A Process for Finding & Achieving Your Unique Purpose | Robert Greene

welcome to the huberman Lab podcast

where we discuss science and

science-based tools for everyday

[Music]

life I'm Andrew huberman and I'm a

professor of neurobiology and

Opthalmology at Stanford School of

Medicine my guest today is Robert Green

Robert Green is an author who has

written more than five bestselling books

including the 48 Laws of Power the laws

of human nature and Mastery he did his

bachelor's training at the University of

California Berkeley and the University

of Wisconsin at Madison Robert Green's

books are both unique and important for

several reasons not the least of which

is that they explore the interaction

between the psychology of self

self-exploration and the psychology of

human interaction all rooted in history

and modern culture and at the same time

in a way that pertains to everybody I

first learned about Robert's work from

reading the book Mastery which to my

mind is a brilliant exploration and a

practical tool for how to think about

and pursue one's purpose purp whenever

I'm asked for book suggestions I always

include Mastery in my top three

recommendations during today's

discussion we cover a wide range of

topics including how to find and pursue

and Achieve one's purpose we talk about

the selection of a life partner as well

as romantic and other types of

relationships we also discussed the

topics of motivation and urgency and

this concept of death ground which arose

during our discussion of Robert's recent

stroke Robert stroke rendered him

certain limitations but also has allowed

him to explore how to write how to

exercise indeed how to interface with

life in general in new ways that allow

him to continue to expand his sense of

purpose I'm certain that by the end of

today's episode you will have gleaned

tremendous amounts of new knowledge that

will allow you to navigate forward along

the path to your purpose perhaps find

your purpose if you feel you haven't

done that yet as well as to greatly

enhance your relationship with yourself

with others and indeed to the world

around you before we begin I'd like to

emphas ize that this podcast is separate

from my teaching and research roles at

Stanford it is however part of my desire

and effort to bring zero cost to

Consumer information about science and

science related tools to the general

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access a free 30-day trial and now for

my discussion with Robert Green Robert

I'm so happy you're here I'm reallyy

happy to be here Andrew thank you so

much for inviting me a short

story in 2015 I was teaching a course to

undergraduates this was a big course 450

students where was this this was when I

was a professor at University of

California San Diego I was about to move

back to Stanford um but the course was

entitled neural circuits in health and

disease but there was a final lecture

where I would do a lot of Q&A with the

students about science about careers

about career paths and what I found was

that many of the students had questions

about not just science but about how to

learn and forage for information yeah

and I recommended three books at the end

of the course every year that I taught

it I taught it for four years and one of

the books was the book longitude which

is a wonderful story about discovery of

timekeeping devices at c um one book

I'll leave as a mystery um not to be not

to be mysterious but because it's not

it's it's a science book I'll just tell

you what it is it's um uh principles of

Neuroscience so I thought that I don't

know that one yeah it's a big it makes a

better a door stop uh for most than than

a book but it's it's a wonderful

resource um if you want to learn about

neuroscience and your book Mastery W and

the reason I recommended Mastery is

because these students were soon going

to go into the great Jungle of yeah you

know post uh undergraduate education and

and for me I found Mastery to be an

absolutely transformative book in that

it taught me so much about how to learn

from others how to expect certain types

of um interactions when one kind of

assigns themselves to a mentor um and

vice versa and it talked about some

things that we'll get into in more depth

today but not the least of which is

about identifying that um unique seed

that exists within all of us that can

guide our best decisions in terms of

finding our purpose and it and so I will

usually end with a great debt of

gratitude and I'll probably do that

again at the end but I want to start

with a great debt of gratitude uh

Mastery transformed my entire life and

and in many ways this podcast probably

wouldn't exist were it not for Mastery

because um it really embedded in me this

idea that we all have uh a deeper

purpose and it explains how to go about

finding that purpose so I tell you that

and I also will use that as a segue for

um asking you now since I'm sure

people's ears are picked up to this you

know how do you find your purpose um

could you share with us what what it is

to find one's purpose and how early life

events perhaps can cue us to what that

purpose is for each of us well thank you

for that that marvelous introduction I'm

almost blushing that's that's fantastic

story um well you know being a human

being is not easy as opposed to an

animal because we're born and nobody

gives us like a direction our parents

might be a little bit our college

teachers Etc mentors but generally we're

on our own and it's a very very

difficult process you wake up in the

morning and you don't really know what

you're what you can do you could choose

12 different paths it can be very

confusing and very overwhelming when you

find that sense of purpose when you find

what I call your life's task everything

has a direction everything has a purpose

your energy is concentrated it's it's

not like you're just going down a single

narrow pathway it's not like life

becomes boring and it's just about

discipline and solving problems it's

actually the most exciting thing that

can ever happen to you because you never

have that lost feeling you wake up in

the morning you go yeah this is what I

need to accomplish people come at you

with all kinds of distractions and

boring and irritating things you're able

to cut it out it's just the most

marvelous piece of internal radar that

you can have so I genuinely wish that

everybody can find that kind of internal

radar and so it's not easy and I

understand that there's no like instant

formula because we're all about instant

formulas it's difficult and I want you

to know that so it's not like Robert can

give me the answer in three minutes no I

can't but there's a process involved

it's not it's not you know a mystery you

can follow a very singular process and

the idea is you're talking about

childhood the way I like to frame it is

when you were were born you are a

phenomenon you are unique your DNA has

never occurred in the history of the

universe going back billions of years it

will never occur in the future your life

experience with your parents and

everything that you experienc in your

early years going on up is unique it's

yours you're are one of a kind right so

that is your source of power to waste

that is just the worst thing you can do

in your life and what what the power is

is find finding that uniqueness what

makes you you and how you can M that and

how you can go deep into it and use that

to create a career path right and so I

tell people when you're a child when

you're four or five or even younger you

have what the great psychologist maslo

called impulse voices there Little

voices in your head that say I love this

I hate that I like this food I don't

like when Mommy moves this way I like

when Daddy comes from here here you're

very queued into who you are and what

you like and what you don't like and

these voices kind of direct you in

certain ways

right and when you're very young they

direct you towards intellectual mental

Pursuits as well and there's a book I

recommend for everybody uh it's Howard

Gardner's five frames of mind it's

helped me immensely the idea is he talks

about five forms of

intelligence our problem is we think of

intelligence as mostly intellectual but

there are many forms of intelligence

there's the intelligence that has to do

with words there's abstract intelligence

that has to do with patterns and

Mathematics there's kinetic intelligence

it has to do with the body there's

social intelligence he has five of them

and the idea is your brain naturally

veers towards one of them it can Veer

towards two of them that happens but

generally one of them kind of dominates

right and it's like a grain in your

brain that's going in a certain

direction you want to go with that grain

and because that's where your power will

lie so when you're young if you go back

and think about when you were four or

five you you can maybe get a picture of

some kind of direction or voice inside

of you that was impelling you towards

this I know for me it was

words from I can remember when I was six

years old I was just obsessed with words

just the letters in Words almost like in

almost slightly schizophrenic way I

would spell words backwards I would take

them apart I would do anagrams I love

paland drums right so I had a thing

about words and language it's very

Primal some people you know Albert

Einstein when he was four years old his

father gave him a birthday gift of a

compass and he was just mesmerized by

this Compass the idea that there are

invisible forces out there in the cosmos

moving this needle and he's obsessed

with the idea of invisible forces Steve

Jobs when he was like seven or eight or

maybe younger in Berling game California

his father they passed by a store with

de technological devices in the window

and he was just hypnotized by the design

of those devices and the glass tubes and

everything so he wanted to go in that

direction you know Tiger Woods saw his

father hitting golf balls in the garage

and he was just like screaming with joy

he had to he had to do that right you

know I can give you a million different

examples of this of course these are

people who are famous obviously we can

go back and find that it's easier but

what happens to you and please cut me

off if I'm going on too long no please

continue please what happens to you is

you're seven now you're getting older

and you're starting to not hear that

voice anymore you're hearing the voice

of your teachers telling you you're not

good at this field you need to get

better at math you know you shouldn't be

interested in these sports or anything

you should be going this dire your

parents are starting to tell you this is

the career they want for or the

direction they want you to go in right

you start hearing that more than your

own voice and as you get older it gets

worse and worse and worse then when

you're a teenager it's all about what

other people are doing your peers what's

cool what's not cool you know and that

kind of is more so all of these noise

enters your brain and you can't hear

that anymore you don't know who you are

and so you go to

college you kind of maybe choose a a

major that seems practical that your

parents want you to go in into maybe you

kind of wander around you're not sure

and then you enter the work world

without that inner radar that I'm

talking about and you brother you're

lost right where should I go well I need

to make money right and so you make a

choice based on the need to make a lot

of money some not everyone but some

people do that and I understand that

need we all need to make a living but

that can set you off on a very bad path

because you're not connected emotionally

the thing is when you figure out that

Primal inclination that grain that's

inside of you then you have the the

energy to to do to be disciplined to go

through boring tasks to learn you learn

at a faster rate because you're

emotionally engaged when you're

emotionally engaged in a subject the

brain learns twice three times four

times as fast as when you're not I

always give the example in college I

studied foreign languages which was kind

of a passion of mine

for three or four years I studied French

and then I went to Paris and I couldn't

speak a word it was it was useless

because it didn't teach me anything

practical right I was totally confused

and then but I was in Paris and I and I

loved it and I wanted to live there

right and I had a girlfriend and I

needed to speak French to her and I can

tell you in one month I learned more

than those four years of University

because I wanted to because I was

engaged my emotions were there it was

like I had to survive survive to learn

French whereas so most of us we don't

have a need really to learn this subject

We're Half we're paying half attention

but when you find that thing that really

connects to you you're paying deep

attention your emotions are engaged

you're learning at a much faster rate

okay and so the thing is how do you find

that when you're older when you're 21 I

I I give people a lot of help and it's

usually not so difficult we can go

through that process it gets harder when

you're 30 and you've been wandering

around but it's not impossible I didn't

really start find my exact path until I

was 38 39 to be honest so there's hope

when you get 40 and you get 50 gets more

and more difficult right and it's very

sad if you wasted that seed of

uniqueness that I'm talking about and I

tell people there are ways of going back

and we go through a process like

archaeology we have to dig and dig and

dig and find those bones from your

childhood that indicated what you were

meant to do

but when you find your life's task

everything opens up it doesn't mean you

figured out okay I've got to aim for

this particular job when I'm 28 that's

not how it works it gives you a sense of

direction you can try different things

you can experiment you can have fun when

you're in your 20s you're going to learn

you're going to learn skills but it

gives you an overall framework instead

of whoa all this confusion this chaos

social media the internet I could go

here here here you're lost at C it gives

you a very important sense of direction

a compass

as you described this I I have this

image of um you know you mentioned

animals um that presumably don't have a

lot of flexibility in terms of the

niches they can exist in but the way I

imagine this process is that as a human

we're plopped into a environment and

here I'm using analogy where um we don't

really know if we are an aquatic animal

a terrestrial animal or a or an Aven

right or an amphibian or an amphibian

for that matter um and to make the wrong

choice right to be an amphibian who's

trying to fly although I'm sure they're

out there um in the animal kingdom uh it

it's not just a waste of time it's

probably deadly um and not to overd

dramatize the the failure of finding

one's purpose but I see it that way

whereas um perhaps we could just say

that the process of finding one's

purpose is to to realize like ah you

know um I'm an amphibian I can go in and

out of water whereas a bunch of other

creatures around me stop at the water's

edge right right and this is really cool

and a bunch of these other things like

these flying things that they can't

actually even go in the water some of

them might you know be on the surface or

dive into it but they they can't do what

I can do so the process of

self-discovery it sounds like it's about

um restricting one's choices to a a a

sort of wedge within the full landscape

of of options and um you know for me I

can certainly recall after reading

Mastery it helped me recall some early

seed emotions that I experienced as a

very distinct sensation in my body can

you describe that yeah um without making

it too um specific to my my unique taste

you know as a kid I loved um flora and

fauna I loved learning about biology

sure yeah no surprise there um but

animals and how they move in particular

and fish and going to a a proper

aquarium store for the first time for me

and going snorkeling for the first time

was like Wow and even as I describe it

it's almost like my body fls I feel it

in my left arm of all things and it

feels like there's something to do about

it it's not just that I'm in observation

of things that Delight me right it's

like there's something there's an

activation State created within me like

I got to do something with this and

typically it's tell everybody about it

until they won't listen anymore um but

oftentimes it's to also draw those

things to think about them and I just

Delight in them it's a constant source

of delight and so seeds such as those

and there are a few other things in that

in that landscape of Flora and Fauna and

learning about animals and biology

including the human animal and then

organizing information feels so

satisfying to me it's like a drug that

um and so it just felt feels like this

you know Eternal spring of of life right

and so for me that's what it was and to

and in 2015 when I was teaching that

course the course I loved but I was

feeling a little bit astray in my

scientific career and then I read

Mastery and I realized yes I love

running a laboratory I love teaching but

there's something else for me and it has

to do not with a podcast I didn't even

know what a podcast I probably I knew

what a podcast was I was listening to

podcast at that time but um but I wasn't

on social media I had no thoughts of

having a podcast but what I wanted was

that feeling in

its total number of forms that's the

goal get that feeling in as many forms

as possible right is that is that about

that's a that's that's absolutely

perfect because the connection to what

I'm talking about it's not an

intellectual thing it's it's visceral

it's emotional it's physical right and

you feel it in your body and when you're

doing it it's like it's at your level

it's like you're swimming with the

current you feel it things are easy

everything clicks together there's a

delight not everything is going to be

delightful there's going to be tedium

involved there's going to be moments of

boredom but you're able to withstand the

moments of boredom because you feel the

Deep overall connection so yes that's

precisely what I'm talking about I mean

it's for me it's a little bit similar

thing is I said about words but the

other thing that I was obsessed with

when I was a kid was early human

ancestors don't ask me why I just was so

obsessed with our ancestors millions of

years ago and how it's possible to be

living here in the 60s or 70s with cars

and everything but to come to where we

are now and I wrote a a short story when

I was eight years old about a vulture It

Was Written from the point of view of a

vulture watching the first humans kind

of emerge on the planet I'm sure it was

absolutely awful Dreadful but the weird

thing is I'm writing a new book and all

I'm doing in that book is going into ear

into early humans and I feel like a kid

again I'm so excited I'm so happy so I

can very much relate to your

story you mentioned these five different

forms of intelligence or frame frames of

Mind as you refer to them um and I'm

certainly aware that you know I lean

towards a more intellectual interests

although as you pointed out the the

excitement the Delight is visceral yeah

and the actions are actions they're of

the body ultimately right um one has to

draw speak write books Etc um to to

transmute that excitement into something

real for people that are not as

intellectually tuned but maybe are

kinesthetically tuned for instance um I

can only wonder what that's like uh I'm

not completely uncoordinated but I don't

think I have a kinesthetic Attunement uh

or frame of mind but I for instance um

had a podcast listener mention that they

think in feels that they literally

experience thought as a Ser as sort of a

patchwork of bodily Sensations right and

that thought for them is not of the

stuff from the neck up but only from the

neck down which to me was really

intriguing and so I only raise this

because um there have to be a as you

point out there's an infinite number of

different sort of um orientations based

on our unique DNA and experience but

what do you

think explains why these particular

seeds or uh as you point out like the

the the direction that the grain runs in

the brain I mean it's it's partially

going to be nature it's going to be DNA

um but we we're talking about this as if

there's some exciting or a inspiring or

delightful

thing that captures us can it be the

other way too can it be um you know one

has a bad experience as a child in an

intellectual environment and then

decides you know I'm I'm going in the D

things of the body feel good things of

the mind of intellect feels bad and does

it matter whether or not we are drawn to

our Purpose By recognizing what we love

or what we hate um or are both useful oh

they're both very very useful um you

know a lot of intelligence is is not is

non-verbal we think in terms of images

we're we're very much infected by the

emotions of other people so I know for

instance uh my mother is very very

interested in history she's obsessed

with history and I probably absorbed her

interest in history I don't think

there's a genetic a gene for that

interest you know so you're you're going

to absorb things from your parents as

well so it's not all just genetic but

yeah what you hate will pay a big will

have a big thing but the problem with

doing that is if you go into a direction

in you're in you're in elementary school

Etc and they force you to learn math and

you hate it what it tends to do is it

turns you off from learning in general

you think I don't want to I don't want

to I don't want to be disciplined I

don't want to go through anything

because it's painful doesn't lead

anywhere it's not me frustration it

turns you off from learning in general

so it's really really important for a

child to have the love experience as

early as possible so that they can know

what they hate and why they hate it

right and then they can Rebel and they

can go into that field as opposed to I

hate learning I hate discipline I hate

studying I hate trying things over and

over again if you're kinesthetically

oriented and you know a part of me I

understand that because I love sports is

you have to you have to practice it's

going to take a lot of it's not you're

not going to instantly be good at

something right and that's going to

require a love of it right but if your

math experience I hate learning

you're not you're it's going to transfer

to sports you're going to hate

discipline in general so it's very

important for parents to let that child

have at least glimmers of that love

moment I know for me when I um finished

college and I entered the work world I

had to get a job I got worked in

journalism I hated it I hated working

for other people I hated hated office

politics I hated all the egos I hated

the smarminess I hated the lack of

quality it was all just about you know

making money and getting things out

there and then I worked in Hollywood I

hated Hollywood I hated working in

Hollywood that formed me very much maybe

go in the direction that I went in but

only from the basis of I knew that I

wanted to be a writer so you know that's

very important that it's not just hate

it can form you but there also has to be

that posit of deep emotional love of

something that also is grounded in you

in some way what you just said really

highlights the fact that energy and

motivation can come from either either

pressure you know desire for something

or desire to get away from something and

um earlier when you were talking about

um how we are so much more engaged and

driven toward things that stir us

emotionally and and actually we know

based on the neuroscience you know too

I'm sure that um only by the release of

certain neurochemicals in the brain and

body would our brain have any reason to

change right if you don't feel agitation

and you can do everything that you're

trying to do of course your brain

wouldn't change like why would it right

that agitation is a is a signature of

the neurochemicals that are saying hey

something's different now right right

you might need to do something different

including rewire yourself right um and

that can come from positive or negative

experiences I'm obsessed with this idea

of energy I mean we all want to have

more energy and focus and normally we

hear about the concept of energy in the

context of caloric energy like what

should we eat and when and how much and

we need to get sleep but what you're

really referring to is neural energy

like the the engagement of ourselves

that's you know uh sitting there ready

to be engaged but it requires the right

experiential macronutrients right the

experiential micronutrients as opposed

to of course we need good nutrition but

that's not sufficient it's necessary but

not sufficient so uh would you say that

when um we are let let's say since a

good number of our listeners are in

adulthood um you know from our 20s on

that the things that excite us as adults

that really generate some feeling of

Readiness or or grab our attention um

are still informative toward guiding our

decisions about best life and life

purpose well um what do you what exactly

do you mean by that I mean like because

there are things that excite you in in a

kind of a quick way like you know where

you have to relieve some tension and you

there's entertainment and there's things

that kind of give you pretty immediate

gratification and there's the larger P

picture of something that will give you

fulfillment over years to come so you

can feel that when you're older and you

can pay attention to it but a lot of the

time is we we're paying too much

attention to the immediate pleasures of

life to what gives us instant

gratification and that's what we're

grabbing for so this is a much more kind

of deeper process that involves that

digging that I was saying it it's it's

deeper than just kind of I like this I

don't like that you know kind of thing

it's it's more it's more something macro

than than just just that and so when

you're in your 20s or in your 30s or

your 40s you want to be paying attention

to yourself and the problem with people

in the world today is you're not paying

attention to yourself not inside your

own head you don't hear those voices you

don't hear what you love what you like

anymore because as I said there's so

many of these other distractions going

on and so you're always like attuned to

what other people like right because

you're in social media this is what

people are following this is what

they're interested in as opposed to

disengaging backing off from that and

and looking at yourself and going

through the process of that's not me

actually I don't really like that you

know and so what you're talking about is

I think very profound is levels of

frustration or anxiety are definite

signals that you must pay attention to

that they're telling you this isn't a

good direction for you this is a waste

of time for you and in general I tell

people selfawareness being able to hear

those voices to understand that your

frustration is telling you something and

sometimes you you just act on it without

understanding it but understanding why

why you're frustrated why you don't like

your career why you're not happy about

where you're going is the key to

everything it will open up it will

actually be able even in your 30s to

return you to that childhood inclination

but if you can't listen to where those

emotions come from then they're useless

they're not teaching you

anything as we all know quality

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physical health but also our mental

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memory our ability to learn new things

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quality unprocessed or minimally

processed sources as well as enough

probiotics and prebiotics and fiber to

support basically all the cellular

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microbiome now I like most everybody try

to get optimal nutrition from Whole

Foods ideally mostly from minimally

processed or nonprocessed Foods however

one of the challenges that I and so many

other people face is getting enough

servings of high quality fruits and

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huberman to claim that special offer so

it sounds like one of the goals is to

engage in what I'll just call for the

moment unadulterated self-referencing

you know unadulterated uh in the the all

senses of the word because um as a child

as you point out um at stages of life

that are before puberty they're

literally prex um which I think is

important right because um puberty to me

as a neurobiologist who started off as a

developmental

neurobiologist I can tell you that

puberty is the most profound

transformation that the brain undergoes

for in the entire lifespan there's just

absolutely no question about it

everything is different after puberty

because of all of the new relational

dynamics that become apparent and our

potential involvement in them yeah it's

just it's you know it's not talked about

enough how dramatically puberty changes

the brain sure I mean we are different

people before and after puberty hormones

that are suddenly raging the hormones

are there and it's not just changes in

how we view the world but changes in how

the World Views us and not just through

the lens of sexuality but also

expectation of what we are capable of

what we are responsible for or not

responsible for our learning capacity I

mean puberty is like this you know it's

also the most rapid stage of Aging in

our entire lifespan those kids that go

home for summer and then come back like

shaving you know I was sort of a late I

wasn't a late bloomer but I had a long

protracted puberty but I remember those

kids I'm sure we we all remember those

kids um everything changes and so I

think prior to puberty these seeds as

you've described them of of delight or

of resistance to things think they are

unadulterated they're not contaminated

by the voices and expectations of others

and so I can see the challenge of

reaching back to those as an adult um I

wonder if this relates to um something

that I've heard you talk about before

although perhaps not as much as some of

the other topics you've discussed

publicly which is um the real versus the

false Sublime oh um could you perhaps

just Define for us what Sublime really

is what a Sublime experience is and and

the distinction between real and false

Sublime experiences because I I feel

like this relates to finding that seed

right it's it's about finding authentic

seeds of within us as opposed to when

emotions can be distracting and

misleading wow I never thought I never

made that connection and it's the book

that I'm writing right now so thank you

for that I have to think about that I'm

actually I'm writing a book on the

sublime and um I have several ways of

kind of illustrating I generally like to

use a metaphor and the metaphor is that

being a human being being a social human

being living in a particular culture

means that you live inside of a circle

and that Circle of that time are the

conventions of thinking of ideas that

are acceptable of behavior that is

acceptable this is where you where you

can go mentally where you can go

physically you know all the codes and

conventions so that's Circle for ancient

Egypt and for 21st century America

they're obviously very different but

it's the same Circle it's the same

limiting factor you're not supposed to

go outside of it these are thoughts

experiences Behavior you're not supposed

to do the sublime is what lies just

outside that Circle um the word sublime

comes from on the threshold of it's like

here's a door and the sublime is

literally at the threshold of the door

you're looking out into something else

right and the quintessential Sublime

experience is a near-death experience

you're standing on the on the doorway

the threshold of death itself right and

so in my book I'm illustrating the

different kinds of sublime experiences

that you can have in relation to the

cosmos in relation to thinking about

being alive just being alive is the

strangest sensation you can possibly

have I have I know that very personally

after my stroke I go into childhood

chapter on childhood and how Sublime

your own childhood was I go into animals

relation to animals I go have a chapter

about the brain chapter about love I'm

working right now on a chapter about

history okay but what I'm trying to say

is the human brain is wired for these

experiences is wired for transcendental

experiences that take us out of the

narrow little realm that we live in

because we're aware of our death as the

only animal truly conscious of it own

mortality and it frightens the hell out

of us and the idea that we can see

something larger than than just the the

the banal parts of our life is a doorway

that open allows us to kind of transcend

the moment to feel connected to

something larger to feel connected to

some power in the cosmos to Evolution

itself right and so we're wired for that

and I'm writing a chapter now about

40,000 years ago at the moment where I

think the sublime was born is a story

that I'm trying to illustrate right now

with our upper Paleolithic

ancestors so it's deep inside of us we

need it we have to have it in the 21st

century we have very few avenues for it

any real Avenues religion used to be the

main kind of way of of accessing this

and so because it's so deep we reach for

false forms of the sublime that give us

the sense that we're we're transcending

but it's not at all because

Sublime has to come from within it's an

experience that you have that you're

generating in your own mind in your own

experience the false Sublime comes from

outside it comes from drugs it comes

from alcohol it comes from shopping it

comes from online rage it comes from

joining a cause and just getting out all

your aggression and violence right it

comes from causes it comes from

addictions okay it gives you a sense it

calms you down and makes you feel like

there's something else going on in life

besides your job that you're you're sick

of but it's not real it's not lasting

it's false it's an illusion it's not

based on anything real it's not

connecting to that deep part of human

nature that's wired for these

experiences so what happens is you have

to have more and more and more and more

of it you have to have you know more of

this rush you need more of the drug you

need more of the alcohol you need more

of the sex you need more of the porn

it's never going to satisfy you but the

real Sublime you don't have that feeling

it's like it's transformative once you

feel it it lasts for you for the rest of

your life it's what maslo again called a

peak experience so that's the difference

between the false and the real Sublime I

haven't quite connected it to what you

were saying but if I think about it I

think you're on something very

interesting I mean maybe the connection

I was trying to draw was uh doesn't hold

but yeah for me

um those early experiences of seeing

things that just delighted me in a way

that felt like that not only is well the

the the thought process was a long time

ago when something like oh my goodness I

can't believe this exists this is so

cool this is the coolest thing and so

clearly create an activation state

within me but then there was also a

thought and a feeling of again a lot of

this is sort of pre preverb it's not

truly preverbal I could speak at that

age but it was

um that's of me and I'm of it right

there's a connection there and then it

was there's something to do about this

the activation State created in the body

was you know I I need to learn more

about this I need to tell people about

this I need to think about this I need

more examples of this and see whether or

not they're all like this you know etc

etc um so certainly it meets some of the

criteria of a Sublime experience

definitely and I knew again when I was

in graduate school and again when I was

this young Professor about to transition

to tenure that I knew it was going going

to do something different it was as if I

was on the threshold of something but I

didn't know what that next thing was but

I could trust it because of that early

experience of knowing that's the threat

like like I'm an amphibian this is my

environment and you're an amphibian too

right and we're different amphibians but

you know we're going to be amphibians

together right and then and there's a

permanence to it that it does seem to

transcend time I'm obsessed with time

perception so I have to be careful not

to go off on a tangent about that but

the human brain's ability to F slice or

macro slice time is incredible and and

it's been set of um not just addictions

but also interactions with toxic people

that they murder time that that humans

have a I think it was young I I'll look

it up but um one of the great

psychologists said something to the

extent that um addictive behaviors

thought patterns substances are humans

attempts to murder time so that they

don't have to address their mortality

yeah and that's always made a lot of

sense to me yeah we say kill time is our

expression kill time through passive

engagement but also kill time through um

trying to get overwhelmed or overtaken

by an experience or a substance as

opposed to when you're truly connected

you have that sense of

flow and 3 hours can pass by and you're

not even aware Ware of it so time is a

totally subjective experience it can be

extremely slow and tedious and you feel

very depressed or it can pass by but

that passes by without you even noticing

it and it's a wondrous experience you

know when I'm deep in my writing I'm not

aware of the time passing I'm so

involved I'm so immersed it's a deeply

deeply pleasurable experience of time it

is Sublime and yeah so I agree with you

I think your distinction is very

interesting you I'm eager awaiting your

your next book but we won't rush you

well I I I'm I'm so immersed in it that

I could I could talk for hours because I

also have a chapter in there about what

I call the

dayon which is like that voice inside of

you that speaks to you and I'm writing a

whole chapter about how Sublime that is

when you connect to that voice so you

are spoton there is something very much

connected to master in this book but

it's the next chapter that I'm writing

fantastic I can't wait I can't wait I'd

like to shift slightly to a topic that

you've written extensively about which

is power um and not just power but also

seduction which you've written

extensively about and of course you've

written about finding one's purpose so

tell me if the framework that I've just

given myself Liberty to create is an

accurate one and if it's not I I'm

hoping that um it's not in perhaps some

interesting ways so to me you talk about

and we will talk about power as as a

resource it's it's something that um

it's there as a resource it could be

used or not used um and I think of

Seduction as one form of exchange

between an individuals so there's a verb

associated with seduction power I'm

thinking of more as a noun in this

context you're the word guy um and then

you know purpose is uh is really about

finding like to what end or ends one is

going to um devote power seduction and

the other forces that allow human beings

to interact with each other in the world

um but power as a resource that can be

expressed in different ways and accessed

in different ways maybe we could just

explore that a little bit because you

know when we hear the word power I think

a lot of people kind of brace themselves

like here we go someone's going to try

and have power over me this is about

manipulation and so on and so forth but

I learned pretty early on that every

every career Endeavor there there are

power dynamics there's Mentor mentee

they teachers and their students and

both have power um in inter in romantic

relationship there's a power exchange

there are yeses and their NOS there are

Mayes there are um uh covert and overt

contracts yeah I'll do this because I

want to right you'll do this because you

want to great sounds great overt

contractor they're also covert contracts

well I don't feel safe doing that so

what I'll do is I'll take something on

through from the interaction that you're

not aware of so that I can sort of um

ease my sense of danger and make give

myself the illusion of feeling safe and

all sorts of kind of complicated human

dynamics that have to do with us having

this forbrain thing that can do all of

that gymnastics so maybe we could start

very simply by just saying you know how

would you define power in terms of its

uh functional definition like in in in

interpersonal relations and then why do

you think power is so essential to all

relationships that's really what I'd

like to get to why is it so essential

why couldn't it be something else well

the way I Define Powers I try and take

it away from that kind of negative

context that most people have and that

you that you brought up and I bring it

to something very primitive and very

Primal the way the human being is wired

the feeling that we have no control over

our environment and in the earliest

period it was literally over our

environment and wild animals and nature

and and climate Etc but now the sense

that you have no control over your

career over your children over your

parents is deeply deeply am miserating

and it compels us to act in certain ways

either attempts to find positive ways of

power or doing what you call covert ways

of getting power you know passive

aggressive traditionally passive

aggressive means so it's deeply wired in

us to want a degree of control over the

immediate environment and immediate

events we can never have complete

control and the idea of having complete

control is nonsense and it would

actually be very ugly because you want a

degree of Letting Go and letting

circumstances come to you etc

etc so the sense of you you you want to

feel like with other people and

relationships that you can influence

them that you can move them in a certain

direction either to get you to love you

and treat treat you better or either to

stop annoying irritating behaviors or

either to you know wake up and and find

and and and do productive activity if

it's your children Etc you want to have

the ability to influence people to move

them in a certain direction either in

your interest or in their interest right

and once you have that need and every

single human being ever who's ever lived

has that need and we often don't

recognize it because we're in

embarrassed by it we're embarrassed by

our desire for power for our need to

control every human being has it right

and it's not easy because human beings

are

complicated they don't if you say do

this and you're talking to your son

he'll do the opposite or he'll do

something else you can't just force

people in a direction right by being

overt and telling them this is what you

need to do you create resentment you

create an enemy they may they may say

yes yes daddy yes husband I'll do what

you say say but they're you they're

they're going to resist you deep down

inside right so people are tricky they

wear masks they pretend to say one thing

and they do another they have their egos

and you inadvertently wound their egos

or trip them in some way and they react

in a way that you don't expect and so

power is this kind of invisible realm

that envelops Society where people are

continually battling each other and

struggling in it but no one is like

talking about it no one's being overt

about it no one's saying this is exactly

what I'm trying to do and so when you

enter the social world and the career

world you're not expecting these battles

you don't know no one's taught you no

one's trained you your parents don't

train you nobody trains you and you make

mistakes and you realize how political

people are if you're a Sharky character

and there's a certain percentage of them

you realize wow I can deceive people I

can manipulate them I can get what I

want I can pretend to love them and they

they'll fall for me and I can do all

this other stuff but for most of us the

95% of us who aren't sharks and I'm I'm

including myself in that category it's

it's it's very very disturbing to

suddenly enter that world and see all of

that invisible power games on that's no

one's given you any advice for helped

you and so take it out of the realm of

it's just about trying to dominate the

world and manipulate and exploit and and

abuse it's something inside of you you

have this need and your suppression of

it will only make you come out in

passive ways and you won't be able to

control certain things if you want to

move people if you want them to follow

your ideas if you want them to be more

aligned with your politics or your ideas

you have to be subtle you have to learn

psychology you have to learn certain

aspects of how to almost move people

without them realizing against in

certain directions which is like The Art

of Seduction and if you're not

interested in that if you're just going

to tell people what you think of what

you're going to do that means you're not

interested in Practical action you're

not interested in results you're just

interested in venting your own

frustrations or your own anger so

learning the subtle little dynamics of

power is extremely essential because

we're a social animal it doesn't mean

that you're going to get dirty that

you're going to suddenly go out there

and manipulate the hell out of people

most of the 48 Laws of Power is about

defense but how to defend yourself from

the Sharks about there how to defend

yourself from making classic mistakes

like outshining the master like talking

too much like arguing with people

instead of demonstrating your ideas on

and on and on it's not an ugly thing it

actually makes you a better social

individual so that's how I I like to

frame it it's very interesting I I

think as a young guy growing up it was

so important to me um to know where I

fit in with my friend group um and I

didn't think of it so much as a

hierarchy um nor when I was in my

academic studies did I think of it as a

hierarchy even though it was clearly was

right um so much as it the goal was to

figure out where was my unique slot that

I could um do the most good for myself

and others you know kind of finding my

spot um I don't want to say on a shelf

because that gives an image of something

vertical but you know in the let's make

it lateral a lateral arrangement of

different people with different

strengths different life purposes trying

to figure them out you know where where

should I be in order to express that and

also feel connected to others and um and

in order to do that I did have to I

realize now based on your answer I did

have to figure out um you know who's

trying to have power over who's

pretending that they don't want Power

but is actually exerting power um you

know these sorts of things and there's

an incredible piece that comes from

knowing that one is in the correct Place

both profession interpersonally in

relation to oneself but also in the

context of one's peer peer group it's

kind of yeah this is where I belong

because trying to gain power when one is

trying to move to a position that isn't

right for them or in a way that isn't

right for them just seems so

energetically costly seems like a waste

of a life frankly right right you know

trying to gather resources simply to to

have them to give the illusion of power

but then being afraid of losing them

just sounds like a recipe for for misery

as you pointed out you know whereas

figuring out where am I most powerful in

the benevolent sense of the word that

that that seems like a good a good

Pursuit well it's connecting up to to

Mastery again and finding your life's

purpose you know I I I knew when I was

young that I couldn't exert physical

power because I was a skinny little runt

and I was I wasn't bullied but people

would kind of pick on me etc etc so I

veered towards intellectual Pursuits

where I could have power and in the end

you know you might have been a jock and

you might have done well in high school

but haha Look at me now I'm not saying

that it's a beautiful thing that that's

but that's part of human nature the

desire to actually you know prove

yourself and find that Niche that you

that you belong to so you don't have

that kind of hum that sense of

inferiority which Alfred Adler the

psychologist describes very eloquently

so a lot of it is kind of compensating

when you're a child for things that are

your weaknesses and finding what you're

so good at that you do have that power

and people can't bully you right and you

you're you're like now a famous

neuroscientist whereas they're like who

knows what they're doing kind of thing

so power definitely is connected in some

way to that inner sense of what you were

meant to do and you feel it with the

with the ease and the connection that

comes from it right so I can honestly

say that my dislike of working for other

people and office politics and egos I

now have a of an existence where I don't

have to deal with any of that and I'm so

blessed and I wake up every morning and

I pray to God thank God I I found this

because it's it's the perfect lifestyle

for me and you're are can be accurately

described as an intellectual be Beast so

it's um and which is like a compliment

right um we hear the word beast and we

think uh you know a Ferocious Beast

trying to harm others but I'm happy

being a beast yeah you know so I think

finding where we can be a beast you know

and and for some people that's painting

or or yeah gardening or whatever it

might be um I think is again ties back

to the these issues of or this quest of

for

Mastery seduction is also a very loaded

word right it's even more uglier than

power

because seduction right seduction kind

of drips with uh the idea that somebody

is

tricking someone else into doing

something that they otherwise would not

want to do but seduction is both our

propensity to do it and to have it done

to us is hardwired into our nervous

system and has a lot to do with the

hypothalamus and a bunch of other areas

that I won't Bor us with the

nomenclature but um seduction to me

implies some sort of exchange I suppose

we could seduce ourselves through denial

or convincing ourselves that of of

something but more often than not when

we talk about seduction we're talking

about an interaction between two or more

people so um what are some of the core

principles of Seduction and and if you

care to play um Anthropologist a bit um

and a neuroscientist I I would invite

that why do you think we have neural

circuits in our brain that allow us to

seduce and be

seduced well um I don't know how if if

I'm if I'm being kind of an armchair

intellectual here but my my theory is

some of it has to go back to social um

events long in our prehistory which have

to do with

taboos and Society was initially kind of

organized by a series of tabos right

most notably the taboo on incest and

what happened this is just not my theory

it's the theory of the malanowski

malanowski is I pronounce it um that the

moment a taboo enters the human brain

like you're not supposed to sleep with

this woman the desire arises inside of

you to actually sleep with that woman

the the the sense of no the sense that

this is prohibited stirs the desire

stirs the contrary impulses in humans

and we can be very um what's the word

perverse creatures right so if you've

ever tried to suppress a thought you

realize that it keeps coming up keeps

coming up you can't suppress it don't

think of an elephant Andrew whatever you

do don't think of an elephant you're

thinking of it because you can't help it

right the idea that you're not supposed

to desire this person stirs that actual

desire so I believe the sense of

something being taboo and transgressive

is the ultimate kind of origin of our

desire for seduction but seduction in

involves

vulnerability it involves somebody gets

inside somebody gets under our skin

right and to do that we have to let them

in so the person being seduced is in

some ways to a degree complicit because

if you just put up a wall and you said

no I I'm not going to be seduced nothing

will happen but you have a vulnerability

you're letting that person into your

psyche Into Your Inner Space the

Paradigm for that Early Childhood so

Freud talks a lot about this I don't

know if people still believe in Freud

anymore but I certainly do okay

absolutely a genius of both Psychology

and Physiology wrong about a lot of

things did a lot of things he shouldn't

have done I let's acknowledge that I

think everyone would agree that sleeping

with your patients and being a cocaine

addict bad ideas but at the same time he

had an absolute like near Supernatural

levels of insight and Brilliance into

human nature sleep with patience I

believe he did um but if I just if I

just threw that on him without him doing

it then you know uh forgive me he

certainly had emotional attachments to

his patients that he shouldn't have had

I don't know if he slept with them he

very well might have but his idea was

that the child is seduced by the parent

you're in extremely vulnerable position

right your life depends on them and

they're seducing you with their energy

you're letting them in right and that

kind of creates a pattern pattern for

the rest of your life and so for

instance the feeling of being carried by

your father and just being taken around

physically is a form of Seduction

because you don't know what he's going

to do to you you're very excited you

want that surprise right and to me it's

related to the seduction of a story

stories are very seducing to us we don't

know where they're taking us we don't

know what the next chapter is what's

going to happen to this character or not

the surprise lowers our resistance and

opens our mind up to what's going to

happen next is a form of Seduction fairy

tales the stories you were reading as a

child your interactions with your

parents they're deeply deeply ingrained

in you you cannot be seduced unless you

are vulnerable right and so I like to

switch it around and get out of the

negative connotations being vulnerable

is actually a positive trait

I think a lot of people now in the world

today because things are so harsh and

invasive that people have become too

invulnerable they don't want to let

anything in right and this now infects

their relationships with other people

they don't want to be influenced they

they want to be strong inside of

themselves they're afraid of giving in

to the other person of surrendering to

their influence but it's actually a

delightful feeling to surrender to the

power of another person and then reverse

that charge and have them surrender to

your power so when I'm reading a writer

and sometimes uh they completely seduce

me like friederick nid is one of my

favorite writers I let go of everything

I let him enter my brain and I'm

completely seduced I let him lead me

along but then I encounter writers that

I don't like at all I I'll mention one

you know probably not a good thing but

Steven Pinker I don't like Steven Pinker

I find him really annoying okay um but I

forc myself to try and find a way to be

seduced by him to let him into my brain

to see where he's coming from to open

myself to the possibility that he could

be correct so vulnerability letting

people into your mental space is a form

of intelligence it's a it's kind of an

emotional and an intellectual

intelligence and forgive me for

interrupting but I think it also implies

a level of confidence because empathy or

allowing oneself to be vulnerable to the

point where you're seduced by something

um by

definition if you're choosing to do it

uh implies that you also have the

confidence that you can get back to

yourself afterward right that you're not

going to get lost in the circumstances

you're not going to be hijacked to the

point of no return right or in some way

that's detrimental to you so it it's um

it I'm sounding really nerdy here it's a

it's cinear with with confidence in many

ways sure like take my mind and take it

where you will because I know I can come

back at any time right right and the

same thing in a physical seduction in a

romantic sense right you're opening

yourself up to the charm to the energy

of the other person but if they start

displaying dark energy and you see that

they're abusive or something is wrong

you have the ability to retreat ah well

there it gets tricky because very tricky

well because the attachment systems

which are also rooted in childhood um

oftentimes can overwhelm one's ability

to recover oneself like to I mean so I

mean how many if I had a dollar for

every time someone in that I knew in my

life saying like you know I know they're

bad for me but I just can't like we just

can't seem to disengage like that you

hear about that all the time I mean you

see court cases about this that are

public and you know you just go why

didn't they just walk away from one

another well because once those

attachment systems are locked in it

almost becomes in a and here

metaphorically speaking like a parent

child relationship like you can't

suddenly decide your parents weren't

your parents simply because you know

better now right you are forever

stricken with the reality that they were

and they had an influence and I think

that that attachment system is um is a

is a force that tugs pretty hard yeah

and um a lot of women have written to me

since the Art of Seduction sort of

saying that their boyfriend or husband

was applying some of these tactics on

them and it was very painful and they

were kind of a little bit angry at me

for for it but then they kind of

realized that they it wasn't they didn't

learn it really from my book it was

already kind of wired in them but that

reading about these tactics and these

strategies actually helped them to

recognize what their husband or

boyfriend was doing to them the

manipulation and the games that were

being played do men write to you and

talk about the seductive adornments that

women have used to to um bring them into

relationship as well or are you

typically hearing from women I mostly

hear from women complaining about men

and and and how they've abused them and

how they used I see some of these

some of the strategies I I don't deny

have a slightly nefarious Edge to them

because I didn't want to write a book

about Seduction That doesn't have that

taboo element because I say seduction

involves the taboo and I didn't want to

I didn't want to censor myself but

female toale seduction clearly also

exists less of I acknowledge that it's

um less often is it physically abusive

um but right I mean from an early age

both boys and girls men and women are

coached by Society on the sorts of uh

seductive tactics and and adornments

right I mean everything from makeup

perfume hairstyles cars watches jewelry

um expression power displays of any kind

um I mean that stuff the world's filled

with that stuff yeah but men are

generally kind of happy when a woman

seduces them right they're unless

they're after their money or something

like that which happens but generally

the sense you know I talk about this in

in the first chapter about Sirens which

I say is the quintessence essential

archetype of the female

seductress the the kind of half human

half bird creature on a rock singing so

beautifully that you have to jump in the

water and then they kill you and so the

idea is that men want to let go because

men have to be so in control so powerful

they have to project this image they

have a secret desire to let go and be

almost dominated by a very powerful

woman a lot of men have that and I talk

about some of the most powerful men in

in history jul jius Caesar Mark Anthony

um Joe dagio who all these men very

masculine men who fallen for very

feminine siren-like women and been

completely dominated by them and they

actually kind of enjoy the process

because it's like a sense of I can let

go I can enter this totally s sensual

physical world and it it's extremely

pleasing it's like another realm outside

of my kind of cold masculine world you

know so I don't really get men

complaining too much about women who've

seduced them honestly it's usually the

other way

around I'd like to take a quick break

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insid

tracker.com huberman I've heard before

um and I promise this is not an original

idea that I'm pretending to have heard

elsewhere that my friend asked me to ask

sort of question that in all sexual

exchanges there's a power exchange

definitely um maybe you could elaborate

on that um because as you were

describing some of the seductive power

dynamics that exist uh a phrase that

I've heard before uh came to mind um

that at first made me chuckle but then

made me think um quite deeply about this

issue of the relationship between sexual

and power dynamics which is this notion

of topping from the bottom you know if

one is giving someone else the

impression that they are more powerful

by virtue of the word giving they

actually hold some power right power is

can be given or taken but um often times

uh seductive exchanges and sexual

exchanges and romantic exchanges in

particular are about both people

uh buying into a ute a temporary

illusion let's pretend that you're in

charge when actually I'm in charge okay

but I know that you think that you're in

charge okay let's just pretend none of

that exists and just do X right and I

think this is another example of covert

contracts and it's one that actually can

potentially create a lot of problems

post Hawk right um but I think the

relationship between sex romance and

power is an important area to explore in

the context of this well I wrote The Art

of Seduction with the idea that it was

an art invented by women it was invented

by women who had no power essentially

socially politically in any sense of the

word in in in domestically right and but

the one power that they could that they

could wield over a man was through sex

some physical attraction and so they

develop this art of kind of luring a man

into their world through various

theatrical effects Cleopatra being kind

of the archetype of this and then luring

the the powerful man into this world he

has the illusion that he's the one

pursuing her but in fact she is the one

controlling the dynamic so often times

the person who appears to be the weaker

one in the relationship who's not not

doing the pursuing is actually inviting

the pursuing is actually leading the

other person on so there's a lot of kind

of appearance games going on and you can

never really figure out who exactly is

in control of the dynamic because one

person is

like allowing the other person to lead

them on but the fact that you're

allowing them is a degree of power is a

degree of control right so it's very

hard to figure out and sex and power and

romantic relationships are very much

intertwined in US physically emotionally

neurologically you can't avoid it right

and so I think it's kind of dishonest to

say that that none of that exists that

it's like that there's some egalitarian

Paradise out of there when it it's

really not wired in us for that kind of

relationship there's a recent scientific

publication SL factoid that I want to

share with you in this context because

I'd like your thoughts on it uh David

Anderson who's a phenomenal

neurobiologist he's been a guest on this

podcast before he's a professor at

Caltech studies um basically the

functions of the hypothalamus so okay

things like uh aggression mating and and

things of that sort um and does it so it

in with great detail he's a virtuoso of

the hypothalamus and he published a

paper two years ago showing that indeed

there are neural circuits in the brain

of animals and presum presumably in

humans as well that control sexual

mounting Behavior but that there is

actually a separate circuit for

purely nonsexual mounting and physical

power over that's expressed in animals

and anyone that's ever owned a dog and

gone to the dog park we'll see same-sex

mounting between dogs or mounting

between dogs that has apparently um no

sexual end point yeah and in exploring

this literature and some talking to dve

about it it's very clear that there are

neural circuits um that have everything

to do with essentially one animal of a

species getting on top of the other

animal usually from behind often times

scruffing or biting the back of the neck

and saying I control you it's a it's

often done in a playful context

especially between animals not always

aggressive but there's a certain element

of aggressive to it but it essentially

says I decide whether or not you are

mobile or not for this moment and that

it and this is very important I want to

emphasize this this is a circuit that is

entirely separate from all of the

reflexes associated with sexual behavior

in males and females I find this to be

fascinating um and because we hear about

power over right and we hear about power

and we think about physical power over

but the idea that something as primitive

as mounting just like something as

primitive as biting or as

striking has its own unique set of

circuits in the brain I think

substantiates every everything that you

put in uh

in your books about power and maybe even

seduction as well so as I just kind of

toss that out there for consideration I

I I wonder um if you have any

Reflections on it if not um feel free to

just say I don't but of course but to me

this was a really important Discovery

because I think everyone looks at

mounting behavior and says oh that has

to be sexual and sometimes it's oh I see

what you mean but but it's not that

there's a there seem to be a host of

neural circuits in the brain that are

are really about finding who's on top

literally that has nothing to do with

sex yeah I'm sure that's true I've never

I've never I've never um read anything

about that but I can say that um I wrote

a chapter in in my new book about love

and that's a different thing than than

seduction and I was trying to come up

with an idea of love that does have an

element of equality that doesn't have

this power Dynamic going on in it of

that and um you know kind of like the

antithesis of my Art of Seduction where

I'm almost contradicting myself and I

was going into the into the biology of

it and even into the physics of it so

there is a famous uh French biologist

whose Name Escapes me I'm sorry I can't

remember from the 20s and 30s um and he

was studying

parium and he found he was studying them

you know they there in these ponds Etc

and he said that there was these moments

where these single celled organisms were

suddenly coupling they were all joining

together just one to one and they were

absorbing the membrane of one inside the

other and then they would like go then

once one couple did that all the parami

started joining up together then they

would sink to the bottom of the

pond and parium don't reproduce through

sex they reproduce through dividing

themselves right self-

reproduction and so he was saying that

the desire to couple to to to connect to

someone so deeply where you absorb one

is absorbed in the other is biologically

wired into US goes back millions and

millions and millions of years and it's

a desire essentially a biological desire

for love right and it's an energy that

permeates all all the it's it's not just

about power and hierarchies and that he

was showing other creatures that had

something similar going on and you know

in physics we talk about

entanglement and we also talk about um

you know matter if matter isn't absor

isn't um opposed by a lot of ktic energy

it joins together I mean particles join

together to form matter etc etc so

there's something in the universe that's

trying to connect things to each other

so there's this this kind of energy that

exists in the world where we have have a

deep need to connect to

somebody with outside of those power

dynamics right where there's a degree of

equality where we're drawn to each other

and we let go of the ego games we let go

of the playing we kind of surmount our

own physiology our own

hypothalamus and we engage in this I

call it love Sublime and it involves the

physical part the sexual part is the

trigger for it because when you have sex

with someone your body is suddenly

permeable to their energy in a way that

you cannot control it releases all kinds

of of chemicals in the brain that are

very powerful and often times that sense

is too powerful and you react and and

you're afraid of it and you pull back

but if you don't react and you go

further then the mind also becomes

permeable to the other person and their

energy and their desire and so then it

kind of creates a SP spiring effect

where the physical and the mental

connection reaches the state that I call

love Sublime now it's an ideal it

doesn't really exists that much out

there in the world today but there are

stories in history that illustrate it

and I believe that is a biological

necessity for us to feel a deep deep

sense of connection we normally ascribe

that to religion to God Etc but I

maintain the essence of love the model

for for love is between to human beings

straight or homosexual doesn't matter

and that feeling of surmounting our own

neurology our own system and and

entering this zone is deeply deeply

satisfying we all want it and it has to

involve letting go of the power dynamics

letting and everything being equal it's

not that the other person is exactly

like you you recognize their difference

but but as far as being worthy of

attention

being worthy and

respected you leave all that other stuff

outside so there is a Zone that's

possible that's outside this power

dyamic that we're talking about I'm

excited that you're writing about this

uh so this is for your next book yeah

I'm very excited I couldn't help but

think of some of the parallels between

what you describe and what we're

observing nowadays in the landscape of

politics and social dynamics where

clearly um there is no setting aside of

egos people feel both sides feel

attacked everyone in between feels

confused like why do I have to pick a

side um and there seems to be no hint of

a future where people are setting down

their swords it which means if we were

to go with your earlier definition which

I like a lot that um nobody feels safe

enough to be

vulnerable enough to um to allow the

union of of people to occur which is

just a way a way of rewarding you know a

bunch of other things um and not nearly

as eloquently as as you described it but

if setting aside of power dynamics and

making oneself vulnerable is is the key

to accessing love in the Romantic

context surely but also in the um

societal context I mean what are the

channels for that I mean I suppose there

is the argument not mine that everyone

should just take a boatload of

psychedelics and see the

interconnectedness of things but that

seems like an unrealistic route I I just

don't see that being you know um you

know 12th grade graduation um curriculum

um nor do I think it would be healthy I

to be clear I think that you we'd end up

with a lot of expression of of problems

there um but short of a magic substance

that could increase feelings of uh

connectedness among everyone

simultaneously um how are you going to

save Humanity Robert well um CU I'm I'm

concerned about young people in

particular with hookup culture with

pornography Etc Etc it's kind of

rewiring the human brain and we're

losing what I was just describing and I

see a particularly a lot of young people

and I don't blame them because they've

grown up in a world that's very chaotic

and very hostile could could I say I

think it's um and not to be nitpicky

here but I I love what you just said I

think in my mind it's hi things like

that are hijacking the hardwiring of the

brain okay um and I'm just again forgive

me my the audience is probably going

can't really rewire brain like that well

I think we can expand and rewire Upon

Our hard wirring but so much of what you

you talk about in your books is about

finding one's Essence but then also what

I love about your book so much among

many other things is that it's about

that dance between the hard wirring and

and the possible of through effort so

anyway forgive me for for being it's

very accurate um so yeah what how do you

get us out of this well you're putting a

big burden on me I am but I think you're

up to it you know um well I try to do it

in this chapter because I wanted to

seduce the reader into the idea that

this is something extremely pleasurable

and extremely healthy and the feeling of

being vulnerable is a very positive

attribute that will infect not just your

romantic relationships but will infect

you mentally so creative people are

extremely vulnerable they're extremely

vulnerable to ideas they're extremely

vulnerable to the environment and

closing yourself off into your own ego

into yourself so the chapter is called

Escape the Prison of the ego and you're

you're kind of trapped inside of

yourself and your own thoughts and your

own desires and it's like a prison it's

enclosing you and you want to escape

somehow and you escape through drugs you

escape through porn but it doesn't lead

to actually escaping you want to be able

to let go of the self and get out of

this this prison that you're in right

and so it's a desire that that we all

have and so I wanted to frame it as this

incredibly positive Dynamic that you can

engage in and the ability to be

vulnerable to other people to open

yourself up and to say that yeah they

might hurt me but I'm strong enough to

take it and if they hurt me I'll learn

from it and I'll rebound and I know

that's a bit naive on my part but I want

you to at least have that feeling

because a lot of young people write to

me and they say I I can't fall in love

anymore I can't don't like that feeling

I it makes the loss of control is too

much you know and and a lot of that

their behavior patterns are in creating

this sense of control which you can have

when you're locked inside of yourself uh

hence over indulgence in pornography

yeah and masturbation

Etc as a way to avoid the you know the

understandable fear about inter

relational Dynamics yeah yeah so you

know when you're young you're you're

idealistic at least a lot of young

people are and you have these dreams and

these hopes and to let go of this

possibility which is deeply pleasurable

and deeply therapeutic to the human

animal as a social animal it's like the

highest form of interaction that we can

have so my strategy in that chapter was

to paint such a wonderful portrayal of

the pleasures that are awaiting You by

letting go of your defenses of letting

go of all of your natural or resistance

factors and opening yourself up to other

people is is a key to not just a

romantic relationship but to Career

Success to mental energy to creativity

to being open in general right and

so I don't think I could have a a wide

you know a huge impact but we'll see

when the when the book comes out but I'm

advocating that sense of opening

yourself up to the universe to the

Cosmos itself as an energy that

permeates the world and so that you

don't want to the feeling of being

closed inside of your ego inside of your

yourself I want to make it so you feel

the pain of that because you don't

really feel the pain of it you feel like

it's comfortable for you but I want to

make it clear to you that it's not

comfortable it's deeply deeply painful

and it's disconnecting you from some of

the best experiences you can have in

life

so I have that strategy the only other

hope I have is in the human Spirit

itself so a lot of this is being caused

by social media I believe right um and

uh and the instant and the the kind of

immediate gratification we can get in so

many ways and my hope is that young

people get fed up and get dis disgusted

with all this disconnection and

alienation in their life and that they

hunger from actually something more

communal more interactive more real as

opposed to Virtual and so that the human

Spirit can't be completely squashed by

technology Etc so I have that hope

because we've gone through these Cycles

before in history where people have

become very invulnerable and very locked

and closed and suddenly there's an

explosion a creative explosion like in

the 1960s like in the 1920s like in 18th

century Europe with the Casanova and the

where seduction reached its kind of

apigy Etc so it has kind of swung back

and forth between these moments where

humans get incredibly closed and bitter

and partisan and everything's conflict

and everyone's divisive Etc and suddenly

goes in the opposite

direction I I have hope in that

possibility and I structured my chapter

to perhaps sweep that a little bit along

that tie and see if I can have any

effect well I I think what you just

described in conversations like it and

that stem from it are likely to have a

tremendous effect I think it's exactly

what's needed now and um certainly I'll

be uh to amplify that message I I agree

with everything you said and not just

because you're sitting here as a guest

uh on this podcast but because um it's

clear to me that while power dynamics

and seduction are um wired into our

human relations since the beginning of

time that we have reached a a a very

challenging period in our history um

it's somewhat of a relief to me to know

that it's happened before but in a very

different context uh we hear a lot about

The Swinging back and forth of the

pendulum uh someone in fact uh Peter AA

online Physician's brother actually said

I um so we'll credit him he said no it's

not a it's not a pendulum that swings

back and forth unfortunately now it's

become a wrecking ball so it's swinging

back and forth and doing damage as it as

it reaches its um you know its extremes

and I think that

um I also look forward to a time where

people

um acknowledge that the injustices

around them and and that have been done

to them and others and um but somehow

are able to transcend that and the word

that I'd like to pick up on there is the

word justice um it was pointed out to me

uh by someone I respect very much that

you know having a sense of justice is a

is a wonderful and important thing and

as humans it's important to how we

structure Society but I do think that a

lot of the negative things that we see

out there nowadays are have something to

do with the availability of uh ready

availability of pornography high density

calorie food Etc a bunch of things like

that but that one of the issues with

social media because it does have its

positive aspects but one of the negative

issues in my mind is that it's a steady

flow of um examples of Injustice so all

day long you're just seeing things like

that that piss you off and that piss

other people off and for different

reasons but but what was pointed out to

me is that one of the key things about a

sense of Injustice is to be able to

determine whether or not there's

anything that you should do about it and

I think that everyone now feels a bit

hijacked by all the injustices we see

because we feel like well we're supposed

to do something about it but it may be

that while we can't let every Injustice

pass that being bombarded all day long

with things that upset us is hijacking

our creativity it's distracting us from

our deeper purpose it's preventing a

sense of vulnerability that would lead

to a sense of deep love

and and on so I don't think it's just

about the The Lure the tantalizing lures

of of sex food and um and looking at you

know bodies and hearing voices on social

media I think there is some validity to

that but that it's also that you know

there's just ample opportunity to go

down the gravitational pole forces of

Injustice like H that's so frustrating

why are they doing that I mean I catch

myself doing that talking to co-workers

when I walk in about did you see this

thing this is crazy what's going on with

the their crazy when you know as opposed

to thinking about anything else in that

moment and I try and yank myself out of

that but I I think that um you're not

going to do it alone but I think you

will play a major role in saving us from

this because people I do I think because

people just need to see themselves

through a different lens and realize

this is distracting me from who I'm

supposed to be well a lot of what what

modern life should involve is the

ability to ignore certain things so for

instance I don't know if you know that

app next door oh right I used to have it

but then I'd see all the the packages

being stolen off my neighbor's porches

in Oakland and then I started enjoying

living in Oakland less and I love the

city of Oakland it's got its problems it

definely has its problems but as an East

Bay kid you know and went to school out

there and you know like I have deep love

for the East Bay and it it's always had

those problems but when you see stuff

being stolen on your phone in the middle

of the night when you wake up it creates

a sense that like they're out to get my

stuff right terrible right and so uh I

have it in my spam filter but I look at

it and and every headline is people

stealing somebody broke into somebody's

house this P dog bit me this's this

rapid dog going around there's this

homeless person that's yelling and

attacking people on and on and on I feel

like I'm living in this neighborhood

it's like Beirut or something in the

1980s I can't even walk out my door I

just got I don't look at next door

anymore I just ignore it I don't open it

ever because because I know that that

they're designed algorithmically to put

that in front of you every single time

so that you click on it because that's

we respond to that kind of stuff

naturally we can't help it so you have

to be able to shut that stuff up and

look at what you can actually control in

your life so I have this visceral

dislike of what's going on in Ukraine

because I was in Ukraine recently and I

feel I've identified very strongly with

their struggle right and and it just I

can't that outrage feeling it just every

time I read an article about it it just

drives me crazy so the only thing is I

stop reading as much as I can I read

things that are kind of rational and

intelligent and I send them money and I

you know I donate as much as I can and I

help them practically but I don't allow

myself to get that kind of outraged

feeling all of the time

so somebody has to write a book somebody

has to instruct Us in what to ignore and

what to act pay attention to so there

are things that you can control

injustices that are out there that you

could control by voting by certain by

amassing a movement by you know dealing

with climate change not by trying to

recycle every little thing in your house

but actually doing something really much

more macro in the world you know joining

a cause there are things you can do and

that's positive and that's a way of

channeling that kind of dark energy in

you for a positive purpose but it's

totally disruptive and it totally

distracts you and weakens you and drains

you of energy to fall into those rabbit

holes and let them and let yourself fall

into them so you have to learn the art

of what to ignore and what not to pay

attention to and understand that you're

wired to see those kind of red alert

buttons on Facebook or on next door

wherever they are and it it's just it's

it's negative it's like a candy rush you

have to avoid it and it's taking us away

from our purpose which we each have I

mean I think to me that's the the most

um delerious aspect unless unless your

purpose is to organize and be an

activist people ask me I wrote a lot

about in my human nature book about the

shadow side of human nature right and we

all have it we all have a dark side we

all have hidden aggression we all have

feelings of Envy we all have feelings of

grandiosity we all have aggressive

impulses how do you deal with it

and I say the way to deal is to channel

it into something positive and

pro-social and that could be putting it

in your artwork venting that anger and

that outrage and something that people

kind of can identify with or it can be

in organizing something that could be

your purpose in life and actually doing

something positive so that's the only

way that you could actually use that

energy for some kind of actual life's

task or purpose you've been discussing

lately a bit on some of your channels

about masculine and feminine um let's

say

roles um and crisis of the masculine

feminine dance as well as the crisis of

masculinity per se crisis of femininity

per se um do you care to expand on that

a bit I think um we could probably take

three four hours to explore all this in

full um but I was struck by some of the

things that you said um because I agree

completely that um just as we are not

given a road map When we arrive in the

world as to how to find our purpose I

think there's also a very conflicted

road map that's thrown in front of us

and indeed conflicting multiple road

maps about what it means to be masculine

or feminine or some combination of both

which of course everybody is some

combination of both just to varying

degrees well um yeah so men have a

feminine side to them which if you try

to repress will come out in other ways

and women have a masculine side of them

I think Yung described this very well

with the anima and the animous which I

think is is extremely

real um it's very very confusing times

for both men and for women right now we

don't know the roles that there there're

everything is just so fluid and it's

very very difficult particularly if

you're young so young women are getting

this idea that everything should be

equal and that women should have and of

course it's right should have be paid

the same and should have the same career

opportunities there should be no

Prejudice or harassment or anything but

at the same time on social media it's

all about looking perfect and looks are

are incredibly important and if you're

not hot you're in terrible trouble and a

lot of young girls are extremely

confused by this they're getting mixed

signals right and boys are even in

perhaps even worse circumstance where

being masculine is SE is something

negative so we don't have any ideals out

there anymore of what what constitutes a

good positive form of femininity and a

good positive form of masculinity in

fact we even think that there shouldn't

be anything like that there's no such

thing as being masculine or feminine

whatever it's very very confusing and so

you know I I think of of of masculine

traits that I think are very positive

that should be out there to kind of

counteract the sort of Andrew Tate

seduction that a lot of young men are

falling for and it's a kind of an inner

strength where you're sort of in control

of your emotions you're not invulnerable

etc etc but um you can take

criticism you can take PE you know you

can have moments of failure and you'll

bounce back but you have a kind of res

inner resilience and a kind of inner

strength a kind of a quiet calm that I

think used to be exemplified in movie

icons like a Gary Cooper type thing

right and that kind of sense of inner

calmness where you're not hysterical

you're not getting upset about

everything that happens where you have a

kind of an inner strength and a

confidence and you can withstand kind of

what Ryan holiday talks about a lot

about with stoicism you can withstand

all of the hardships in life but you

have that Citadel within you is a very

very powerful form of masculinity as

opposed to it's all about sleeping with

a lot of women having really fast cars

you know being abusive and being a bully

etc etc these are signs of weakness of

insecurity and to be masculine should be

a sense of security and inner confidence

and Inner Strength right and that's what

we should venerate in our culture and we

should have icons like that okay um it

doesn't mean that that there's no role

for men who are not masculine or have

more of the feminine virtues that's also

there's definitely a role for that and

you know we see a lot of that in all

sorts of Arenas of life and then there

should be a positive model for women you

know where instead of their appearances

being judged by their appearances and

having to conform to the ideals of

what's hot or not it's about being

incredibly powerful and competent and

and have expertise and being really

successful in your career and and as

opposed to being continually judged by

your appearances which is very damaging

so these are terrible times I mean I I

feel fortunate that I grew up in a time

where there were these kind of models

for me to go by and I think of my father

who who was a very quiet man and he was

he was just a middle class salesman is

basically what he was he just sold for

all his whole life he sold chemical

supplies for one company um but he was

very dignified he treated people well he

was very calm and very quiet but he also

was very empathetic that was my role

model for what I think is a good

masculine energy and I think a lot of

people just don't have that and they're

very lost and so I don't know what the

answer is that I can't really produce

that out of thin air but I wish I could

well certainly nowaday is there many

more um let's say examples and options

of masculine and feminine qualities out

there for observation because of social

media and because of the internet uh and

as you pointed out before a key feature

to becoming a functional human being

especially nowadays is learning what to

ignore I mean there's an interesting

idea in the circles around a nutrition

and health that you know never before in

human history have human beings been

able to access such a wide variety of

foods that are differ from what their

ancestors ate and I don't even mean

ancient ancestors I mean if you grew up

in the Bay Area as I did in the 1970s

and 80s there were a few ethnic

restaurants but we ate the same you know

15 or 20 Foods over and over again right

and then eventually that exploded into

dozens of options and more and fusion

foods and all sorts of things and so

there is this idea in the nutrition

communities that we are not hardwired to

um think about and discern so many

different food options that you know

that's um and to taste so many distinct

flavors whereas before people one

portion of the planet or country ate

generally one way in a given season if

there's seasonality etc etc in a similar

vein um we are now and children too are

now um overwhelmed with a number of

different options of how to express

oneself both masculinity and femininity

but generally speaking and so question

is then how does one choose right how

does one decide what's what's functional

what works what's best what's me right

everyone asking themselves who am I

right I think all teenagers I find this

fascinating ask themselves who am I

adults don't tend to ask themselves that

question but who am I I still ask myself

question okay well that's good maybe I

should ask myself that more often but um

I think

that we clearly have gone over a cliff

with this stuff I don't think we're

still at the point where we're kind of

veering towards the edge of of confusion

I think young people are really confused

because the moment one assumes uh one

clear and let's say balanced Mas set of

masculine feminine attributes or maybe

ver is a bit more masculine or a bit

more feminine it's like um there are a

million examples telling you that that's

wrong I know and then sometimes has the

tendency to Anchor to well no no I'm

right because this is this is who I am

and then all of a sudden you're you're

in a larger battle so uh you know Gary

Cooper's great love his movies um but

we're like we now have a million

variations on Gary Cooper um that don't

look anything like the Gary Cooper you

and I are talking about and a lot of

people won't even know who we're talking

about but I

they I'm a dinosaur but perhaps it

illustrates the point no i' not that

you're a dinosaur but that um there is

no single or even um set of masculine or

feminine ideals so picking Role Models

is something that I really truly

internalize from your book mastery yeah

you know there were a lot of lonely

years for me and I won't get into the

stories of just wondering like my what

am I going to do you know I'm 13 my home

was completely broken no semblance of

the reality it was before you know who

are the the males in my life I'm going

to orient to and fortunately for me I

assigned mentors to me whether or not

they knew it or not that really helped

me along and I changed them up as you

recommend there wasn't one um I

understood there was a breaking up

process an integration process combining

and threading together different things

I think I truly believe that that's

what's required then um it doesn't have

to be 100% Gary Cooper it can be 10%

Robert Green 10% someone else you know

5% this and creating a pie chart of

sorts of you know who one wishes to be

in a given context but that takes work

it takes a bit of work and

discernment but gosh that's powerful um

and really credit goes to you because I

you know you were a mentor of mine you

didn't even realize it in the way that

you forge and organiz information and

there were others and but Mastery is

where I learned to do that and this is

not a podcast it's a sales pitch for

Mastery but gosh it really taught me

okay I have a graduate adviser she was

wonderful and Brilliant but she didn't

know how to explain a lot of things to

me so I'd find someone else for that

right and someone else for the other

thing and someone else for the other

thing and together create a patchwork of

of really excellent mentors that made a

lot of sense to me yeah yeah so I I

think there's a a role for

that process that you spell out in

Mastery in the larger context of like

could have become as a person and that

includes masculine and feminine ideals

yeah and and it's an ongoing process

throughout your life so who you glommed

on to when you were 14 or 15 will change

when you're 19 I had a series of people

like you're talking about my high school

English teacher who had an enormous

impact on me who taught me basically how

to write I internalized his voice when I

went to Berkeley I had a professor that

who became my kind of surrogate father

at Berkeley who I deeply admired for his

level of scholarship so he became kind

of an intellectual role model later in

life when I finally wrote my first book

I met a man y steers who was a book

packager who understood the business Etc

he kind of saved me he was sort of my

mentor for the next phase in my life so

on and on and on I found people but they

have positive qualities qualities they

admire they're not perfect everyone is

flawed

and so at some point maybe you see too

many of the flaws you go on I need

somebody new in my life but there's

nothing wrong with that it's not like

you're you're you're violating any codes

or hurting them you move on to somebody

else but the sense of finding people

whose qualities you admire we don't

learn from people just by following

their ideas we pick up their energy

their Spirit now you didn't necessarily

pick up my energy or Spirit from Reading

Master although Maybe you did I don't

know but when you're interacting with

that professor at Stanford or whatever

it's not just verbally there's kind of a

non-verbal communication going on you're

internalizing some of the positive

qualities that you saw in them and

finding these series of mentors because

I call it surrogate

parents you can't choose your father and

mother but you can choose these ideals

for you can choose these mentors in your

life you can kind of rewrite

your family history and find that Father

Figure You Never Had by glomming onto

this person but it has to be the right

fit it has to be someone that you

connect to emotionally and

intellectually and that has the positive

qualities you wish for yourself well

I'll embarrass you perhaps by saying

that um since I was a freshman in

college which is really when I turned my

academic life around and really my life

around I've maintained the same notebook

with a list of names of people that I

admire and who I'm um you know trying to

emulate in some way not in every way

certainly and the certain names have

been crossed off but um most of them

have survived and and certainly after

reading Mastery your name made that list

and um and I hope I'm not being crossed

off at some point no not at all not not

at all and through Reading Mastery there

were there were additional names um you

know I had the great the great

Misfortune of having all three of my

academic advisors die suicide cancer

cancer which sounds tragic the joke in

my field is you don't want me to work

for you that's what that's what everyone

says but by being essentially

scientifically orphaned because there's

a strong Mentor mentee relationship in

science and progression through the

career uh track it forced me to go out

and find other people and also to learn

how to quote unquote mother and father

myself in the context of profession and

I got a lot of help but um I I can't

emphasize enough how valuable that

practice is and so when one looks out on

the landscape of social media options I

mean these are literally just options of

people to you know we call it following

but um you know it probably should be

called something else uh because

following you know it fall short of

emulating or attempting to emulate but I

think that in the context of masculine

and feminine ideals this is so critical

but it's like the buffet of food is so

enormous now right I mean you've got

every cuisine on the table so speak

we're we're not wired for that no and I

know personally I I get very agitated

and upset if I go to the market and I

have to choose between 30 items and I

have no idea what I want it makes me

really cranky and upset whereas if I

know okay I can have this food I can't

have that I'm only looking for this okay

it's easy it doesn't take two hours and

waste my time too much choice is very

detrimental to the human being I think

and that's why going back to what I

originally said when you have that sense

of purpose about your life about what's

important it does just infect your

career but it infects everything you do

so you know eating this food is going to

drain me of my energy that I need to

create this thing that means so much to

me and energy and feeling my my brain

active and alive is incredibly important

value all right I'm not going to eat all

that Sugar because it's bad for me right

it means I'm not going to get outraged

by these things on the internet because

it's a waste of time I can't do anything

about it it's just feeding on my you

know on my I forget the part of the

brain that's that's like the amydala or

whatever right so no I don't want to go

there right and on and on and on all

these things in social media some of

it's good some of it's interesting I can

follow Andrew huberman's podcast and I

enjoy that and I learn a lot from it but

a lot of these podcasts are useless

they're they're not helping me in any

way so it gives you this kind of filter

and this radar to cut out those hundred

different choices that drive us

absolutely crazy and I know maybe I'm

partially I maybe maybe I'm a little bit

I don't know I hate to say that maybe

I'm partially on the Spectrum or

something but I can't trans can't stand

too many choices it completely drives me

nuts so I always have to kind of funnel

my energy into something to things that

are productive and having a sense of

your purpose whenever you discovered in

your 20s hopefully gives you that

ability to say these are the positive

role models I want in my life these are

the mentors and the thing about

following people on social media is it's

so easy it's just a click it doesn't

mean anything a mentor relationship

takes work it takes courage because you

have to actually go up to somebody and

physically ask for their help and a lot

of people write to me say I'm afraid of

asking this important powerful person to

be their mentee right so it involves a

sense of social courage where you have

to literally engage with another human

being who you admire and who you think

is powerful so it's building your social

skills Etc but it's a skill you develop

you can't just follow someone you can't

just watch their lectures you have to

engage with them and you have to get

over some of your fears and your

anxieties in the process yeah and I

might add to it uh I think everything

you said is absolutely true and I think

um engaging in the the various um tools

that they recommend is immensely helpful

like I think hear hearing about a book

is great reading a book is even better

um thinking about a book is even that

you read is even better than that and

and then uh writing down your own ideas

and writing a book well that's that's

the big win right and that's what the

world I believe that's what the universe

wants from us not necessarily to write a

book but you know translate what I just

said to any number of different

Endeavors yeah you want to be able to

think for yourself right so you're not

just absorbing ideas from other people

and kind of mimicking them and kind of

just learning the exteriors of their

ideas you want to kind of digest them

and then have them slowly become your

own ideas by interacting with them by

Crea then putting them through your own

lens so someday it's it's a book

stirring in me is the art of thinking

and how to use that kind of process and

go deeper into it and I talked a lot

about it in one of my podcasts which

might be the seed of a book but it's

it's the the difference between dead

thinking and Alive thinking ideas can be

either alive or they can be dead and an

alive idea is something that enters your

brain from an external Source a

philosopher an article somebody you

admire somebody you hate and then you

absorb it and you think about it and you

decide I'm going to turn it around into

this and I'm going to make it alive and

it's going to make it something that's

part of me another part of an alive idea

is um you have an idea that comes to you

about a book or a project or something

about the world and you go maybe that's

not actually true maybe the opposite is

true and you go through a process and

you cycle through it on and on and you

reflect on it and you refine this idea

and maybe it turns into its opposite and

through the process of reflecting and

correcting and revising it you turn it

into something living something alive

within you right on and on and on and

what prevents people from going through

that process which would be the subject

of my book is basically anxiety because

I think how you handle anxiety is the

most important kind of quality in life

it'll determine whether you will be

successful whether you will find your

career path or whether you won't be able

to I don't know if you can follow that

idea at all but um anxiety is a signal

to you that you don't understand

something that that there's a problem

out there that that you can't

resolve and so what happens to most

people if you're insecure is you glom

onto something instant and easy to get

rid of your feeling of anxiety I don't

understand this problem oh it must be a

must a must be the answer because this

person said that right and so you don't

develop the the ability to think you

don't develop the ability to go to the

next level but if you take that anxiety

and you go all right maybe a is an

answer and then you start going through

a and then you go no maybe a isn't the

answer maybe B is the answer you're able

to surmount your anxiety and go past it

further and further and further you

don't rush for the first available

answer that's out there right you're

able to go through a process of refining

things and so in your

career if you're anxious for Success if

you're anxious for money you're going to

make the wrong choices but if you're

able to deal with that anxiety and say

maybe I'm I have to think more deeply

about where I'm going I have to come up

with other Alternatives then you're

going to make a much better choice on

and on and on so how if you're deal if

you're a creative person it's very very

challenging to have that blank piece of

paper before you that book that you

haven't written that film or whatever

you're filled with a lot of anxiety and

you have to deal with it and if you're

able to turn into something creative and

productive then great things will happen

you'll create a masterpiece so the

ability to deal with anxiety and to not

give into the most instant gratification

that you can get is to me a marker of

somebody who will be creative and will

invent something as opposed to people

who just recycle old and dead

ideas Amen to that I uh was once told

that you know anxiety makes children of

us all and not in the positive sense of

being childlike you know it it regresses

us to a mode where we feel a complete

lack of control and I completely agree

that being able to manage anxiety and

and work dance with it since we can't

rid ourselves of it no no perhaps nor

should we right because it's a signal as

you point out that we don't understand

something that there's there's something

to get curious about right a process or

something out there or both I think uh

that really resonates yeah and I think a

lot of people will benefit from from

hearing that because I think we hear the

word flow and we just all imagine I even

catch myself imagining that you know

when Robert Green sits down to right

it's like there's a blank sheet and then

he just kind of meditates and then boom

out come these books um but I you know

if I get realistic for a second I'm sure

that there's a lot of inner turmoil and

anxiety oh my God you have no idea so um

my process is is 95% pain and maybe 2

and a half% ecstasy and I don't know

what the other 2 and a half% would be

but um so I write a story because all in

my new book in most of my books I always

begin with a story from history

Etc and it is so bad it I just I can't

believe how bad how flat it is how it

sucks I'm so embarrassed I hate myself

then I go and I go dig into and I start

changing the words in it I start making

it a little bit better the second

version It's kind of palatable but it

still sucks it's if I let it out into

the world be very embarrassing I work I

it's an anxious you know and my wife can

tell you I'm a miserable being when that

happens everything looks black to me at

that point and I push through it so if I

gave in to my anxiety and this happens

with a lot of books and writers I would

just put out that second version which

isn't very good it isn't very strong it

isn't thought through because my ideas

when I look at them the first time I go

that's not real that's not the actual

thing that's going on here Robert you've

missed the mark you want to hit what's

actually real in that story so you have

to go deeper and deeper and harder and

harder and harder so I don't just give

up and go here's the chapter I go it's

got to be better it's got to be better

until

finally after two months of

struggling it seems like it's it's gone

to the place that I wanted to be in

right but I I use that anxiety to keep

improving and making it better and then

when I reach that point in the story is

good enough and I can let my wife read

it and then my editor I feel great I

have that 2% moment of Joy but it came

through all of that anxiety but I can

tell you the feeling of f fillment when

I finish a chapter is pretty damn great

when I finish a

book it's better than any kind of drug

experience anyone could ever have it's

such a wonderful feeling of

accomplishment and pushing past all the

barriers you know so my process involves

a lot of anxiety and dealing with that's

why I'm talking about it why I want to

write a book about it thank you for

sharing that um I'm attempting to write

a book and have been for several years

and now I feel a little bit better but

clearly I need to ratchet down harder um

but in other domains of life I I am

familiar with the experience of tons of

anxiety and just okay I'm going to just

get to this one Milestone and then I'll

figure out the next Milestone but even

that process of saying okay I'm going to

break this down into Milestones itself

is anxiety provoking it's just that but

at some point it generates enough

inertia that you just that you just sort

of stumble forward into the process and

then keep going so try not to bloody

oneself that's right too much yeah I

think a lot people will benefit from

hearing about that in fact I'm certain

they will So speaking of anxiety you

have a clip on the internet that we will

provide a link to in the show note

captions which I think is absolutely

fabulous about how to find a romantic

partner and or get more out of an

existing romantic partnership I don't

even remember what I said you're going

to have to remind oh it's so good

um one point in particular yeah that uh

I remember um that I think is oh so true

is that there needs to be at least one

and probably several uh points of like

real convergence in terms of one's

interests or likes that go beyond like

what food somebody likes or uh you know

what type of house they want to live in

but that actually traces back to these

early forms of delight and you mentioned

uh that for you and therefore presumably

your partner that you know a mutual love

and respect for Animals happens to be

one of those things within the context

of your relationship right that not that

A Love For Animals is required for me it

sure as hell is right exactly could

never go out with a woman who didn't

love animals right my sister used to

tease me that um if a woman gave me a

birthday card or a card that had a

drawing of a particular animal which I'm

particularly fond of my sister used I

have an older sister and she used to say

oh no it's over he's gone you know that

it would you know um fortunately it's

it's not that simple um but uh there's

some truth to what she was saying um

it's certainly uh it's necessary but not

sufficient but maybe you could elaborate

a little bit on this notion of um

convergent interest and contrast it with

a lot of what people tend to hear and

say about what's important in

Partnership because I think this is

something that a lot of people grapple

with both in terms of finding a partner

and in terms of building

partnership well um you have to you know

there's you can there's different

relationships you can have I mean do you

want like a one week a one month

relationship are you looking for

something longer more satisfying that

will entail you know maybe years of

being

together and um you know uh people can

get very boring very quickly right

particularly if you can't have a

conversation with them about subjects

that interest you and so you mention

animals animals is a very good example

because it's not I'm not saying that you

both have to be Democrats or Republicans

that's too banal and superficial but the

Love of Animals reaches into your

character reaches something deep inside

of you or your dislike of animals if

that happens to be the case but it

signals something about it that's so

Primal that's so connected to a

child that there's going be a deep

connection there and it's not like you

have to both love cats which is good if

that happens to be the case but just

animals in general you love their energy

you love the fact that they're that

they're innocent in their own way you

love the fact that they're not playing

games with you you love the kind of

instant love you can get from them kind

of thing and you connect to them on that

level is a very very positive sign

because it goes beyond just intellectual

things into something emotional and

visceral

so really the emotional connections the

values that you have together are very

important money is another one that's

extremely important so if one of you is

incredibly material oriented and it's

all about money is is is power and

success and comfort and the other isn't

really into it it's into spending money

Etc a lot of people have endless fights

over something like money right where

the there's no convergence there and

money signals a deeper value about the

person so I'm not saying there's

anything wrong if money motivates you

I'm not moralizing about it because that

can signal a value that maybe you grew

up without it and that feeling

comfortable and feeling like you don't

have to worry about something is very

very important to you and the not being

interested in money reveals something

about your character so I'm telling

people you want to look at the person's

character and see a kind of convergence

there and something that can last and I

remember I was reading um for one of my

books about Franklin Delo Roosevelt and

Elanor Roosevelt and the thing of it was

Franklin delanor Roosevelt was this

incredibly handsome vibrant young man

before he got polio very active very

athletic very handsome all the women

were after him he was like the perfect

match he was wealthy and Elanor

Roosevelt was like the ugly duckling she

wasn't very pretty she was kind of

socially awkward

but he saw into her character he saw

that intellectually she was a match for

him he saw that they had kind of similar

interests on that level that I'm talking

about that go beneath just the

surfaces and he chose Elanor and

everyone was shocked about it you know

nobody was was trying to court Elanor

I've wrote her last name at the time I

think she might have in being a

Roosevelt um so it was very shocking he

said I I looked at somebody who I could

last with who had some qualities that

were much more important to me and ended

up being a very satisfying relationship

of course later on he had his Dianes so

it wasn't perfect but it was a very it

was a very positive relationship so

seeing your values in life you know when

it comes to like money when it comes to

like career when it comes to comfort or

lack of comfort some people like not

being comfortable they like being on the

Ed Ed they want challenges they want to

move from City to City kind of thing and

if you partner with somebody who just

wants to live in the same house you're

going to have conflict after conflict

after conflict the sex might be great

and that might be good for a month or

two months I have nothing against that

I'm not going to judge that either but

it won't lead to a longlasting

relationship you know Sports and

Athletics are another thing is a someone

that likes the outdoors or is it someone

who's you know like zaha Gabor and has

to be in in a Time Square in a penthouse

in Manhattan you know kind of thing so

values that reach inside of a per

character that are deeply ingrained that

you can almost not change you can't

control and there's a convergence there

on several levels is a sign that you can

have a deep connection with that person

and it's very important and if those

connections are good and there's a

physical attraction because if without

the physical attraction it will kind of

fizzle out you've got a recipe for for

incredible success for something that

can really last and having a lasting

relationship as I've

had is is such an anchor in your life

you know for me for someone who works as

hard as I do and hopefully for her as

well it just grounds me and it makes

life so much simpler and easier and and

it's not just simple and easy there's a

lot of love and a great deal of of of

deeper emotions involved but having a

long-term relationship if you can have

it is something that pays off in so many

dividends so being able to find that

kind of convergence you know when I

first met my now my wife um I had a cat

at the time I'd always been a dog person

but this was a cat I had and I love that

cat like hell I can't believe he was

such a wonderful

cat I brought her over to my apartment

on the first date I wanted to see her

reaction to the cat you know because I

generally and I don't know people

misjudge that women who don't like cats

I I don't I can't get along with right

because there's something feline in the

feminine nature that I love and she

loved my cat boy that was the best sign

of all and things just Bloss and she

loved me for loving a cat so there was a

great convergence right there that we

saw right away and there were other

things but that was the first

one I love that story and everything you

just said suggests I believe that in

order to find the right partner and to

build an existing partnership that

hopefully feels at least partially right

to people that it requires at least some

knowing of self Because unless you know

your character one's own character then

it's impossible to really determine if

somebody else's character is going to

mesh well with it or not self-awareness

is is actually the most important

quality in life for all aspects but yeah

I mean if we go by social pressures a

man will choose a trophy wife who looks

sexy and hot and will impress all of his

male friends etc etc you go by the

things that culture tells you that these

are the right images for you right and

then there won't be any connection to

you because you're choosing for purposes

that don't connect to who you are and so

you have to know yourself you have to

know what you love you have to know what

you hate I think most people know that

they love animals or don't love animals

I think most people know that they like

stability or they like things to be kind

of slightly chaotic I don't think you

have to go through deep levels of

introspection but what you have to do is

when you're involved in a relationship

you have to think that those things

matter that's the problem you tend to

think that those things matter you think

that sex matters more than anything

physical attraction matters or you think

that the person having a lot of money

matters etc etc you don't think that

this other aspect is important if you

value what I'm talking about then your

self-awareness will kick in because you

really basically know these essential

basic parts about your own character I

think people sometimes get um distracted

by admiration of qualities that they

might

find admirable but that don't mesh with

their own character I've seen this many

times before where examp well uh where

someone will say well there someone will

start listing off the positive

attributes of the person that they

happen to be dating like he does this

blank blank and blank she does this you

know he volunteers Etc and that's all

great I mean volunteering for good

causes I'm all in support of that but

then what they're overlooking often it

seems is whether or not that's a core

value for them or whether or not it's

just something that they admire I hear a

lot of admiration in the early days of

relationships that later I hear about

failing and what you're talking about is

something deeper more uh aligned with

one's own sense of self and it almost um

leads me to use the word you know sort

of a more about energetics it's like

merging of people's energies which

sounds very new Agy and that's not my

intention but but I think it relates to

something that we do hear a lot about

and I think is valid which is how it

feels to be around somebody in different

context like do we feel at ease do we

feel lightness and ability to express

ourselves and to um and do we enjoy and

admire them in their expression as

opposed to just admiring what they do

they've accomplished blank blank and

blank I see right they uh manifest these

qualities that I wish I had right you

hear that and and aspire to have which

is very different than a meshing of of

energies also there a couple other

things you have to understand their

character as well and people can be very

deceptive and very slippery and can wear

masks

one telling sign that I've noticed in my

own relationships in the

past is that the woman would be a

certain way with me that I thought was

very good and I liked and then the

moment we were with other people she

acted in a way that was very irritating

it's like a different character and I

really kind of fell out of love with her

when I saw her in social interactions

she revealed so with me she was almost

wearing a mask and playing a game but

the moment she entered a different

circumstance I saw other aspect to her

character so you also have to be very

attentive to their character what lies

underneath that they have some of these

values that they're not just trying to

win you over for whatever and they're

playing along with you the other thing

that's very

important is a sense of mystery so a

partner can become boring very very

quickly right after a year you know

every single thing about them right

they're going to say the same things the

conversations go around found in circles

it's just you've reached an end there's

no surprises there's no mystery you want

somebody where they have corners that

you don't really see at first that they

surprise you sometimes suddenly there's

a quality that you hadn't suspected

before so people who are too obvious who

are too familiar who show everything

instantly they're going to end up boring

you right but people who have a bit of

Reserve I I know this is maybe I'm I'm

projecting my own values on the world

but people who who kind of intrigue you

that you don't fully understand that

make you want to know more and if they

can be like that after two years or

three years or five years wow that's

fantastic but the sense of I know every

single thing about this person they

never surprise me anymore is what kind

of breaks the the the enchantment and

leads to the end of the relationship

well the idea of more to learn about

somebody um perhaps also suggests that

they are continuing to evolve into

forage in the landscape of life you know

that they're not fully baked right that

which I think is um an interesting idea

in during the four episode series that

we did on Mental Health Paul kti a

psychiatrist said that um a matching of

generative drives which he defined as

the desire to create something in the

world of One's Own expression is really

critical in relationship and he said you

know it matters less whether or not one

person likes classical music and the

other person rock and roll provid that

their relationship to music is similar

or something of that sort like that it's

about a drive to of a certain sort to

engage in the world so one person could

love music the other person's not into

music but the way that they approach

life is one of perhaps Mutual curiosity

desire to find out Etc and that this

exists on a Continuum uh I'm curious if

uh it seems to jive with what you're

with what you're saying it does but the

only thing I would add is if you love

classical music and they love like heavy

metal music you're going to be driven

crazy pretty quickly it's going to you

know it's not going to mesh with you and

I know I would have that problem you'll

both be in headphones a

lot right so the fact that you both have

because music is like animals in a way

so I agree completely with what you're

saying but I would say maybe music isn't

the best example because music says

something very deep about a person right

there and you know I'm not saying one is

superior to the other but it reveals

something that's nonverbal that that

kind of gives you a window into who they

are so if they like punk rock like you

do and I grew up on punk rock there's a

rebellious thing this to there's an

anti-authoritarian quality that's very

strong you get you get to see that

through them if they like modart and

soft string quartets there's somebody

that kind of values softness and

tranquility and peace and you're not

like that so the music kind of shows you

something a quality about their

character that can be very telling can

be very eloquent and so it doesn't mean

that you both have to love The Clash or

the dead kennedies or whatever showing

my own Generation Um but that you both

have that rebellious streak and that

rebellious streak could be you like

there's classical music composers who

could be pretty damn rebellious and

angry you know and I actually kind of

like them so that convergence I think is

a positive one kind of thing but in

general I agree with that I'm curious

about the nonverbal communication

component of all types of relationships

but let's stay in the landscape of

romantic relationships for the moment

yeah maybe include professional

relationships too because what you just

described is really about a resonance

around the non-verbal stuff I mean it

can be articulated with words yeah um I

love animals I love this music this is

the best song like did you see that like

otter are amazing right this kind of

thing but language is just an attempt to

place you know words on a Feeling in

those instances so it it can be

classified as non-verbal

um with respect to non-verbal

communication you've

written fairly extensively about the

fact that people often communicate with

their body and facial

expressions um I'm certainly familiar

with the somewhat if not not very eerie

sensation of somebody um smiling like a

toothy smile and then it as they pivot

away that smile just dissolving very

quickly and um you know you don't have

to be a neuroscientist or a psychologist

to realize that like there was something

quite false about that experience or

that this person experiences um emotions

like step functions on off on off which

is not how most of us experience

emotions most of us experience emotions

with some pervasiveness like I was happy

walking in the door because of something

happened before and so I'm going to

smile while I'm walking in the door if I

see something shocking and dismaying of

course I'm going to frown I'm going to

wipe away that smile but those are rare

instances so um let's talk about the

mouth the eyes the face the body in the

context of communication what are what

are some important things to P attention

one that I I I I wanted to go back on as

far as convergence is sense of humor is

extremely important right so it's not

like you both like the same comedians

but if one person likes runchy humor and

the other person doesn't that's that's a

problem and also the fact that the

person doesn't have a sense of humor or

doesn't make you laugh is a very very

bad sign so I wanted to add that one

component in there I'm so glad you did

uh someone who can make me laugh has uh

you know necessary but not sufficient

but boy it's uh approaching sufficient

yeah I'd say so I'd say so um you know

when it comes to the Art of Seduction

The Art of Seduction is a nonverbal

language that you must Master it's a

language of the gifts that you give it's

a ma it's a language of of how you smell

it's a language that you TR that you

communicate through the eyes etc etc and

the thing you have to understand about

the human being is that we evolved for

much longer period of time without words

than the small 40 35,000 years that we

have symbolic language so during that

vast period of Darkness where we did not

have words words we were non

communicating non-verbally we were

picking up signals from people we were

watching every little detail of their

behavior because we didn't have words to

decipher it so it's wired into our

brains to have an amazing sensitivity to

people's non-verbal Communications we

can almost be telepathic that way if we

learn that

language the problem is we have the

capacity but we don't develop it at all

because we are so word oriented you're

just listening to people if you're even

listening to them at all you're just

hearing the words and you're so thinking

that the words mean something the words

are sincere which they're often not at

the same time that you're listening so

much to words people are shuffling in

their chair they're kind of looking away

they're looking at other women or other

men their voice is kind of trembling

when they say something that where it

shouldn't tremble their eyes are dead

the smile is kind of fake you're not

watching any of it so the most important

thing in non-verbal communication law

number one is pay attention to it

continually develop the practice of

shutting off the words and watching

people almost as if you took the

television and muted it right and just

watch their behavior it's not easy and

it's not natural because it's the words

the words the words we want to we want

to focus on them right but your ability

to turn that television off to mute it

will suddenly open up so many things

about people they reveal so much things

Sigman Freud said people are continually

oozing out all of their secrets through

their non-verbal Behavior you can read

them like an open book if you master

this language and I have the laws of

human nature I described the story of

Milton Ericson I don't know if you're

familiar with Milton Ericson perhaps the

greatest modern master of non-verbal

communication he was a an amazing

psychologist he sort of um is the

inspiration behind um n what's it called

n help me out here neuro linguistic oh

the NLP I mean it's kind of a

bastardization of his ideas but he's he

created hypnotherapy he's the person who

created hypnotherapy certainly I uh

hypnotherapy is is a valid psychiatric

practice I mean it's excellent clinical

data to support well Milton Erikson had

Polio when he was

19 and he was paralyzed his entire body

was par paralyzed he couldn't even move

his

eyeballs right and he sat in bed and he

had a very active mind and he was going

to just die from sheer boredom and what

he did during the two years of being

paralyzed like that was just watching

People's non-verbal communication and

making notes in his brain and learning

every single he learned the 20 different

forms of yes the hundred different forms

of no right every intonation how

somebody entered the room how they left

the room you know how they looked at him

with the pity or empathy or something he

mastered it and then when he became a

psychiatrist and he treated people they

thought he was psychic he could see

everything into them it's because for

two years that's all he could do was

Observe them he couldn't speak he

couldn't do anything he couldn't read a

book so you have that same power but you

don't have polio obviously but you have

to first pay attention to it right it's

an amazing thing once you do it's a lot

of fun actually and I tell people go to

a cafe one day in your city wherever you

live and just watch people because you

can't hear them they're a few tables

away watch their non-verbal Behavior as

they interact and see if if you pick up

cues from them and they're things that

are signs of genuine emotions so for

instance an exercise you can do is you

go up to somebody

from an angle where they can't see you

coming up to them and you surprise them

you go hey hey Mike whatever they turn

for that second their expression reveals

how they really think about you you'll

detect if you can pick up micro

expressions and and you can they're only

like one 150th of a second but they're

there you can express a kind of and they

smile you can see the little disdain in

their eyes right then the mask comes on

right right or you're talking to them

they're looking at you but their feet

are facing in an opposite direction that

means that they're dying to get away

from you kind of thing these are signals

that you don't necessarily pay attention

to their posture will tell you

everything about their levels of

confidence right on and on and on the

fake smile if you can just Master the

ability to detect the fake smile it will

go wonders for you because you're able

to see what you really want to do is to

see the person with a genuine smile

particularly in romantic

relationships someone whose face lights

up a real smile lights your whole face

up it doesn't light your mouth that

these parts of your face go up your eyes

get alive there's like there's like a a

neuro thing going on in your brain

that's changing your whole facial

expression and it means that someone

genuinely likes you they're genuinely

interested in you they're genuinely

laughing or connecting to you man and if

you can see that it'll help you so much

in the Romantic realm and then it'll

help you get away from those toxic

people that are continually faking

interest in you because a narcissist a

toxic

person thrives by deceiving you with a

Charming alluring front that makes you

come into their world then they can hurt

you then they can do something to you

right then they have you in in in their

in their you know in their trap right so

being able to see that they're not

genuinely interested in you that they're

faking it will help you avoid very toxic

relationships and as I said to you I

don't know if we were on air or not but

deep narcissists have dead eyes they

they almost can't help it they can fake

the smile they can fake everything else

but the eyes you have to be able to read

it because you say well what are dead

eyes you'll know it when you see it

there's no life in them they're like

looking through you they're not looking

at you they're looking through you what

can I get of you you're what they call a

selfobject they're an object for you to

use and that's how they're looking at

you like they would look at a hammer or

something yeah the concept of dead eyes

and also alive eyes is so fascinating

because um as audience of this podcast

will know that because I've said it too

much but I'll say it again that the eyes

are the only two pieces of your brain

that are outside the cranial Vault I

mean they're literally two pieces of

brain lining the back of your eyes and

the Dynamics of the pupils those changes

of course reflect how bright or dim it

is in the room but they also reflect

levels of arousal that are on the

millisecond time scale so as one

expresses you know words of um of Glee

right the pupils constrict a little bit

believe it or not or excuse me dilate a

little bit I got it backwards there for

a moment um and vice versa you know as

one feels uh less less excited um sort

of moments of Despair expressions of

Despair the pupils should get a little

bit smaller because arousal is going

down and so I think you know we pick up

on these things at a unconscious level

do um the deadness of the eyes is is

kind of the the um the the conclusion

that that pops out at us if we're paying

attention but the problem is it love it

registers unconsciously but we don't

give it any value to it we trust our

words we trust our rationality as

opposed to our intuitions about people

so sometimes when you meet a person for

the first time signals go up in your

mind brain something's wrong about them

and then you forget it because you don't

trust those initial unconscious signals

that your brain is giving you right so

you have to you have to first kind of

trust that this that these intuitions

are very valuable the other thing is pay

deep attention to the tone of voice The

Voice as actors will tell you is like

the hardest thing to fake right it's

very hard to fake excitement your voice

either has it or it doesn't it's very

hard to fake confidence and you can I

mean books have been written about that

I'm not going to go into all the the

details about it but the person will

reveal so much of their emotional of the

emotions that they're experiencing

particularly levels of confidence you

know like a trembling Voice or something

or a booming confident voice which some

people can fake but often it's very

difficult you can still see through it

and on the level of Seduction

women men are very very attuned to the

voice of a woman but we're not aware of

it because the voice of our mother had

an incredible impact on us in early

early early childhood her singing her

the tone of her voice that was probably

the first seduction that we ever went

through and a woman's voice has

tremendous power over us right and so

hearing a voice that kind of grates or

irritates you is is something that's

that's a bad side and that goes deeper

than all the characteristics that we

were talking about but a woman's voice

that kind of reminds you of that mother

that sing song you whatever feeling it

was that's that's somebody that's that

can very easily seduce you yeah there's

a um there's a place for uh naming this

of it's like subcortical courtship uh

you know you know below the cortex as a

the geeky neuroscientists like myself

say you know you're getting down below

the cortex with all of this stuff you

know convergence of of real uh loves and

desires I mean we express with words we

sense the world using of course our

cortex but we're really talking about

getting into the the subcortical stuff

that is the stuff of our history the

stuff of our um hardwiring and our

unique our uniqueness I couldn't help

but think about the fact that earlier we

were talking about the now you know

infinitely vast number of choices of

things to engage in people to engage

with Etc but at the same time as you

were now talking about um these micro

inflections and the subtleties of voice

and bodily

communication that whether or not it's

emojis or people sending filtered images

or the default to text message

communication that is so prominent now

it seems like we now have more choices

so uh more input

but the sort of qualitative differences

between the inputs have been binned into

a couple of simple bins as if it's as if

we've um regressed to primary colors

only um but the canvas is huge or may I

don't know if that analogy works but you

you get the idea because ultimately in

order to develop good choices about

profession romantic relationships

friendships you need a lot of examples

and a lot of information that allows you

to glean the subtlety um but as long as

it's emojis and filtered pictures taken

at a particular angle you know usually

from above ask for the picture your head

on and Below send me a picture of your

worst your worst expression um all of

that um it seems that there's now

increased opportunity for deception and

I don't just mean people misleading

others I also mean us misleading

ourselves like oh my goodness how could

I be so disappointed yet again about

particular landscape of life it doesn't

just have to be romantic interactions it

could be other Landscapes like how could

I be fooled well you're fooled because

the the uh the inputs were deficient

not good data as we say well the thing

is if things are you're immersed in the

virtual

realm it's very very hard to master the

non-verbal communication aspect which is

so important so if you're dating from an

app and you're flipping through and then

you find that person you've missed out

on the greatest experience of life which

is actually having to go out to a bar or

go to a restaurant or go to a social

event and have to literally encounter

another person and deal with looking at

their their behavior and kind of

assessing who they are it's a muscle

that you have to pay attention to

non-verbal communication and if you're

just you know going through the Emojis

or going through the Tinder apps that

muscle completely atrophies you have no

power you're not able to decipher

anything and that's what's happening

with a lot of people who are using these

ABS a social skills are like any skill

at all they you have to develop them

it's a muscle you have to develop and

you've all noticed this probably in your

own life if you've gone through a period

where you're kind of retreating you

don't want to be around people and you

spend a month like that and then you go

out you feel awkward it takes you like a

couple days to get used to being around

other people you say stupid things your

body language is awkward but if you're

in a situation for months where you're

constantly interacting people you're on

a film set and day in day out day out

that skill starts developing but you

have to be out there in the world you

have to be interacting you have to be

looking at people's emotions you have to

be gauging them in real time we're not

built for virtual encounters we're

creatures of human of Flesh and Blood

and we need to be looking at each other

in the eye and paying attention to all

these little details these nuances that

you can only get in person a on those

lines what are your thoughts about Ai

and how that's going to shape our um

sense of self sense of others and

relationships as if that's a topic that

could be covered in uh a series of

minutes but what what are your um what

are your top Contour maybe even deeper

thoughts about AI well I'm G to I'm

going to piss a lot of people off but

I'm I'm kind of very concerned about it

um I mentioned before about anxiety the

role that anxiety plays in thinking you

come upon an IDE

idea and you go yeah that's all good

then you go to the next level and it

becomes better then you go oh maybe

that's not so good then you go to the

next level you go to level three and it

gets better and better you have anxiety

another aspect of intelligence is

self-awareness right the be to look at

yourself go I have biases I have

confirmation bias I have conviction bias

I have recency bias I have to counteract

these things I also have a dark side I

have aggression I have to be aware of

how they color my thinking my emotions

the third quality that goes into int I'm

talking about now intelligence not

artificial intelligence to be able to

deal anxiety and go to a third level

intelligence is the ability to look

inside of yourself and see your own

biases and the third thing is the

ability to see a holistic picture the

kind of aha moment that scientists have

where you accumulate all kind of data

points and then out of nowhere an image

comes to your mind of yeah there's the

answer you see the whole thing you see

the whole G

right Simone vile compared it to a a um

a square Cube you can only see a cube

from one side or you can never see a a

square Cube you can only see a side of

it if it's rotating you're still only

seeing sides of it only in your mind can

you picture the whole thing so the mind

has to go through a process to have

holistic thinking if they can invent a

machine that can deal with anxiety and

has has anxiety and it can go to level

three if they can make a machine that

can be self-aware that can go the people

who program me have biases therefore I

have biases I also have a dark side

because people have programmed me who

have a dark side if this machine can

also think holistically beyond all of

the data points and all the mass of

information it's combined it can have

that aha moment all right I can see a

human consciousness I can see creativity

there the other thing I would say is

when I was a student at Berkeley going

way back I was 19 years old I decided

One Summer was is a big paradigm shift

for me I'm going to take this class in

ancient Greek in six weeks they teach

you a year of ancient Greek that means

every day you have an exam every Friday

you have a final exam eight hours every

day of a dead language I thought this

would be the best discipline for me

after someone who didn't been doing too

many drugs to be honest with you okay

and so finally at one point they give us

this paragraph of the hardest ancient

Greek writer of all to read this was

near the end through cities or through

kitties as they

say I stared so I had I had like the

whole night to try and translate one

paragraph I couldn't figure it out you

have to understand the the weirdness of

ancient Greek all the endings the weird

ways of thinking the whole picture that

aha moment was eluding me at one point I

thought I got it and I translated it and

I gave it to the teacher next day I

remember he was this kind of hippie that

you'd have at Berkeley Dennis classic

Professor but also a hippie the fact

that you knew his first name is very

telling I can only remember his first

name Dennis he he's he said Robert I can

see your thinking but you need to go to

another level you missed you didn't have

that aha moment you didn't put the whole

thing together you were close but you

didn't you have to try harder and that

stuck in my mind forever like whenever I

have a problem I have to think harder I

have to go to that next level

now what would happen if I had pulled

out my translation of thusi and just

copied that out right or what have

happened if I put it through chat GPT

and it gave me the translation that

muscle in my brain that I have developed

for 40 years that allows me to write

books would never have developed and

that muscle is I don't know the answer

here I have to go to another level I

have to try harder I have to think I

have to think I have to have that engine

woring around right but if I just grab

for chat GPT it's deadened and then

we're going to have a whole generation

of people who stop thinking who don't go

through that process you know you've

heard of Douglas hter I think he said

people train to go to Mount Everest it

takes months physical exertion it's

painful then they climb M Everest they

see the top whoa what a great moment he

said chat PT be the equivalent of taking

a helicopter to the top of Mount Everest

without any of that training and having

the same moment it's not the same right

you need to go through that process you

need to go through that pain and if you

just and the thing of is Chad gbt we

think we're so modern So Sophisticated

but really we're just seduced by Magic

you put it in there and you see the

scrip

going whoa It's like magic it's like a

magician but it's empty it's like not

your brain functioning right it's p it's

the Pagan part of us we like that kind

of magic

as opposed to actually having to go

through the thought process itself so

I'm not in FA against having tools I use

tools I use the internet I use Google

I'm searching for like some factoid from

my book I find it I use it I I like it

but I've also learned to develop my

brain to think to get that engine

constantly moving and I'm deeply

concerned about G people who can't learn

a foreign language who can't master

anything who just immediately grab the

first answer that it generates etc etc I

have

concerns I am too and I was thinking a

moment ago that you know like some

people might hear what you just said and

say oh well the same thing was probably

said about the automobile like how many

amazing experiences of walking from one

place to another are going to be lost

when people start driving from one place

to another but I think a key difference

and this certainly aligns with

everything you just said is that what

you're talking about is not just

arriving at the same destination you're

saying the destination itself is

different when one exerts some effort

and experiences some anxiety to get

there so it's not the same as automobile

versus horse versus walking versus

airplane it's fundamentally different

because the the journey transforms the

outcome yeah yeah I I'm in agreement

with you about many aspects of AI I'm

also excited about it in the context of

certain things I I I I agree with you it

could be a tool but are we operating the

tool the tool operating us is what I'm

talking about I am concerned a bit too

especially in the context of what we've

been talking about for most of today's

discussion about um avatars replacing

our online personas too much um you know

the

Avatar of ourselves is already taking

place through through filters through uh

reduction of emotional expression to

emojis through reduction of of language

to a diminished number of words to

explain one's feelings you know a prior

guest on this podcast um Lisa Feldman

Barrett who's an expert in emotions

talked about how the moment that a

culture has a word for a particular

subset of anxious feelings so so for

instance she taught me that in Japanese

there's a word for the sadness one

experiences when they get a bad haircut

yeah I know you know and so that

normalizes the feeling and leads to

feelings of less despair as opposed to

what now many kids especially grow up

Lear learning which I'm anxious I'm sad

I'm depressed that you know in science

we say there are lumpers and there are

Splitters and they've been arguing for

years about like is that one brain

structure well if I name those two

things next to each other two different

things not only can I name one after

myself which is what tends to happen so

to speak but when you have too many

lumpers or too many Splitters things are

either overly simple or overly complex

that of course the right answer the the

the best use of naming things arve

someplace in the middle that's how a

field progresses cuz if you if you lump

things together too much a field can't

progress you give yourself the illusion

that it's progressing but it's not

progressing but if you split things up

into a million different subcategories

like just even the word adrenaline is

also called epinephrine and that's has

to do with basically people arguing over

who got credit crazy and it's confus

people for for decades yeah and there's

a there's another story there that and I

know far too much about the scientists

involved and the there was a love

triangle about naming of certain parts

of the nervous system that oh yeah

people sleeping with other people's

partners and love triangles have created

more drama of gnomen clature in science

I I could do a whole hour on this um in

any case I what I'm hearing from you is

that we cannot afford to lose our sense

of nuance and also because that sense of

nuance Taps into what we're really

experiencing and AI threatens that that

we can become avatars of oursel well

look at it this way we we worship

technology it's our new religion okay

and we worship chap GPT as if it's a God

and seriously there's religious elements

going on here what we really should

worship is the human brain which is the

greatest creation in the known universe

I'm afraid it is the most complex piece

of matter in the entire universe the

number of neurons the number of synapses

the number of possible connections

between neurons is infinite practically

infinite it is a wondrous instrument it

is so powerful we've we've very scratch

the surface of what we can use for it

let us worship that brain that's in your

head you only have so many years to use

it you have so many use to develop it it

is so wonderful and Powerful that can

bring you such pleasure so much power in

life so tools are fine we all need tools

we all need we need hammers we need

Nails we need saws Etc but the real

thing is the hand that uses it the brain

that connects the hand to the Hammer

that knows how to to hit things you know

I think of the of the um the great

painter Renoir in the 19th century he

had like a a stroke or something that

the last years he couldn't move his

right arm which was she painted with and

it was disastrous so what he did is he

put the brush in his mouth and he

painted and he painted some beautiful

paintings that way because his brain had

mastered the art of painting not his

hand but his brain had mastered it so

well that he could actually paint well

with the brush in his mouth because he

could direct it and he he had the

knowledge of how to make something

perfect the brain is absolutely

incredible the plasticity of the brain

which I'm discovering after my stroke is

absolutely a miracle you know what I

don't know is it Professor Schwarz at

UCLA who was studying OCD and how he was

able to kind of cure people of OCD

through certain plasticity exercises

that he had making them aware of their

kind of brain lock Etc and getting them

out of it the that plasticity of the

brain is by far the greatest Miracle of

all and it goes on into your 60s and 70s

and on onward let's all get down on our

hands and knees and worship the brain

and if we did it would create a complete

shift in our values and we wouldn't be

so instantly seduced and enamored and

worshiping the technology we would

worship the brains that create the

technology

instead of you know the other way around

I certainly got a fan of brains and

their uh potential for plasticity

sitting over here uh I have the benefit

of having my scientific

great-grandparents are Hub and weasel

who won the Nobel Prize for

neuroplasticity during the critical

period say that again so my scientific

great-grandparents are David hubel and

toron visel David's dead torsten's still

alive he's 96 and they won the Nobel

Prize for essentially discovering the

critical window early in development

where plasticity is especially robust

they did other things too they should

have won two nobels frankly uh for their

other work on Vision but um one thing

that they missed however was something

that you mentioned and is worth

highlighting again which is that the

brain maintains the capacity for immense

plasticity throughout the entire

lifespan that's absolutely clear the

conditions change from early to later in

life but your specific situation really

highlights that and it's something I'd

really like to um talk about for a few

minutes if if you're willing um as you

mentioned you experienced a stroke um

and perhaps uh it was aware to some but

perhaps not all especially the people

just listening to this podcast and who

are not watching on video that um your

shirt while very nicely designed um in

uh in its original state also includes

some unique stitching so maybe you could

share with us uh what and for those

listening there's a there's a jagged

line of stitching that um extends from

uh Robert's uh left short sleeve to his

midline to where the buttons on his

shirt are and from the from his right

short sleeve also to the midline offset

from one another these um this is the

sort of stitching that looks like

perhaps I had been at the sewing machine

um and not somebody was uh skilled but

they did a good job basically putting it

back together why are those stitches in

your shirt tell us about the stroke and

let's let's talk about neuroplasticity

it could also seem like a fashion

statement you know but it really it

isn't um well it was May of 2018 it was

my birthday and my wife gave me this

shirt I have a love of plaids it's like

I don't know why I just love patterns

and plaids must be like some Scotch part

of me some ancestor thing but I love

plaids C can I interrupt you just

briefly forgive me everyone's going to

get upset that interrupt do you know

that there is a fundamental circuit in

your visual cortex designed to detect

plaid patterns no I did not yes and we

can talk about why that is it's tightly

tightly linked to your ability to

perceive motion really yeah and we can

go over it some other time but yeah so

we'll talk about just as a cue so okay

yes back to your birthday okay so she

gave me a plaid shirt knowing how much I

loved it and I love this shirt I love

the colors in it etc etc and then two

months three months later August 17 2018

I was driving my car she was with me I

was pulling out into traffic I started

driving and suddenly she's saying pull

over Robert pull over go why why I can

drive I'm fine and then suddenly

everything started getting really

strange everything looked strange my

voice didn't sound the same and she was

like freaking out but she was actually

fairly calm which was amazing I was

undergoing a stroke I had a blood clot

that was blocking the bra blood flow to

my brain I actually at one point got out

of the car like I was I don't know what

the hell I was thinking and then she

pulled me back in and then the rest goes

blank and I had had some weird

Sensations that still remain with me

because essentially I was on the verge

of dying because blood not flowing to

your brain is basically the end of you

right unless something happens very

quickly and she either that or you're

can to get severe brain damage so she

called 911 right away she recognized

something my whole face was looking

funny and they got there I was

unconscious and essentially they took

the his shirt and I just scissored the

thing in half and took it off my head

and then they intubated me I believe in

my hip area to get something the blood

clot was in my neck and they were able

to free it up and they rushed me to the

hospital and I'm unconscious and then um

I wake up and I'm in a gurnie in the

hospital and I don't for a moment I'm

thinking maybe I'm dead because I'm

lying in a gurnie and I almost feel like

I'm in a coffin I don't know what what's

going on and I have all of these weird

Sensations and I I tell people we're so

curious about death we think about death

a lot and you know is it final what does

it mean we really should pay attention

to

dying dying is actually much more

interesting in some ways than death and

people who have died go through a

process if it if it's long enough and

people who have had near-death

experience experiences like I do have

gone through that process of dying and

have come back to life and in the

process of

dying strange things happen to the brain

right so particularly with a stroke or

something like that where blood stops

flowing to your oxygen stops flowing to

your brain you have kind of visions and

things that you might think are

hallucinations but that later seem like

actually you are actually glimpsing the

reality as opposed to the illus that the

brain creates so I've written about this

in my new book but um my idea of the

brain is that it creates endless series

of Illusions for you it creates this

seamless version of reality the sense of

a self the sense of a continuous self

Through Time right it creates a linear

sense of time progressions it creates

colors it creates a world that visually

you can seems familiar and etc etc but

it's all illusion it's all a

construction right images come into your

brain and they're not organized in any

way and the Brain organizes in a way

that you can understand it well when

you're dying all of that scrambles up

and you actually are seeing something

else so I saw for instance that I really

don't have a self that it doesn't really

actually exist that I'm and the image

that came to my mind because it was in

sitting in that gurnie was a weird feel

feeling

of like I can almost not explain it but

it's as if you took an image of

something real in the world and you

completely scrambled it up and it was

all wavy and you couldn't see what

exactly it was to me that was the image

I had of the self there are like 50

different selves inside of you that are

all competing and you think there's just

one and you think it's consistent but

there's not it's an illusion the self is

literally an illusion that your brain

constructs

when you're dying you see these things

when you're dying you see other things

like that you see that time is something

very weird so I had experience of when I

got out of the car and I got pulled in I

thought like 10 seconds had passed my

wife told me no those those was like 10

minutes I had no sense of time

everything was scrambled and so it was

very very El it taught me so much things

that I can I can barely even expressed

now I'm always now thinking of strange

things that come to me because my brain

was damaged it made me realize that the

brain creates everything so I can't

communicate with my hand my fingers I

can't communicate my brain can't

communicate with my leg right so you

think that walking and writing and

handling things is just your your body

operating a certain way it's your brain

telling you how to move these different

things when that brain stops functioning

you realize how much your brain

determines everything it all starts

there and when there's damage to your

brain your whole thinking Alters Etc not

to mention how you look at life itself

after something like that so it was a

terrible experience it's ruined so many

things that I loved in life but it's

given me an awful lot as well in return

that I could go on for hours and talk

about because

it was the most powerful experience of

my

life when you were going through your

reemergence to Consciousness in the

hospital did you feel as if you were

observing these multiple versions of

yourself um maybe a different way to

phrase it is did you feel you were sort

of behind the circuit board that is your

brain observing how you normally

function and you could see multiple

versions of self or was it something

else where you sort of outside of your

body and brain I think it was more

outside of my body and brain I also had

this other thing that happened

where I you know sometimes you can't

reme your memory might be playing tricks

on you so I've also have to realize that

maybe I'm not remembering exactly what

happened or that I've since translated

in a different way so that's a caveat

here and I'm aware of it but I had this

Vision that I was dead at first when I

first became conscious and that I was up

in the sky and I was looking down and my

mother and my wife were talking and was

like over my grave I suppose and I had

this feeling huh everything's okay I'm

gone but life goes on they're they're

doing fine it's okay right so I don't

know about that sense of self whether it

was like I'm aware of it happening but I

have a feeling it was something from the

outside I don't really know the answer

to that because it's very confused the

other feeling I had was life when I was

having the stroke was life draining out

of me and my bones getting softer and

softer and softer and I can't really

logically explain that the feeling of

Bones softening up and

dissolving but for weeks and months

afterwards I could access that feeling

of my bones dissolving Etc it was a

feeling

of all your energy draining out of you

and you're dying literally so um reading

books about near-death experiences cuz

that's a lot of what I'm big part of my

next book God is it's fascinating

there's so many interesting things to go

in because it teaches us so

much I'm so glad a you survived your

stroke B that your mental faculties he's

not more grateful than I am I tell I

probably not but still very grateful so

there it just um illustrates how

grateful you must be um B that you've

maintained if not grown your mental fact

faculties I mean you seem extremely

sharp um I promise you you're not

missing a beat uh you know one always

wonders right actually one of the most

common fears people have is that somehow

they're losing their mind or their

memory and people aren't and they aren't

aware of it you know you hear I have

family members who have asked that if

they ever start to exhibit signs of

severe dementia that I um well put an

end to them which I won't um that's not

my place in this world um but I think

it's a common fear among uh among people

but you're still extremely sharp uh and

thank good for it and you mentioned that

um while you've lost certain abilities

that new appreciation and new abilities

have surfaced um could you perhaps share

what some of those are and and what they

mean to you um because I think that when

one hears about somebody having a stroke

we tend to focus on what's what's

lacking but clearly this has been a

transformative experience also in

positive ways well uh I had to confront

some of my own demons I had to confront

the sense that um I expected things out

of life and here they're taken away and

I'm I'm I'm kind of ungrateful for being

alive and here I'm pissed off that it

takes me 10 minutes to tie my shoes and

I can't really button my shirt I had to

learn what really matters and to have

patience and stuff the other thing

was I used to love hiking I was very

physically active and I'm sitting at my

window in my office and see people

running up and down bicycling walking

their dogs God I'm so envious if I had

if I could walk a dog right now I'd be

the happiest person alive but then I go

through a thought process which maybe

isn't completely healthy which is

they're not aware of how wonderful it is

just to walk a dog but I'm aware of it

so when I go out in my backyard and I

can't walk and I'm seeing like I know

this is going to sound really trically

and sentimental but I see you know

butterflies or things in my garden I'm

like wow that's incredible you know

things like that that I I couldn't

appreciate before because I'm I'm

sedentary and I can't move I have to

suddenly pay attention to what's around

me not take it for granted and find and

suck all the pleasure out of it that I

can so now when I sit at my desk to

write my new book it's 4 hours because

that's all I can stand maybe three

sometimes those 4 hours are like such

Bliss for me I truly appreciate it now

because I know that my brain was almost

gone right so it means so much for me

and to just be alive you know is is is

is just a wondrous experience I have a

chapter in my new book called awaken to

the strangeness of being alive and it's

about the fact that if you think about

it and how unlikely it is that we humans

evolved at all even that we even exist

all the bottlenecks and evolution that

we had to pass through including The

Disappearance of the dinosaurs and the

emergence of manimals but there are 20

other huge bottlenecks throughout the

history of evolution we had to pass

through all of those we nearly went

extinct 80,000 years ago from some virus

that infected there were only 8,000

people humans on the

planet all these different things and

here we are with zoom meetings etc etc

it's like the strangest story you can

ever it's beyond science fiction but

nobody thinks about it nobody sits down

and goes God I'm alive if you went back

to the chain of people that had to

connect and have children leading up to

your parents the unlikeliness of you

ever being born is astronomical I mean

unless my science is all wrong you know

70,000 generations of people meeting etc

etc finally ending at your DNA I mean

unless I'm missing something it's it's

pretty

unlikely but nobody thinks about it well

I certainly think about it now

because I almost died I have nothing

else to think about that's I have to

entertain my brain the way Milton

Ericson had to entertain himself by

observing people so it's taken a lot

away from me I can't swim I'm writing my

my recumbent bike which I love and

80-year-old grandmothers are zipping by

me and God damn it how awful I'm so

envious I'm so my insecurities all well

up but then I realize hey I'm I'm like

I'm I'm like on a boat I'm sailing it's

wonderful I'm outside you know I have to

go through these processes but I think

it's developed me in some way that's

that's in the end very positive sounds

like you've had to adjust to a new frame

rate on life like that the the old movie

had a certain frame rate this movie has

a certain frame rate but that within

that frame rate there are gifts to be

that you certainly missed in your prior

version of self is that is that a yeah

but also like I tell people this I

totally took my life for granted I I was

swimming all this time I was fantastic I

was bicycling I was traveling but I

never sat back and thought wow this is

wonderful how grateful it is could be

taken away from you I tell people don't

do that to yourself I try and teach them

it can be taken away from you tomorrow

when you're out walking the think of me

think of me that can't walk the dog and

appreciate those things which I didn't

appreciate so I try and help people in

that way when I can you

know I think uh critical message is also

to inspire a sense of urgency in people

you know I think people hear a sense of

urgency and they go oh God I'm already

under so much pressure life's so hard

but we're not talking about a sense of

urgency to take on more of what life has

to offer uh I think we're talking about

a sense of urgency

to find one's purpose which takes work

and is an ongoing process but to really

get out of modes of apathy laziness um

languishing and to start as you've

described it paying deeper attention I

mean this is a a concept that was super

important for me to hear about and I

learned about it from you was how do you

get yourself out of a rut you start

paying deeper attention to the things

around you and inside you and um perhaps

not coincidentally you referred to that

as quote death ground yeah so um it's

what it's a strategy from my book I

wrote wrote a book on strategy my

version of The Art of War it's called 33

Strategies of War but it's really about

strategy the Strategic thinking it's

inspired from sunu the great Chinese

strategist but it has vast philosophy

iCal

implications the idea

is you can almost think of it like

barometric pressure when necessity is

pressing in on you like your back is

against the wall like you have to get

something done and there's like this

pressure around you you find energy in

there that you never believed before

William James talks about this when he

talks about getting a second wind he

explains it very eloquently when you

feel like your life's in danger

suddenly you can you can leap over

things that you never could leap over

before so sunsu says put an Army on

death ground and it will fight and until

it's it wins meaning put an army with

its back to the ocean or a back to the

mountain and it's either win or die

they're going to fight 10 times harder

you're going to find the energy in you

that you normally lack when death is

facing you in the face or urgency or

deadlines or people pressing in on you

when that barometric pressure loosens up

and there's none of it you think you

have all the time in the world you get

nothing

done wow man I'm

23 I've got all these years ahead of me

I'm going to figure it out right I'm not

going to die I got 50 70 80 years ahead

of me no you don't that pressure now is

gone and you're wasting time you're

you're you're doing all sorts of things

that aren't leading to any kind of skill

you're not learning or anything you need

to put yourself on death ground you need

to feel that barometric pressure which

is the actual reality the actual reality

is you could die tomorrow you could have

a stroke tomorrow you you could be fired

tomorrow everything could fall apart you

need to have that sense of urgency now

because that's the reality you're

fooling yourself by thinking you have

all of this time and so when you feel

that

pressure suddenly you can move mountains

you you have energy your life you you

know you just have Focus Etc

neurologically everything Clicks in you

know and people who've had that

experience where they've where they felt

like the the ship was going under and

they better get their act together and

survive they talk about all these

physical processes I have a story in my

new book I I hope I'm not boring you

here with all

no quite the opposite about a mountain

climber who

um he he he was climbing this mountain

by himself and he was having a great

time but there was a storm coming and he

had to get down and he suddenly fell and

he cut his leg open massively and there

was like a branch sticking in it and he

he broke all these bones and he was he

was going to die he was on a Ledge he

could see that it was getting dark and

and storm clouds were were massing there

was going to be this was in the Rocky

Mountains he was alone and suddenly he

met managed to get up on his two

feet and he can't explain how but all of

this energy all this adrenaline started

flowing in him and he said he was like a

mountain goat he was like going down the

ledge he he jumped he was able to kind

of get down to another ledge he he got

it he got out of it and for the for the

next 20 years he was haunted by how did

that happen I want that feeling again

because it was actually the most

ecstatic feeling I had energy that I

never suspected in myself and so he

tries everything to get that feeling

back he tries climbing other mounts he

tries going to to Mount Everest he tries

and it doesn't come back and finally he

kind of figures out the formula for it

and why it happened he studies a lot of

Neuroscience it's a great book I'm using

it in my new book it's called bone bone

games it's very interesting book a lot

of Science in it um and he got the

feeling back in a smaller sense

but it was the feeling of your life is

in danger I better get my act together

or it's the end and suddenly adrenaline

dopamine all the other things were

occurring in him and he got and and he

found that energy so um that's that's

the ultimate kind of death ground right

there the human will to live is truly

incredible and so now I have to

say as I said before I'm so grateful

that your stroke didn't take you out

because clearly there's still so much in

there and you're continuing to share uh

what is really

exquisitly useful knowledge oh thank you

it's just it's just kind of astonishing

to me I started off today's discussion

expressing my gratitude for what you've

already done for my life and for the

lives of so many other people through

your books you know it's clear you've

been on a a for foraging exploration and

that foraging for organizing and

communicating information mainly in the

form of written books but also online

content you have a terrific YouTube

channel which I subscribe to and follow

and um and listen to um with wrapped

attention uh and the other venues with

which you share information including

this one today are really truly valuable

and appreciated so I I want to say on

behalf of myself and

um for those that have known you in your

work for a number of years but also for

the many people that are now sure to um

know who you are and what you're about

that it's just so clear that like this

stuff comes from the heart and that it

whatever early seed planted this you

know um that we're all grateful for and

better off as a consequence of that that

seed so uh I could make this list very

very long with the the number of

specific ways in which you've um

improved the journey through life and

made it clearer I mean you know life is

certainly can be hard but it also can be

really confusing and I feel that the the

Robert Green uh road map even though

it's but one road map is an extremely

valuable map to have and to use

certainly has been for me so um just an

enormous thank you Robert thanks for

sharing today and thanks for all you do

and all that you're still doing and sure

to do in the future oh thank you I I

wish I could find the word for

explaining the kind of weird emotions

that I'm feeling when I hear that there

isn't maybe Yiddish maybe if for CLT or

something I don't know but thank you

yeah well we'll have to have you back

here again uh when your next book comes

out um can't wait but we will wait okay

yeah hopefully I'm still around I I I'm

confident you will be okay okay good

thank you come back thanks very much I

hope I will thank you for joining me for

today's discussion with Robert Green I

hope you found conversation to be as

stimulating as I did if you're learning

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