup and I got my startup
and I think we're and we have separate
bank accounts now let's have a merger
startups are more successful than
mergers there's in business oh yeah and
the worst of course are hostile
takeovers are Acquisitions but you know
wow okay so no you can have a merger
that works yeah but you gotta go into it
with your eyes open and make it as much
of a startup as you can make and that
was I don't recommend separate bank
accounts I don't recommend it really
yeah there's huge data showing that
couples are more successful when they
have joint bank accounts interesting let
me run something by you so when Lisa and
I first got together
um we had enough difference in values
that it was I looked at the things that
she spent money on and I thought they
were dumb she looked at the things I
spent money on she thought they were
dumb so what we did was we said bills
are joint but spending is separate and
so we put our money together and then we
each had the exact same amount to spend
yeah and at the time so when we got
married she certainly had more money
than me because I was just absolutely
broken in debt uh but then when we got
married I was the only one with a job
and the one insight and I wish I could
track back to where I got this but I was
like this because this is all
pre-functional internet the internet
existed but nobody was really using it
right for much
um and I said okay look we're gonna come
together but the we're in this together
so whatever money I earn it really is
half yours right and so we're gonna take
care of all the bills together we'll
have the separate spending accounts
um and really have looked at everything
in that way like when we started impact
Theory
um the lawyers were like who's gonna own
51 and I was like what are you talking
about and they said you can't be 50 50
that's the ultimate divorce Nightmare
and so my wife was like you're obviously
going to work more than me like you take
the 51 she's like I don't have any
problem with that whatsoever and I was
like Over My Dead Body I was like I need
you to know to the core of your
existence this company whatever
if something goes wrong with us I have a
problem if we're in a position where I'm
like thank God I have 51 I've already
lost everything
so right 50 50. all you're saying is
impact theory is an extension of Tom
and so therefore my life is 50 50 with
you so axiomatically impact theory is 50
50. nice and really what I wanted to say
was impact theory is an extension of Tom
and Lisa right this is a thing we are
doing two together and even if we
weren't I mean I suppose at that point I
wouldn't have thought about it but like
if my wife ba trade me I'd still give
her half my just be like you love
her yeah and not only that I don't know
who I would have become had I not I'm a
startup with her you're not pre-nuppy at
all no and all you were doing is
avoiding fights by you know having
separate allowances yes it's not the
same thing I mean it's just that's just
that's just prudent yeah it's the way
that it works out it's like yeah we're
gonna tend to fight over this and and
you know we don't want me to
accidentally take all the spending on
you know giant chess pieces or you know
or you know Batman statues or something
video games video games whatever the
thing has to be and so let's let's you
know make it so this we just avoid a
fight let's just simply avoid a fight
and that way you can I can laugh at the
way you spend your money you can laugh
at the way I spend my money instead of
feeling a source of resentment but
basically saying my money your money my
account your account my property your
property that's problematic from the
very beginning because what you're
basically is you're planning for is the
dissolution you're planning for the I
mean it's a union
and you know the union of this is to say
that we're I mean it's biblically it's a
man shall leave his parents and and
cleave to his wife it's one flesh I mean
the whole in in religious Traditions
divorce is supposed to be like cutting
off your arm
it's supposed to be that kind of of I
mean I get I get it it happens sometimes
I get it I you know I live in the real
world it happens sometimes but for when
you're doing it from a startup you can't
you don't really understand yourself
without Lisa like who's Tom I don't know
alone literally yeah that's the thing
now not everybody can have that you know
and I'm not saying people shouldn't not
everybody can can be held to these
standards because of the the reality of
things that have happened in their lives
and you know they I talk to people who
have been the victims of abuse and and
addiction and criminal behavior and all
of this and and they have a need for
love in their life and they get married
again and they have an established life
and it doesn't have these perfect
standards social science gives you the
the ideal circumstances but not the only
circumstances and so here's the key when
the circumstances are not ideal you have
to work consciously with your eyes open
to make them as ideal as you can so if
you've got a merger on your hands gotta
merge on your hands good you can make
that work too but but make it as
startupy as you can yeah the thing I
would encourage people is to understand
that their the reason a startup works is
for a set of principles if you
understand the principles and can apply
them later in life so be it one of them
is going to be being open to being
changed by the relationship going into
it and knowing we are creating a union
and in doing that like what are the ways
that we have to move and to dance in
this thing in order to make it work and
then a big part of it especially if
you're older is understanding that
selection is eighty percent of the
battle like if you select poorly you're
gonna be in dire circumstances there are
I mean again without magical thinking
without thinking there is one soul mate
so Choose Wisely yeah yeah that is not
that's not the way it's unbelievable for
Sight I'm just saying that if for
instance you said earlier you have to
grow together as a couple now the amount
of all the things that we talked about
here emotion General stability getting
that right knowing how to fight well
like I mean there's just a laundry list
of Happiness things right that if you
get right you will be way Prime
knowledge is power and your
relationships and your work in your
spiritual life knowledge is power and
and again it all goes back I know people
who you know say yeah we knew each other
for a week and we got married in Vegas
it's like that's Folly yeah that's just
Serendipity that it that's just doesn't
make sense on the other hand you know
when somebody says I say how long you've
been dating that girl it's like eight
years like no yeah no no
um and and you know what's the right
amount of time this is what this is a
question of Prudential judgment too you
know my oldest son met his wife now wife
when he was
24 early 24.
they dated for six months they were
engaged for six months they got married
a year after they started dating their
first child was born nine months later I
mean that's called the six six nine
Cadence in Catholic Life by the way six
really that's a thing that's a thing six
months dating six months engaged nine
months till the first baby
I mean it's not it's not that we
recommend this it's just but it worked
out really really well because that was
enough time but it wasn't too much right
you know it wasn't the kind of thing
where I don't know why don't we lived
together for you know 50 years before we
decided whether or not to get married
that's that's not the right thing either
so you know Prudential judgment is is
and it's the same thing with a startup
by the way I don't know I think I need a
little bit more experience so when I was
writing my dissertation I would see
these guys and you know I was doing my
PhD with like I gotta read a couple more
books like write your dissertation
pop the question after a certain point
but not on the first date yeah I didn't
have any trouble with that so for me
when I met Lisa I did not think I was
going to get married and then I was 24.
and when we started dating
um probably about three months in
something three four months in something
like that I realized oh like I'm in
love with her and then I was like okay
well I'm either never getting married or
I'm marrying this woman yeah and so I
proposed that eight months and we had
spent some of those eight months apart
so it wasn't even like we were living
together for eight months or anything
because she was in England and then I
was ready to get married right away I
was like what's it take to get married
about three months and she's like you
are having a laugh she's like no way
this is gonna take like a year to plan
this wedding so we ended up being
together for about 18 months by the time
we got married but uh good and fast
that's good yeah by today's standard
that's fast and by today's standards you
were young yeah
um and again Society changes in
different ways but some of these some of
these principles don't change I don't
know if any of the principles change
that's the thing like circumstances do
but principals don't yeah yeah so how do
you how do people grow together like
what is the key there
part of it is understanding that you
have a you you you are stronger when you
are together and that one of the cues
for you to change is the other person
changing so not people who struggle they
think the cue for me to do something
different in my life is I feel
differently about something one of the
cues for you to do something differently
in your your life is that your spouse
starts to think feel differently about
that you have to take on the
characteristics of the other person as
if they were inside you
you know so you find for example that
your spouse is on a spiritual journey
starts to find stirrings of spirituality
that's a cue for you to do that too
that's a cue for you to do that too and
to do that sincerely as well and again
people say well you're losing your
individuality and the whole thing yep
that's exactly right yep yeah you're
sublimating the individuality on these
things to have greater strength in the
Union
right so that you can have a greater
multiplicity of experiences across the
two of you greater adventure and
excitement across the two of you is the
way that that works and sometimes it's
hard for people because they feel that
they're the the senior partner in the
relationship doesn't that's not the
secret to a successful marriage now
there are social scientists that have
very heterodox views on this there's a
guy named Eli Finkel at Northwestern
um a psychologist who's written about
marriage and he says that one of the
reasons that marriage is so hard today
is because we we expect too much from it
he says you know we expect your best
friend and your your one and only lover
and your business partner and the person
who helps you raise your kids and the
only person who who knows your secrets
and it's like it's too much pressure for
one relationship that was distributed
across 10 people until about the 19th
century or the 20th century and but then
the time of the Romantic Era uh uh where
in in when when romance took on it
modern connotations which is it's
everything it's magic it's a you know
it's a it simulates the relationship
with God even so the language that we've
used in this conversation that then it
took on too much pressure and he
recommends in his book about this that
and in his work and his his very
interesting research that you ease off
on the throttle a little bit you don't
expect your wife to be your best friend
necessarily he even suggests that some
couples do better when they're not the
only exclusive sexual partner I disagree
with that well I disagree with that I
don't think that I don't think the data
support that I mean again as they say in
finance your results May differ right
but they certainly don't in my case or
yours yeah that uh that one I can't
imagine having unshared sexual
experience the only thing that I can
imagine is if yay if you're like sharing
something by all means but when people
go off I just don't see how that works
and I certainly don't see how it works
if you invite another person into the
stable pair bond like whoa I know and
there's actually yo is an evolution guy
you'll you really really like this
literature that talks about why it
screws up relationships so there's a guy
at University of Texas that does work on
Jealousy on The evolutionary basis of
jealousy and he had this hypothesis that
men are more jealous of sexual
infidelity and women are more jealous of
emotional infidelity and so what he does
is he finds that that that women in
relationships they will forgive their
husbands for sexual Discretions but not
for falling in love with another woman
and a man if if your wife says
I mean yeah I had an affair all that but
it was only because I felt like I was
falling in love the sex was terrible
you'll be like I forgive you yeah yeah I
forgive it it's so asymmetrically weird
and the reason for this from an
evolutionary basis is that males have to
be really Vigilant about making sure
they're not inadvertently raising The
Offspring of another male yeah and women
have to be very Vigilant to make sure
that the provider and defender of the
family doesn't stray and take it and
defend and provide for another family
and another and another female's
Offspring and so that's why the the
jealousy is going to work in that
particular way but no matter what I'm
telling you if you have if you have an
open marriage
somebody's gonna fall in love
you know and and there's all kinds of
stuff that can that can go wrong on that
so that's not I mean again it's like
different social scientists disagree on
that but I think my reading of the data
and my Prudential judgment not just my
Catholicism suggests that that's not a
wise course of action for most I'm a big
believer I think you're right about that
I'm a big believer in what I call frame
of reference so your frame of reference
or your set of beliefs and your values
right there's other things at the
fringes but that's the core of it and it
will make all the difference it's not
what happens it's how you perceive what
happens just going back to Victor
Frankel So to that point you said guys
have to be really hyper protective that
they're not raising somebody else's kid
but you adopted a kid right and so that
to me speaks the frame of reference so
and I've heard you say that you have
every bit of love for your adopted
daughter that you have for your
biological kids which I have no reason
to believe is not true so what did you
do to your frame of reference in order
to be able to welcome her in even though
we would both agree that from an
evolutionary standpoint that doesn't
make sense yeah it will yeah from an
evolutionary standpoint it actually
might make sense for an evolutionary
standpoint because if you if there's an
orphan even in nature will be adopted
it's interesting by by non-human mammals
we'll adopt orphans as their own and
sometimes it will be even a mistake so
you see a the cuckoo bird will actually
lay its eggs in the nest of other birds
and then they knock the eggs out of the
nest of the other of the of the birds
that have the nest and then the cuckoo
will hatch and be taken care of by the
surrogate mother the
yeah exactly right and then of course
the cuckoo is twice the size the regular
bird so it's hilarious because you know
the the the
theory is gigantic It's the funniest
thing so so there there is some
evolutionary basis for that in the case
of not raising somebody else's Offspring
per se but raising an orphan and
bringing the child into your own family
and one of the things that you find is
that at the my experience but also the
research shows that the oxytocin release
for an adopted child is just as high as
it is for biological child so you
basically know that this is my child you
lay eyes on that child and
is Fourth of July all over his Roman
candles in your head and and it is
forever and so it's funny because
you don't actually know till you do it
it's all a theory oh yeah no you know
the bond with the adopted childhood just
as much as with a biological child it's
it's it's weird because intellectually
it's a it's a stronger bond in some ways
because it's this this election is this
human will on top of the neurophysiology
of of human connection on top of it it's
really something I have to say it's
funny it's funny but it's just deep deep
deep love and for both both kinds of
kids
it's really interesting speaking of kids
how does a good Catholic end up with a
son who becomes a sniper
yeah there's been a lot of good good
service members in the Marine Corps but
my son Carlos it's interesting so I used
to
I my my Approach with my kids has been
given that life is a startup
they need a business plan
and I need a business plan from them
because I'm VC
right and I deserve a good business plan
and so I had my kids write business
plans in high school and when they were
not original or no good I'd send it back
for revisions and Carlos has been
planted like six rounds of revisions the
first one was very unoriginal he was not
a motivated student in high school it
was always like
you know it's he's getting a c and
history he's getting a D in Latin he's
getting you know all this and and he's
clear he was not cut out for the you
know the for college and when it came
time you know he got a big athletic
scholarship he's a great big healthy
strapping coordinated athletic boy and
um but I said in his business plan you
need something more original than that
you know I'm an academic so this is
breaking my heart but you know so
finally he comes back and he says
part of it is because your business plan
as a kid has to answer two questions by
the way as an adult too the question the
the meaning requires that you have two
answers to two questions this is the
diagnostic test why are you alive and
for what are you willing to die today if
you don't have answers to those
questions you have a meaning crisis I
don't know what your answers are but you
have to have real answers not BS answers
not nonsense were they when you started
asking this high school so like junior
year in high school and he didn't have
answers so where are you gonna go find
the answers and he had a very good
answer to the question of how to find
the answers which was I want to go work
hard with my hands Outdoors why do you
think that was a good answer because I I
believe that that was the case for him
he's a very kinetic boy you know he was
he was a kid who
he had a strong
um an affinity for the outdoors fishing
hunting which is not in our family you
know I didn't grow up I I used to I used
to go fishing every year in Lincoln City
in the on the Oregon coast when I was a
kid and you know that kind of thing
about Outdoorsman my dad was a professor
right and and so but he was really into
it he's good at what good that whole
thing so he took a job as a a dry land
wheat farmer up in Idaho in Grangeville
and worked two Harvest made a bunch of
money he was alone all the time with his
thoughts he was digging rocks out of the
soil and mending fences and driving was
he making it spiritual for himself or
did well he was going to church I mean
he was I was kind of half-heartedly you
know but but it wasn't spiritual so much
as he was he was looking for these
answers to meaning you know why am I
alive what does it mean for me to be
alive for what would I be willing to die
and at the end of that and this was kind
of vaguely part of the business plan but
it became clear as time went on he said
I wanted I want to join the Marines I
want to see what I'm made of
and and so he did it was hard you know
boot camp was hard he broke his foot a
couple of times and a couple of times
twice Jesus yeah and then he went into
the Infantry training Battalion because
he was a war fighter which is 15 of the
Marine Corps are are our combat Marines
I mean I thought they were all war
Fighters yeah but 85 are in support
roles 15 of the war Fighters the door
kickers and the and The Rifleman wow I
didn't realize it was that he was in the
Infantry yeah for sure I mean this
Logistics and mechanics and I mean
there's so many jobs to support the 15
and then from there he became a mortar
man and from there he went into the
Elite Sniper core which is a really
really hard during any of this
kind of except that
what do you want as a dad you want a kid
who has the answers to these questions
because this is what it means to be
fully alive this is
Saint in the fourth Century named Saint
irenaeus and he's most famous for saying
the glory of God is a man Fully Alive
like don't give me half dead
don't give me half dead and half dead is
I don't know why I'm alive and I don't
know what for what I'm willing to die I
want I want my kids I want the people in
my life and my friends to be able to
have answers to these particular
questions so I was scared but I was I
was energized by his particular energy
and it's so interesting because you know
the the the sniper or the scout sniper
platoon which is uh which is a a branch
of the Special Forces they they set
three hours behind the scope of a rifle
just sitting there and they're they're
this is a kid who couldn't concentrate
in school I mean it's like ADHD
whatever that is you know it's uh it's
it's a funny diagnosis their their motto
is suffer patiently patiently suffer
that's my son
I'm super proud of him I'm scared but
I'm super proud of him is he active duty
yeah exactly do you just get down to
Camp Pendleton right now yeah for sure
for sure how does he's 23 years old he's
married wow he's uh he because when he
when he got that you know when he got
that then things became clearer when he
answered because you know why are you
alive did you already say what he said
because if he did sorry I missed no I
didn't his answers are
I am alive because God Made Me
for what am I willing to die today for
my faith for my family for my friends
and for the United States of America
well and for our allies for those of you
listening or you know that he'd die for
you too
and and those aren't everybody's answers
those might not be your answers but man
those are solid answers and when you
have the answers life proceeds
life proceeds life becomes linear life
becomes clear
that's why meaning is so critically
important employee that my son taught me
a lot
he's like I got the theories I got the
data but seeing it play out
it's it's thrilling
so you know the phone rings at 2 am
don't like it not looking forward to
that when he's like yeah
going on a field trip
not great
not great but I'll take it I'll take it
all day
every time I get to spend time with you
I love it the most it's amazing where
can people follow you where can they get
the new book thank you orthobrooks.com
is that has a sort of
it it collects all the stuff that I do
my column on the science of happiness is
published called how is build is how to
build a life at the Atlantic every
Thursday morning in the Atlantic the
atlantic.com in my new book with Oprah
Winfrey build the life you want the Art
and Science of getting happier
September 12th from penguin Random House
I wrote it
because I want people to
understand these ideas to change to
change their habits and and share these
ideas with others thank you for having
this conversation with me thank you for
what you're doing thank you for your
heart ah thank you the book's amazing
everybody I highly encourage you to pick
it up and speaking of things I highly
encourage you to do if you haven't
already be sure to subscribe and until
next time my friends be legendary take
care peace
to learn more about artificial
intelligence check out this episode with
Mo Gadot we've never created a nuclear
weapon that can create nuclear weapons
the artificial intelligences that we're
building are capable of creating other
artificial intelligences as a matter of
fact they're in