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The Diary of a CEOThe Diary of a CEO

Greene: Why skills beat money in your twenties and thirties

Why a sense of urgency unlocks the search for your life's task; learn by failing fast, redirect envy as fuel, and stack skills before chasing reputation.

Robert GreeneguestSteven BartletthostGuestguest
Feb 27, 20252h 42mWatch on YouTube ↗

EVERY SPOKEN WORD

  1. 0:00 – 2:03

    Intro

    1. RG

      Everybody has narcissistic tendencies, and we're all self-absorbed, but nobody wants to admit it. It's always somebody else. It's always Donald Trump. It's always Elon Musk. But everyone has a manipulative side. There are no saints in this world.

    2. SB

      But can you use it productively?

    3. RG

      Yes, most definitely. There's deep narcissists who are very problematic, and there's healthy narcissists. And knowing the distinction between the two will help save you years of misery.

    4. SB

      What if I'm dealing with a narcissist?

    5. RG

      I want you to do the following. I want you to-

    6. SB

      Robert Greene is one of the most influential writers in history- Unraveling the secrets of power, strategy, and human psychology-

    7. RG

      That are essential for purpose, resilience, and success.

    8. SB

      What is it about human nature that we just don't want to admit?

    9. RG

      One is that envy is deeply ingrained in all of us. In fact, always wanting to be better and superior to others is the most motivating factor of 90% of human behavior. But if you don't admit it to yourself, that ugly emotion is like a nuclear bomb to all aspects of life. It will seize you by the throat and make you miserable. But there's also understanding things like, we all judge on appearances, that everyone has a dark side, and that we are all actors. And I will get into the nitty-gritty of all of them, because it's really about how powerful people use those traits for their success.

    10. SB

      People are lonelier than ever, and when you look at the impact that's having, it's equal to smoking 15 cigarettes a day. What is the antidote for this?

    11. RG

      I empathize with it very much so, because when I was younger, I was losing in the game of life. I was very depressed and even suicidal. But what lifted me out was...

    12. SB

      This has always blown my mind a little bit. 53% of you that listen to this show regularly haven't yet subscribed to the show. So could I ask you for a favor before we start? If you like the show, and you like what we do here, and you wanna support us, the free simple way that you can do just that is by hitting the subscribe button. And my commitment to you is, if you do that, then I'll do everything in my power, me and my team, to make sure that this show is better for you every single week. We'll listen to your feedback. We'll find the guests that you want me to speak to, and we'll continue to do what we do. Thank you so much.

  2. 2:03 – 4:41

    The Most Important Decision of Your Life

    1. SB

      Robert, at this moment in time, what do you believe your followers, your fans, the people that love your books, what do you believe that they're struggling with the most? And I'm asking this question because I imagine you get thousands of DMs and messages from these people. What are the common themes?

    2. RG

      Well, the, the most common question I get, particularly from people in their 20s, is they don't really know, uh, where they're headed. They don't know what their career is, what I call in Mastery, their life's task. And I talk a lot about it in interviews and in my fr- in the book Mastery, and I make it, the point that it is the most important decision in your life, figuring out what you were destined for, why you were born, wha- what you were created for, what makes you unique. And I say that everything from that realization, from that understanding, kind of stems from that. Your sense of fulfillment, your happiness, everything will come from that one realization. And a lot of young people are very confused right now, and I don't blame them. These are very, very confusing times that they're going through. Much more confusing than anything I had to deal with, particularly, I think the influence of technology and social media. And what I mean by that is, to know who you are, to know what you were meant to do in life, what, what, why you were born, what makes you unique, requires a lot of reflection on yourself, self-awareness, self-knowledge. You have to go inward. And when your attention is always focused so much on what other people are doing, what other people are saying, you know, the, what they think is hot, what they think is cool, you become kind of a stranger to yourself, right? So when I talk about that concept to them, it's like, "That sounds interesting, Robert, but I have no idea what that is. I don't know what my, my life's task is." Now, that's maybe 30 or 40% of the emails that I get. It's quite high, but it's not all of them. But it is a trend I've noticed with young people who are going through, I think, very, very confusing times. And, uh, I'm very empathetic to it because I was actually someone who was quite lost in my 20s, and I know the pain that that can cause. Not feeling like your life has any meaning, you know, I think that's something that really is, is, um, tormenting a lot of young people. What does life mean? What will give me a sense of meaning, right? To what I'm doing, to where I'm headed, to my daily experiences. And not having that is deeply disturbing, and I've been through that myself. I think I'm getting a lot of that kind of feedback in a lot of those emails among others.

  3. 4:41 – 9:41

    Is There a Strategy for Finding Your Purpose?

    1. RG

    2. SB

      And is there a strategy that young people or really anybody that feels lost or aimless in their life should and is able to deploy to find their purpose, to find the direction, the, the thing they should be aiming at?

    3. RG

      Well, you know, you have to get out of the- this, this way of thinking that, that so many people have, which everything has to be simple and linear, and I'm headed in this direction, there's gotta be a solution, like I'm hacking my way to the truth. Life doesn't work that way. Life is very complex. So I can't give you a single-track answer to finding your life purpose, you as an individual, but I can give you kind of clues. I can kind of direct you towards certain paths that have worked for me and that have worked for hundreds of thousands of other people who've become masters or very successful in their field. And the first thing is, you have to go inward. So you have to resist the pull that our culture gives you. You have to also really want this. That's probably what it really comes down to. Are you unhappy? Are you frustrated? Are you hitting kind of rock bottom? Is this a turning point in your life where you realize, "If I keep going this way, in five years, it's gonna be really serious?" Okay? It has to be important to you, and you have to have a sense of urgency.And with that sense of urgency, you have to make some decisions, and one of the decisions that's absolutely essential is to pay less attention to what other people are doing, to pay less attention to what other people are saying, to pay less attention to what people are telling you you should be doing, and to go inward and think about yourself, and think about what you love and what your interests are that have nothing to do with what people are doing on social media, the things that grab you, that excite you deeply inside in a way that's almost irresistable. Now, for me, I can say that it was always been writing, okay? And I just couldn't figure out what kind of writing. But there's also things like when I ever read anything that has to do with ancient history, particularly the origins of, of humanity hundreds of, you know, tens of thousands of years ago, I am so excited. I can't, I can't... I can read every single article about that. Every discovery that takes place in Africa about our origins. It just puts my mind in a spin to think that this is who we were 100,000 years ago, and this is who we are now. I wanna know more. That's like this, one of these things that hits you in the gut. Well, the people out there, you have that. There's something like that. You had it when you were a child. You had it when you were two, three, four years old, five years old, and you've lost it because you're listening too much to other people. So it's kind of like archaeology would be the metaphor. You have to dig and dig and dig and find those bones and those relics and those artifacts from your past, the things that really excite you, as well as the things that you hate. Now, if I were to go, you know, kind of do a reverse engineering, which I do with a lot of people who are successful, like yourself, I could go back and kind of find that with you, where that hit you, because you had a particular path that led you to doing these podcasts. I know it wasn't a straight line. You deviated, you were in some other job that you hated, and then you slowly found your way. With each of those stories, there's a lesson for people, right? And that's what I compiled in Mastery, but it all begins from a sense of urgency, "I can't go on this way. I have to find something that I love." When you're 20 or 21, maybe you don't feel that urgency because you're so young, you know, you look good, you have lots of energy. The world's kind of open to you. But you have to be careful because time passes really quickly those years in your 20s. They go by faster than you think, and if you've turned 30 and you never thought about this and you're kind of been wandering around trying things, it starts to get a little difficult and much harder for you. So it's better if you have that sense of urgency when you're 21 or 22, and the other thing I would say is, you don't learn anything if you're not excited by it. So you have to have a sense of fun and adventure about this. So discovering what your life's task... It can't be this dreary, boring thing that Robert's advocating you do where you, "Oh, I have to spend time with myself. I have to look, you know, do a journal, blah, blah, blah." No, it's fun. It's an adventure. Trying different things that fit into this general shape of what you were destined for, it's a blast. You know, when I was in my 20s, I had more fun than anybody. I had an amazing time. It was the best years of my life. I was trying all sorts of different things. I was exploring, I was traveling. I had adventures. So I don't want your life to be boring. I want you to learn. I want you to have adventures. But you have to have a sense of direction, a sense of purpose to guide that kind of, those, those ve- different adventures that you go on.

  4. 9:41 – 14:19

    Is It Harder to Find Your Purpose When You're Older?

    1. SB

      Do you think it's harder to find your sense of purpose and what you're deeply connected to as you get older?

    2. RG

      Yeah, I, I think so. Your, your mind gets a little bit more rigid. You think you know all of the answers, right? But what happens with a lot of people who I also get correspondence from, who are, let's say, turning 40 or even a little bit older, and they're coming to those crossroads, is it's even much more painful than when you're in your 20s because there's this sense of regret. There's a sense that you've wasted your time, and to get back to a path that will suit you can be very difficult, as you mentioned. But there's also another a- another side to that, which is, you probably have been learning some skills in your life. You've probably have had some experiences that have changed you because when you're 21, 22, you don't know the world. You don't know people. You think you know everything, but you don't know anything, right? You've never had any experiences in life. You've never had to suffer. Maybe you have, but not really suffering like you do when you get older, okay? So you're 40. You've had tough experiences. You've been hardened. You've got... you know, you're not so fragile, and you've learned things. If you change your mindset at that age and you go, "I'm gonna take what I have, my experiences, my skills, what I've learned, and I'm gonna redirect it towards something more exciting for me," then it will work for you, right? But as you say, it can be harder because you're more set in your ways.

    3. SB

      And you've built a life. You've built a network. You've built a reputation for being this thing-

    4. RG

      Yeah.

    5. SB

      ... whether it's lawyer, doctor, dentist, whatever it might be, and so there's a element of shedding that might have to occur, shedding people, shedding a city that you live in, shedding a, a way-

    6. RG

      Income.

    7. SB

      ... that people know you, an income, and that's deeply difficult, and s-

    8. RG

      Yeah.

    9. SB

      ... I think some people would prefer the certain misery of their current situation to the uncertainty and the shedding that occurs when they go in search of something else.

    10. RG

      Yeah, but I mean, the pain that you feel when you get older and, you know, we have... we humans have very active minds. We're gifted with the most powerful organ in the entire universe, the human brain. The billions of possible connections in our brain is greater than anything in the entire universe. It is the most amazing instrument, and our brains are very active, and when you get older...... and you don't have anything to put your brain onto, and things are slowing down, you don't realize that that's what's making you depressed. You don't realize that the fact that you haven't been able to fulfill what you were meant to fulfill is actually the source of your misery and unhappiness. You will blame it on other people. You will blame it on the world. You will blame it on politics. You won't look at yourself and realize that it's comes from you, and the sadness comes from you and the fact that you're not maximizing, you're not exploiting this gift that you were given. So, it might be difficult to shed all of that, but I've talked to people, I'd say more like around 30 years old, who say, "Robert, I'm at this horrible job. You know, I'm, I'm in a fast food place or something," I don't remember what it was, or, "I'm a barista," whatever, you know? "I'm so unhappy. I have a wife and I have two kids. What do I do?" Right? And so I s- a- and, and I g- I go into their misery a little bit, and then I say, "Okay, let's, let's first figure out something that you think would, you would really want in life, something that will have an income because you have to pay for your wife and your children. You can't just go off and write poetry or become a rock star. You have to support yourself and your family. What could that possibly be?" And we dig and we dig and we dig. I say, "All right. We have an, an answer or kind of an idea. I want you to do the following. I want you to carve out two hours or as much as you can at night where you start exploring this field on the internet, and you start considering maybe going to night school, okay? And taking classes that change this course, and then I want you to think of five years where you're gonna be a goal, five years ahead." And they tell me overnight just having that has changed them. Suddenly from their depression, they have hope and they feel a f- million times better and they have energy just from realizing that there is a possibility. It's gonna take hard work, but there is an answer. There is a place to go, and so it changes it when you, when you f- have a l- some sense of direction.

  5. 14:19 – 15:38

    The Only Way to Learn Anything!

    1. RG

    2. SB

      There'll be so many people listening to that now and they'll be thinking, "I have a plan. I have an, an idea, or at least a kernel of an idea, but I've spent the last 3 months, 6 months, 12 months, 18 months, 2 years thinking, thinking, thinking, thinking."

    3. RG

      And not doing?

    4. SB

      And not doing.

    5. RG

      Yeah.

    6. SB

      People stop me all the time and they'll say, "Steve, I'm thinking of starting a podcast," and I'll say like, "How long have you been thinking about this?" "For the last t- two and a half years."

    7. RG

      Yeah. You know, I talk in Mastery about something ca- a concept called learning by doing, and, um, back in, in the Middle Ages, they used to have a, uh, an apprenticeship that you would go through. Seven years you would learn to be a craftsman, right? You'd first go from being an apprentice to a journeyman to a master. By doing things, the brain learns, but if you never do anything, you're never gonna learn. So, if you suddenly said, "I've been thinking about a podcast," I would say, "Get off your ass and start the podcast tomorrow," and it fails, you have learned so many things. You've learned more in those three months of failure than you have in two years thinking or five years of getting a MBA from, from some school and putting yourself in massive debt. Learn by doing. Learn by failing.

  6. 15:38 – 16:59

    Why Do We Procrastinate?

    1. RG

    2. SB

      Why is planning and procrastination that comes with the prolonged planning so tempting for people? Like, why do we love to plan, plan, plan, plan, plan?

    3. RG

      Because you're afraid of failure, quite honestly. Um, I mean, Freud has a word for it in German, Erfolgsangst, which means fear of success. Um, because... And this is something that afflicts a lot of adolescents, because if you're successful, you now have responsibility. You now have a reputation. You now have succeeded and your next venture could fail, right? There's pressure that comes with trying something and putting your name out there, and if I don't ever try anything, if I don't bother, if I blame the world, I blame my parents, I blame th- my education system, I blame my partner, this, that, and the other, then you never have to worry. You never have to have that responsibility. You never have to have that fear of success, and that holds people back. So, it's easier to not do anything and stay in your little bubble and go, "God, if I only... if only I had had money, I would've written this great novel. I would've, you know, done this, this, or that or the other." It's just crap. You're trying to delude yourself i- and you're afraid of actually putting your neck out on the line. That's what it comes down to. It's a common syndrome among adolescents.

  7. 16:59 – 19:56

    We Need to Develop Toughness and Set Limits

    1. RG

    2. SB

      Uh, I was reading, I think it was the book The Courage to Be Disliked, and it was talking in one of the sections about how some people would like... they prefer to live in the, like, realm of possibility.

    3. RG

      Yeah.

    4. SB

      And the realm of possibility is the space you live when you declare to the world that you're gonna do something and be something and bef- and before you actually do it.

    5. RG

      Yeah.

    6. SB

      So, when I tell my friends, "Listen, I'm gonna become an actor," for example, the year and a half where I go around saying that, I live in the world of possibility where there's been no feedback to disprove me yet-

    7. RG

      Yeah.

    8. SB

      ... which is nice.

    9. RG

      Yeah.

    10. SB

      But I'm kind of getting the credit for being the type of person that's aspiring to change.

    11. RG

      Yeah.

    12. SB

      And that, like, realm of possibility before you get feedback or try-

    13. RG

      Yeah.

    14. SB

      ... is a very nice place to be (laughs) for some.

    15. RG

      It is, and it, it's very addicting and it's kind of a narcotic, but the thing is, so you've got this realm of possibility in which you could become anything. I could become an actor. I could become a great novelist. I could become a CEO. I could be Elon Musk II, but the way the world works is you don't achieve anything unless you have limits. Having limits and hitting that wall and that resistance is what makes you learn, is what makes you great, is how the human brain functions. And what I mean by that is, let's say you, you're learning the piano.You can't just start out playing anything and just doing all the notes. It's very limited what you can do, right? And you have to pl- you have to go within those limits and those walls and learn the first things first, and then those walls start to expand a little bit. But you're constantly pressing against limits, and, and those limits make you stronger and stronger. It's like s- when you're swimming, the resistance in the water is what makes your muscles bigger, right?

    16. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    17. RG

      The resistance of limits is what makes your brain bigger, makes, makes you more successful, makes you learn. But if all you do is live in that nebulous world of possibility, you're never developing, you're never de- getting any muscle, you're never getting any strength. You're not developing life skills. It's a tough world, Steven. You know that. People can be very cruel. It can be very, a mean-spirited world. You have to have a thick skin in this world. You have to develop some toughness, and you develop that toughness by trying things out and by failing, and if you fail, you know, like, um, my wife's in the film business, and we know a lot of actors. An actor, you know, we think it's all glamorous, but it's actually, like, 99% rejection. People are constantly rejecting you, and they're rejecting you for things that are, you, you have no control over, like your looks, you know? And so what separates the actors who succeed and the ones who don't are those that have a bit of a t- tough skin. They don't take that rejection and go, "Oh, I'm so un- I'm so unworthy. I hate myself. Oh, the world's so awful." They go, "All right. I'm gonna go on to the next one. I learned what wasn't working there," and you develop some toughness. If you don't develop that toughness, you're never gonna get anywhere in life, and you get it by trying and trying and working at

  8. 19:56 – 22:50

    Skills Are the Gold of Today's World

    1. RG

      it.

    2. SB

      And when you were in that sort of first chapter of your professional life, is there anything from all of the work that you've done, the writing that you've done, that a young person should be trying to acquire? And I say that... Uh, should they be aiming at knowledge, skills, reputation, money, um, network?

    3. RG

      Definitely not money, definitely not reputation. Perhaps, I mean, um, yeah, nep- rep- or fame. Um, perhaps network can help, but what you really want to do in this world, in the 21st century, in, in our decade, is skills. You wanna be learning skills. The more skills you have, and I mean true skills, I don't mean trying something out for a year and then going on to something else for another... I mean, getting real skill at something, right? Whether it's in computers, whether it's in the arts, in any field. Real skill, and then if you can develop two or three skills by the time you're in your 20s and still have some fun, the world is gonna open up to you because what you're gonna be able to do when you turn 30 is you're gonna go, "I can take that skill that I learned in computers, I can take that scrol- skill I learned in media and in, in creating a podcast or whatever, and I can create a business that's gonna combine the two in a way that no one has ever thought of because I'm a unique person." The world will open up to you. Skills are the gold of the 21st century, and if you're seduced by money, if you think about money, you're doomed because that's not what matters in life. Because let's say you have two job offers. One is at Goldman Sachs, f- opening position for 150,000 a year, and one is at some startup for 30,000 a year, and you're living in New York, and you're gonna be starving. You're gonna be sharing a, a miserable little flat somewhere in Bushwick, whatever, okay? Take the $30,000-a-year job because you're gonna learn so much. You're gonna be hands-on, whereas in that other job, you're gonna be lost in the, in there. You're gonna be among hundreds of other young people, and you're not gonna have responsibilities.

    4. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    5. RG

      Here, you're gonna have responsibilities. So money is not what matters to you because when you're in your 20s, you can starve. You can live on less food. You can have it a little tough because you're young. I, I know myself, I, I lived... I was very poor. I lived in London. I had a job in London in 1984, I believe, 19- yeah, '84, and I was making, I think it was 30 pounds a week, maybe s- less than that, was my starting salary, and my girlfriend at the time, the only thing we could eat was turnips and cauliflower. Cauliflower cheese was our main dish, but I was 25. I could handle it.

    6. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    7. RG

      So you can handle not making money and learning because that's what's most important.

  9. 22:50 – 26:22

    The Longer Road vs. Shortcuts

    1. RG

    2. SB

      I don't think e- many young people in that f- first season of life realize how l- long life is. So, you know, we, we try and take shortcuts. We try and get to the money as fast as we can, but you're telling me to take a longer road, which is the acquisition of skills, even at the cost of some of those short-term rewards that are very tempting to post on my Instagram.

    3. RG

      Yeah. Well, I mean, um, also, you know, you look at somebody like Steve Jobs. I can relate to that 'cause he wasn't interested in money at all. It was never the motivating factor. It's never been my motivating factor, right? I wanted to have fun, and I wanted to be successful, and I wanted to be able to write. He wanted to design the most beautiful pieces of technology in the world. It ended up he was, like, the richest man in the world at the time, but he never cared about money. It wasn't what motivated him. I never cared about money, and now I'm not as rich as Steve Jobs, but I'm doing fairly well 'cause it'll come to you. If you play the game right, if you learn the skills when you're young, and then you develop your own business, by the time you're 35, you'll be making four times what you would've made at that Goldman Sachs job, right?

    4. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    5. RG

      That's, that's the, that's how the game is played these days. Starting your own business, being an entrepreneur. Being an entrepreneur is the most powerful position you can attain for, aim for. Some people aren't, a- aren't, you know, destined for that. It's not in their DNA, but to me, that's what, what we should all be aiming for, to be your own boss, because personally, I hated working for other people. But being an entrepreneur, starting your own business, one that has a niche in this world, you're gonna make all the money that you'll ever need.

    6. SB

      It's quite painful being an entrepreneur though. I think it was actually Elon that said building his businesses is like chewing glass and staring into the abyss. And I can relate, to some degree, of the businesses that I've built over the years, and just the immense hardship and uncertainty and, you know... (sighs) Uh, I guess there's, at times, a subtle envy for your team members who are unaware of the chaos that one has to endure to make sure everybody's paid on time and, you know, make sure everything's, everyone's happy.

    7. RG

      Okay. But, um, the lesson for me in all of that is altering your sense of what pleasure and happiness is. So in the moment, it's painful, right? And we don't like pain. Nobody likes pain. I don't like pain, right?

    8. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    9. RG

      But if your sense of what pleasure is and happiness is only like here, from the present moment to here, it's gonna be very hard to get out of that. But if your sense of pleasure and happiness is here-

    10. SB

      Long term.

    11. RG

      Yeah. Then, then you've got, you've got power, you've got maneuverability, you have room to maneuver, and that's, that's the key to the whole thing. So-

    12. SB

      Uh, okay. So you're saying that if I have a short term view on happiness, I, I expect it today, now, and every day-

    13. RG

      Yeah.

    14. SB

      ... then my life's not gonna be great. But if I expect happiness to be a long term-

    15. RG

      Yeah. So I mean, look at you now, uh, is what I'm trying to say. You're pretty happy, I imagine.

    16. SB

      Yeah, I am. (laughs)

    17. RG

      You're pretty fulfilled, right?

    18. SB

      Yeah.

    19. RG

      And you wouldn't have gotten there if, when you were 24, whenever, you just gave up because it was so painful, "I better just go grab that, that easy job working for a bank or something." You'd be miserable now. Whereas look at you now. That's what I'm trying to open people's minds to. Follow Steven Bartlett here. That's, that's the model.

    20. SB

      One of the, uh, things that I think helped me get here is my dark side. You

  10. 26:22 – 30:20

    Channeling Your Dark Side

    1. SB

      talk about dark sides a lot. And when I say my dark side, I mean the, the insecurity, the shame, the, um, the, the wanting to fit in, all of those kinds of things that acted as a driving force, and a lot of people have a dark side. I've heard you talk about how all great achievers have a bit of a dark side in them. Um, h- h- how do we, how do we channel our dark side so that it's productive and not destructive? I was talking to someone the other day who is a very successful entrepreneur, and they have their own story of like shame and embarrassment and tr- re- trying to run away from a certain life they used to have.

    2. RG

      Right.

    3. SB

      And that made them successful. But now, they work 18 hours a day. They're just like almost addicted to their work. So-

    4. RG

      Right.

    5. SB

      So I wonder if it can go too far.

    6. RG

      I see.

    7. SB

      Yeah, but they say they're happy.

    8. RG

      They do?

    9. SB

      Yeah, they say they're really happy.

    10. RG

      And do you, and do you believe it?

    11. SB

      It's hard to distinguish true happiness from the contentment that you get when you are successfully escaping your dark side. Uh, do you know what I'm, do you know what I mean by that? Because h- this individual has successfully ran away from their darkness and they appear to be in a s- a state of contentment-

    12. RG

      Yeah.

    13. SB

      ... because they're suc- succeeding in that pursuit of running away from their past. But I don't know if that's happiness. Some, a yogi might tell me that happiness is when you stop running.

    14. RG

      Well, um, you know, I, I, I worked for somebody, I was on the board of directors for this company, American Apparel, which no longer exists, and the CEO, Dov Charney, was the founder of the company, an incredible entrepreneur, who from one little shop here in Los Angeles, when I met him, created this empire, and it was incredibly rewarding and he was a r- I'd say a very fulfilled person, but he couldn't stop. He couldn't stop. It was like a demon possessed him. He had to have more, he had to ha- he had to build more buildings, he had to have more American Apparels all over the world. He leveraged himself, and then when the crash occurred in 2007, just before the company w- just after the company went public, he was so in debt that it, the company never recovered, right? He tried too hard. He didn't know the limits. Okay? So part of this isn't... When I said if money motivates you, then you're gonna have that demon. If fame and reputation motivates you, then that demon is gonna take, seize you by the throat and gonna make you work 18 hours until everybody eats your dust and you humiliate all your enemies, and you're miserable, right? So knowing who you are and knowing what matters is gonna save you from that kind of demonic possession, because you're actually not gonna be very successful if you're like that. You're gonna burn yourself out. You're not gonna have very good ideas. What happens to a lot of people when they become successful is first of all it goes to their head. They think they have the Midas touch, they think they've got th- you know, the golden touch. And then their minds start going in this kind of uni- this singular direction. They learned how to do something and they're just doing it, doing it, doing it, doing it, and doing it, and they don't know how to learn, they don't know, know that there's other ways of doing things, right? And that's what happens when you become completely possessed and your mind isn't open and isn't free and isn't expanding and you're not creative anymore. To be creative will require you to try something different, to not expand your company endlessly like he did, and instead to take the five branches that you have here in Los Angeles and make the product better and be more creative with it and don't be possessed by money and fame and reputation. That's the answer I think there. Does that make sense?

  11. 30:20 – 41:15

    How Important Is Focus for Mastery?

    1. RG

    2. SB

      Yeah, it does. Yeah. Yeah. Something that I think many a, many a person struggle with, which is in part this idea of focusing on the thing in front of you versus getting too distracted with other opportunities, and I wanted to talk to you about this idea of focus-

    3. RG

      Sure.

    4. SB

      ... and how important you think it is for mastery.

    5. RG

      Yeah.

    6. SB

      I meet so many young people who...... who'll say to me, "Oh, I'm doing this little crypto thing here, and I've got this hair business here, and I've got this other thing here." What would you say to those people that are trying to become a master in this world as it relates to focus?

    7. RG

      It's funny, because I- I- I'm helping a, a, the son of an old friend of mine who's, who's, who's got that problem, and he's incredibly successful. I hope he's not listening to this. He's 20 years old. He's very wealthy. He's done amazing things. But he's one of those people who's spread himself out to all these different things. He's... And I can't find a through line what connects them all except making money and having connections and stuff. And it's very alluring in this world, particularly, you know, where there's so many possibilities, where you can get on the internet and you can learn this, that, or the other, people are doing these things, you can get into crypto, you know, you can s- you know, start your own business here, you can get into, into the health and fitness world, you can... And then later on try to figure out how to connect them all. But life doesn't work like that. That's not how the brain functions. That's not what we were meant for, because it doesn't start from you. The whole thing has to start from you. It can't start from the world, it can't start from what other people are doing, it can't start from what's sexy. It has to come from within. If it doesn't come from within, then you're gonna be floundering for years and years and years. And so what I've done with this young person, whose name I won't mention but I love dearly, is, what is it that really is in your heart? What is it that you really, really love? How can we connect this crypto with this media business that you're starting, with the sports world that you're starting, with this fitness thing? What, what connects them all? You know? And to me, I- I was thinking, I was getting the sense, we haven't solved it yet, but he's kind of excited by celebrities and by that world, and that's fine. I think there's, that's, there's nothing wrong with that. So I'm saying, well, maybe what connects all this is the film business, right? Because the film business is pretty wide-ranging. To be a producer, to raise money, you're dealing with all kinds of different people, you're networking, you're meeting starlets, you know, it's a glamorous life, but it's focused, okay? So, you know, when you focus on something, th- the world just kind of opens up, but you have to be focusing on the right thing. So if you were meant to be a writer and then you decide, because you want money, to go into law school, and then you focus very deeply on law school, what will happen is for a year or two you'll be able to, to skid by, but then you'll, the wheels will start going slower and slower because you're not interested in it, you're not connected to it. You get bored and your focus will start falling to pieces. But if it's something you love, you can focus on that for seven, eight, 10, 12 years and never get bored.

    8. SB

      From observing a certain family member of mine do a very similar thing, part of it as well is that when she would start one pursuit, starting X business, it would get hard-

    9. RG

      Yeah.

    10. SB

      ... as it always does, and when you look over at the person across the road, they seem to be having a much easier life with their thing, or with their crypto, or with their whatever-

    11. RG

      Yeah.

    12. SB

      ... and they tell you the story of how much money they've made and how easy it was, whatever, so you get tempted into believing that the grass is greener and you pursue that. So now you're doing two things. Now your first thing starts to suffer.

    13. RG

      Yeah.

    14. SB

      And I think especially in the early season of life, when you don't have Elon Musk resources, much of the game is focusing enough on one thing to build those resources-

    15. RG

      Yeah.

    16. SB

      ... so that you have the chance of being able to do more than one thing or spreading your bets a bit more. But in that first season when you're in resource accumulation phase, I think my early investors in my company, I remember one day emailing my first investor, who's a very successful man, and saying, "I've got an idea." And it was an idea other than the one he'd invested in. And I remember the email, he... I was 18 years old and he hit me-

    17. RG

      Whoa.

    18. SB

      ... so hard on that email. He was like, "If you don't focus on one thing, you will never, ever be successful."

    19. RG

      Wait, you were the one that was interested in this other-

    20. SB

      Yeah, I was trying to

    21. RG

      He was the one, uh-huh.

    22. SB

      Yeah, so he, my investor, he was a very successful man-

    23. RG

      (laughs)

    24. SB

      ... and I emailed him this other idea which I thought was amazing-

    25. RG

      Yeah, yeah, yeah.

    26. SB

      ... and he sent me this email back which was like being hit by a whip, and he was like, "If you don't focus on one thing now, you will never be successful," 'cause also you rob yourself, as you said, of the chance of accumulating deep skills.

    27. RG

      Yeah. Yes, it is. Um, yeah, I remember, um, this is something that wise people know, and if you're young, if you have, like, a mentor like you did who could tell you th- the truth, the ropes as they are, it will help save you years of misery. I remember when we were at American Apparel, it was the year 2007, the company was just about to go public. I was about to be put on the board of directors, and this man came to me who was like your investor, and he said, "Robert, just make sure that Doves doesn't mindlessly expand. Make the brand focused. Have it focused on one thing and then he will be successful." At the time, I thought that was interesting, but I didn't really have the guts to, like, explain that to Dove. But there are people out there who understand the truth of this. But the other thing about envy, like you say, you see your other friend doing crypto and they're having so much fun and making so much money, to tell you it's bullshit. They're not having f- as much fun as you think, right? People c- create a front on Instagram or, or TikTok or wherever where life seems so glorious, but they're never having as much fun as you might imagine, you know? In, in my book Laws of Human Nature, I talk about Aristotle Onassis, who in the '60s was the wealthiest man in the world. He was married to John F. Kennedy's widow, Jacqueline Kennedy, Jacqueline Onassis. Who could, who could be happier than that? He had yachts, et cetera. He was the most unhappiest, miserable person in the world, as Jacqueline Kennedy explained in, in her autobiography. He was such a mean-spirited, unhappy person, yet everybody thought, envied him because he had this beautiful wife and all that money. The people you envy are not doing nearly as well as you think, so don't let that influence your decisions in life.

    28. SB

      I, um, I've never forgotten a, a certain Jony Ive clip that I watched many, many years ago. I think it was, must have been five years ago now, where he talks about working with Steve Jobs. And this is what he says in the clip, and I've never forgotten it, never forgotten it.

    29. GU

      Thi- this sounds really simplistic, but it still shocks me how few people actually practice this. Um, and it's a struggle to practice, but is, is this issue of focus. Um, Steve was the most re- remarkably focused person I've ever met in my life. And, um... and, the thing with focus is, it's not sort of, like, this thing you aspire to, or you des- you decide on Monday-

    30. SB

      (laughs)

  12. 41:15 – 43:24

    Too Many People Want Quick Returns

    1. RG

    2. SB

      Uh, this... when they talk about compounding returns in life, they always say that it's slow then it's fast. And even this podcast, if you look at the graph of this podcast, for the first three years of me recording in my cupboard, uh, on Sunday nights alone, completely flat, no one's listening. And then by year... maybe I'd say year four or year five, it goes straight up.

    3. RG

      Yeah.

    4. SB

      And that's a consequence of... those first three years were acquiring skills, understanding what people liked and why they liked listening to the show, and actually getting better as a talker, a speaker, an interviewer, et cetera. And what most people miss is, they miss that internship of this slow, lonely-

    5. RG

      Mm-hmm.

    6. SB

      ... unrewarding couple of years because they lose focus. No one's clapping, no downloads. Um, I've never seen another route. I've never seen another path there. I've never seen the overnight success.

    7. RG

      Well, I mean, I, I, I know... I could name five other podcasters who have the same story as you who've told me that. Lewis Howes-

    8. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    9. RG

      ... Chris Williamson-

    10. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    11. RG

      ... Jay Shetty.

    12. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    13. RG

      They all have the same story.

    14. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    15. RG

      For several years, nothing, crickets. And I knew these people when they were just starting out.

    16. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    17. RG

      And, and then that happens. I remember when I was working with 50 Cent on the book The 50th Law. You know, people look at, at rap stars and they go, "Wow. The glamour, the, the fun, the excitement, the sexiness, the, the lifestyle." But he said, you know, he... I knew him 'cause I was with him, "Nobody I... worked harder than 50." He was incredibly disciplined and incredibly focused. And when he made it in, in the music business, it took incredible years of difficulty, hardship, and failure. But nobody ever sees that. They only see him in concert and, and all the glamour and all the fun. They never focus on the years of grit and near-failure. He got shot and nearly died. His record label dropped him. He had to work his way back up into the music industry from the very bottom until...... Eminem finally noticed him. Um, but we don't see that in these celebrities, all the grit and the hard work that took them to get there. We just see the success, and we get seduced by the success.

  13. 43:24 – 46:54

    The Different Types of Intelligence

    1. RG

    2. SB

      I've heard you reference before Howard Gardner's Frames of Mind: Theory of Multiple Intelligences book, and in that book, it says that there are five types of intelligences, logical intelligence, linguistical intelligence, interpersonal intelligence, spatial intelligence, and bodily intelligence, and it defines them quite differently. Logical is the ability to reason and solve problems and think in abstract terms-

    3. RG

      Yeah.

    4. SB

      ... like scientists and mathematicians. Linguistical intelligence is things like writers, lawyers, and poets. You're one of those writers. Interpersonal intelligence are leaders, psychologists, and teachers. Spatial intelligence are architects, artists, and pilots. And lastly, bodial intelligence is athletes, dancers, and surgeons. How important is it to know your form of intelligence to be successful in life?

    5. RG

      So, figuring out what that is, is incredibly important, and th- the reason why I like this book so much is we tend to think of intelligence as intellectual, as, you know, computer programming, or mathematics, or whatever it is, you know, having a, a PhD in this field and ... But that's not intelligence. Intelligence is also bodily intelligence, like somebody like Kobe Bryant in basketball is in- is as intelligent as Albert Einstein but i- in a different way. So, you have a parent who's always geared towards, you know, going to the best school and, and being an intellectual giant, and their child wants to do ballet or sports or something, and you kind of look down on that, and you say, "No, no, no." You're setting your child up for misery. Recognize what one of these frames are for your child and press on it, and let them go in that direction because it's what they're naturally v- gearing towards. It's what's fun, right? So if, for me, it was linguistic intelligence, words. I've just, since I was a child, I just, words bewitch me. I can't believe that we have words to name things, and that there are these symbols with letters that have sounds, but a lemon isn't a lemon. It's just a word. And I was like, five years old, "What the hell can that be? That's so interesting." You know? And that you could take a word apart and spell other words with it. So, I knew from very early on that it was words, words, words, words, and I absolutely stink at one of these intelligence is, is build- is mechanical intelligence, knowing how to build things. I'm terrible at that, which is very odd because my father was brilliant at that-

    6. SB

      Mm.

    7. RG

      ... and he wasn't good at any of the others, and I didn't inherit it. So that goes all, you know, that kind of debunks genetics right there, but, you know, so figuring out which one of those and, and leaning in it, and making that the direction of your life is so, so important. So if your, your thing is interpersonal intelligence, and you understand that, and yet you're not heading into a job in which you're social and around people, you're gonna be so miserable. But if you know that what your thing is is interpersonal intelligence, you've got, like, 100 different directions you can head into, you know? That doesn't mean you have to only be a social worker. It just means you have to be a leader of people 'cause you understand you like being around people. You like working with others. You're very empathetic. There could be 100 different kinds of jobs.

    8. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    9. RG

      But once you know that, it gives you a sense of direction. It's by far the most important step for people, and I always recommend people reading this book 'cause it's very, very important.

  14. 46:54 – 52:17

    Controlling Your Envy Is Important

    1. RG

    2. SB

      Much of the reason we lose focus, as I've seen in my own friendship group and my own family, is because of envy.

    3. RG

      Yeah.

    4. SB

      How important is it to get control of one's envy? I've heard you describe it as the ugliest emotion.

    5. RG

      Well, it's ugly in the sense of, you know, it, it's a, an admission that you feel inferior, that you feel that somebody is better than you are, and who wants to admit that, you know? There's a very famous psychologist named Alfred Adler from the '20s. He was a disciple of Freud. He thought this ability of always wanting to be better and superior to others was the g- most motivating factor of 90% of human behavior, that we always wanna feel at least that we're superior in some way, and the sense that we're inferior creates what he calls an inferiority complex. So, it's very, very painful to tell yourself that this person is doing better than you are, or that they're younger and better looking than you are, that their wife is, is more interesting than you, or their kids are doing better because it means ... It's a slight on you, right? We are very prone to envy genetically by the way our brains operate. So, it's a known factor that chimpanzees are prone to feeling envy, right? If you give one chimp a banana or a grape and don't give another one, they'll be giving you that kind of evil eye that we, the stink eye that we ca- we, we associate with envy. So, it's, it's something that's in primates, and what it comes from, I believe, is our brains operate by comparison. That's how we learn. That's how we understand things. We understand that this is a wild animal because it's not that other thing over there. Our brains compare bits of information to decide what is what, what's different from what's the other thing. So, our brains are geared towards, towards comparing, and when you create a social animal, we are the most social animal on the planet, and you have that brain that's constantly comparing, we're using that mechanism to compare ourselves to other people.... and always wanting what other people have. And they've noticed in hunter-gatherer societies from back in 30,000 years ago and the few that still had, had existed in the 20th century, that envy was a huge problem among them, and so that when one person was given a gift, everybody in the tribe was so upset and angry that the person who was given the gift had to give it to other people so that they wouldn't be the target of envy because it could lead to being murdered, right? So envy is deeply ingrained in all of us. We're constantly comparing ourselves to others, okay? But we don't want to admit it. So if I compare myself to some other writer who I think is having a better life than I am, who's sold more books than me, what I'll do in my mind instead of saying, "He deserves that," or, "She deserves that," because they are actually a better writer, I'll go, "They don't really deserve it. They're, they're, they're a hack. They're just doing that because they know what the public wants, and they're not... I'm gonna be... My books are gonna be read 100 years from now, but nobody will read their books in five years." I justify it to myself, right? I don't feel envy. No, no, no. I'm not saying that person's superior. In fact, they're actually inferior to me. That's the games that we play when we envy other people, and it's something that, that social media is like a nuclear bomb of envy, right? So 60 years ago, ugh, I wouldn't have known what my neighbors or friends from college are doing and how much more money they're making and how happy they are.

    6. SB

      (laughs)

    7. RG

      But now you know what everybody on the planet is doing and how good they are and how happy they are and, and these incredible trips they're taking and, you know, the, the great schools that their children are getting into, on and on and on. So it's this machine for manufacturing envy, and it's infesting our political system as well. It's seeping into all aspects of life, but nobody wants to talk about it, and nobody wants to admit it. The main thing with envy is to admit that you feel it, okay? So I will say, I will get on my hands, and I will say, "You know what? Sometimes I actually envy Ryan Holiday. He's 30 years younger than I am. He's written already more books than I have. He... before I even wrote my first book. He's got a family. He's got these great homes. He's doing really well. Yeah, sometimes I feel envy. I'll admit it," okay? If you don't admit it to yourself, then it just festers, and something ugly will happen. And so what I'm able to do with the feelings of envy that I might have is I think, "God, Robert, there's no reason to, to feel that way." Go through a process and go, "He's actually deserved all the, all the success he's had. You know, he deserves it because he's worked really, really hard, and he's a really good person. He's ethical. He deserves it, and so you should be happy for him," which I am. I'm incredibly happy for him. But I have that first little twinge of envy. You have to admit it to yourself, and it's not an easy thing to admit because it means you're admitting you feel inferior for a

  15. 52:17 – 54:01

    Use Your Envy to Become Better

    1. RG

      moment.

    2. SB

      Can you use it productively?

    3. RG

      Yes.

    4. SB

      That, that envy?

    5. RG

      Yes, most definitely. And I, and I talk in Laws of Human Nature about strategies for doing that. One of them is there's somebody that you envy in the world. Well, instead of festering with that ugly emotion, make that a spur. Instead of envy, feel what's called emulation, where you're going... you feel competitive, and you're gonna be as good as they are or better than they are. You're gonna use that sense of inferiority to motivate you to, to work harder and harder and harder. Another thing is... So when somebody has failure and we're actually kind of gleeful about it, it's called schadenfreude, right?

    6. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    7. RG

      The opposite of schadenfreude is a phrase that Nietzsche called mitfreude, which means instead of feeling pleasure in their pain, you feel their pleasure as well. So instead of feeling envy, try and feel happy for the other person. Now, you'll say, "That... I, I can't do that," but yes, you can. You have to practice it. There's a, there's a great psychologist named William James who called it an as-if strategy. So just tell yourself that I'm actually happy for their success, and when you do that, it's actually a really great feeling. To actually feel good about somebody else doing well is a very ennobling feeling. It kind of raises you up. Instead of lowering you down and making you feel ugly, it makes you feel noble. It makes you feel better about yourself, and it kind of opens up your whole emotional life. So those are c- I have other strategies in the book, but those are a couple.

  16. 54:01 – 55:42

    Why Mastery Is Still a Successful Book

    1. RG

    2. SB

      I was wondering why your book Power is still selling unbelievably well. Uh, it... I mean, most books, when they come out, they have their moment, and then they're done. But for some reason, what you write in this book is as compelling, tempting, and attractive to people now more than ever, and one would then assume that's because people feel more powerless. And when they see the book, it offers them a promise of something that they so desperately want.

    3. RG

      Yeah.

    4. SB

      Is that a accurate assessment?

    5. RG

      I think it is. I think it is. I mean, I've noticed, um, in the last six years or so, the sales have been higher than they've ever been before, and a lot of it, you know, young people went through the, the crash of 2008, then they had to deal with the COVID and the pandemic, and in those years where ev- where the world seemed upside down, the book was selling better than ever. So I think helplessness and feeling a loss of control...... and feeling like there might be something out there that can guide me a little bit in this very confusing, anarchic times that we're living through. It can be very seductive and very appealing. So, I mean, we've always, there's always change in our world, there's always chaos, but when the world ca- when the book came out in 1998, it wasn't nearly as chaotic as it is right now. So, I, I think you're right. I, I do attribute the success, not necessarily to my brilliance or the brilliance of the book, but to the fact that people are feeling more and more help- powerless.

  17. 55:42 – 1:01:19

    What Is the Solution to Loneliness and Powerlessness?

    1. RG

    2. SB

      People are lonelier than ever, according to many of the stats.

    3. RG

      Yeah.

    4. SB

      And when you look at the impact that's having on people, it's equal to smoking 15 cigarettes a day, according to some reports. Um, they're more likely to live alone, they're more likely to feel lonely, to report feeling lonely. They're more likely to feel that they have no- nobody to turn to in a time of crisis, according to some studies as well.

    5. RG

      Yeah.

    6. SB

      Um, they're more addicted than ever before. You can class that in a number of ways. Chemical addictions, but social media addictions and other things. And that's the state of especially young men. You know, it's, it's young women too are having their own struggles, especially with anxiety and the comparisons and those kind of things we've talked about, but young people generally, and especially young men, are killing themselves at higher rates than ever before. Um, suicide, as you know, is one of the, the biggest killers of young men. What is the antidote for this, this sense of powerlessness, loneliness, isolation, addiction, aimlessness?

    7. RG

      Well, you know, w- w- our, our tendency would be to bring it down to the individual level, but I think it's also a cultural problem. I think our culture is contributing to it. Um, the kind of aimlessness in our culture where we don't really, um, talk about the skills that are necessary to get ahead. Our culture promotes all kinds of bad values. It emphasizes fame and celebrity. It doesn't talk about discipline. It doesn't give young men a sense of purpose and direction. It doesn't value them. You know, right now, a lot of young men feel like, uh, you know, it's, it's women that are getting all the attention, that what, why am I m- you know, what is my purpose here? So, it's, I think it's a cultural problem th- more than anything else, and when I say that, that kind of absolves individuals, but I don't mean to do that as well because you are an individual, you live in this culture, and you've gotta get yourself out of that kind of hole that s- this culture is, is imposing on you. And so I have a lot of sympathy for it because I don't think it's completely your, your fault that you feel lonely or that you're isolated or that you don't have friends, that you don't know how to socialize. You know, I didn't have this phone in my hand when I was in my formative years and I had to meet women when I, when I wanted to, you know, at that point in my life, in the '70s, when I was in my 20s. And so, I had to go out there and suffer from rejection. I had to go to bars, I had to go to clubs. I had to put myself out there and meet them and it was tough and I learned skills, seduction skills, whatever you wanna call them, but just social skills about, you know, women think differently than you, they have different values than you. What are their values? Get outside of yourself and think about what it's like to be them and what you can do that's going to please them and, and get them, how you can enter into their world. You have none of that now, none of that. It's all shh, shh, shh, shh, you know, um...

    8. SB

      Swipe, swipe, swipe.

    9. RG

      Yeah. So, you're not going out, you're not, you're not developing that muscle, you're not putting yourself in live in interacting with people where you're feeling their body language, their non-verbal communication. So, no wonder your social skills are atrophying. And as your social skills atrophy, it becomes harder and harder and harder to go out there and put yourself on the line because you're not good at it, so you, you have it, you fall into this hole of becoming lonelier and lonelier because it's harder and harder to get out of it, okay? So, I have tremendous empathy and I would never, like, preach or, or, or, or s- or blame young men in particular for the problems that they're having, and I empathize with it very much so because I myself went through a phase where I felt very, very unhappy and even suicidal when I was younger, and I understand how your life can turn that way. So, i- i- i- I don't mean to ever come across as somebody who has all the answers because I think it's cultural. But if you are an individual, you have to see that first of all, it's not a bad thing necessarily to be lonely. Part of the problem of loneliness is it's got this, this, this taboo against it, this bad name, like it's terrible to be lonely, terrible to be alone, right? And so you feel shamed for the fact that you're lonely. But actually, it's extremely important in life to be alone sometimes and to be able to be on your own and to think about yourself and to kind of come to terms with who you are and to embrace what makes you different, and you can't do that if you feel ashamed about being lonely or if you can't ever be alone. So, knowing how to be alone is very important. It's what will make you successful, it will b- bring you skills. So, don't think of it as something necessarily terribly negative in your life. But the other thing is you have to force yourself, you force yourself to go to the gym to develop muscles and become stronger. You have to force yourself to interact with people and get out of your phone and have real experiences instead of virtual experiences. And if you do that 10 times a month, just like going to the gym 10 times a month, your social skills will get better and better. Your, your social muscle will get better and better and you'll feel better about interacting with people.

  18. 1:01:19 – 1:09:37

    The Difference Between Being Lonely and Alone

    1. SB

      On that point, you, um, I remember law, I think it was law 18. I'm just having a look-

    2. RG

      About isolation? Yeah.

    3. SB

      "Do not build fortresses to protect yourself. Isolation is dangerous."

    4. RG

      Yeah.

    5. SB

      "Solitude is not a defense because it cuts you off from valuable information, allies, and opportunities." (sighs) There's a difference, isn't there, between being lonely and being alone? 'Cause being alone is one thing, but the state of loneliness feels like it's a slightly different proposition.

    6. RG

      Well, it's the difference between you feel very unhappy that you, you're not connecting to other people. We're a social animal, right?

    7. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    8. RG

      And you feel like people don't like you, they don't respect you, that you can't interact with them on a level that's meaningful. Whereas the feeling of being alone, for me, wow, I don't have to be around ugly, idiotic people. I can just be by myself. I can read a good book. I don't have to interact with people whose ideas I don't like. I can just be myself and be as weird as I want. Wow, what a relief. I'm so happy being alone. Now, I'm not like that all the time. It would be terrible, but sometimes I do feel that way, and that's the difference, and that's a good thing. I, I remember once I was on an airplane, and I saw a, a young woman who was by herself, and I could sense that it was driving her crazy and she had to use her phone to never feel alone, right? Even in the middle, when we're flying over the ocean, she had to, like, somehow connect onto the internet and be, and be sending emails and texts and anything. And I got this kind of desperation in her, this, this intuition, this feeling that being alone was just horrifying for her, you know? And, um, I, I think that's not a good thing. I think that's a terrible thing. So yes, isolation is bad. You need to be ne- You're a social animal. You're meant to be around other people. But if you can't be alone, you can't ever figure out what makes you different and what makes you unique, so you have to be able to play both sides of the game.

    9. SB

      To, to listen to that voice-

    10. RG

      Yeah.

    11. SB

      ... inside, to turn inwards.

    12. RG

      Yeah.

    13. SB

      It's hard, it is hard to turn inwards when you never have moments of solitude, I guess. When you were... You said you were suicidal in your earlier years.

    14. RG

      Yeah.

    15. SB

      What lifted you out of that state?

    16. RG

      Well, uh, I had a girlfriend who was very understanding, who helped me a lot, so I wasn't completely alone, um, and then a little tiny voice inside of me was saying, "You are... You have interesting thoughts. You're a strange person, Robert." I've always been strange. I never was like other people, even in high school. There was always something off about me, which could be made me lonely, which could make me be a problem, but I kept saying, "There's something different and off about you," right? "And you have skills as a writer. It's going to happen someday. Don't give up. Don't give up. Don't give up. Keep trying." Right? And so finally, I'm 35, 36 years old. I was in Italy at the lowest point of my life, and then I met this man there who was a book packager, Joost Elffers, and he asked me if I had an idea for a book, and suddenly, just... I, I almost get emotional just thinking about it. Everything just shifted inside of me. It's like, yeah, I could write a, a nonfiction book, and I just improvised what would turn into The 48 Laws of Power. He got so excited. He said, "I will pay you to write the f- the, the, the, uh..." I forget what the word is. To sell it, you know? And, um, "And then I'll pay you to live while you write it." And so suddenly, it went from darkness to, to light because I had a purpose, and all of my misery... You know, I could take all of the bad bosses I had, all of the horrible psychotic bosses who were so stupid and so political and so manipulative, and I could go, "Wow, I've got all this material to write The 48 Laws of Power. All my worst experiences can go into this book. It all has purpose for it." I'm not saying that's gonna happen to everybody, but I was literally at that moment before it happened pretty much near rock bottom, and I asked my, my wife what would have happened if this didn't turn out. Would I have committed suicide? Would I... I, I... If I'd gone the same path and gotten into hol- done some hol- hack job, I'd probably be incredibly overweight and alcoholic and I might have already died of a heart attack, or maybe I would have found my way to something else, but it was a really, really low point in my life.

    17. SB

      Purpose.

    18. RG

      Yeah.

    19. SB

      It's crazy how it can lift you out of darkness, it can turn the lights on.

    20. RG

      Yeah.

    21. SB

      It's just so un- unbelievably hard to find for so many people. I mean, you're not gonna find it in your bedroom necessarily, sat there thinking.

    22. RG

      But, you know, opportunities come. You just have to be ready for them. So I had this opportunity that came to me, and you might say, "Well, that's lucky. That's never gonna happen to me," but it will happen to you. You're just not ready for it. You're just not recognizing it. Some person will cross your path that can lift you out of what you're doing, who could connect you, but you're not paying attention. You're not ready for it. You don't think you deserve it. So there is opportunity all, all, every day of the week. You're, you're... It's around you is what I'm trying to say.

    23. SB

      There's so many studies, and there was one on TV by, I think it was Derren Brown, the illusionist, that show certain types of people are pessimistic towards opportunity, and when you do studies where you... And there's one particular study where they have a newspaper and they give it to one group of people who I think are pessimists and one group of people that are optimists, and the, the researchers say, "When you find the 100 pound voucher or $100 voucher, just come back to us."And what happens is they scroll through the newspaper and the pessimists c- never find it, but on the first page of the newspaper it says, "Stop the stu- stop, go to the researchers now, you've won $100." The optimists find it.

    24. RG

      Ah-huh.

    25. SB

      And Derren Brown did a similar thing, the illusionist, in the street where he put, I think, it was, uh, like a $50 or $100 note in the middle of the street as they were walking down the street, and the optimists find it, they see it, but the pessimists just walk right past it.

    26. RG

      Yeah.

    27. SB

      I think it was a winning scratch card potentially, and then that really opened my mind to, like, my, my state, my mental state, my psychology is determining whether I see these opportunities-

    28. RG

      Yeah.

    29. SB

      ... or totally miss them, and then it's almost a downward spiral because then I'll think, "God, I'm such an unlucky person."

    30. RG

      Right.

  19. 1:09:37 – 1:15:59

    How Pornography Hooks You

    1. RG

    2. SB

      One of the, um, sort of adjacent points here about purposelessness, about loneliness, about the struggles and plights of young men in the world that they face, and, and young women, is the conversation around pornography. If you go on many of the social media apps these days you will be exposed to pretty explicit pornography, whether you, you were searching for it or not. Uh, there's certain apps in particular where even if I'm scrolling on my feed certain things will pop up and I go, "Jesus Christ, like, you know, I'm at work here." Um-

    3. RG

      (laughs)

    4. SB

      And I was thinking about this more br- broadly because, uh, the studies show that about, I think it's, like, 80% of men and about 40% of women in the United States use pornography, and I wondered if you had a view on how it robs us of the, of the hard work it takes to form romantic relationships-

    5. RG

      Yeah.

    6. SB

      Um, and if the act of consuming pornography is robbing us of the desire for the real thing?

    7. RG

      Well, it, it's, it's an addiction and you have to understand that you are being manipulated, that you are being programmed, that these people have figured out exactly the kinds of things, the kinds of images that are gonna hook you and you're being played, you're a fool. They're playing with you just like Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook knows all the algorithms to hook you to his, to h- to the newsfeed. You're being played by, by the images they know how to create and keep you always wanting more, just like fast food has all these tricks to constantly be eating their Doritos or whatever it is. Okay? But the other thing is, um, so I'm not gonna preach and moralize about pornography from a, a, a prudish aspect of it, because I'm not a prude, but I have a chapter in the book that I'm writing on the sublime on what I call love sublime, and the act of loving not God, not the universe, but another human being and individual, man or woman, gay or straight or whatever it is, and how sublime that is, and what it is is in that relationship the boundaries between the two of you are allowed to melt and your li- your ego can soften and you can feel their world and they can feel your world and you have a connection that for a social animal is the highest form of connection, it's superior to a religious connection, I'm sorry. Um, and what it requires is... We s- we have the expression falling in love and it literally is falling, it's like you fall, fall, fall, fall, fall, you're open and you're vulnerable and you're letting yourself fall, and when you're not, uh, what stops you from doing that is you don't wanna be hurt, you don't wanna be vulnerable, right? Because if you open yourself to u- someone else you're likely to get hurt. And so the moment there's a disagreement between you or there's a moment where a friend says something nasty about this person you're interested in, you stop falling, you cut it off and that romantic thing ends and dies, but if you get past that and you allow yourself to open up completely and you just keep falling, falling and falling and falling, this incredible thing can happen. And I describe it to y- and I describe it, wo- the dynamics of that and examples of that and why for a social animal it's like the ultimate experience, and so pornography is completely robbing you of that because love of another human being is a sense of enchantment, right? There's like this, this spark that's happening, this electricity and it's... Obviously sex is involved so it's a very physical relationship as well but it goes beyond that, it also has a kind of spiritual component, right? But it's this sense of enchantment where the world becomes alive to... Everything is beautiful in the world in those moments, right?

    8. SB

      Mm-hmm.

    9. RG

      And pornography is disenchanting you from everything. It's making it all mechanical and ugly and, and, and-... it, it has no romance to it. It has no dimension to it. It's almost as if the two humans involved in it, or however, are like machine parts, right? They're not human anymore, and there's no em- emotion involved. There's no kind of spiritual connection. It's depressing. It's really, really depressing. When I see it, I feel really sorry that I experience this, and I feel really sorry for the people who are in that industry. I find it really, really ugly and alienating. Now, I'm not, as I said, a prude, and I under- and, and I could watch a movie, a great movie with a love scene in it, and it's very exciting and beautiful. But the seduction element, the element of... I saw a movie recently, a Japanese movie by the great director Ozu from the '50s, and there was a man who was married, and he was about to have an affair with this woman who was kind of seducing him, and they had this kiss. And I go, I thought, "Wow." I was getting, I'd use the word turned on, but I was getting really excited. It was so full of emotion and energy, and it made the sexual elements so much more powerful by the element of romance, by the element of something kind of transgressive. There was no nude bodies. There was no sex you ever get to see. But the lead-up to it and the nature of the emotions involved made it, to me, deeply, deeply exciting. And if young men, particularly, can't have that experience, if everything is so mechanical, is so computerized, it's gonna be like AI. It's gonna be like AI sex, you know? Then you're losing your soul. You're losing your capacity for really falling in love, for really having that kind of dimensional experience, which by the way, can be extremely physical, and it can only last for three months. I'm not saying it has to be 20 years with one woman or one man. It can be for three months, but it enriches you. It cre- it makes you more human.

  20. 1:15:59 – 1:17:03

    Ads

    1. RG

    2. SB

      I've invested more than a million pounds into this company, Perfect Ted, and they're also a sponsor of this podcast. I switched over to using matcha as my dominant energy source, and that's where Perfect Ted comes in. They have the matcha powders. They have the matcha drinks. They have the pods. And all of this keeps me focused throughout a very, very long recording day, no matter what's going on. And their team is obsessed with quality, which is why they source their ceremonial grade matcha from Japan. So, when people say to me that they don't like the taste of matcha, I'm guessing that they haven't tried Perfect Ted. Unlike low-quality matcha that has a bitter, grassy taste, Perfect Ted is smooth and naturally sweet. And without knowing it, you're probably a Perfect Ted customer already if you're getting your matcha at places like Blank Street or Joe & The Juice. But now, you can make it yourself at home. So, give it a try, and we'll see if you still don't like matcha. So, here's what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna give you 40% off all matcha if you try it today. Head to perfectted.com and use code STEVEN40, or if you're in a supermarket, you can get it at Tescos or Holland & Barrett, or in the Netherlands at Albert Heijn. And those of you in the US, you can get it on Amazon.

  21. 1:17:03 – 1:21:32

    Are We Breeding a Culture of Lower Motivation Because of Porn?

    1. SB

      The other thing that a couple of psychologists on my podcast before have alluded to on this subject is that they told me about a study with rats where they messed with the part of the rat's brain that is responsible for causing dopamine.

    2. RG

      Yeah.

    3. SB

      And then when they put food in front of the rat's mouth, if the rat was, it was like six inches from the rat's mouth, the rat would starve to death because they had impacted the rat's dopamine so it no longer had motivation, and they speak of dopamine as this sort of motivation chemical.

    4. RG

      Yeah.

    5. SB

      It's the thing that gets you to take action. So, if you're frying your dopamine receptors by doing these sort of high-dopamine activities-

    6. RG

      Oh, right, right.

    7. SB

      ... I'm wondering if you're gonna, if we're, we're sort of breeding a, a culture of lower-motivation individuals. And because of this thesis, I was kind of looking at some s- some studies around this, and it does say that-

    8. RG

      Yeah.

    9. SB

      ... constant exposure to high-dopamine activities can lead to dopamine desensitization-

    10. RG

      Right.

    11. SB

      ... or deregulation of dopamine receptors, and then this can lead to a significant reduction in your motivation. And there's multiple studies here that, um, point in this direction. So, I'm wondering how, when I look at some of the stats around purposeless and people having less partners and being more sexless, if there's a through line here that when you make dopamine easy through pornography-

    12. RG

      Yeah.

    13. SB

      ... we're less likely to go and get up out of our bedroom and take an action.

    14. RG

      Yeah, but, uh, it's not just pornography. There's too much of that, uh, uh, in, in, in social media as well on, on other levels. So, um, you know, you have to... We're, we're... You have to understand what it means to be a human being, first of all. And we're physical animals. We can't be in our heads all the time. We, we think with our bodies, right? We, we think with the chemicals mixing in our bodies. We're very physical, and we're social animals to the core. And that social animal, what makes us superior is that we connect. I can kind of look at you, and I can maybe understand what you're feeling, what you're thinking, and we can have a discussion, and our ideas can go back and forth and connect and go to higher levels of understanding or lower levels of disagreement. But that's what it means to be a human being. You're not this fucking AI machine. You're not a bot. You're not an algorithm. You're not a f- little piece of data that Mark Zuckerberg can mix with. You're a, you're a human being with a body, with physical problems, with hormones, with emotions that are coursing through you, and you have to become a physical creature, which means doing things in the world, taking action, working, building a business, doing things with your hands, you know? Exercise, meeting people. Be inside of your bodies. And when you're in pornography, you're disembodied. You're not in your body. You might be wanking off, as far as I know, you know, probably are. But you're not really inside of your body in any meaningful way. And so...It's like, my hope, if there's any hope, is that ... and there's seeds of it in the world now, where young people are gonna start getting disgusted with this because the human spirit is still very powerful, and it's still, like, "I don't wanna be like this. Uh, it doesn't feel natural. It doesn't feel right." And at some point, my hope is in 20, 30 years, after I'm probably dead, there'll be a movement where people are gonna be so against this that they're gonna go in the opposite direction. They're gonna be returning to what it means to be a human being. There'll be a re- rekindling of interest in our past, in the primitive past, in the pagan past, things I'm writing about in, in my book right now. And I see things like that sometimes. Like, in the New York Times, they had an article a few weeks ago about a group of young people in college who hate social media and absolutely refuse it and will not... It's, like, almost like a fraternity or a sorority. They will not allow anybody into their group who ever looks at their phone. And I go, "Yay! Yeah! Right on, brother." I could have ... If I'm in college right now, I would join that, not that I think everything is evil. I have my own phone, et cetera. But if I were young, that sense of this is a nasty world, I wanna return to what it means to be a human being, I wanna spark a movement, a revolution that goes back to that. I hope that that's gonna happen. I hope that's in the cards.

  22. 1:21:32 – 1:24:17

    What Do We Not Want to Admit About Human Nature?

    1. RG

    2. SB

      What is it about human nature that we just don't want to admit?

    3. RG

      Well, um, first of all, we don't want to admit-

    4. SB

      (clears throat)

    5. RG

      ... um, where we came from, our, our primitive roots, that we are animals, you know, that before we invented language, you know, we were living like any other animal on the, in the outdoors, right? And, um, I remember one day, I was, I was in Sydney, Australia, about 10, 12 years ago, and they had this amazing zoo. I don't ... I hate zoos because I, I'm an animal lover, and I think zoos are like prisons.

Episode duration: 2:42:12

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