← Young and Profiting with Hala Taha
Young and Profiting with Hala Taha
Mark Manson on Embracing Pain for Personal and Professional Growth | Human Behavior | YAPClassic
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- [00:00]
Hala Taha
Today's episode of Yap is sponsored in part by Rakuten, Robinhood, Airbnb and OpenPhone. Get the Rakuten app now and join the 17 million members who are already saving. Cashback rates change daily. See rakuten.com for more details. With Robinhood Gold, you can now enjoy the VIP treatment. Receiving a 3% IRA match on retirement contributions to receive your 3% boost on annual IRA contributions, sign up at robinhood.com Golden Hosting on Airbnb has never been easier with Airbnb's new co host network Find yourself a co host@airbnb.com host OpenPhone is the number one business phone system. Build stronger customer relationships and respond faster with shared numbers, AI and automations. Get 20% off your first six months when you go to openphone.com profiting as always. You can find all of our incredible deals in the show notes or@youngandprofiting.com deals I'm starting this New Year in Texas, y'all. Well, I still need to work on the y'all part, but I've taken a big leap into the unknown and booked a beautiful Airbnb here in Austin. And so many entrepreneurs that I know love it here. And I'm gonna see if I love it here as well. And so far, so good. And while I still have to make a decision if I wanna live here in Texas permanently, one decision I've already made is what to do with my new pad when I'm not in it. And that's hosting it on Airbnb. Of course. The thing is, when it comes to hosting my place on Airbnb, I don't really want to worry about the hosting part. I'm so busy with my company and podcasts, I couldn't possibly put another thing on my plate. And plus, you know me, I love to delegate, especially if it saves me time and money. And now with Airbnb's new co host network, I can just do that when it comes to my place. That's right, hosting just got a whole lot easier with Airbnb's co host network. You can hire a high quality local co host to take care of your home and guests vetted on Airbnb. Co hosts have knowledge in the hosting space and can help get your investment properties set up for you. Imagine having someone who can handle reservations, guest communication and on site support for you so that you can handle other things like your own business, y'all. It's never been easier to host or co host your home on Airbnb. Find yourself A co host@airbnb.com host hey app fam. I hope you enjoyed my interview with Mark Manson this week in which he showcased his wonderfully candid perspective on discovering life's deeper purposes. Mark is the bestselling author of many books, including the Subtle Art of Not Giving an Fantasy, and was also on my show way back in episode number 65 during the early days of the pandemic. And so we decided to give you a double dose of Mark Manson for this week's YAP classic. In that episode, Mark talked with me about the downfalls of hope and why we'll never be satisfied unless we face the uncomfortable truths of life head on. That's deep. He also had some great actionable advice on how to gain more self control, make better decisions, and even how to use pain to strengthen your relationships. So enjoy this hard hitting classic conversation with the always entertaining and thought provoking Mark Manson.
- [03:32]
Mark Manson
Welcome to the show, Mark.
- [03:34]
It's good to be here. Thanks for having me.
- [03:36]
For my guests who don't know you, I would like to get some color about your background. I read some of your blogs on career advice and you note that you're living out your dream job currently. And I say that with like air quotes because I know there's no such thing as 100% perfect job. So how did you end up becoming a blogger and an author? Was that something you always wanted to do or did that sort of like fall into your lap?
- [04:01]
It was kind of an accident. See, I graduated from college in the last crisis we had, which was the financial crisis in 2008 and there was like zero job market and I kind of bounced around a few odd jobs. I lived on a friend's couch for a while and I started doing freelance web design. And around the same time I read Tim Ferriss Four Hour Work Week, which talked about building online businesses and automating them and how you could work four hours a week and go live and play in Argentina or whatever. I was like, hell yeah, I'm in. That sounds perfect. And so I spent the next couple years trying to actually build e commerce sites and like affiliate marketing sites. And it turned out that I was kind of bad at it. I'm not a natural salesman or marketer. But the funny thing was was at the time, blogs were kind of like all the rage back then.
- [05:01]
And so when did you start?
- [05:03]
I started blogging in 2008. And so if you wanted people to come to your website, if you wanted to rank on Google, if you wanted, there wasn't much sharing on social media back then it was you had to be blogging, you had to be posting articles and coming up with stuff. And so that's actually how I ended up blogging. Originally it was just to like promote these crappy affiliate sites I had. And it turned out I was much better at blogging than I was E commerce.
- [05:30]
Yeah.
- [05:31]
And by 2011, 2012, it was blogging was all I was doing.
- [05:36]
Yeah. You are such a good writer. So many people like, really like your writing style because it's so different. It's like a breath of fresh air. It's like a little witty and cheeky. So, so props to you. I actually had a website as well. I had an entertainment news website from like 2010 to 2013. And I think that was like the height of blogging, but I couldn't monetize it. And so I shut that down. And your blog is one of the only blogs I think that really has been able to monetize. You've got like a premium subscription. I know you also have a podcast, which is sort of like the audio version of a blog, in my opinion. So would you recommend like going, starting a blog or a podcast, or do you think those things are saturated now?
- [06:16]
I definitely think blogging's in a tough spot. What happened with blogging is just that all of the smaller and medium sized websites, they either they couldn't monetize anymore or they got eaten up by larger networks and large websites. So people went to Huffington Post, started writing for Huffington Post or Business Insider or whatever. So it's a tough spot to start. And I mean, I don't want to discourage anybody from blogging, but if you're looking to build a content business, blogging is probably one of the worst options right now.
- [06:51]
I totally agree.
- [06:53]
If I was starting today, I would start a podcast or a YouTube channel. Those are the spaces that are still growing very quickly. Those are the spaces where there's still a lot of opportunity. The big media companies haven't totally figured out what works or how to do it. Those are always going to be the spaces where young hustlers have an advantage.
- [07:14]
I totally agree. And I'll be more frank with my listeners because I have a more personal relationship with them. I would totally avoid blogging if you don't blog yet, because unless you're Mark Manson, who was able from back then, when it was like at its peak, to get all these subscribers and things, it's really hard. And I would, I would suggest working on something like he mentioned, like podcasts or YouTube instead. Okay, so we have limited time. And like I mentioned your new book, everything has so much content. And I definitely want to get into some of the key takeaways that I found. Just to summarize, in my opinion, at a super high level, what this book is about, it's really about becoming an adult. And not just any adult, but the best adult that you can be. And some people think that, like when you turn 18, you automatically become an adult, but that's not really the case. 13% of adults actually behave and think like adults, according to some studies. We'll get into that later. I just want to say that I read that book. It was great. I felt like I was getting a philosophy lesson with a modern twist. And I really learned about philosophers I didn't really know much about, like Nietzsche and Kant and Plato. And so I want to just say thank you for writing something that's, like, easy to understand for somebody who's not really into philosophy. I want to go back to when you actually started first writing this book. So it released in May 2019, so I'm assuming you wrote it like the year before. At that time, why did you think that everything was.
- [08:41]
Well, it's funny talking about this now when actually there is a real crisis happening, because I think we so easily forget that. I feel like that period of 2017, 2018, 2019, there was kind of like a fever pitch in our culture where everything felt like a crisis, but nothing was actually a crisis. Like people were always freaking out over everything that happened, whereas, you know, you look out the window and everything's great. And job market's best it's been in 50 years, and economy's doing great. And all the metrics in terms of like life expectancy and health and education are like all time highs. You know, meanwhile you go on Twitter and you would think that like the apocalypse was happening. So, yeah, the book was very much written to address that. What is it about, not just our culture today, but our generation that we get so worked up about things and trying to put those things in perspective. And it's ironic because one of the things that I talked about in the book is that there's a little bit of a paradox where when things are great, you kind of have to make up problems to be upset about, because it's by being upset about things that you give your life a sense of meaning or a sense of hope. And when things are actually up as they are right now, you don't have to go searching for a crisis. You don't have to go searching for problems. The problem's right there in front of you. So in a weird way, crises are almost psychologically easier for us to bear because we know exactly what to hope for.
- [10:22]
Yeah. So it's almost like when things are going so great, we end up making it worse for ourselves because we imagine things to be so bad, or we make things that we wouldn't otherwise think are bad just to, like, kind of satisfy our need to have a crisis and our need to kind of, like, hope for something. So tell us what the definition of hope is, in your opinion. Like, how do you define hope?
- [10:47]
I define hope as some sort of vision of the future that we believe will be better. There are a couple of things that are interesting about. I guess that definition of hope is. One is just simply that if we don't have some vision of our future that is better, that's when we fall into depression or despair. One of the things I talk about in chapter one is that the opposite of happiness is not sadness or anger. The opposite of happiness is hopelessness is the sense that nothing we do matters. Nothing that we do will affect any sorts of change. But the other thing about that vision of a better future is that, paradoxically, that it's easier to have hope when times are bad, and it's more difficult to find hope when things are good and comfortable. And so for me, that's. I present. There's a lot of statistics like, you know, suicide is the highest in the wealthiest and safest countries in the world. People who, once they reach middle class or upper middle class, you see things like depression, anxiety, mental health issues start to start to increase. And that doesn't really make sense. But when you look at it in terms of the difficulty it comes with hoping for something better in the future, it kind of explains that.
- [12:07]
And so I know that a way that we can kind of deal with the issue of hope is to deal with something you call the uncomfortable truth and take that head on. Can you explain that concept to our listeners?
- [12:21]
Sure. The uncomfortable truth is that, you know, in the grand scheme of things, the vast majority of the things that we say and do are not gonna matter.
- [12:33]
Period.
- [12:36]
You know, it reminds me, like, when I was at school, I remember taking an astronomy course and, like, just learning how vast the universe is and how, like, long the history of the earth is and how many billions of people have come before. And it's just like that feeling of smallness of. And insignificance. It's like, wow. And I was really upset over what My mom said this morning, it just seems so trifling by comparison. So the uncomfortable truth is just this realization that the vast majority of the things that you spend your energy, time and energy caring about are not going to matter in the long run. And on the one hand, that can be a very depressing realization, but on the other hand, it can be a very liberating realization because it allows you to let go of those things.
- [13:22]
But how would somebody get motivated from that? Or is your point not to motivate someone from the uncomfortable truth? Is the point for the person to feel like, less stressed about everyday life? What's the point of acknowledging that uncomfortable truth?
- [13:38]
Well, I think we all spend a lot of our energy avoiding that truth. So we convince ourselves that some little project in our life is like life and death important or something we say to another person is like if we embarrass ourselves in front of somebody, it's like, oh my God, our lives are over. It's the uncomfortable truth. It's a scary thing that we avoid accepting. But if you are able to accept shows you that most of the things that stress you out are actually not that significant. And so it kind of has a little bit of a double edged sword. It can make everything feel meaning, but at the same time, if most of the things that you say or do or pursue are meaningless, then that means you're completely free to do what matters to you. There's no excuse to not embarrass yourself or to not fail at something, or to not pursue a dream or to not tell somebody that you love them. Because we're all going to die anyway, so you might as well live each moment to its fullest.
- [14:45]
Yeah, totally. It's like, gives you some perspective and also helps you with your priorities and makes you realize that like, this big problem that I have isn't really that serious. Who's gonna remember it when I die? Who's gonna. So that's a good point.
- [14:59]
Hala Taha
Let's hold that thought and take a quick break with our sponsors. Yeah, fam. When I first started this podcast, believe it or not, I had an all volunteer team to help me out. But as my business took off, I needed to hire a lot of new people and fast. It soon became pretty overwhelming because I had to sort through piles and piles of resumes, conduct countless interviews, and you.
- [15:20]
Mark Manson
Know how it goes.
- [15:21]
Hala Taha
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- [19:33]
Mark Manson
Something else in your book that I really thought was interesting was the concept of the thinking and feeling brain. And so this is something that people have been talking about for a long time. In the Christian era, I think that it was people thought that it was more like the thinking brain that was in control. But now, more recently, people are saying it's really the feeling brain that's in control of our mind. You have this awesome analogy of the conscious car. Would you explain that to us and help us understand your perspective between the thinking and feeling brain and how they react with each other?
- [20:07]
Sure. So the consciousness car is, if you think about the two aspects of our minds, kind of the emotional side of the mind and then the more rational side of our mind. Most of us operate under the assumption that the rational side of our mind is like the adult in the car who's driving and is in charge. And the emotional side of our mind is like the obnoxious kid in the passenger seat who just won't shut up and is like demanding ice cream all the time. And a lot of what we understand as being like a disciplined, mature human being is like teaching that kid and that the emotional side of our brain to just shut the up for like, 40% of the time so that the adult, like, the rational part of our brain, can, like, get to work and do the right things and be a. Be like a functioning human being. But what's interesting is that if you look at psychological research, it's like, it turns out that we're all very driven. It's actually the emotional side of our brain is the one that's driving the car. And the thinking part of our brain is very good at explaining our emotional impulses in a way that sound very reasonable and rational, but they aren't necessarily. And so really, we are very impulsive creatures. We all make most of our decisions based on our emotions, based on our feelings. And if we're not aware that we're doing that, then the rational side of our brain is kind of enslaved by our emotions to always just justify whatever we feel about ourselves. And so what I argue in that part of the book is that instead of working, trying to work against our emotions or, like, suppress our emotions or deny our emotions, we need to work with our emotions. We need to understand the role that each part. Part of our mind plays. Because the emotional side of our brain is incredibly important. It determines our motivation, it determines our inspiration. It determines where we feel value and significance in our lives. And so if we deny that part of ourselves and just try to be rational all the time, then we're kind of gutting ourselves of the meaning in our lives. So what I argue is that we should get the two sides of our brains talking to each other and listening to each other, which is difficult because they kind of speak different languages. But in my opinion, that's kind of what emotional, or I would say even mental health is.
- [22:48]
Yeah.
- [22:48]
Having the rational side of our brain and the emotional side of our brain interacting with each other and understanding each other.
- [22:57]
So give us, like, a real example of doing that. Like a situation where. Let's give an example of, like, you don't feel like going to the gym, but you know that you should. Like, what's the dialogue that you should be having in your head?
- [23:09]
Right? So if you feel like you should be working out, but you're not. We've all experienced that before, and most of us, we judge ourselves. We're like, man, I'm such a loser. I can't get out of bed and go to the gym. And we see it as a failure of willpower. We see it as a failure of kind of like our rational side of our mind. But the fact of the matter is until we are emotionally motivated to go to the gym, until we enjoy going to the gym, to some extent, we're not going to go. We're always going to find a reason not to go. And so in that sense, it's an emotional problem. It's not a problem of knowledge. It's not a problem of willpower or whatever. So if we understand that what we can do, instead of trying to will ourselves to the gym constantly, what you can do is you can set up your environment in such a way in that you make it enjoyable to go to the gym. So maybe you find a friend who goes to the gym with you. And it's in that way, if you wake up and you're supposed to meet your friend at the gym at 8am the fear of embarrassment of not being there and like your friend arriving and you not like that is an emotional motivation that will get you out of bed and going to the gym, you know, another way to do it is to hire a trainer and be like, well, I spent all this damn money and I'm going to feel awful if I don't use it. So it's using your rational mind to create parameters and circumstances that make something emotionally enjoyable to do.
- [24:38]
Yeah, it's like tricking your feeling brain into something that you want to do.
- [24:43]
Totally.
- [24:45]
So another piece of this thinking and feeling brain in your book that you talk about is how the thinking brain tries to maintain a sense of hope. And we were talking about hope before. Can you help us understand the connection with that?
- [24:57]
Well, the thinking brain is always. You're always trying to envision some sort of better future for yourselves. And whether that's like, you as an individual or if it's the world being a better place or impressing your parents or whatever. Like it's, we all need some sort of carrot dangling in front of us to give ourselves direction and purpose in our lives. And so the thinking brain's job is to kind of come up with those sorts of things is to, to figure out that equation of if I do X, then I will be happy, you know, whatever.
- [25:35]
Okay, so let's move on to another big topic, which is pain and values. Now you say pain is a currency of our values. I thought this was super powerful. Help us understand why you think that, like, pain is what really keeps our us motivated and things like that.
- [25:57]
Well, generally people, you know, people like to avoid pain, but the problem with avoiding pain is that we only value things in our lives in proportion to how much we feel we have to give up for it. So, like, if you think about like a spoiled child, like a child that's just given everything he or she wants.
- [26:16]
Yeah.
- [26:17]
The reason there are these spoiled kids grew up to be like awful human beings is because they never understand the value of anything. Everything is just a frivolous thing for them to experience from moment to moment. It's only when you're able to go through some sort of challenge or hardship that you are able to understand what is worth sacrificing for and what is not. It's only once you've lost something that you understand how valuable, how meaningful it was in your life. And so I just. Through all my work and all my books, I consistently make the argument that pain and suffering is important.
- [26:57]
Yes.
- [26:58]
And not only is it impossible to get rid of pain and suffering, but like, we need to have pain and suffering because psychologically it is kind of like the fuel that generates our sense of meaning and importance in the world.
- [27:12]
Yeah.
- [27:12]
And so it's not a question of getting rid of pain, it's. It's like choosing better pain.
- [27:16]
Totally. Yeah. And we can go back to the workout example. The more you put yourself in pain with working out, the more you're able to keep working out and kind of like build that strength. And everything is pain. When you're happy, it's just like your pain is alleviated. When you're sad, it's your pain is amplified. So let's talk about anti fragility. This is a really cool concept that you have. And basically it means that we need to kind of, like you said, choose our suffering and be okay with choosing pain and not avoiding it. Can you tell us more about that?
- [27:51]
So antifragility comes from Nassim Taleb. It's a really cool idea where he talks about how the opposite of fragility, or being fragile, it's not necessarily being robust, it's actually being antifragile, which is you gain from pain or disorder in your life. And so if you look at things like the human body or the human mind, the human body and human mind are actually. They're not resilient, they're anti fragile. The reason you get stronger at the gym is because you are breaking your muscles back down and making them stronger. The reason that you get better after failure is because you are breaking down a lot of your assumptions and beliefs and your fears and building up better experiences over them. And so in that sense, by actually inviting certain amounts of pain and struggle into your life, you make yourself a stronger individual with far more. More potential. And one of the big arguments of the book is, is what I. And what I fear is that, you know, in our culture, there's been such a. It's been. It's. It's becoming so taken for granted that, you know, we're all like. We're all supposed to be happy, and we all deserve to be happy, and we all deserve to have a great, easy life and nobody should suffer and all this stuff. And yes, we should try to get rid of injustice. We should try to get rid of people who are predatory or people who are. Who are evil. But you shouldn't try to get rid of suffering because suffering is necessary for growth. It's necessary for making people stronger, more resilient, more mature human beings. And so what I fear is that as our culture kind of has turned towards this obsession with positivity and feeling good all the time, we are losing that ability to grow from our pain and our failures.
- [29:48]
And I think you say this in the book. You say that everything you do, everything you are, everything you care about is a reflection of your choice, your relationships, health, work, emotional stability, your integrity, your breath of your life experience. If any of these things are fragile in your life, it's because you've chosen to avoid pain. I think that's so powerful because it's so true. The way that you grow is through pain. Let's stick on that a little bit. Tell us about how pain helps you grow and how if you don't choose to accept pain and if you avoid pain, how you kind of stay as an adolescent and you don't ever really grow up to be an actual adult. Tell us about that.
- [30:29]
So I think for me, and I define this in the book, but, like, what defines an adult or just being a mature, healthy individual is that ability to understand what is worth suffering for and when is it worth suffering for it. In the simple example of, like, say, a romantic relationship, for that relationship to grow, you have to understand when a fight needs to happen. Some people, and I think kind of younger, more idealistic people, their idea of a good relationship is a relationship where you just never fight. But it's like, that's not a healthy relationship because that means you're hiding things, you're pretending things are not happening, and that makes you more fragile as a couple. Whereas if you get very good at noticing the things that need to be addressed and being able to address them, even though you know you're gonna Fight about it. You know, it's gonna be painful. You know, you're gonna be angry at each other for a day or two. If you're able to do that, you actually become a stronger.
- [31:27]
Yeah, your bond is stronger.
- [31:29]
It's the same thing in business. You know, if you've got employees that are messing up, like, you can't just pretend they're not messing up. You have to say something. Or if you've got a co worker that's screwing around, like, you have to say something.
- [31:45]
So it's.
- [31:47]
There are so many instances everywhere you kind of look in life, there's a skill set of understanding what pain is necessary for growth to occur and then having the ability to step into that pain.
- [32:02]
I loved the fact that you brought up how pain can strengthen relationships. So just to relate to that a little bit, my listeners don't really know this. I haven't really shared this, but I shared it on LinkedIn, but not on my podcast. I actually went home to take care of my whole family who got coronavirus. So, like, my mom, my dad, my brother, and my brother was home from California. And, you know, we haven't spent that much time together in a long time, you know, and it was such a hard time. But now I feel so close to my brother and my mom and everything, because it's like we, like, went through that crazy time together, and we'll never forget that. And it was. It's. It was horrible. But at the same time, like, my relationship, particularly with my brother, is, like, so strengthened because we went through this horrible experience together. So it's just. It's funny how, like, even if it's a horrible experience, there's always some silver lining. And actually, like, that kind of pain can. Can grow a really big bond.
- [32:57]
Absolutely. And it's. I talked about this in my first book, Subtle Art. I said that if you think about the most important experiences of your life, probably three out of four of them were negative experiences, like a breakup, a death, losing a job, like these all. They're horrible in the moment, but, like, when you look back on them years and years later, you're like, wow, I'm so glad that happened. I'm such a. Such a better person for that happening.
- [33:26]
So you say that living well does not mean avoid suffering. It means suffering for the right reasons.
- [33:31]
Hala Taha
So.
- [33:31]
Mark Manson
So tell us, what do you suffer for? What suffering do you do to provide value in your life?
- [33:38]
Well, I stay inside. That's one way. I suffer for the right reasons. I think there are a few fronts. One I think the most obvious example is just my career. So it's. Writing is. I mean, it's fun a lot of times, but a lot of times it's suffering. You know, I'm finishing up another book right now, and I went back to revise a chapter that I hadn't looked at in a few months. And I just looked at it and I'm like, this is terrible. This is absolutely terrible. And it's just. It's like almost heartbreaking. Like, I had to take the rest of the afternoon off because to have something that you've been working on for over a year and you think you're almost done, and then you go look at, like, an early part of it and you're like, wow, that's. I can't publish that. That is awful. It just flattens you. And I think writing is. It has its emotional struggles that a lot of people just don't. I seem to be constituted for it. I like being alone. I like working by myself. I don't mind rewriting something like eight different times. And so that's a form of suffering that I'm well adapted to and that I. I even get a little bit of a sick pleasure out of. And so that's kind of why it's become my life. One thing I always say in my talks is that it's not being good at something is not because you enjoy it necessarily. Being good at something is you enjoy the sacrifices that are involved in it.
- [35:10]
Totally.
- [35:11]
In a way, the thing you end up best at is just the pain you can tolerate better than most other people.
- [35:17]
Hala Taha
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- [40:26]
Mark Manson
Totally. And that's kind of like back to like you're in your dream job. Not every job is perfect. It's like, what job do you enjoy the most? Like even the shitty parts of the the job can you tolerate the most? That's how you find your dream job. It's not like something that you like all the time and you're always happy doing it. It's just like the parts that do suck. Are you able to manage that suffering enough?
- [40:47]
Yeah, it's even if you're in your dream job, like your dream job's gonna suck about 30% of the time. Like there's Just no such thing. Like, we all have to do taxes. Like, there's just no such thing as a job that is fun every single day. Yeah.
- [41:03]
So I do want to talk about the difference between a child, an adolescent, and an adult. You say it's not how old they are or what they do, but why they do something. Can you unpack that for us?
- [41:14]
Sure. So when I go through this, I'm summarizing. There's a field called developmental psychology, and so I'm kind of just summarizing this entire field. But basically, the human mind develops in a series of stages. We don't just come out of the womb, you know, knowing how to drive a car and send an email. So when we're kids, we're generally very. Everything we understand about the world and understand about life is very much just derived from pleasure and pain. Toys make us happy. Candy makes us happy. Falling off the bed makes us sad. You know, like, it just. We don't really think past that. Kids aren't able to think about the future. They aren't really able to reason about the past. They aren't able to think about other people's feelings or what other people might do. It's just all they know is, like, this is fun. This is not fun. I want to do the fun thing. As we get older, though, we start to realize things. We start to realize that sometimes something is pleasurable now, but it causes pain later. So maybe it feels good to eat a pound of candy right now, but when I'm, like, sick in six hours, you know, last time I did that, I got sick and I felt awful. And so kids start to understand that there are repercussions for things. They start to understand that there's cause effect. They understand that other people have thoughts and feelings that are affected by their actions as well. And so around late childhood or early adolescence, maybe around ages like 8, 9, 10, kids start to figure out that the world is very transactional. Like, if I agree to do what mom says today, she will reward me tomorrow. And so the adolescent phase is very much built off of a life of managing transactions, of understanding that if I behave in these certain ways, people will be nice to me and I will get good things that I want. Now, the transactional approach to life is fine. Like, we all need to be able to do it. We all need to be able to think through those things. But the problem is, is that it kind of objectifies everything. So if your approach to all of your relationships is, well, I'm gonna say this to Hala Because I know she likes to hear that. So if I say this, she'll like me. That's great if I'm, like, trying to get a favor from you. But if I'm trying to be a friend or if I'm a family member, that's a really crappy way to have a personal relationship with somebody that, like, everything they say to you is based on what they think you want. Like, it's just, you can't really operate in life that way, and you run into the same thing. You know, if you look at businesses, for instance, like, some people are very good at the transactional game of, okay, if I put this product out or market it this way, I'll get a lot of money. That's one way to play that game. But at a certain point, you. You have to ask yourself, okay, maybe this will make me a lot of money, but am I screwing over my customers? Am I willing to screw over my customers? Or am I willing to break a law to add profit to my bottom line? You start running into situations like that. And so it's only when you get to adulthood that you understand that sometimes you simply have to willingly take on pain for no other reason than it's the right thing to do, that it's better for you in the long run, it's better for society in the long run. It's better for the people you care about in the long run. And so a lot of kind of like the highest virtuous concepts that we've had throughout human history, things like honesty, charity, compassion, these are all things that can really only be attained in adulthood. I have to be willing to sacrifice myself for my family or willingly sacrifice myself or give up potential profits to make sure my employees are taken care of. Those sorts of actions and behaviors can only occur once you've kind of transcended this transactional view of the world. And so that's the adult view.
- [45:19]
Yeah. And if I remember correctly from your book, to think and act like an adult, you need to endure pain, you need to abandon hope, and you need to let go of the desire for more pleasant and fun things, and you have to act unconditionally. That's something else that.
- [45:35]
Yes, the unconditionality. Yeah.
- [45:37]
Yeah.
- [45:38]
And the thing about adulthood, I mean, I go kind of hardcore on it, but I think people should understand that it's like an ideal. And I even mentioned that often this kind of ideal, this selflessness of adulthood is something that's been canonized and crystallized in religious myths and heroes and stories. And things like that. Like none of us are actually fully that that way all the time.
- [46:01]
Yeah, it's impossible.
- [46:02]
We've all still got like our inner child that like just wants to drink ice cream for the next three hours, you know, and then we've all got the adolescent in us who's like, maybe I can scheme a little bit and get a little bit more for myself. Like, it's those things. Never. You never completely leave those things.
- [46:19]
It's like, what point of the spectrum are you on? Totally. So one of the other topics. There's so much content in your book. I'm actually having a hard time, like trying to grab everything that I need to talk about. This is definitely one of the hardest interviews that I've had in terms of that, of tying everything together. But one thing that I wanted to talk about is fake freedom versus real freedom. I thought this was really important for my listeners to understand your perspective on. Can you talk to us about that?
- [46:44]
Yeah, I feel like this is very important in this day and age and especially in the U.S. i think if you look historically, the idea of freedom and liberty is not what we traditionally think of it today. Today we think of freedom and liberty as simply being able to do whatever the hell we want when we want to do it, without being constrained by any sort of outside force whatsoever. In my opinion, this is a very childlike, entitled version of freedom. This idea that it's like I should be able to do whatever the hell I want. And you, if you don't like it like that is like an angry child sitting on the floor of a grocery store demanding that he can eat as much candy as he wants. The truth is that we all live in a society. We all have to make compromises because we are all better off for it. And the truth as well is that when you do indulge everything you want, it makes you more fragile. It makes you a weaker human being. It makes you a more susceptible individual to outside forces. In chapter eight of the book, I spend that whole chapter kind of arguing that we need to redefine freedom the same way that the philosophers and the Greeks and Romans understood it, which is that freedom is the ability to choose what to give up. Freedom is choosing what you will sacrifice. And so freedom is not sitting on the couch eating whatever the hell you want for the rest of your life. Freedom is actually getting up at six in the morning and going to the gym. Because by building up your body, you are actually giving yourself more options for the future by limiting options today, by choosing which Options you're going to limit today by choosing not to eat Cheetos, you are giving yourself more options in the long run. And so freedom is actually. It's a personal form of discipline. It's. It's a constant choice of what sacrifice am I going to bring into my life and what is going to be important to me. And so in that sense, I see things like, and I just have to bring this up because we're in the middle of it now. Like, there are people protesting during this coronavirus thing saying that the government shouldn't tell me to stay home, I shouldn't have to stay home, blah, blah, blah. You know, and it's like, it's like, guys, you can't. Like, you're okay. If the government tells you you can't smoke next to a pregnant person, or like, you can't smoke in a restaurant, you know, you're fine. If the government tells you you can't scream fire in a theater, how is this any different? At some point, you have to accept that it's not about what you. Freedom is not about what you individually want. It is about what you are individually capable of sacrificing and giving up, both for yourself and for the greater good.
- [49:36]
And also because I think you talk about this in your book, that if freedom is variety or, you know, unlimited experiences, like, you'll never be satisfied. You'll never actually be free because you'll never be satisfied. There'll always be something else that you're trying to attain, and so you'll never really be free. You say that freedom isn't what you can experience, it's what you can limit yourself to. I think that's really powerful stuff. Okay, so the last question I'm going to ask. It's on the last chapter of your book. You ask us to abandon hope all throughout the book, but when I was reading your last chapter, it's clear that you have hope in science and technology and AI and you imagine the world in the future where AI has taken over humans and ultimately does a better job of running the show than we do. And that's terrifying. But then it's oddly hopeful. So talk to our listeners about this world that you imagine in the future.
- [50:33]
With AI well, first, I would argue that it's not even the future really. It's already happening. I think AI runs the world better than humans in many ways already. The last chapter is a little bit tongue in cheek. It's a little bit just me being a little bit crazy and being like, you know what? Let's see how far I can take this. One of the more tragic things I talk about in the book is that ultimately we do have to hope for something. But our hopes inevitably end up causing everything to be. You know, it's everything is, which is why we need hope. But then it's our hopes are what cause everything to be. So it's kind of like this vicious cycle that keeps happening and it's just kind of an inherent part of our psychology. There's not really any way around it. And so really the message of the book is like, since we can't get rid of hope, we have to just be very, very careful about what we hope for. And the last chapter is kind of my very, very careful, slightly facetious hopes, which is just that I personally think one of the cornerstones of my personal philosophy and kind of all my work in general is that humans suck. We are just. We're not. The human mind is not very well equipped to handle global ethical, moral questions. If you look at human history, it's just full of violence and screw ups and disasters. So it's my starting point is like if there's any way we're going to kind of save ourselves from ourselves, it's going to happen via science and technology in some form. So that is the one thing I dare to hope for. Although I am also very skeptical of my own hopes.
- [52:28]
Yeah, well, I hope our AI masters are nice to us.
- [52:34]
Exactly.
- [52:34]
Not evil. Okay, cool. So the last question I ask all my guests is what is your secret to profiting in life?
- [52:43]
Secret of profiting in life. I think if you just make it a habit to give more value than you consume, good things will happen everywhere. It'll happen with people, in relationships, it'll happen in business. It'll happen in your own life. Like it's just build a habit of give more than you take.
- [53:04]
I love that. That reminds me of David Meltzer. Thank you so much, Mark. You have such great content. Your books are amazing. I would highly recommend everybody to go get your latest book. Everything is. You can find it everywhere. And thanks so much for your time today.
- [53:19]
Thanks for having me.
- [53:20]
Hala Taha
Thank you.