Inside OpenAI: Coaching the People Creating AGI | Joe Hudson, Founder of The Art of Accomplishment

Summary

Podcast Summary: AI and I — Inside OpenAI: Coaching the People Creating AGI

Host: Dan Shipper
Guest: Joe Hudson, Founder of The Art of Accomplishment
Date: June 18, 2025
Episode Theme:
A deep dive into the inner emotional world of the people at the forefront of artificial general intelligence (AGI): OpenAI. Joe Hudson, executive coach to senior leaders at OpenAI, shares what it’s like working with people tasked with creating AGI, the unique pressures they face, and how his own journey has paralleled the societal and personal transformations ushered in by AI.

---

Episode Overview

Joe Hudson offers a rare, intimate look at the leaders inside OpenAI, exploring the emotional, existential, and transformational challenges they face as they shape unprecedented technological progress. The conversation covers what it means to coach those inventing tomorrow, identity collapse and grief in a rapidly changing world, the fallacies of certainty, and how to foster resilience in oneself and one’s family. The episode balances philosophy, practical coaching wisdom, and psychological insight with approachable and heartfelt storytelling.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Emotional Reality Inside OpenAI

• Projection & Pressure: Joe describes the intense projections placed on OpenAI staff, from “savior” to “villain”; these are heavy burdens that mirror the outside’s hopes and fears (00:05, 06:39).
  • Quote: “There’s just all this projection of savior, which is a heavy load to handle for any of these folks, to villain, which is a heavy load. Everybody in the company, I notice, is just as human as you and I.” — Joe (00:05)
• The Birth Analogy: The acceleration and scale at OpenAI feels like being present at a birth: a time of chaos, mystery, apprehension, and awe.
  • Quote: “There’s this. Oh, yeah, we’re. We’re giving birth to something here. That’s what it feels like.” — Joe (03:10)
• No Magic Separation: The same range of human emotions exists both inside and outside the company; if you think they’re different, “the only difference between the people inside the company and the people outside of it is they just think about it more often” (05:51).

---

2. Transformation, Grief, and the Collapse of Identity

• Societal Moment of Change: Joe draws a parallel between personal change (like divorce) and collective transformation: who we become is shaped by how we sit with change, not by control or prediction (09:21).
  • Quote: “It will be massively transformative... what I know for sure is how you sit and be with that transformation is what determines whether you grow or whether you get crushed.” — Joe (09:23)
• Personal Grief & Identity Loss: Joe shares his own grief at coaching people building tools that could make his profession obsolete, and how facing that loss can paradoxically create more freedom (10:20–12:59).
  • “I’ve had massive grief... If grief doesn’t come, your transformation ain’t coming either. Like, there is a natural necessity for grief to hit there, and if someone doesn’t grieve that, then the transformation doesn’t come.” — Joe (10:20, 12:59)
• Commoditization of Knowledge: As knowledge work is automated, who are we without our identities as ‘the writer,’ ‘the lawyer,’ ‘the coach’? (11:30)
  • “A lot of us are identified with what we know, and what we know is getting commoditized.” — Joe (11:30)

---

3. Practical Coaching: Emotional Resilience and Decision-Making

• Three Brains Model: Transformation must happen at three levels: thinking (prefrontal cortex), feeling (heart/emotion), and nervous system (gut/reactivity) (25:45).
  • “If you want transformation to happen... you want to address all three parts of the brain.” — Joe (25:45)
• Self-Talk and Criticism: Most people are dominated by a harsh self-critical voice; learning to change one’s relationship to that voice is crucial for healthy decision-making (29:23–31:49).
  • “Imagine if you had a boss, and the boss 50,000 times a day, said, ‘Nope, you didn't do that right’—how could you ever get work done?... Apparently, it'd be a lot easier than doing it with a boss.” — Joe (29:23)
• Surfing the Unknown: Rather than trying to perfectly predict the future, it’s more fruitful to “surf” — to engage experientially, reflect, iterate and remain open as events unfold (32:52–34:56).

---

4. Responsibility vs. Ownership: Pressure on OpenAI’s Leaders

• Distinction: Joe avoids “responsibility” for coachees’ actions (which can breed guilt & stagnation), instead embracing “ownership” (which empowers and enables growth) (36:48).
  • “Ownership is a sense of empowerment, and responsibility... feels more like a weight or a have to or guilt or shame. It’s something that stagnates.” — Joe (36:55)
• Iteration over Perfection: Mistakes are “iterations,” not moral failures; this reframing is essential for resilience and growth, especially when making history (40:43).
  • “I failed. No, you’re iterating. We’re all going to, like, make a ton of mistakes... you want to lose weight, you don’t come up with a diet and fail, you say, here’s the 20 different things I’m going to try in succession.” — Joe (40:43)

---

5. Parenting and Preparing for a Post-AGI World

• Teaching Resilience Over Specific Skills: Joe raises his daughters to cultivate emotional resilience, curiosity, flexibility, and conscious tool use — not mastery of specific technical skills (21:07–24:40).
  • “Their ability to pivot is going to be based on their emotional resilience... rather than, okay, learn these six tools and be ready to go into the post AGI economy.” — Joe (24:38)
• The Hammer Analogy for AI: The value or danger of a tool like AI depends on how it’s used; self-trust and consciousness are necessary to avoid addiction and disempowerment (21:32).
  • “Just like a hammer, I can build a house with it, or I can smash somebody’s brains in or my own brains in with it.” — Joe (21:32)

---

6. Dealing with Criticism, Uncertainty, and the Public Eye

• Not Taking Things Personally: Joe practices not conflating his identity with outcomes or criticisms, freeing up energy to see multiple perspectives and adapt to criticism (42:40–45:56).
  • “Life is so much more joyful when you’re not taking things personally.” — Joe (43:06)
• Openness to Triggers/Appreciation for Criticism: Even negative feedback (like Twitter trolling) is an opportunity for self-discovery and growth, analogous to Zen or Tibetan teaching techniques (45:56).
  • “Trigger warning. I’m like, great, let's go get triggered. Let's see what I can be triggered by so that I can find more freedom.” — Joe (45:58)

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Change & Grief:
  “If grief doesn’t come, your transformation ain’t coming either. Like, there is a natural necessity for grief to hit there, and if someone doesn’t grieve that, then the transformation doesn’t come.” — Joe (12:59)

• On the Unknown:
  “Uncertainty is freedom. Like falling and flying feel really similar for a while and then falling feels a lot like flying if you never land.” — Joe (17:41)

• On Coaching the Builders of AGI:
  “I think most of them know that they’re building something that will replace them.” — Joe (12:34)

• On Emotional Work as the Core of Adaptation:
  “When people feel overwhelmed at work, usually that’s emotional stagnation... a lot of what I do... is all about having that emotional, that emotional fluidity.” — Joe (25:49)

• On Love vs. Responsibility:
  “I get to love people or I get to take responsibility for them. I think loving them is going to be far more effective at being of service to them than taking responsibility for them.” — Joe (50:00)

---

Timestamps for Important Segments

• 00:05 — Joe introduces the “projection of savior and villain” placed on OpenAI staff
• 03:10 — Hospital/birth metaphor for OpenAI’s rapid growth
• 06:39–09:21 — Discussion of transformation, pressure, and what the world “should” offer AI labs
• 10:20–12:59 — Joe on grief, identity loss, and transformative potential for individuals and society
• 21:07–24:40 — Parenting, encouraging agency and emotional resilience amid technological change
• 25:45 — Joe’s “three brains” model and role of emotional fluidity in decision-making
• 29:23–31:49 — The impact of self-critical internal voices on productivity and well-being
• 32:52–34:56 — Surfing the unknown, the limits of prediction, and learning by experience
• 36:48–40:43 — Responsibility vs. ownership; importance of iteration and reframing mistakes
• 42:40–45:56 — Dealing with external and internal criticism without stagnation or self-defense
• 50:00 — Joe’s exercise: Can you take ‘responsibility’ for someone and genuinely love them at once?

---

Tone and Style Notes

The conversation is heartfelt, deeply reflective, and occasionally playful (especially around personal anecdotes and the exercise about loving a dog). Joe’s philosophical wisdom is down-to-earth and focused on practical, lived experience. Dan Shipper is an engaged, curious interviewer who relates many points to his own personal journey, creating an open, inviting space for listeners.

---

Conclusion

This episode provides an unusually honest, human window into the emotional lives of the people building AGI—and those coaching them. It’s a meditation on personal and societal transformation, pressure, grief, and freedom in times of rapid change. Rather than offering easy answers, Joe Hudson invites us into the “wave” of uncertainty and transformation, equipping listeners not with a roadmap, but with skills and frameworks to surf whatever comes next.

Transcript

[Dan Shipper]

You're a coach to a lot of the senior executives at some of the big AI labs. What is that?

[Joe]

Like, there's just all this projection of savior, which is a heavy load to handle for any of these folks to villain, which is a heavy load. Everybody in the company, I notice, is just as human as you and I.

[Dan Shipper]

I want to know how you're sitting with it or how it's transformed you and your perspectives.

[Joe]

I've had massive grief, Right. So one of the number one use cases of all of the AI labs right now is coaching.

[Interviewer/Host]

Like.

[Joe]

You know what I mean? Or therapy. Do I think they do a great job of it? I absolutely don't. Will they get better? Oh, yeah. If grief doesn't come, your transformation ain't coming either. Like, there is a natural necessity for grief to hit there, and if someone doesn't grieve that, then the transformation doesn't come.

[Dan Shipper]

It might be easy to be like, I've been through this before. I can handle it. But, you know, your kids are off in the world, like, trying to figure things out when things are changing in this dramatic way, like, how are you handling it with them?

[David (Google Gemini Product Lead)]

This podcast is supported by Google. Hey, everyone. David here, one of the product leads for Google Gemini. If you dream it and Describe it, view VO3 in Gemini can help you bring it to life as a video now with incredible sound effects, background noise, and even dialogue. Try it with the Google AI Pro plan or get the highest access with the ultra plan. Sign up at Gemini Google to get started and show us what you create.

[Dan Shipper]

Joe, welcome to the show.

[Joe]

Thank you. Good to be here.

[Dan Shipper]

I'm psyched to talk to you one, because we've known each other for a while and I just love hanging out with you. We spent the whole weekend together here, and it's been just really fun.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah.

[Joe]

Really enjoyed it.

[Dan Shipper]

We do this, like, now it seems like a yearly beach walk together.

[Joe]

Right.

[Dan Shipper]

So a lot of good stuff. But the reason I invited you on is you're in this really interesting position. I think of you as the guy who's inside the minds of the people who are building AGI. And that means you're a coach to a lot of the senior executives at some of the big AI labs, and you get to watch the emotional experience of bringing this into the world. And I want people to get to know you, and I want to get to know, like, what that is like and how. How you think about it and how you feel about it.

[Interviewer/Host]

Cool.

[Joe]

Yeah, I'm excited for it. Just specification I, because it would be a conflict of interest to be the coach of many. I'm really just the coach of one company, but the lot of the other people from a lot of the other companies come into my courses and do the really deep emotional and. And introspective work. So.

[Dan Shipper]

Okay, what company?

[Joe]

OpenAI.

[Dan Shipper]

Okay, cool. And obviously, without revealing confidences. What is that like?

[Joe]

It's a little bit like being in a. Like, it reminds me of when we gave birth the first time, or when my wife and I gave birth and my wife gave birth. I didn't. I didn't do that. But in that process, I remember going into a hospital. We were deciding where we were going to give birth, and again, where she was going to give birth, and I went to a hospital, and we were just looking at how it was going in there. And that's very reminiscent of what it is like at a company. There's a lot of growth happening really quickly. That company is just multiplying quickly. Everything they're doing is hitting, like, a massive amount of success. So I don't think I've ever seen, you know, a release of products at this kind of speed and level, both in the industry and in a company or this kind of growth. I've never seen anybody cross a chasm the way that this company is. So there's a lot of change very quick. And there's this. Oh, yeah, we're. We're giving birth to something here. And so there's. That's what it feels like.

[Dan Shipper]

That's interesting. I feel like there's a lot of different things that could be true about the experience of being in the hospital while someone is giving birth. Like, there's probably, like, a lot of fear, maybe, or there's a lot of, like, chaos. There's a lot of excitement. There's a lot of this. I'm witnessing something that's almost this indescribable mystery happening. So when you say it's sort of like being in that room, what is that like?

[Joe]

All of that.

[Dan Shipper]

Okay, tell me more.

[Joe]

You know, the way I think about the way I've seen birth happen, especially in modern America, is the first thing that happens is the pregnancy is happening. It's obvious that something big is going to occur. And so there's a tremendous amount of projection that occurs. This is going to be the best thing ever. This is going to destroy my life. This is going to take away all my freedom. This is going to finally give me someone to love. Like, all those things are happening. I see that, that happening both inside the company and outside of the company. So I don't see any difference. And inside of the company you have all of that. You have people who feel like, oh, this is going great and this is a wonderful thing. And some people are more skeptical and some people are really more skeptical. And so all of humanity is in, both outside and inside of this particular company and every other company that I've had any kind of exposure to, it is just, it's very human. And what we like to do as humans is to say, oh, those people, those people. But it's us people. And my experience is the only difference between the people inside the company and the people outside of it is they just think about it more often. But every position you can think of, from excitement to repressed excitement, to fear to repressed fear, to concern to optimism, they're all expressed both inside and outside of the company.

[Dan Shipper]

And you've coached a lot of different people in a lot of different companies.

[Joe]

Yes, that's right.

[Dan Shipper]

So I'm kind of curious if there is any specific difference between the kinds of issues you deal with with general companies that you, that you're a part of versus this one, given its particular project, which is like creating minds.

[Joe]

Yeah, that's a great question. Again, I would say outside of the fact that the growth is so exponential and the amount of pressure from the outside world is extremely different. If I could push a button and control everything, I would want the entire world to give all the AI labs a tremendous amount of love. Just send like a tremendous amount of love and care and just like support. Because these folks are giving birth. And instead what seems to be happening is. And as humans are, you know, instead there's just all this projection of savior, which is a heavy load to handle for any of these folks. To villain, which is a heavy load to handle for any of these folks. Everybody in the company, I notice, is just as human as you and I. There's some distinction. Obviously they are hyper intelligent folks, more with a higher propensity to fall into a spectrum of some level neurodivergence and maybe more sensitive just in general. But. But in general, what I would want is just people to actually acknowledge that we're creating something different in the world as a species. And how do we. Instead of saying, oh my gosh, what's going to happen when this baby is born or AGI is created or whatever, how about how do we want to be while AGI is created? I think it's a far more powerful question. There's these moments of transformation in an individual's life, divorce or graduation or breakups. And those are the moments that when people come to me, that's when the most of the transformation can occur. It's like, that's when we can really become better versions of ourselves or more authentic versions of ourselves, I think is a more specific way of saying it. And we're in a moment in society of a massive transformation. And that means it's a massive opportunity if we treat it as such or we can treat it the way some people. Like two people get divorced and one of them is like, how am I. How am I going to go about doing this? And they. How am I going to grieve? How am I going to feel all there is to feel? And they're going to be better on the outside of that divorce. And the other one's like, and this is all. And it's all devastation. You have blame, blame, blame, blame.

[Dan Shipper]

As a child of divorce, I recognize. I recognize this.

[Joe]

Yeah. And on the other side of that divorce, they're. They're there. And I think it's. All of us have that same choice right now. The only thing I can say is that it will be massively transformative. I don't really believe anything that anybody tells me about how it's going to be transformative. I have my thoughts. I don't believe them either. But it's going to be transformative. And what I know for sure is how you sit and be with that transformation is what determines whether you grow or whether you get crushed.

[Dan Shipper]

Well, then I think this is. I think that's really interesting. And I want to know how it has, how you're sitting with it or how it's transformed you and your perspective. So coming into this, like, obviously you probably had some feelings about what it is to build a company or maybe even what it is, like what AGI is or what AI is. And now you're obviously, I assume you've gone through all the same stages of, like, panic and, like, excitement. And I don't know. I don't know what it is, but I want to understand what that process has been like for you.

[Joe]

Really similar to, you know, the process of grief. You know, there's like, I don't subscribe entirely to those five stages, and I don't think they always happen in order. And I think there's nuances, but it's really similar. I've had massive grief. Right. So one of the number one use cases of all of the AI labs right now is coaching, you know what I mean? Or Therapy do. I think they do a great job of it. I absolutely don't. I mean, I think that the recent thing that happened with sycophancy is an example of that. But will they get better? Oh, yeah. Will they be as good as me one day? I can't imagine that they won't be. I don't know if that's five years or 20 years away or two years or one year away, honestly, like, that's. The other thing is the speed of progress is so unique. And so there's a grief. There's the grief of a change, of a transition. There's also an identity collapse, which is the thing that I like the most about it is a lot of us are identified with what we know, and what we know is getting commoditized. I know how to write, or I know how to coach, or I know how to. And the question becomes, well, who are you if being a doctor is commoditized and they can do. And a computer chip can do it better than you, or what happens when a lawyer can do it better than. Or a computer can do it better than a lawyer? Like, who are you then if you're not the fancy lawyer in the suit with the Mercedes? So that's the part, actually. Really, Dig, because I know how much freedom is on the other side of that. But I think very few people understand how an identity collapse can actually create a lot of freedom in a system.

[Dan Shipper]

Interesting. I think this is. So I want to go deeper on that. So basically, I'm hearing you say coaching these people, helping these people bring this into the world. You feel like to some degree, you're helping them build something that will replace you.

[Joe]

Yeah, they. I think most of them know that they're building something that will replace them.

[Dan Shipper]

And you. That's causing you grief.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah.

[Dan Shipper]

And it's also causing you to have to ask yourself, what happens if I'm not a coach? Or like, coaching is not the thing that makes me unique. And what's left.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah.

[Joe]

But both of which are, in my world, very clear stages of positive transformation. So that's the good news, because I see that. I don't think most people see that. But the moment of, oh, my gosh, I have been trying to please people my entire life, and it's gotten me nowhere. And I could have been being in my truth this whole time, or, oh, my gosh, I have lost myself and other people for decades, and I never needed to do that. That moment is a moment that if grief doesn't come, your transformation ain't coming either. Like, there is a natural necessity for grief to hit there. And if someone doesn't grieve that, then the transformation doesn't come. So, yes, it's grief, but it's also. Yeah, grief.

[Dan Shipper]

Yeah. Yeah. I love that because I think it gets to something that is.

[Interviewer/Host]

Just.

[Dan Shipper]

It's this latent thing in a lot of AI criticism, which some of it is totally valid, but some of it is sort of like coming from a place of. I actually want the world to stay the same.

[Joe]

Yeah.

[Dan Shipper]

Which is never really possible. And grief is a legitimate, valuable response to the fact that the world changes.

[Joe]

To any form of death, which is just transformation.

[Dan Shipper]

Yeah, that's right. And okay, so you're going through the grief, or maybe you're still carrying it. Maybe that's still, like, happening for you.

[Joe]

Yeah, for me, all emotions come in waves. So, yeah, it comes and goes.

[Dan Shipper]

Yeah.

[Joe]

I don't look at grief and go, okay, you should be done by now. According to my calculations, I have grieved enough. Like, that's not how it works.

[Dan Shipper]

That seems very healthy.

[Joe]

I have this saying that is every time I allow my heart to break, it increases my capacity to love. So for me, I hope there's more grief.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah.

[Dan Shipper]

And sort of coming from this place.

[Interviewer/Host]

Of.

[Dan Shipper]

Facing this question and do you have an answer of, here's who I am after. Being a coach is not the thing that makes me special.

[Joe]

I do have an answer, but it's not an intellectual one. And so I've luckily, you know, if you look back into my history, I wrestled with a question. What am I? For decades, that question came across my mind for 10, 20 times a day for decades, thinking that I would find an answer, only to find that the answer is very silent. It's a very quiet answer. It's nothing that the intellect can comprehend. And so there's an answer, but it's not one that's ever going to satisfy the intellect.

[Dan Shipper]

It's not a thing.

[Joe]

It's not a thing. Yeah, there's. The way I think about this is that there's something that we have been and always been, and then there is a whole bunch of things that we. That come and go, that arise and fall. You know, our thoughts come and go. We sometimes think we're our thoughts, but how could we be our thoughts if we weren't able to think even at a young age? And we might think it's the body, or we might think it's emotional, and we might define ourselves by all that stuff. But when you really sit down and Just be with that question, like, what am I? Essentially, that has never gone. It's always been there. It can't be taken, it can't be given. That is the quintessential question.

[Dan Shipper]

Yeah, I think it's. That is an interesting answer because it is unsatisfying unless you're in a particular place.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah.

[Dan Shipper]

And I think it's also interesting because it can create a sense of faith or belief that you may not know what the thing is that you're going to be able to say. Yeah, but there will be something eventually that you'll be able to say. Like, I don't think you have this sort of, like, you have this very deep knowing of, like there's this thing that you can't say.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah.

[Dan Shipper]

But I also don't think one way to interpret what you're saying is that in a post AGI world or, you know, progress continues, whatever that means. I don't think that there's not going to be a word for you to be like, I'm AI coach. I don't know what it is. There will be another word.

[Joe]

There will be another. We always find a way to identify ourselves. Yeah, that's right. I need to be different than you for me to maintain a sense of self. And so I will find that.

[Dan Shipper]

And we can't know, like during these times of transformation, we can't know ahead of time.

[Interviewer/Host]

Right.

[Dan Shipper]

Which is really interesting. And it's something that people hate because it's uncertainty and uncertainty sucks.

[Interviewer/Host]

Right.

[Joe]

But people hate it not because it's uncertainty and uncertainty sucks. Uncertainty is freedom. Like falling and flying feel really similar for a while and then falling feels a lot like flying. If you never end, if you never land. Right. So that there's a freedom. The only thing that gets in the way is, you know, the thought that I'm going to land. But in this particular case, we don't know if it's going to go splat or not, so might as well enjoy the falling, flying, you know, And I think that, that. So you were asking me a little bit about how this transition was for me on a personal level. I was noticing that I was getting amped up. I'm quite sensitive, I'm quite empathetic. I'm going into an office every day that is, you know, first of all, just an office, which is not the way that I typically hang out. You know, there's a bureaucracy and everything like that. And there's this feeling of like, oh my gosh, we're doing something big and exciting and all the things that you mentioned. And I was noticing I was walking away a lot of days, very amped up. My nervous system was really amped up. And when I was wrestling with it and I had this recognition, I'm like, I've never, I have no idea what's going to happen. Nobody does. Everybody thinks they do, but they don't. This transition is occurring and I recognized, I don't know how it's going to be, but I know I've lived this before. I haven't lived it in this, but I've lived it both in the form of like Covid. Like we all lived through that unknowing of COVID We all try to convince ourselves we knew. None of us predicted it correctly. But I've also lived through it in personal shifts, like the way my inner world has shifted. There's moments where my identity fell through the floor and I know what it is to not be able to figure out what to do next. When I work with people, it's not uncommon for this is very common. In fact, somebody to have a really powerful session or go through a week long thing with me and they get to the grocery store, for example, and they're like, I don't know what to buy. I always bought this thing. I've always just done this on routine, but now I don't. And because they're living their life afresh, because they're looking at the world through different eyes and, and I know what that is, I know what that looks like. And what I know about it is don't try to get back to what you know quickly. Being in the unknown for as long as possible creates the most freedom and the best transformation. If you go right back to what you know, you're in the same relationship again.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah.

[Dan Shipper]

How are you handling this as a parent? Because like, I don't, you know, I've not met your kids, but one thing I've noticed, just watching you walk around here, there were one or two times where you were on the phone and someone mentioned you were talking to your daughter and you were just laughing and smiling the whole time. And I was just like, ah. And so, yeah, I think that's a, that's a really important thing is like, it might be easy to be like, I've been through this before, I can handle it. But you know, your kids are.

[Interviewer/Host]

Off.

[Dan Shipper]

In the world, like trying to figure things out when things are changing in this dramatic way, like, how are you handling it with them?

[Joe]

I'm definitely encouraging them to use AI. One of my Youngest daughter was, I don't want to use AI. It's going to make me dumb. And I was like, how do you use AI to make you smarter? And that changed her whole perspective.

[Dan Shipper]

What does that move? What does that move for her? Like, I think that's such an important move that most people don't do, but if you do it, it's a huge unlock.

[Joe]

Yeah. I think it's like any technology. It has the ability to empower you and it has the ability to harm you. And it's just really how you use it. Just like a hammer, I can build a house with it, or I can smash somebody's brains in or my own brains in with it. And so for me, the quintessential move is how do you trust yourself? That's the most important thing. And then how do you bring consciousness to the tool that you're using? How do you. And how do you learn it, and how do you learn what you can do with it? I think the thing about AI or any really complex tool is really spending time with thinking, how am I going to use this thing? I think that's the. The thing that most people don't do. Most people don't look at the television and go, how am I going to use this to make my life better? They just go to the addictive behavior. And I think, without a doubt, somebody is going to try to make AI as addictive as possible. And it's going to be up to us and our own personal wisdom to decide if we're going to use it or not use it. And so for me, teaching my girls that at the end of the day, they're deciding, they get to choose. They're at choice about how they use this. That's kind of the easy, basic thing around it. The secondary thing around it for them is I actually, I'm very forthright. So my girls are 16 and 19, and I'm very forthright about my fears or my concerns or my hopes, my aspirations, like the coolness of it. I'm very, like, very open with them about that whole thing. And. And, you know, I. I'll just share what's going on, and they'll be like, holy, dad, that's intense. You know, and. And so. So I'm bringing them along for the ride with them, with my nervous system being like, here we are. So I'm teaching them how to be with themselves in this very intense situation that we're in an intense situation. And so. Oh, like, how do you be with intensity in a way that actually Creates freedom for you. So that's another thing that I'm deeply, I'm doing with the girls. I don't have a big strategy on. Okay, here's how you prepare for a post AGI world, because I don't believe I know what that is, but what I know is that their ability to pivot is going to be based on their emotional resilience. It's going to be based on their open mindedness. It's going to be based on like how not neurotic they are, so how much they don't need perfection, how much control they need. And so I've just raised daughters. If you've seen the podcast with my daughter interviewing me, you can see it's like they're just, they are those kinds of people. So I feel like that's the deeper strategy rather than, okay, learn these six tools and be ready to go into the post AGI economy. Like, I don't.

[Dan Shipper]

I love that answer. This episode is brought to you by Addio, the AI native CRM built for the next era of companies. With Addio, setup takes minutes. Connect your email and calendar and it instantly builds a CRM that mirrors your business with every contact enriched and organized from the start. From there, Addeo's AI goes to work. It gives you real time intelligence during calls, IT prospects leads with research agents, and it automates your team's most complex workflows. Industry leaders like Union Square, Ventures, Flat File and Modal are already building the future of customer relationships on addio. Go to adeo.com every and get 15% off your first year. That's attio.com every and now back to the show. Well, I mean, I guess so. Some of those things you mentioned, being able to be with intensity, resilience, flexibility, curiosity. How do you develop that with your girls, with yourself, with the people you work with, for people listening who may not be familiar with your work?

[Joe]

Yeah, so that's a good one.

[Interviewer/Host]

So.

[Joe]

One of the main keys is that decision making, neurologically speaking, happens in the emotional center of the brain. So if I took out the emotional center of your brain, you would take maybe like a half an hour to decide what color pen to use. Your IQ would stay the same, but your entire world would fall apart because you couldn't make a decision. When people feel overwhelmed at work, usually that's emotional stagnation. If people feel stuck, that's usually emotional stagnation. It's not. They don't know what to do. If people feel like they can't make a decision that's emotional stagnation. And so a lot of what I do, or I'd say a third of what I do is all about having that emotional, that emotional fluidity, which means I can feel and accept and welcome all my emotional experiences without trying to manage them in a way that doesn't like take me out of myself and behave in a way that I'm not proud of. So. And that like it's moving the anger and the sadness and the fear is a lot of my work because that clarifies decision making, that helps you not feel overwhelmed in the world. And it does a whole bunch of really positive things. So that's a part of the work. A part of the work that I do is really pay attention. So to back up for a second, the reason I say a third is because I think of my work as humans have three brains. They have one brain obviously, but they have three brains. One is the prefrontal cortex. It's the very human brain. It's the thought, there's the emotional brain, I call that the heart. It's about emotions and emotional fluidity. And then there's a nervous system part of the brain which is, I put it in the gut and it's that, that reptilian reactive part of us. And if you want transformation to happen for humans, you want to address all three parts of the brain. So we've all been in the place where like I know I should exercise, but I'm not exercising. I know I shouldn't be such an, but I'm still an or whatever it is, right? That shows that like you get it here, but you haven't gotten it in the emotional system, you haven't got it in the, the nervous system. And so you want to get it in all three places. So if I think about the work that I do, generally it's in the prefrontal cortex. It's about how we talk to ourselves and what our relationship is with ourselves. And so how do you have a great relationship with yourself is a massive part of the work. So for instance, there's a lot of people who have self criticism, self critical thought. I'd say almost everybody has it. I think it's like 1% of the population maybe, who doesn't? Some of it, some people recognize it, some people don't recognize that they're having it. How do you interact with that is a great question. So most people either don't recognize it or if they recognize it, they just believe everything it says. It's hey, you should you on that it's just like, okay, well, according to that, I on that. So I must put that. In fact, most people listen to their voice in their head the same way that, like, a deep believer of a politician listens to a politician.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yep, huh. Yep, huh. Yep, huh.

[Joe]

And so I'm often, one, helping somebody recognize that in themselves that it's happening. And then two, the second thing that people will do is like, how do I stop that voice from happening? Which doesn't work. That which we resist persists. So what I'll often do is help people. And this happens in our courses as well. I help people react to the voice differently because there is a reaction to that voice. We know neurologically that every time your voice speaks to you like that, a little cortisol bump, it's like it's under threat. We're under threat when it speaks like that. And so it's draining our adrenal glands. It's costing us a little some of our energy. It makes us not work as well. Then the next thing that typically happens is somebody says, yeah, but I need that, because how will I ever get off the couch and stop drinking beer if I don't beat myself up? I don't know. The same way a baby learns to walk, apparently. The way everything. Everything in the world evolves without that negative voice in the head. And so typically, I help somebody with that. Think about it. Imagine if you had a boss, and the boss 50,000 times a day, which is about how many thoughts we have in a day, according to. I think it's a Mayo Clinic. Imagine you're sitting there doing your work, and there's a boss who's like, nope, you didn't do that, right? Nope. Hey, wow, that's a little slow. It's like, how could you ever get work done without a boss doing that? Well, apparently, it'd be a lot easier than doing it with a boss. And so that's another place that we unpack for them. And so. And there's seven or eight different tools that we go into about how to change the way that we speak to ourselves. And what it turns out is that the way that we relate to ourselves is often what we project onto the world and the way that we relate to the world. So an example of this that pertains specifically to AI is oftentimes the people I notice who are trying to predict the future are the people who are scared and trying to figure out how to be safe. And so their nature is to predict a really shitty future. Like, that's the thing and if you look back through humanity and you look at like the prophecies, none of them are like. And everything works out well at the end. All the prophecies are and people are.

[Dan Shipper]

And there is that whole messiah thing. Like that's, that's one kind of example. But yeah, well that's.

[Joe]

People are. And then somebody comes and saves us, you know, so. And even like I was reading this wonderful thing about like pre Jesus times and the Dead Sea Scrolls and apparently the Dead Sea scrolls were kept by a cult that was basically like we're in a couple hundred years. Like is this has been going on forever. And so, and so it's like, oh, so that's the relationship they have with their life too. Their relationship with themselves is typically not a relationship of trust with themselves. The relationship that they have with themselves typically is it's, it's not trust and it's worried about how they're going to act next or what's going to happen or if they're going to be able to do the next thing rather than I've got it. And so that's the person's relationship with themselves is being reflected into their actions in the world. And so when you really work on that, it changes that.

[Dan Shipper]

One of the things we've been talking about this weekend is my obsession with this show. Hundred foot wave.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Dan Shipper]

One of the things that what you're saying reminds me of is sort of looking at a wave coming in from the beach and either being like trying to figure out exactly where the wave is going to break or just going out and surfing.

[Interviewer/Host]

Right.

[Dan Shipper]

And those are two very different ways of being. And sometimes the like figuring out where it's going to go can be a helpful frame of mind. But for really big things that you have no familiarity with that are like hyper complex situations, it's just better kind of to surf.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah.

[Joe]

I think about it oftentimes there's this great study about how leaders have a lot more theta brainwaves. Theta is that place that you hit meditating or place that you are between dream and awake. It's what little kids from 0 to 8 years old are in. And I think about it like a basketball player. There's a time in basketball when you're thinking about logically dissecting the situation when there's a time when you're putting it in your body, but when you're playing the game, you're out of your head. If you're thinking about like where does the ball have to go and da da da da you're going to have a horrible game, like, get out of your head is what people are going to say. And it's the same way with life or with the surfing that you're talking about. And so a lot of what I.

[Dan Shipper]

Do is teaching people, and I think critically, in order for the thinking about it to make any sense or be helpful, you have to have been on the wave and come back out and been like, okay, what did I do wrong? How do I fix that? You can't just think about it without being on the wave.

[Joe]

I think you can do a little thinking about it in advance.

[Dan Shipper]

Maybe a little.

[Joe]

A little bit. Watching some people surf, like, look at some things, dissecting it, there's a little bit of that.

[Dan Shipper]

But you hit diminishing returns. Pretty.

[Joe]

Yeah, exactly. And then you could literally go be on the wave, then go watch those same videos, and you'll learn twice as much than before being on the wave.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah.

[Dan Shipper]

One of the things you brought up earlier is the tremendous sense of responsibility that the people internally at OpenAI feel and the tremendous amount of pressure that they're under, both, like, positive to, like, deliver on this, like, amazing thing that they're trying to do, and negative with people being like, you're going to totally destroy the world.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah.

[Dan Shipper]

And I imagine.

[Joe]

And I would assume all of that's going inside of all of them.

[Interviewer/Host]

Right, Right.

[Dan Shipper]

And I imagine as someone who is, like, inside their heads and caring for them, you must feel that, too.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah.

[Joe]

I'm years of training not to do that, and yet it still happens. But I have years and years of training of not taking responsibility for other people's actions. Right. If I'm a coach and I'm taking responsibility of your actions, if I'm coaching you and I'm taking responsibility, then I'm disempowering you. Then I'm saying that I'm responsible for you. I'm making you a victim. I'm making you a puppet. It's a amount of hubris or narcissism that is incredibly uncomfortable for me to exist in. And so the way I coach generally is I'm following people. It doesn't look like it when I'm coaching, but there's. I'm kind of opening doors and seeing where they go, and then I'll follow them into the door. You, if you were a coachee, where you need to go next, only, you know, I can't tell you that. And so I might be able to say, here's some doors that you might not know about. And Then they can go there. But to take responsibility. For them to take responsibility, I don't find that that is, like, a useful perspective. Ownership, yes. Responsibility, no.

[Dan Shipper]

What's the difference?

[Joe]

So semantically, I don't. I mean, I have to look at it.

[Dan Shipper]

How does it feel to you?

[Joe]

Yeah, exactly. The feeling difference is ownership is a sense of empowerment, and responsibility is. Feels more like it's a weight or a have to or guilt or shame. It's something that stagnates.

[Podcast Promoter]

It's.

[Joe]

You know, and so. And it does something really screwed up when somebody feels responsible. So let's say I'm working with somebody, I'm coaching somebody, and I say something that really hurts them. If I feel responsible, I'm like, oh, sorry. Like, making them more of a victim. Like, they can't handle it if I don't feel responsible. And they go, ugh. I'm like, ooh, cool. What did we just find there? What's happening there? Like, what's the thing that we need to investigate there? That, like, I'm excited for the hurt because I see somehow that we've run across their story. And so. And so the difference there is if you feel this intense form of responsibility, say, if you're an OpenAI researcher, is you're not going to be as resilient to correct the mistake. Oh, I did it. I knew I was gonna do it. Oh, I. Instead of, oh, yeah, wait, misstep. Let's go. Wait, turn here.

[Dan Shipper]

It seems like you're sort of pointing to, in some ways, the difference between guilt and shame. And there's like a. When people feel ashamed of something because it's. The difference between guilt and shame, classically, is like, I am bad or I did something bad. When people feel ashamed, they tend to not take ownership over it when they're confronted with it because it's about them versus, like, when people feel guilt. It's easier to take ownership because it's, like, not about me. It's just, I did something wrong. Yeah, that up. So it sounds like that's maybe a little bit of what you're talking about.

[Joe]

Yeah, it's interesting. Yes and no. Okay, so I love that framing. I haven't heard it before. I've heard the did something wrong am something wrong before, but I never heard the nuance after, which I really like. For me, both guilt and shame are a. I'm gonna do this in two parts. So the first one is guilt and shame. Both of them kind of stagnate the emotional experience. Shame more than guilt, for sure. And Oftentimes when someone's guilt tripping them, they're actually shame tripping them, but we call it guilt tripping. So I don't want people to feel either of those two things because it typically. I don't mind if they feel it. Don't get me wrong. But to stagnate in it really just stops progress. So as an example is shame is used to stop things.

[Interviewer/Host]

Right.

[Joe]

So I'm a little kid and I'm on a couch with my aunts, and I fart and my. And my. And my aunts laugh. Cool. I'm not stopping anything. I sit on a couch and I fart with my aunts, and my aunts are like, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame. I'm gonna. I'm gonna literally hold. Right? It's the same thing with any of the action.

[Dan Shipper]

Is this a personal story?

[Joe]

If it was happening, that probably would have been totally shame, totally rigid. But the point is that the shame is meant to stagnate us. And so oftentimes you can't steer a ship that's stagnating. You want to have that movement so people can. But with what you're saying, I think that there is a similarity in the fact that empowerment is apologizing in an upright way. There's nothing. I made a mistake. It's the difference between I made a mistake and I'm iterating.

[Dan Shipper]

Yeah.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah. Yep.

[Joe]

I'm iterating. And it's like, I failed. And I made a mistake, I think would be maybe even the better way to say it. It's like, I failed. No, you're iterating. We're all going to, like, make a ton of mistakes. There's no way that any AI lab isn't going to make. We're doing something new for the first time. It's just going to be a series of mistakes. But the way that a mistake is looked at is so critical. So you could look at the first iPhone as a mistake. All you have to do is look at the iPhone4 and you look at iPhone1 and you're like, yeah, that's a piece of. Compared to iPhone4. So iPhone1 must have been a mistake. But we don't. We just say first iteration, second iteration, third iteration. But if we eat cake when we say that we're going to be on a diet, then we failed. We're not like, iteration one cheesecake next time. We don't iterate. Even though the science is really clear that if you want to lose weight, you don't come up with a diet. And fail, you say, here's the 20 different things I'm going to try in succession. Because that iterative mindset is what succeeds.

[Dan Shipper]

And for you, I know that it's much less present than it might be for someone else who hasn't spent a lot of time with this kind of topic. But I'm sure, as you said, even still, sometimes you kind of feel that. That weight. Yeah, what is that? Like, for example, you brought up the glazing thing earlier, or you see a headline in the news and you're like that second of, like, oh, yeah, because you do. You are very connected to. Even if you're not making any choices for anybody, if you've opened a door for someone that they go through even though they chose to do it, like, maybe if you hadn't been there, they wouldn't have gone through that door or whatever. Like, there's always that kind of thing. So how do you. Like, how do you deal with that and how do you think about it?

[Joe]

The first thing is I don't take it entirely personally.

[Interviewer/Host]

So.

[Joe]

This is a hard thing to explain to folks. But right now, for example, stop thinking. And if you're listening to this, stop thinking. So almost everybody who was listening has already failed. They've already had a thought.

[Interviewer/Host]

Right.

[Joe]

But yet we think that those thoughts are ours and that we're responsible for them. But out of the 50,000 thoughts you've had in the last 24 hours, you didn't decide to have one of them and you can't make them stop. So is it you who is it? Exactly? Like, what are we talking about? But yet we take things really, really personally. So there's a way in which life is so much more joyful when you're not taking things personally. So that's part of what's happening. The other part is that I really work on not being defended. Defended, really? If somebody comes up to me and they say, wow, you're the planet, or you're screwing everything up, you know, and I have the time, in that moment, I'll be like, oh, how? What's going on? Like, what am I missing? Or I'll be like, absolutely, yes, totally. Like, yeah, I can't. Like, yeah, I just drove here. Fossil fuels. I'm with you. Like, there's. I can think of 30 ways I destroyed the planet today. I'm not going to defend against that. And so. And what I notice is that in my defense, if I have to defend myself, if I have to say, no, I'm doing something good for the world, or, no, this is all going to go well, or I'm going to justify it in some way. All of that, first of all, takes a huge amount of energy out of me. But second of all, it makes it so that I'm not actually open to an alternative frame of reference. And to me, the more I mature in the world, the more I can see the truth in everybody's frame of reference. And so I want to see the truth in all those frames of reference, because that's what's going to allow me to do my best work and potentially make the best decisions and ask the best questions and. And do all do my work in the best possible way. The same is if I'm constantly questioning myself, then it's like playing basketball and being in my head, it goes wrong. So there's this. So what I typically do is I take time to reflect. Oh, how do I want to be? What am I doing? What am I missing? And then I don't. That was done. And now I go do the thing. And then a couple weeks later, I come back and I spend some time reflecting, seeing what I miss. I love. It's a little bit less now for weird reasons, but I love Twitter because people like, they with me on Twitter and it's like, I don't know if you know this, but Tibetan Buddhist teaching, the second stage of teaching somebody is to just make fun of them relentlessly, like, try to trigger them to teach them what they're still taking personally. And Twitter is like a Zen master at that shit, like a Tibetan master at doing that. And so oftentimes I'll take time just to listen to everybody's crap on Twitter.

[Dan Shipper]

It's like the opposite of a trigger warning.

[Joe]

Exactly. Trigger warning. I'm like, great, let's go get triggered. Let's see what I can be triggered by so that I can find more freedom. Because every piece of me that gets triggered is something that I haven't reconciled in myself.

[Dan Shipper]

I think there's a misinterpretation of what you're saying that I'd like to represent for you and hear for sure what you're saying, how you would respond to it in case there are people listening who, who hear that, which is.

[Joe]

Well.

[Dan Shipper]

When hard things happen, I can just sort of go to a place where I'm like this formless thing, and I have a lot of space from all the thoughts and it's not really me. And then otherwise I just sort of like, do what I want and like. And so it's a way for me to avoid responsibility. And, and that's well and good for Joe because like when they invent AGI, like he's going to have something's good's gonna happen. But I'm like a lawyer, I'm like a paralegal and I'm fucked. And I can't just go to my foremost void place. So how do you think about that? How would you respond to someone who's interpreting what you're saying in that way?

[Joe]

Well, the first thing I would say, you can't prove it and B, is that whole thought process that you've just put yourself in actually helping you be more successful in the post AGI world. That would be my second. The third thing I would be non defendant. I'd be like, yeah, there's some absolute truth to that. There is a part of me that is choosing, specifically choosing not to take on a sense of self abuse and heaviness because I don't think it's going to allow me to love you or the people at OpenAI or anybody as well as I could if I wasn't taking that on. So I would also agree with that. I think as far as logically I would say show me somebody who is making those decisions successfully that has like that heavy hard sense of obligation and responsibility. And so what I would say is I've looked, I have worked with billionaires and ambassadors and people who have a lot of responsibility and consistently I see that heavy, hard sense of responsibility that weighs on you on a day to day basis, makes you make decisions. And so if you want to project that onto me, feel free, it's cool. And maybe take a look at the decision quality that you're making and see, and do an experiment and say, oh, let's see if I like lessen up on that. Is my life get better? Do I? Am I better to people? Am I?

[Dan Shipper]

Yeah, I agree with that. I mean I as someone who I have for many years had that kind of like very weighty responsibility sense.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah.

[Dan Shipper]

It feels like the right thing to do or it feels moral or whatever. But I know that I've like made a lot of decisions that ended up hurting people more because I had that.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yep.

[Dan Shipper]

You know, and it's definitely like a tough place to be. Like I didn't choose that. I didn't really want to feel that way, but I did.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Dan Shipper]

And I don't feel that way anymore. And it's so much better.

[Joe]

So here's a direct experience for people who are listening that they can have, have a feeling about it literally have a feeling of love towards anybody in the world. So try it out. Like pick somebody that you love or something that you love. And then like I'm thinking about my sister's dog.

[Interviewer/Host]

Cool.

[Dan Shipper]

She's very cute.

[Interviewer/Host]

Great.

[Joe]

So think, think about that.

[Interviewer/Host]

Right.

[Joe]

And now I want you to take responsibility for that dog without. Without constraining the love, without making the love smaller. See if you can even do it.

[Dan Shipper]

Oh, definitely not.

[Joe]

You can't do it. So you got a choice.

[Dan Shipper]

It's a different way of relating to her.

[Joe]

That's right. So I have a choice. I get to love people or I get to take responsibility for them. I think loving them is going to be far more effective at being of service to them than taking responsibility for them.

[Dan Shipper]

That's really interesting. One way to. That was a very interesting exercise because there's this book I love called the Master and His Emissary.

[Joe]

Wow, fascinating title.

[Dan Shipper]

It's really good. It's about the relationship between the left hemisphere and the right hemisphere. And he quotes this person who did a really intricate study of the anatomy and physiology of your hand. And his basic point is that any kind of like more logical, left brain, analytical way of relating to the world is very associated with your dominant hand. It's very associated with the idea of grasping something. And I think that that sort of, when you have that sort of sense of responsibility, it's, at least for me, very associated with like, I need to hold this thing. And it's very hard to hold something like that and grasp it. You're totally like taken out of it, its environment. It's completely within your control and, and feel the kind of like open, loving thing. It's just a different way of relating that. I don't know what physiological. I don't know what we would relate it to instead, but it's just different from holding something. And holding is important. Like I need to hold stuff to like drink water or whatever or feed myself or type on my computer. But there's this other way of being that I think we really under emphasize and don't understand particularly well that I think you're pointing to. That's really important.

[Joe]

Yeah, I would say almost all of my work is pointing to that, the balance of those two ways of being. And it's interesting because as you were talking, I was like, oh, there is this one way in which I hold responsibility, but it's a little bit different. And so I don't think I would call it responsibility, but I have a deep sense of responsibility. Say to not take responsibility for people or I have a deep sense of responsibility of not answering a question that wasn't asked of me or not helping somebody unless they ask for help. I have a deep sense of responsibility to live by my principles. The difference is I don't feel like there's a choice to be made there, and I have to make a particular choice. They are a sense of responsibility because I know choosing anything else is painful. So it's not like I have to do this thing. I have to.

[Dan Shipper]

Should.

[Joe]

It's not a should. There's no should. There is just like, I can either do that or it will be painful. I will either do that or I will hurt somebody. I'm not doing so and so. There's just nothing in me that wants to do it. But there is a sense of responsibility. It's just not heavy.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah.

[Dan Shipper]

Joe, this is great.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah.

[Dan Shipper]

Thank you so much for doing this. I really appreciate it.

[Joe]

Pleasure. Pleasure.

[Interviewer/Host]

Yeah.

[Podcast Promoter]

Oh, my gosh, folks, you absolutely, positively have to smash that, like, button and subscribe to AI and I. Why? Because this show is the epitome of awesomeness. It's like finding a treasure chest in your backyard, but instead of gold, it's filled with pure, unadulterated knowledge. Bombs About Chat GPT Every episode is a roller coaster of emotions, insights, and laughter that will leave you on the edge of your seat, craving for more. It's not just a show, it's a journey into the future with Dan Shipper as the captain of the spaceship. So do yourself a favor. Hit, like, smash, subscribe and strap in for the ride of your life. And now, without any further ado, let me just say, Dan, I'm absolutely, hopelessly in love with you.