How To Design Your Life For Peak Creativity - Dan Koe

most people's lives are determined by

how they choose to cure their boredom

what's that

mean oh man uh the story of that came

from my friend my YouTube editor we were

out getting dinner one night and he said

he wanted to start a company called Bard

like you know just a little passion

project and it was because he had been

bored for so long in his life that he

the only options that he saw were to do

the typical things that you do in your

board you scroll on your phone maybe you

watch Netflix you hang out with friends

there there isn't really something to

build towards right and so I kind of

ideated that with him for a decent

amount of time because the reason he

wanted to start that specifically was to

give

people help people create a project that

they could work on that would help cure

their boredom and so that kind of ties

into

uh another tweet I wrote where if you're

bored build so build your body build

your business build anything really just

focus that uh boredom towards something

that

isn't it isn't giving the opportunity

for entropy to take hold you'll know

Parkinson's law work expands to fill the

time given to it this almost feels like

it could be Co law which would be life

expand to fill the boredom given to it

what's funny is that I I have a CO law

but it

was yeah it was for Creative work so uh

man what was it it

was something along the lines of the

same thing where it's creative work the

the work expands the results

expand to fit the time allotted for

completion where my whole thing with

that is since

I did didn't have a job for too long I

i' had worked part-time jobs for quite a

while but I was freelanced pretty

quickly out of a job and what I started

to realize is that when you progress

through freelance work and then I got

introduced to social media and digital

products physical products other things

that I just wasn't aware of at the time

it

was very interesting how I could make so

much more without increasing the amount

of work that I

did m yeah that is interesting so just

to round out the bordedom thing I it

kind of feels to me like if you don't

have something to take up your time your

habits and your behavior will sort of

default to the path of leas resistance

is that fair to say absolutely yeah

interesting okay what about hard work do

you think there's a delusion around hard

work uh by delusion I would say

misconception

or uh

poorly poorly fabricated expectations in

your head where if you work hard on one

thing for a specific amount of time you

aren't

necessarily you don't

deserve something that someone else has

gotten by doing that specific thing so

as an example if you spend one year

writing a book that is a lot of hard

work but that doesn't mean that you

deserve $100,000 a year for doing that

specific thing right and so since

we most of us or quite a few of us we go

to school we get a job and we that that

frames our mind in quite a few different

ways one being that we tie a specific

amount of work or a specific amount of

hours of work each week to a specific

number on a paycheck when that doesn't

necessarily have to be the case and the

thing that can trip you up there is you

bring that mindset over into your

creative work or building your own thing

and you work very hard but then you get

discouraged when you don't get the same

amount of results or you get

substantially less until you pull the

levers that allow you to make

substantially

more yeah I uh it's a ruthless

realization that hard work doesn't fix

all of your problems and that what you

work on is significantly more important

than how hard you work and I've been

sort of fascinated ated by this idea of

um telling people to work harder that

already work quite hard or telling

people that that uh already chill out

that they need to learn how to relax but

it you you know you need to Target the

particular vaccine or the particular uh

modality for the person that you're

speaking to and um yeah the hard work

thing you know I understand why and

maybe it was right you know the last

sort of 10 years have really been

dominated by discussions around gritting

your teeth uh avoiding your victimhood

mentality discipline a stuff like that

and uh on average for most people I

think that's right but it

does a lot of the time forget some other

real high points of Leverage What are

you choosing to work on how easy are you

finding it what are you sacrificing over

the longterm in order to be able to

achieve these results in the short term

if you say uh in the short-term results

are determined by your intensity in the

long-term results are determined by your

consistency if you trade the latter for

the former you end up being kicked out

of the game quite early um what would be

another one for instance saying that uh

working harder results in better

outcomes in life which means that

focusing on working hard and building up

discipline is the only thing that

matters when creativity are step

functions that can increase whatever it

is that you're trying to achieve by you

know sort of massive amounts so yeah all

this to say as a person who works really

[ __ ] hard like I I I love it but I

kind of need to remind myself that it's

not a Panacea it's not a one-sized

fits-all solution to all problems there

are very few problems that won't get

better by working harder but there are

significantly better Solutions than just

working harder a lot of the time and

being able to hold those two thoughts in

your mind at the same time is uh tough

it's difficult yeah uh I I think it

comes down to context and pain points

quite often

where if you don't have the pain point

of not getting results out of your hard

work then maybe you don't need to not

work harder right it it's completely

dependent on the person's situation

where uh a lot of the people who are

discouraged by working so hard and not

getting anywhere with it they're not

real they're not realizing that that

within itself is a pain point that has

to be

solved and so then they don't have a new

direction to work so they're they're not

registering their hard work leading to a

lack of results as a problem where you

can create a solution and start working

on that thing so then when you come back

to the hard work or whatever it is

you're moving from a higher vantage

point so you can make better decisions

toward that

thing yeah yeah talk to me about sort of

handling the tradeoffs between um growth

and maintaining Simplicity because those

two things I think uh often end up

coming at the cost of each

other yeah it's dependent on what you're

building and your goals for me I can

just speak from experience where in my

life I've noticed maybe three or four

different macro periods of productivity

or creativity where there's typically

Seasons where I feel lost and those Fe

those seasons of feeling lost or just

not knowing what to work on next usually

coming come

after hitting some kind of goal that

I've been pursuing for a long time so

all of these are cyclical they're not

exact kind of like chapters in a book

where each one resets they each have

their own goal they each have their own

highs and lows that's how I like to view

life from a bigger picture but starts

out as feeling lost and then it if you

don't get distracted there or you don't

get bored or or you fill your time with

uh the default activities that come

after being bored then you start to move

into this phase of curiosity so first

phase feeling lost second phase

curiosity you start

to pursue new interests or go down a new

rabbit hole or study something whatever

it may be and you're trying to find uh

you're trying to experiment with

different things until you find that one

thing that you can't pull yourself away

from and then at that point you kind of

get pulled naturally into the season of

intensity and that's where you make a

lot of the problem progress for me those

are where the long 12-hour work dayss

come into play and it's when I build a

new project new product new software as

I'm doing right now completely new right

novel new feels very good challenge is

high that's when fulfillment is also

very high and then once that reaches

there's like two options right you can

fly too high and touch the sun and get

burn a bit and you learn a lot from that

or you stay aware during it and you

realize okay I'm I'm reaching this peak

I need to figure out how to sustain a

higher baseline from this and for me

it's when I hit some kind of new monthly

high in the gym that could be a new

weight in business that could be a

certain amount of followers in a month

or whatever it may be money in a month

who knows but it it's a spike for me I

know that's not sustainable so along the

way I have to be thinking how I'm going

to be consistent at this thing and

that's kind of the fourth phase is the

consistency phase where what system can

I build to maintain a higher Baseline of

the progress that I've made with this

thing while not trying to sustain this

peak that I know is ultimately

unsustainable if I want to do different

things in my life talk to me about the

emotion that comes up when you reach

that new Bas that new highest peak and

then you're coming back yes it sounds

great to think well okay every every

stock hits at hes and then we come back

and we go okay this is the new base

right but as you feel the trajectory

begin to reverse despite the fact it's

just gone in the other direction uh that

feels like an emotional problem not just

an operational

problem yeah uh that's kind of why it's

cyclical because you start to feel lost

in a sense where you can work hard and

try to push through it and maybe there

are some situations where you can

sustain a very high Baseline and that's

the singular thing that you do but for

me uh I tend to like desire to drop back

down to some kind

of lifestyle that I can maintain while

not pushing too hard but

also it's like adding muscle mass right

the intensity phase is for building

muscle the consistency phase is for

cutting fat and revealing what you built

underneath and when you do that enough

over time you're kind of surprised with

where you end up after doing those

things but in terms of the emotions you

can kind of think of how it is when you

feel uh after a bulk if you do some kind

of a dirty bulk I don't really do that

yeah if you do an epic dirty bulk then

you usually feel pretty shitty you feel

sluggish you feel tired you want to

train because it's really enjoyable but

every other area of your life it took a

backseat or it is taking a backseat now

and so

you feel that for a bit you just feel

sluggish you feel tired you don't have

the same motivation that you did at the

very beginning of that intensity phase

and it starts to round out a lot more it

it normalizes like a a

wave maintaining Simplicity uh I

think reducing down complexity is

something that a lot of people struggle

with uh you know there's an unlimited

number of things that we can choose to

do with our time a lot of options

uh even within one project you know

little hobbies and oh maybe I'm going to

take up CrossFit I've always wanted to

learn Brazilian jiu-jitsu or you know

maybe I should maybe I should start

doing improv on a nighttime or whatever

it might be um for the people who are

competent and like to sort of acquire

skills like to feel like they're making

progress um how do you come to think

about ensuring that Simplicity is

prioritized so that you don't sort of

dilute down your attention across across

too many things both professionally

personally socially

Etc yeah uh for me it comes with time

where in the past I I mean I still do I

try things if I have a very strong

desire I allow myself to try them at

least once I'm also very aware that if I

don't invest energy into that thing then

I'm probably not going to enjoy it as

much as if I just did it one time so for

something like

Jiu-Jitsu I never really tried that one

specific thing but I would try it i'

take a few classes and then if I didn't

like it or I I didn't see it fitting

inside of my lifestyle then I'd be quick

to quit that thing what does not fitting

inside of your lifestyle

mean uh if it impacts or takes away from

my higher priority goals so for me

training lifting weights in the gym

that's always just been a top priority

like when I would get into running

that's something that I did for a decent

amount of time and I did enjoy it but I

couldn't find the balance of running

with training with uh work with social

time I could fit it in the in the

morning but it

just there's a lot of moving pieces when

you decide to fit something new into

your day and nutrition training all of

the things that you already have inside

of there if you are a curious person

that likes to acquire these skills it's

very useful to do because you can pull

some kind of principle or lever or

lesson out of it to apply to other

domains of your life to kind of fill it

from the thing that it was missing that

was making you want to run or do

Jiu-Jitsu in the first place and get

that out of your system but at the right

when you asked that question what I said

was that it it takes some

time because the more you try and

experiment with these things the more

you realize the the more you can

approach those new desire with a better

perspective

and shiny object syndrome to me isn't

something that is bad at all you just

have to be able to refocus during that

or you need to be able to P maintain

your priorities during

that so you mentioned before uh

attention that I kind of ignored for

quite a while I think uh maybe like a a

hammer that sees everything as a nail I

just assumed I assumed that basically

all problems in my life could be fixed

by more hard work more discipline more

focus more productivity you know

somewhere in between those four things

uh which is essentially sort of gripping

more tightly paying more attention

becoming distracted less uh but

especially this year uh I've realized

that the creativity part

um results in changes sort of Step

changes of insight about your own life

progress professionally or personally or

whatever it is doing something that's

new and defective in a different sort of

a way or coming up with a different kind

of an idea and then you can still

iterate on that but that I I basically

prioritized zero time for creativity in

the past I was very much sort of a blunt

blunt force trauma uh hard work type

person and um this tension between

creativity and productivity I think is

still even with the Rick Rubin of the

world and the Dan Co of the world uh I

think it's still very much overlooked so

I really want you to sort of break that

apart yeah I'll start off by saying that

I was the complete opposite when I was

first starting out I always wanted to I

was very lazy or or whatever definition

of lazy you can give where it's like

productive procrastination in a sense

where uh I would be playing video games

and I would just try to fit in some work

that would lead to something better

right the priority was the video games

the work was just something I did in

between and what that made me have to do

while I didn't get it right the first

time around because that's very

difficult to do is that I would at least

have to think about what are the one to

two things that really move the lever

here and when you're doing something

creative creative work has a very

uh it has a lot more opportunity to find

and Leverage The those high priority

things where let's let's take a social

post for an example if you're an author

you're a musician you don't have to be a

quote unquote content creator if you

have any kind of work that you want to

spread social media is a decent way to

do that and with social media if you

post one thing and it is very good then

that post can do better than a thousand

other people's posts that went out today

and you can do quite well with that

thing so that's the first thing is try

to adopt a mindset that allows you to at

least search for those higher leverage

things because while you're doing the

work then you'll be able to identify

them because if you aren't necessarily

looking for them they may just pass you

by and you may not realize that this

could lead to an exponential event of a

lot of progress in that specific amount

of

time when it really came to me is when I

started to remove a lot of what I would

call my bad habits which were the video

games which were the Netflix which

were uh quite a few things the junk food

I just remember sophomore year of uh

College uh living in the dorms terrible

time quit the gym just was not

productive very low period of my life

and after covid specifically I started

going on walks because the co 15 or

whatever they call it I couldn't go to

the gym I was gaining a decent amount of

weight I just felt like the Pillsbury

Doughboy and I'm tall so it it wasn't

that bad but in my face you could see

like it's all puffy and didn't like that

so started going on

walks and I would listen to audiobooks

during that time and started to notice

like all of these ideas were starting to

pop into my head that never had before

it it was just a weird realization of

like wow I actually have the ability to

generate good ideas that sound unique to

me and with those ideas I've realized

the power of them later is that those

can fuel different aspects of your

creative work

so that's all to say and to wrap

around that I believe productivity is

highly dependent on creativity and that

when you separate them both both of

them lose their impact to quite some

degree where to give an example if I'm

writing a book or I'm creating any kind

of a project it doesn't matter what kind

of a project

is that project my mind expands to fill

the context of that project so when I'm

on a walk or I'm making time for

creativity or when the default mode

Network in my brain is activated where

it's you're at rest you're not focused

on work that's like shower thoughts when

ideas just pop into your subconscious or

into your

conscious those ideas that happen during

the creative period are usually the

things that are higher leverage and

apply directly to the project that you

were building during your productivity

periods isn't it strange we get even

though when we're working on the problem

we're kind of blinded in this way on a

set of train tracks but maybe they're

not quite the right ones and you've sort

of got this weird momentum thing that's

carrying you forward and you think well

I'm doing the thing this is this is what

was on the to-do list for today but you

never actually step back and fully get

up and above and look at the

territory

yeah let's say that there's somebody

listening who uh identifies with me as a

a recovering productivity

addict how do you design your lifestyle

for Peak

creativity lots of walks man quite a few

walks where I try to bake things in and

try to blur the lines as much as I can

between creativity productivity Health

whatever my goals are they they do kind

of all blend together

so in the morning I wake up and go on a

walk you know the fresh morning sunlight

in your eyes like everyone wants you to

get

after that shower hygiene Etc get

straight into some kind of building

right I like to th I like to separate my

days as much as I

can and lump them into two categories

where it's releasing or constraining

entropy and releasing entropy where in

the morning don't touch your phone don't

do anything that would cause a rogue

thought to pop into your head and just

Cloud your mind for the rest of the day

so the morning on my walk is just sole

intention focused on okay what am I

writing about today is can I find a

starting point for when I get back and

then the first project that I'm working

on is usually something that is novel

that needs to be done first thing in the

morning this is something like a book or

a a a longer term project that takes

that extra effort to build then after

that I get into my main levers which is

writing for me so that's newsletter

social post

and those are the main things because

those pull traffic right if I'm not

building a product or a project then my

main focus on is on getting traffic to

those specific things and then the after

that I take a walk to kind of create

that segment where it's like okay now I

can start letting more people into my

day and start taking on more

conversations and

when I get back that's usually when I'll

check email when I'll check slack when

I'll check telegram let other things

come into play do a lot of the

maintenance or admin work where it's

it's not really creative it doesn't

require a lot of focused attention on

that thing and then after that block

I'll go to the gym and then that's kind

of like a hard separation where the rest

of the day it's kind of like Reading

Writing dabbling it's just free flow

right if I have priority things that I

need to do I'll sit down and do them if

I don't I'll maybe read a bit go to my

computer walk around it's kind of like a

a pacing balance of productivity and

creativity is it interesting that in

order to be able to get the creativity

thing even when you're in just letting

the ideas come to me I'm writing I'm

doing the social posts I'm doing

whatever I need you still need to apply

discipline because if you didn't apply

the discipline You' have already checked

slack and that would have distracted you

on the morning and that one email and

that gu [ __ ] I got to have that call

with that guy later on and I put it off

twice already and so on and so forth so

there still is an importance of

discipline within the act of being

creative you need to sort of you you

need to uh fortify yourself through uh

discipline but primarily saying no in

order to then allow the creativity to

come out yeah I I think of it as a

a creativity still has constraints and

it still thrives within constraints I

feel like with productivity it it's more

of a narrow block you're just hyper

focused on one thing with creativity

you're not letting your mind just be

exposed to Absolute chaos and like

drowning in that that's what leads to

the boredom anxiety overwhelm other

things that come from kind of leaving

that skill challenge match

where creativity un least in my lens is

when my mind is operating within a

specific set of constraints usually a

project right so if it's a book or it's

a newsletter that's why why I love

writing a Weekly Newsletter specifically

is because there's never an idea that I

can't utilize right I can listen to I

don't know if you've experienced this

but when you have a project you can

listen like you're on a walk you listen

to an audio book or a YouTube lecture

completely different from what the topic

of that thing you're working on is and

it will still give you ideas for the

project yeah it's always pulling back

across whatever your uh focuses captured

by whether it was an argument with your

mom yesterday or whatever it's weird you

are right it's like a I don't know a

shape-shifting poltergeist or something

that create it moves into the form it

fills the size of the bottle of whatever

it is that you're doing you've got a a

tweet about discipline saying you aren't

disciplined because you keep putting

yourself in environments that give you a

chance to be undisciplined is this about

environment

design yes to an extent

where it's environment design and

just that making it difficult to be

undisciplined so if you have trouble

with your phone in the morning then put

it in another room I've never really

done that or had to do that but I know

it's a common piece of advice and I'm it

probably works for that exact reason

right at least you get up and then you

realize hey I don't do this same thing

with putting uh unhealthy Foods in your

pantry or just buying them in general

you're probably can't eat the foods that

you don't have in the house yeah exactly

yeah

um so yes that's the main thing is

environment design for that tweet you

had another one as well which kind of

feels a little similar as we start to

talk about Direction in life and stuff

your potential is determined by how much

uncertainty you're willing to embrace

why uh that kind of uh contradicts what

we said about creativity thriving within

constraints what I mean by that is the

progressive overload of uncertainty and

responsibility

where if you just throw yourself into

the middle of the ocean you can maybe

learn to swim but you probably won't if

you don't know how to swim before and

it's not going to be a very good time

and you're definitely not going to quote

unquote reach your potential there but

uh what I mean by that is now if you

were to look back on what was uncertain

previously in your life it no longer is

so what I mean by that is you're

gradually expanding what is known to you

into the unknown you're taking those

steps into the unknown allowing your

mind to sit and marinate in that thing

in that slight amount of uncertainty

that is kind of more empowering than it

is the opposite and that's when your

mind can grow the most think of that as

we'll call it your Edge right living at

your

Edge pushing into the unknown in the gym

that's represented ative of pushing

close to or near failure or to failure

uh it's when you're lean bulking it's

eating 200 calories over it's very

difficult to stay at that specific place

and not put on the extra weight because

you want to Eagle lift or not eat over

because you're just hungry or can't

control yourself right that's where

you're making the most progress that

what is the most fulfilling but that's a

difficult place to and the way you can

kind of filter for that is boredom or

anxiety or uh boredom and uncertainty

where if you feel yourself getting

anxious that usually means that you're

punching above your weight in a sense

the task is too challenging for you and

you don't have the knowledge skill or

Clarity to make sense of the path to get

there so when people set these uh high

and hard goals but they don't have any

of the puzzle pieces to make sense of

that with their mind

then it's extremely uncertain to them

but once they reach that goal looping

back to the quote they've kind of been

able to Umbrella that or make sense of

that picture so they can uh hold more

uncertainty in their minds because one

last thing with that is the more you do

this the

less the more experience you have let's

say you're at level 50 or let's say

you're at level one when you're at level

level one you wouldn't face a level 10

right you're probably going to get

one-shotted but if you are a level 50

you can probably hold your own against

the level 60 like the the decrease in

challenge as you're going more and more

becomes ever so

slight how should people figure out what

they want out of life you know we have

insights about oh you know I can live

with this uncertainty but I don't really

know but there is an literal unlimited

amount of options it for everybody to

choose the direction and that's only

getting more uh what's your advice for

people who want to figure out where they

want to go

yeah oh

um I like to think of it in terms of

solving an infinite string of problems

in your life where there is a most

pressing problem in your life right now

and by solving that you at least start

to gain some kind of

footing if we were to extrapolate that

out and see what that picture looked

like over a long enough time scale right

now I feel slow I feel sluggish it's

impacting my relationships it's

impacting my ability to focus at work I

should do something about that first

right I should focus on solving that

problem a problem implies that there is

a goal you don't necessarily need to

create a goal but there is a goal there

and at least you start moving in a

better

direction as you move forward with that

more meaningful challenging and deeper

problems start to uncover it's like when

you start in the gym for vanity but then

you stay for the therapy in a sense

where you start going to the gym because

you want to look good and someone in

high school broke up with you or

something like that and you want to get

back at them but then as you get into it

two three years you the progress starts

to slow down and you need to solve a

newer problem of like okay where did my

fulfillment in that specific thing come

from and you have to start to develop

some kind of philosophical sense of

Mastery around the gym in and of itself

that's kind of the

progression to answer the question that

always comes up there with okay well I

don't know first I don't know what

problem to solve and two I'm still not

motivated to solve that problem because

my mind isn't in the place that is

important to me yet it's not an

automatic decision to go and do that

thing or create that new habit or

whatever it may be to

that we need to create a frame for your

mind to operate within kind of like a

world view your own little world that

you can start to piece together the map

of so what I like to do there and this

is a practice where you're going to take

10 20 30 minutes however long it takes

to create an antiv vision for your

future

and this isn't set in stone this is like

a minimum viable antiv Vision right now

it's something that you just want to you

want to plant a flag in the ground and

you want to come back to it to add to

and refine to it in order to do this

you're just trying to contemplate and

think of experiences that you never want

to experience again you're trying to

reflect on the things that you may have

passed over and you probably did passed

over in your past that were rather

painful but as you kind of just let time

go on that pain equalized and now it's

no longer painful to you so first

reflect on those things what do you not

want what is your anti ideal future

write all of those things down just

anything write it all down there's no

specific way to do that come back to it

when you need to after that create the

opposite side of the frame so the

vision what are the things that you want

what are the things that you want to

experience again again this is the first

iteration of this is probably just going

to be some kind of delusion in a year

you're going to be like what was I

thinking but that's the purpose of

iterating refining evolving right now

the only purpose of this Frame is

to reorient your mind to perceive New

Opportunities and ideas where if you

weren't aware of it

previously or if you didn't previous

viously have a conscious top of Mind

goal

of making let's use a fitness examp of

of getting a six-pack and avoiding

getting a six-pack for your vision and

avoiding feeling sluggish overweight

just not liking how you look in the

mirror as kind of like a push pole

between the two now with that on your

mind you're at least able to pick apart

more things in your everyday experience

when you're scrolling on social media

now you're going to see that post of

some useful piece of Fitness information

that you would have scrolled past before

you're going to follow that person the

algorithm is going to start to uh cater

toward that specific interest you're

going to be recommended a book you're

going to purchase that book you'll

probably read a chapter but then you'll

go down this other Rabbit Hole of Mike

Mike is Rell on YouTube and don't do

that really get yeah uh but then you get

really get into it and then you start to

develop this love for this one specific

thing and when you start to repeat that

for the different domains of your life

over years of health wealth

relationships happiness whatever it may

be then you can really start to make

sense of this bigger picture and refine

that frame over time so it's less about

here's a specific path to take and more

about here's the Direction you don't

want to move in here's the direction you

kind of want to move in now let's just

start solving problems along the way and

see where trial and error takes us

because you're you're probably not going

to end up in a bad spot if you are doing

that and even now it's like I

don't I still don't necessarily know

what I want out of life right I have a

very good idea that I H hold High

conviction in and I'm going to pursue

but I'm also open to that changing so

that may be another piece of the puzzle

is just don't have these high

expectations like you need to know what

you need to do yeah I love the idea of

uh writing out what you don't want your

life to be like George had this thought

experiment years ago which was uh how do

you make a miserable person happy you're

like I'm not too sure you go okay how do

you make a happy person miserable it's

like piece of piss so I think you know

inversion is just such a powerful tool

with things like that everybody knows

well you know go through this little

list of things disconnect them from the

friends i' remov them from any work that

gives them a sense of meaning I'd mess

with their sleep I'd mess with their

food I wouldn't let them see any

sunlight I wouldn't let them train do

exercise you know okay those are the

things that make a happy person

miserable the very bare minimum like

that okay there's there's the things

that you need in order to so you know

I had this insight about depression that

basically if you're not covering those

building blocks how would you make a

happy person miserable you really

shouldn't be looking at the serotonin

balance that's inside of your brain and

how much is this to do with being

exposed to microplastics and so on and

so forth it's like hey [ __ ] dude like

you need to form some Foundation or else

basically what you're doing is maybe

laying at the feet of something far more

complex a problem which is way more

simple and significantly easier to fix

uh but yeah uh I never thought about

inverting it for where do you want your

life to end up or not I did this um

annual review the template that I gave

gave out for free and um one of the

questions is what would I do to make

85-year-old me

miserable oh wow and that's not too

dissimilar that was good yeah what does

85y old me wish that I did more of what

does 85y old me wish that I did less of

and uh that's not too dissimilar to what

you're talking about here if I know

what's that thing about uh tell me where

I'm going to die so that I can never go

there it's like tell me tell me the life

that I don't want to lead so I can avoid

doing

it I have a question for you there

is do you see I I know it's hard

to create some kind of blanket statement

for this but in your eyes are there

those foundational habits that every

single person should do and then the

Fulfillment in creativity comes from

kind of dancing between those and doing

their own thing or is there leeway

there it depends how rigidly you define

what it is that you do you know like you

wouldn't let the person exercise well

there's you know a million different

types of exercise for some one person

it's dancing for one person it's doing

yoga for another it's lifting weights

somebody wants to do it on their own

somebody wants to do it in a group

someone wants to do it at night someone

wants to do it during the day someone

wants to do it outside someone wants to

do it inside you know there's a lot of

different ways to sort of slice and dice

this and it ends up as with most debates

just becoming a semantic game like well

what do you actually specifically mean

by exercise and what do you actually

mean by enough sleep who even says what

enough is but you I think ultimately if

you're not sleeping enough if you're

eating poorly

consistently if you are not getting some

form of exercise that makes you feel

good if you're not going outside and

seeing at least a little bit of sunlight

or daylight if you live in Iceland or

whatever and if you're not working on

something that gives you a sense of

connection to the world a sense of

purpose at least you're contributing to

making the world a little bit of a

better place and if you're doing all of

it on your own like I godp speed being

able to get through that

um so yes I would say maybe there's a

basically for the more of those things

that you're not taking off the box of

you need to become an increasing outlier

on the tail end of not normal in order

to be able to say that you are living a

good life or in order to be able to be

sufficiently resilient most people and

especially the biggest chunk of most

people in the middle of the bell curve

they need most or all of those and you

need to be a supremely unique individual

to be able to say

yeah man you know I just crush it I mean

I never see my friends and I I I eat

Budweiser in dominoes and you know some

days I sleep for 10 hours and some days

I sleep for two and I don't really

exercise at all and not that connected

to my work but Life's good uh that you

are a a particularly unique individual

if that's the way that you the way that

you show

up yeah I agree and I think it goes for

the the other end too where right now

building software a lot of the team has

those habits but in the opposite

direction where like not even by my

design or encouragement of it I actively

encourage the opposite but uh they're

like the cracked startup Engineers that

you'll see on Twitter where they're just

working till 3:00 a.m. because that's

what they love to do they love to code

and they love to just work together and

be friends and I've also noticed that in

my life where when you are working on

that one thing

and you're going all in on it it's that

intensity phase other areas of your life

do kind of have to peel back I think the

wisdom there is not letting them

completely fall off or finding a lower

Baseline that you can maintain of those

things Oliver burkman's got this prompt

from 4,000 weeks where he says decide in

advance what you're going to suck at and

um it's a really good one because if you

focus all of your attention on one thing

you make more progress in that thing

than if you spent three times the amount

of time on that thing but with only a

third of the attention you sort of

accumulate more it's not it's not a

linear progression of more time on the

thing and more Focus equals the same

amount if spread with less Focus over

more time that's not the way it works if

you focus exclusively on health and the

gym for six months you make way more

progress than 50% of that attention for

a year and the same thing goes for

businesses and skill acquisition and so

on and so forth there's this sort of

weird compounding there's a kind of

obsession that causes you to focus on

the minutia that you might have missed

typically you're allowing it to sort of

become part of your personality so the

the um momentum is harder to slow down

after a while it sort of keeps you going

it keeps you going it's a part of you

you feel like it it's very personal to

you and

um yeah you you end up in this place

where

so so many of the results that you

wanted to get over the long term can be

achieved more quickly by focusing but

the problem is that you feel that fall

away

you feel the drop off of well you know I

said I was going to work on my business

this year and and and or I was going to

get a promotion at work or I was going

to build a family or get a girlfriend or

do whatever it is but my body's looking

a little bit off it's like yeah dude

you're doing 12 hour days at work or

you're going out three nights a week

trying to socialize and find a partner

or you're do you know whatever it is

that you're doing there are there are no

Solutions there are only tradeoffs and I

think in advance identifying to yourself

what are the tradeoffs I'm prep prepared

to trade like I want to do this thing I

want to 2025 I want to get a promotion

at work I want to move out of the house

I want to get I want to move into a new

place okay what are the things you need

to do in order to be able to do that you

you already thought about that okay and

what are the things that you're you're

going to need to pay a cost of well

maybe I'm not going to be able to go out

as much so maybe I'm going to feel a

little bit more lonely uh maybe some of

my friends are going to stop hanging

around with me because I can't pay them

enough attention to sort of keep them uh

feeling like we've got this connection

going uh okay well am I prepared to pay

that price because most people stop

doing things I think because of the pain

that's come along with the byproduct of

them not the lack of progress that

they're making it's all of the other

things that stop that it's like the the

most salent thing is the discomfort of

other [ __ ] dropping off as well as the

discomfort of what you're trying to do

now that requires a lot more attention

and you need to manage both of those

Worlds at the same

time absolutely

yeah it it's fun when when that happens

because

you I don't know you you kind of prove

yourself wrong in a lot of ways where

the the most progress that I've made in

the gym was actually like two years ago

rather than 10 when I first started

simply because I just refound an

obsession with that one thing focused on

it for six months and surprise myself

with a lot of progress just because I

was so meticulous about that one thing

but then everything else took a back

seat and another even further thing with

that is if you get into the habit of

doing that it's a lot harder to pick

steam back up in something like work if

that took a back

seat yeah that is interesting you've got

another uh tweet that I liked if you

never contradict yourself you're

probably too attached to a limiting

belief and it's holding you back from

reaching the next level people don't

like contradicting themselves the

internet [ __ ] hates hypocrisy

you know it's like catnip you once said

this but now you've said that uh and we

also don't like it being called out in

ourselves right it seems it's half a

step away from being called a liar um so

why should we be contradicting ourselves

more if we draw a person's life out as a

book or this let's say a

song what people like to do is they like

to focus on one specific lyric or word

of the song and act like that's the

entire person in and of themselves or an

image they like

to zoom in on the pixel of an image and

act like that makes up the entirety of

their being right but the thing about a

song specifically is that it

continuously evolves

it's another example of that would be an

indux fund right right one stock can be

down but the index fund can be up and

the the people love to focus on the

stock being down and that's all they can

see rather than zooming out and seeing

Oh okay in the big picture in the actual

story of this thing if I'm trying to

think in stories instead of just words

or phrases that this person has said at

one point in their life then it makes a

lot more sense and I can see their

growth and development and I can uh

actually pull something from this and

potentially change my own belief

but that's the problem in and of itself

is that you don't want to and those

beliefs are causing you to narrow your

attention on that one tiny little thing

that when you actually think about it it

doesn't matter in the slightest and

you're going to forget about it in 10

minutes and your anger was for nothing

yeah how important is writing as a

practice for you for sort of getting all

of these realizations together obviously

it's something that you do

professionally

but uh how important do you think those

insights are uh even for people who

don't have a Blog that they need to be

publishing

too it is extremely important because I

don't see I don't see when you think of

writing when people hear the word

writing just now they're going to think

oh they're not explicitly going to think

this but words are going to come to

their mind of okay English degrees

academic writing uh grammar punctuation

Grammar Nazis all of these different

things when that's not what writing is

writing is writing just think of texting

your friend you text your friends every

day maybe if you have friends you write

in some way you write emails whatever it

may be I want you to think of that in

things like journaling as a way to

practice

thinking specifically because writing is

thinking on paper it's organized

thinking that you can break apart you

can uh redo you can be very intentional

with it in your mind it it's kind of

it's not an actual canvas it's just

something you're like swimming through

and it's very difficult to find one

coherent line of thought or create one

long coherent line of thr there's

absolutely no way that you're going to

write a book in your head so by putting

your words on paper and starting to

understand how you think and then

starting to you could say reprogram

that you are doing just that in your

head you're reprogramming the way that

you think in

hopefully a way that is beneficial

toward ideal outcomes so that's reason

number one the second reason is that I

see

writing personally as a skill that

amplifies any other skill that you could

acquire therefore I see it as a very

good first thing to learn because it

requires you you to

learn very fundamental skills of human

nature psychology persuasion potentially

marketing depending on the medium of the

writing sales in many cases for

copywriting different types of writing

it's communication anything that you

want to get out of life you're probably

going to be communicating persuading

offering value exchanging value with

another person and the written word is

the base form of media that allows you

to do that thing so by practicing it and

stacking skills on top of it it can be

extremely powerful while also being a

way to reshape your entire mind and

if if

uh your language that you

use paves how far your thoughts can go

then that's extremely powerful in not

only your decision making but in

whatever potential you have in life yeah

I uh you know started this newsletter

thing that I do um four and a half years

ago I think and um I think I missed a

week since then so we're on whatever

Edition 250 some [ __ ] like that and

uh even as somebody that speaks a lot

all the time uh to people that are way

smarter than me the process of writing

that newsletter has become better over

time like it's reliably my favorite part

of the week and I'm aware this is every

guy with a [ __ ] substack ever going

like bro you got to get on substack uh

but the reason I think for me was I

struggled so much

to Jour ever keeping up sort of a deep

journaling practice Beyond something

that was very structured you know like a

six-minute journal five minute diary

type thing um artist Pages or morning

Pages by Julia Cameron or whatever was

just I really struggled with that and um

I need a lot

of social pressure to get myself to to

do hard things especially new hard

things so uh CrossFit was a great

example started doing CrossFit you don't

quit in the middle of the workout

because there's 15 other people who are

all doing it with you and they're going

to look at you and you're going to

they're going to look at you weird so

you use the social pressure you

externalize and Outsource your sense of

uh motivation to the group and um you

know if you say it's called three minute

Monday and Tuesday rolls around and

there's been no email well what about

all the all the people that are

expecting email on a Monday so given

that uh it was the first time that I

actually had a consistent Writing

Practice and you know it's informed so

much I think you're right as well you do

a you're going weekly too right once a

week yeah yeah and uh for me that

Cadence is is really beautiful because I

always have something to write about I

never don't have something to write

about and sometimes I have more to write

about than I want to write about but it

never feels arduous I get to a Friday or

a Saturday I'm like [ __ ] like I can't

wait I can't what what have I got this

week I've got my note and again you know

struct I can open the open my pants and

show you what I've got looking inside

which is just a huge huge [ __ ] off

single note with random links and and

bits of insight it could be way more

organized I'm sure I could I could have

a better system but this one works and

it's lightweight and I've used it for

you know quarter of a million words so

sue me and dude I love it I love it I

it's helped me personally it's helped me

professionally um it

gives me ideas and stories to talk about

over dinner uh it's you know made me

reflect on things from my childhood it

gives me space to so yeah you know I I

had this I had this rule that I came up

with about five years ago that everybody

should have a a a podcast in that for

half an hour a week put your phone on

the table press the record button and

talk to a friend about a topic that you

care about because very few people have

a focused conversation on

one topic and I think it's therapeutic I

found it kind I found this kind of

conversation when I started guesting on

podcast eight years ago I found it

really therapeutic in a way that was

like being thirsty without knowing that

I needed a drink and um writing is

actually the same so I've I'm I haven't

said it yet but I'm slowly veering

toward everybody should start the

substack even if they have no intention

of sharing it um just cuz it's it's

really really good if you're finding

that your thoughts are messy if you like

ideas and you keep playing with them but

they're always up here uh you know I

think you've got you I saw a tweet from

you that was something to do with um

you're not making as much personal

development progress as you want because

all of your ideas for personal

development are locked in your head as

opposed to doing the one thing that

could actually move you toward uh

achieving your goals and it's kind of

the same with this you've got all of

these ideas and they're just sort of

lurking around here and until you've got

it to be able to reference somewhere

what are you going to do you're just

going to keep thinking about it you know

what it's like that's I mean this is the

ruthless thing about missing persons

right what do the family say I just want

to know we just want to know where they

are and your brain is saying I just want

to know where this [ __ ] idea is like

I just want to know and you go it's

still in the brain you go yeah I know so

I need to keep reminding you of it in

case you forget once it's down on a

piece of paper you sort of liberated to

think about new different ideas

yeah I I I find it quite interesting how

everyone says that where I I think

writing is important because it is a

part of my identity right I'm going to

talk about it a lot because it is for

you it's podcasting or starting like a

smaller version of the podcast what's

interesting to me is that for almost any

Creator they would say the same thing in

whatever medium they have so while it

may be writing while it may be speaking

in some kind of fashion I think just

creating something being able to

synthesize the ideas in your head being

able to take out some of the ideas that

are stuck in your brain organize them in

some way that you think is beneficial to

the world and giving it to them solves a

a good amount of those

uh not basic needs but meaning

needs by a long shot and there's so many

different connected ideas there and and

ways of doing that like you said there's

uh a hundred different ways to exercise

are you going to do it inside outside or

you going to do CrossFit running walking

Jiu-Jitsu whatever it may be with

creating you you do that with any

interest that you have and that's what's

so fun and fascinating about it is it's

just uh giving yourself permission to

explore those interests and do something

with them it's less about reading just

to read and you don't see any benefit

out of it now you have something to do

with it dude I mean you know one of the

most

common uh questions or insights that

came from the live shows was some thing

along the line of how do I better

remember the things that I learn and

read and yeah you know the problem is

you don't have a reason to [ __ ]

remember them that's your issue your

issue is why do you need to remember

them other than trying to be more

interesting at the water cooler off for

some vague sense of personal development

you have no Outlet there's no reason

there's no pressure being applied to the

system to constrain it or or cause you

to do it so if you don't have a reason

to it's why should I get fit and go if

you didn't know or if if here's a good

one if it wasn't the case that training

in the gym had any bearing on health or

well-being or the way that you felt or

how attracted people were to you how

many people do you think would do it

almost none right because it's hard and

it sucks and there's basically no

benefit so the benefit to you is way

less Salient when it's this vague idea

of I will become a better more mindful

more insightful wisdom person no if I

got to write a thousand words this

weekend that's that'll apply some

pressure to you

yeah uh Naval put out a tweet recently

and it said something along the lines

of if you don't if you didn't man what

was it it was if you

didn't if you don't if there wasn't a

reason to remember it then you shouldn't

want to remember it something of that

line of thought where he was

saying you don't need to if you needed

to remember it you would mhm and trying

to memorize anything is kind of against

the point Tim Ferris has got an idea

called the good [ __ ]

sticks and uh it's not too de similar

basically that it's not it's not your

job to find a book interesting it's the

book's job to be interesting to you and

if you read 200 pages of some book and

you go well nothing stood out to me I

can't remember anything you go well

maybe nothing was sufficiently

impressive or interesting or or resonant

with you to Warrant you remembering

anything that's not a you problem that's

a book problem yeah that that's changed

how I view and read books where I don't

I don't really sit and read entire books

over the course of a few sessions of

course I I usually am hunting for ideas

that I can utilize or write down or the

ones that I will remember and I don't

pay attention to too much else where if

I can use it as a portion of my writing

or I can weave it in somewhere here or I

can make sense of this abstract

worldview that I was trying to integrate

with my own then perfect but the other

things in the book me trying to study

and memorize and be able to recite those

things again so or like you said so I

can sound smart to someone else that it

is kind of against the point

heck yeah Dan Co ladies and gentlemen

Dan dude I really appreciate you I think

um this blending of of productivity

creativity discipline with sort of

freedom and simplicity is uh it's good

it's a much needed redress where should

people go they want to check out the

things you've written and the work you

do where should you send them yeah just

the danco.com everything's there dude

heck yeah this was awesome I really

appreciate the opportunity no my

pleasure dude until next time think that

your algorithm on YouTube is a bit of a

God is able to know things about you

that you don't know about yourself well

the YouTube gods have selected this

episode specifically for you bespoke so

go and go and check it out