How to Build a Large Audience From Scratch (And More) | The Tim Ferriss Show (Podcast)

1. 0:00 – 1:39

   Intro

   1. TFTim Ferriss0:00

      Optimal minimal [upbeat music] At this altitude, I can run flat out for a half mile before my hands start to shake. Can I ask you a personal question? Now would have seemed an appropriate time. What if I did the opposite? I'm a cybernetic organism. Living tissue over metal endoskeleton. The Tim Ferriss Show. Hello, my little kittens. This is Tim Ferriss, and welcome to another episode of The Tim Ferriss Show. I'm testing a new mic, so if it sucks balls, please let me know on Twitter, #suckballs. Otherwise, if you like it, #likeballs. I'm kidding, don't do that. Don't do either, actually. Just, uh, communicate with me like a human on the Interwebs instead of using hashtags. Thank you very much. The Tim Ferriss Show is typically involved with deconstructing world-class performers, trying to identify the routines, the tips, the books, the influences, and so on, that help you to replicate the successes of people who are the very best at what they do, whether they are hedge fund managers, actors, and politicians like Governor Schwarzenegger, for instance, uh, musicians like Mike Shinoda, blah, blah, blah, everyone in between, chess prodigies. We've got something for everybody. Now, every once in a while I do a Q&A format where people will vote on questions, submit and upvote questions just like you have in the past week or two. So several thousand people voted on questions, and I have the top 10 to 15, and I'm gonna tackle as many as I can in the next short stint, the short period that we have together before I have to run to dinner. So let me start

2. 1:39 – 5:09

   My movie picks

   1. TFTim Ferriss1:39

      at the beginning, but before we jump into the questions, I want to recommend that you check out my movie picks. I watch a lot of movies, and I uncover some pretty fun ones because I dig very deep and I search far and wide for lots of weird, esoteric stuff. If you go to fourhourworkweek.com, all spelled out, F-O-U-R-H-O-U-R, et cetera, fourhourworkweek.com/vimeo. Vimeo is a sponsor, and I have been a member for many years now. Uh, if you go to fourhourworkweek.com/vimeo, you can find some of the movies that have been amazing for me, inspiring, game-changing, or in some cases, life-changing. There are some really, really impressive movies. And before I've spoken about, for instance, a science fiction short called World of Tomorrow, which was the winner of the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance for short films and is just a really thought-provoking, intense 16 minutes or so. I've mentioned Waking Up with Sam Harris, which is actually a lecture and effectively a class, which is the perfect tool if you want to explore mindfulness and meditation. And for those of you who have listened to, to a lot of these podcasts, you know that perhaps 80% of the top performers all have some type of meditative practice, and it can differ. Uh, whether that is, say, a DJ or founder of the Glitch Mob, all the way to Schwarzenegger, they all have some type of mindfulness practice. Then you have The, The Act of Killing, which is probably the most brutal, innovative documentary I've ever seen, uh, and many more. So they, they have, uh, just about anything you can imagine, from documentaries on the revival of manual work through motorcycles, which is super cool. You can check that out. A breakdancing documentary. And the one that I wanna highlight today is a very short film called The Lady in Number 6. And The Lady in Number 6 is an Oscar winner. It is a short about Alice. Now, Alice is 109 years old and the world's oldest pianist and Holocaust survivor. And this short film is really mind-expanding for me, uh, was mind-expanding for me in a number of respects. It just shows the importance of mental framing and also how your perspective can lead to happiness or resentment at any given point in time. And there are a number of people in the film who appear besides Alice, and you can look at the, their demeanors and the contrast in perspectives. It's very, very interesting. But 109 years old, very, very sharp still, moving around, playing the piano every day. I found it a, a really enlightening and, uh, engrossing watch. And it's, it's only, you know, 20 to 30 minutes long. So the, the, uh, name again is The Lady in Number 6. You can go fourhourworkweek.com/vimeo, and I will be continuing to add movies to this page. Uh, they are not affiliate links, but I do have a discount for you guys for any of the films that you might watch, so you can check that out. Uh, but the subtitle is Listen to the Secrets for a Long and Happy Life. So The Lady in Number 6, check it out. It's short, well worth the time. Go to fourhourworkweek.com/vimeo. All right, now, moving on. Let's get to the very first question, just jump into it. And, uh, I think I'll spend a good amount of time on, uh, this question, and I've omitted a handful of those that were voted up because I thought the wording was weird or confusing.

3. 5:09 – 18:09

   If I had to build a large audience from scratch today, how would I start?

   1. TFTim Ferriss5:09

      Um, so the first one I'm gonna tackle is this question from Mike in Santa Cruz. "They say blogging 1.0 is dead. If you had to build an audience from scratch today, how would you start?" Well, this is a tricky question because, uh, uh, y- you may be tackling the wrong problem, and let me explain how I think about this. And just to, to put things in perspective, so I have a number of platforms. Uh, I obviously have the blog, which gets somewhere between, I don't know, uh, one and two million unique visitors per month. Uh, then I have my Twitter and social. Twitter alone gets, I don't know, 1.3 million or so in terms of followers. And then the podcast, which is hundreds of thousands, uh, per episode, and so on and so forth. So I've tried it all, right? I've played around with any platform you can imagine, and I live in Silicon Valley and invest in tech. Here's my perspective. So I'll answer your question somewhat directly and literally first. There is always a market for high quality And there's always a market for long form, okay? I'm going to recommend a couple of resources right off the bat. There's always a market for high quality. There's a book called Small Giants I would recommend that you check out. And this is to say if you offer the best of anything, you can charge a premium and your customers will tend to be very high margin, low headache customers. So you could, say, produce the best cigar in the world or even in the top 10% and charge hundreds or thousands of dollars per cigar. You could do the same thing with leather pants and sell them to people like Sheryl Crow and only make a couple of hundred or even fewer per year and make hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars per year. That's actually an example from Small Giants. This is related to long form, and that's how I interpret blogging 1.0 is writing blog posts and then having comments on those posts. There's always a market for long form and people lament the death of long form, the death of this, the death of that. Oh my God, TV is going to be the death of radio and podcasts are going to be the death of this and this is going to be the death of that. And it makes for very sensational headlines, but I think it's usually mostly hot air. So long form, here's the advantage of long form content. And I've always specialized, I think, in long form content. You look at my books, they're not short. They're not intended for people who claim to have short attention spans. And many of my blog posts are 15 pages long, 20, 30 pages long if you print them out. And the reason I approach it this way is because if you're building an audience, and I'll come back to that aspect of your question, the most labor efficient way to build an audience over time is to have evergreen content. So I write long pieces that will be more valuable from an SEO real estate standpoint two years from the date I write it compared to the week it launches, if that makes sense. So were you to look at my back catalog and the stats, I'm on WordPress VIP. If you were to look at my stats or Google Analytics, you would see that my most popular posts that get each hundreds of thousands of visits per month were written several years ago. And that's very much by design. I'm not upset by that because I fully expect that some of the articles I write this year, for instance, my post on practical thoughts on suicide, which is a very intense post, I expect that will continue to gather steam and be spread around and shared. And a year from now, it will be right in the top 10 rankings, which is very important to me. So the question you asked though is a multi-layered question and there are a lot of assumptions built into it. So if you had to build an audience from scratch today, let's examine that. Why do you have to build an audience at all? Now, the belief right now is you have to be on social. You have to be putting out content. I think that's bullshit. You don't have to at all. Amazon didn't start with building an audience. Uber didn't start with building an audience. So if your goal is to create a profitable or massively scaled business, that may not be the right thing to focus on. That's part one. Part two is I encourage you to always ask yourself why three times when you feel like you have to do something. So you have to build an audience. Ask three times. And this is something I think I adopted from Ricardo Semler, just spelled with an R. He's a Brazilian entrepreneur asking why three times. So why do you have to build an audience? Well, and you might say because I have to have people to sell to when I launch my product. Okay. Well, why do you have to launch your product? Well, because I want to build a business that allows me to the freedom, let's just say, to travel the world and have enough income to do A, B, and C. All right. Let's take travel the world. It may turn out once you ask why three times that volunteering at a local embassy for your target country like Sweden or someplace else is the shortest path to getting to your objective, not building an audience. So don't mistake the intermediate signposts or not even signposts, the intermediate steps that you've been told repeatedly are important as the goal itself. And this comes back to a lot of the discussion in the four-hour workweek about multiple currencies and the fact that income is only one currency of time. You have mobility and that the value of that money is determined by the number of Ws you control in your life, where you live, what you do, who you spend your time with, and so on. And the reality that income is a barter system. You are taking this paper or digital symbolism, basically these units and trading them for experiences or possessions. So there may be more direct ways like volunteering, like taking a specific job, any number of things that could get you to your goal faster than building an audience because building an audience, quite frankly, is a pain in the ass. It is not an easy thing and it requires a very concerted, conscious, and well-planned effort. Okay. A couple of other recommendations. If you still decide that building an audience is the right step or the right place to focus, a couple of things I would suggest. Read the article 1,000 True Fans by Kevin Kelly. This is an important concept to grasp because you do not want to target the masses. Your objective should not be to build the largest audience possible. It's too vague. It will be too expensive in terms of cost per acquisition, even if that cost is measured in the man hours that you put into creating content. The least crowded channel is where you should focus. That's another reason why I prefer long-form content. The least crowded channel is still long-form content, whether that is print or audio. And that is why I am able to compete effectively, for instance, in the podcast realm, even though my podcasts are very minimally produced. I don't have a team. It's me and one freelance engineer and my assistant. That's it. Uh, but I can compete against podcasts that have many, many tea-- many, many people and groups of people focused on producing a narrative, uh, partially because I, I go very in-depth with guests. Um, this, this episode, of course, being, uh, an exception, I mean, an anomaly. A few other points. If you're trying to build an audience, the first place to start, and this is gonna sound funny, is to look at your credit card statement. All right, look at your monthly credit card statements and identify where you are price incentens- and price insensitive, okay? So you could have a, a specific highlighter for that. Let's just say they're printed out. Use an orange highlighter, red, whatever, for things that you are price insensitive about, where you could spend three or four times as much and not care. You should also break things into groups. Where do you spend $100 a year? Okay? So obviously you're gonna have to divide some things or multiply them by 12. But what do you spend $100 a year on? What do you spend $250 a year on? What do you spend $500 a year on? And what do you spend $1,000 a year on? Uh, and if you're in a, a, a very high income bracket, then you can multiply those out, obviously. Okay, that's step one. And the price insensitive aspect is very important if you want minimal headache from the customers that you choose. Next, you're going to identify the subcultures that you belong to. What are the subcultures you belong to? Are you a CrossFitter? Are you involved with orienteering? Are you into role-playing games or World of Warcraft? Do you like particular types of movie? Are you, uh, into Japanimation? Whatever it is, identify three to five subcultures that you belong to that you understand very well. And then for each of those subcultures, you're going to identify the five sites that those people go to, if you had to guess where someone in that subculture would go, the five sites that they go to regularly, three to five, the three to five Twitter accounts they're most likely to follow, the three to five Instagram accounts they're most likely to follow, the three to five Facebook pages they're most likely to like or be fans of, the three to five podcasts that they're likely to listen to, and let's just stop it there. And you don't have to do all of them. But spec that out, and what are you doing by following this process? What you're doing is defining yourself, your psychographics, your demographics, and, uh, th- my, my first recommendation is always going to be go after markets that you belong to. So when I launched The 4-Hour Workweek, my objective was initially-- And the target is not the potential market. This is really important to understand. The m- the, the target market is not your total market. The target market is the tip of the spear. That is what you use at the front lines to win the battle that then allows you to win the war. But you win the war when your target demographic then expands to include a lot of other people. In practical terms, what does this mean? When I launched The 4-Hour Workweek, my objective was very measurable, and what gets measured gets managed, as Peter Drucker says. I was going after 20,000 sales of The 4-Hour Workweek per week to tw-- I think it was 20 to 35-year-old tech-savvy males in New York and San Francisco predominantly, Chicago also. Um, and this is because I did the homework looking at Nielsen BookScan. I had a good idea of what would be necessary to hit the New York Times bestseller list. I knew what type of distribution I needed, hence the importance of Chicago and having, uh, not only sales limited to the coasts. And I also knew that I belonged to this 25 to, uh, 40-year-old-- Is that what I said? [chuckles] 25 to 40-year-old tech-savvy male demographic. Therefore, I knew how to appear ubiquitous to these people in a cost-effective way. So follow me. I knew that if I were able to get on at the time, say, Gizmodo, TechCrunch, uh, Gawker perhaps, and a handful of other sites, then, uh... Now, Twitter was nascent in this day, and Instagram didn't exist. But if I was able to appear at, say, two or three or four conferences that these people attended, I could appear as though I'm spending millions of dollars, uh, or being recruited by all these companies and publications around the world, when in fact I only was targeting a handful in a very concerted and, uh, surgical way, okay? You're not trying to build the largest audience possible. You're trying to find your 1,000 true fans. So to bring it home, just review all this stuff. You're trying to find your 1,000 true fans who belong to subcultures and markets you belong to, so that you can then design a product or service that they will be price insensitive to and, in doing all of that, finding a handful of outlets or pages, uh, or accounts that you can target so that you can very cost-effectively appear ubiquitous in a surround sound way when you launch something important to you. And that is it. By focusing on the least crowded channel, you can win at surprisingly low cost and with very elegant surgical approaches. And, uh, that is a long answer to question number one. So [laughs] I'm gonna go get a glass of water, but hopefully you guys find that useful, and I will be back. Okay, I'm back, you gorgeous, filthy animals, and I'm going to do a speed round, uh, at least to the extent that I can do a speed round and jam through a bunch of these

4. 18:09 – 20:05

   If you're the average of the five people you surround yourself with, who are those five people for me?

   1. TFTim Ferriss18:09

      questions here. The next question is from, uh, Mike M. in Hoboken, as well as Holly. Holly asked a very similar question. "If you're the average of the five people you surround yourself with or associate with most, who are those five people for you?" This varies very widely. It depends a lot on what my goals are, and I'm, I'm not purely pragmatic about my friends either. These need to be people I enjoy hanging out with, so it's not just for furthering the goal of averaging out to a higher standard. But, uh, the first few names that come to mind, uh, currently are Kevin Rose, Josh Waitzkin. Uh, so Kevin Rose, entrepreneur, serial founder, has been on the podcast. Josh Waitzkin, known as a chess prodigy, the inspiration for Searching for Bobby Fischer, uh, has also been on this podcast. Uh, Garrett Camp, who's a co-founder of Uber, found- co-founder of StumbleUpon, et cetera. I do a lot of work with him, but he is not on the podcast and probably won't be, um, because he doesn't do as much PR as people like me. Uh, Jeffrey Zoravsky, so Jay-Z is his nickname. Jeffrey Zoravsky was a chef featured in The 4-Hour Chef. He was very, very helpful. We did a lot of ridiculous things in that book, including the New York City Food Marathon, where we had something like 26.2 dishes in 24 hours over God knows how many different locations. And, uh, I suppose right now, 65-year-old or older, 60 year plus, let's just say, 60 year plus very fit dudes. So older guys who are in incredible shape who I have trouble keeping up with, um, really making a study of their longevity and just general life practices that lead to that type of existence. And then lastly, I'd say the, the, the Rick Rubins of the world. So Rick Rubin, legendary music producer, uh, he was recently on the podcast. Very zen, very calm, very unflappable, and I wouldn't say any of those things come naturally to me. So that is the short answer to that question. Next question.

5. 20:05 – 22:18

   Are there any habits I continue to implement on a daily basis?

   1. TFTim Ferriss20:06

      This is from Barry in Glasgow. "Based on the self-experiments you conducted in your books, are there any habits you continue to implement on a daily basis?" And I would expand the experiments in the books to also the blog and elsewhere, and there are plenty. There are tons that I continue to follow, uh, whether that's using cold baths as well as heat exposure to facilitate sleep. Uh, there was a, a piece that was put on the blog with Dr. Rhonda Patrick about using saunas and heat for growth hormone increase. You can check that out. Journaling in the morning. I use the Five Minute Journal, which, uh, was inspired by The 4-Hour Workweek. In fact, the people who created this read the book and then created the Five Minute Journal, so that's a nice virtuous cycle. But I use the Five Minute Journal typically in the mornings, although I try to do it at night as well as a way to focus my day. The no complaint experiment that I wrote about on the blog some time ago, trying to go 21 days without complaining and the parameters for that is something that I'm experimenting with right now, and that involves wearing a bracelet that can be swapped from wrist to wrist. The training program in Effortless Superhuman in The 4-Hour Body is something that I follow, uh, generally on and off depending on, on what my goals are. But if strength is the goal, then there's almost always a component of that. The, uh, sex chapters, those, those get good use, uh, [chuckles] hopefully more and more use. But those are in The 4-Hour Body. The 4-Hour Workweek, I would say, and certainly slow carb, the slow carb diet I've been following for something like 10 years now, although I'm in, uh, in a ketogenic experimentation phase at the moment. Then you have The 4-Hour Workweek, and, and I use stuff from all of these books. So many of the recipes in The 4-Hour Chef, sexy time steak and so on, I use all the time. 4-Hour Workweek, 80/20 principle and analysis, automation, autoresponders, all of that stuff is implemented on a daily basis. Just had a, um, a phone call with one of my right hands yesterday going through and rank ordering a bunch of things, and we'll, we'll get to some of that in a later question. And in fact, we'll get to that in the next question, which is from Arturo in Mexico.

6. 22:18 – 24:12

   What is the most important question I ask myself every day?

   1. TFTim Ferriss22:18

      "What is the most important question you ask yourself every day?" Closely related to the last question. And I think that question has to be, which of these, and these are the items on my to-do list, so if you have a to-do list in front of you, which of these, if done, make the rest easier or irrelevant? This is something that I've asked for many, many years, but w- we're really looking for, and I, I don't think I'm the only person to call it this, but looking for the lead domino. Uh, so the, the, the, the domino at the front that once tipped over will help make all the others happen automatically, make them all much easier to do, or make them irrelevant. So if you have multiple, say, revenue goals, and there are one that could have a disproportionate ROI for the number of hours invested, then that may make three or four other revenue options irrelevant if that's going to c- potentially comprise 80% of what you would make from that entire to-do list, for instance. So which of these, if done, makes the rest easier or irrelevant? Another question I ask a lot is, which of these makes me the most uncomfortable? And, uh, it's hard to define important. I know this, this, this-- it can get very complex very quickly trying to define what is most important, and, uh, I won't sp- spend time talking about that term right now. But instead of trying to define certain terms, you can just ignore them or leave them out, uh, and that solves a lot of problems. And we talked about sort of the, the, the trouble with the word success in The 4-Hour Workweek, for instance. Uh, but you can ask, which of these makes me the most uncomfortable? And that, from an 80/20 analysis, if done, is going to reduce anxiety, uh, and improve quality of life the greatest, potentially. And that often correlates to what you would consider important. So if you don't know what the most important thing is to do on your to-do list, uh- Find the one, find the item that makes you the most uncomfortable, and that's probably it.

7. 24:12 – 24:56

   If I could make one thing mandatory in high schools, what would it be?

   1. TFTim Ferriss24:12

      Uh, next question: "If you could make one thing mandatory in the nationwide high school curriculum, what would it be?" This is, uh, from, uh, also from Mike in Santa Cruz. This is, uh, pretty good voting on his questions. Uh, th- so this is a potentially long conversation, but the first one may be somewhat unexpected, and that is mandatory sports to keep kids occupied and focused and improving themselves from 3:00 to 6:00 PM. That's known as the danger zone, uh, for after-school programs. When kids have idle hands from 3:00 to 6:00, often before their parents get off of work, that's when a lot of kids go off the rails. So I think mandatory sports, which I had f- in high school starting in sophomore year. I just thought it was, it was very powerful as a tool.

8. 24:56 – 27:20

   What methods do I practice to maintain focus and follow through to achieve goals?

   1. TFTim Ferriss24:56

      All right. Next question. [sniffs] Uh, this is from Jerry A. in Philadelphia. "Bruce Lee said the s- quote, 'The successful warrior is the average man with laser-like focus,' end quote. What methods do you practice to maintain focus and follow through to achieve your goals rather than getting sidetracked, distracted, or discouraged?" Uh, first point that I'll make in answer to that is that I do get sidetracked, distracted, and discouraged. Uh, there's a post I wrote called, I think it's Productivity Hacks for the Neurotic, Manic, Depressive, and Crazy, and then in parentheses, (Like Me) . So if you just search, uh, productivity hacks for the neurotic, uh, and then my name, y- it will pop right up, just to give you an accurate picture of what my days and weeks look like. So number one, don't expect that you're going to eliminate that stuff 100%. That's setting yourself up for failure or feeling like a failure. You're going to get sidetracked, distracted, and discouraged. The question is, what can you do to minimize that, or more importantly, because the goal isn't minimizing getting sidetracked, the goal is getting really big things done or getting things done that have outsized returns and results, right? So there are a couple of things that I find very helpful. Number one is a Chrome extension called Momentum. This will prevent you from getting lost on the internet. Displays a beautiful photo with a quote, and then your most important task for the day. And we already talked about importance, so I won't belabor it. But the Momentum extension for Chrome, check it out. The next is thinking of my day as split into maker period and manager period. And there's a great essay by Paul Graham called, I think it's just The Maker's Schedule Versus the Manager's Schedule, something like that. Uh, f- up until about lunchtime or, uh, early afternoon, I try to produce content, uh, and focus on writing or recording audio, answering questions like this, for instance. And then after lunch, uh, where my brain is typically dialed down in terms of RPMs after eating anyway, I try to focus on the administrative stuff, the managing, the conference calls, the making the trains run on time stuff. And then The Five-Minute Journal I already mentioned. That helps me to keep somewhat focused, and the follow-through is related to that since you do a recap and a postmortem on your day every evening for a few minutes. Next question. Scooter from Silly Valley. I don't know if that is a real place, but I kinda like the name. Silly Valley.

9. 27:20 – 28:46

   What are the best or most reliable resources on health and healthcare?

   1. TFTim Ferriss27:20

      "Question: With all the misleading information on health out there, what are the best or most reliable resources?" This is a very tough question. What I would say is, as Richard Feynman would say, a physicist and a hero of mine, uh, "The most important thing is not to trick yourself, and you are the most-- you are the easiest person," or, "Not to fool yourself, and you are the, the easiest person to fool." Something along those lines. Uh, there's a book called Bad Science that you should read. Uh, Bad Science is written by a- an MD named Ben Goldacre, and it teaches you how to parse good science from bad science, uh, and to learn how to evaluate headlines in the news that are usually sensationalist, uh, or written by people who, who don't understand how to read studies properly, and perhaps a bit of both. Um, and I did take some excerpts from that, uh, and created a appendix or, I should say, bonus chapter in The 4-Hour Body that goes through a lot of this, so you can check that out too if you have a copy of the book. Uh, condensed a lot of that at the back of The 4-Hour Body. But you need to educate yourself so that you can separate fact from fiction, good science from bad science, good studies from bad studies, et cetera, and it doesn't take that long. You can, in an afternoon, uh, for most people, double your ability to be intelligent about evaluating all of the stuff that gets thrown at you. Mostly noise, very rare signal, um, but, uh, that is that. All right. Let's see. Uh, the next question I'm gonna answer

10. 28:46 – 30:53

    What natural supplements have I found to be most helpful?

    1. TFTim Ferriss28:46

       is, "What are your top 10 natural supplements that you've found most helpful?" And I wanna answer this question because I am of the mind now that you want to minimize supplementation because supplements should be supplements. Unless you have a clear deficiency that you cannot fix through diet, uh, you should attempt to fix it through diet and optimize through diet. And there are a couple of easy ways to do that. I like to, uh, so there are foods that I consume regularly, for instance. I mean, coconut oil, Brazil nuts, et cetera. Uh, I try to consume a diet that includes a spectrum of colors. So I will often order food or get, for instance, materials from a salad bar based on getting as wide a spectrum of different colors as possible. I think that allows you and helps you to cover a lot of bases. And then the last, uh, there's a supplement I use. I've used it for years, talked about it in The 4-Hour Body, Athletic Greens, which is kind of my insurance policy to cover things that I don't hit. Um, but there, I would never take 10 supplements. Uh, and natural is really a, uh, a dicey distinction or description because natural does not mean good, does not mean safe. Uh, hemlock is natural. It'll kill you. Uh, natural and synthetic are not always great distinctions, but whole food supplements, supplements derived from whole food, uh, I think are generally, uh, all things equal, which they never are, better than synthetic. But And also if you're doing something like, uh, recombinant, um, human growth hormone, right? You want human growth hormone that's been synthesized and not pulled out of cadavers. There are more dangers with the latter than the former. So that is a long way of saying, uh, I don't use-- I try not to use any supplements all the time because you develop tolerances. There are feedback mechanisms that can screw up your own, um, endogenous or sort of, uh, production in your own body by over-supplementation. So I'm trying to go whole foods whenever possible, Athletic Greens when I feel like I'm probably not covering my bases or traveling a lot. Next question from Chase in Kentucky. Uh, and

11. 30:53 – 33:13

    What are the things I’ve done to become a better writer?

    1. TFTim Ferriss30:53

       his question is: What are the things you've done to become a better writer? Uh, I still don't-- I'm not satisfied with myself as a writer. I, I think I'm a better teacher than I am a writer, so that has a lot to do with how I format the sequencing of things in my books and simplification of things. But couple of things. Uh, number one is read outside of your genre. So even if you're a nonfiction writer, read good fiction. Don't become a bigot, uh, genre-wise. Couple of books I found very helpful, On Writing by Stephen King, simple and direct. Uh, On Writing Well by, I can never pronounce his last name, I think it's William Zinsser. [laughs] On the psychological game of writing and just actually getting past your own head, uh, and insecurities to write, I think that Bird by Bird is one of the best books out there. Uh, if you can't find a professor or someone who is a, a, a, a writer per se to proof or review your writing, uh, then find a lawyer. Find a lawyer to look at your stuff. Even if they're not a good writer, so to speak, or don't consider themselves such, they're very good at removing extraneous words or nebulous words. Uh, so that, that is a tip. And then, uh, get into the practice of writing. Uh, so I use morning pages. Uh, you can use any number of different types of journals. If you just search what my morning journal looks like and then my name, what my morning journal looks like and my name, you'll see examples of how I do that and the, uh, the specific journal that I use just to get into the habit of writing for yourself. They are not intended for publication. Uh, and then when I am having my material proofread by people, my general rule is if one person loves something, it stays in. So I only need a vote of one to keep something. But if one person hates something, that's not enough to get rid of it. So I need a consensus to remove something, uh, but I only need one person to love something for me to keep it in or to strongly, strongly consider keeping it in. Uh, and that is that for now. I'm sure there are other things, but those are the ones that come to mind. Next question. This is [laughs] @proposalidea, all right, from Kentucky. We all have times when we, when we need a brain

12. 33:13 – 35:06

    What are my guilty pleasures for those times when my brain needs a rest?

    1. TFTim Ferriss33:13

       dump. What are your guilty pleasures for those times when your brain needs a rest? So I think of brain dump as just getting a lot out of your head in a brainstorming session without editing. But let's assume I'm answering the second part, which is when my brain needs a rest, what do I do? Uh, I like hand drumming. I have, uh, djembes, which is D-J-E-M-B-E. I have a hand pan, which is kind of like a steel drum turned inside out. Uh, I also watch serial television, uh, but it's, it's not appointment viewing. I'm downloading, say, True Detective or something like that, and then watching each episode. The Jinx also. [laughs] It's just coincidence that both those are very, very dark. Uh, the-- something a little lighter, I read fiction, and I actually really like reading kids' books or young adult books because I think the books that are really well-written and stand the test of time in the young adult category are just well-written books, don't have a lot of extraneous bullshit or, you know, $10 words when a 10 cent word will suffice. And I think they're just very well-written. Uh, Wrinkle in Time is one that was gifted to me, uh, not too long ago, and recently read that and just loved it. It was a, it was a really fun read and, uh, very relaxing to read before bed to turn off the problem-solving apparatus in my own mind. Uh, so that is my answer for the brain dump. Taking a rest, those are a few things that I find very helpful. Uh, and then there are a bunch of questions here. I'm just gonna answer one more and then get going and let you guys get back to your day, so hopefully you can, you can, uh, charge forth and conquer worlds. Uh, last question from Jamie. This is, uh, oh boy, Gloucester, UK. Gloucester? I don't know how to pronounce it. G-L-O-U-C-E-S-T-E-R. It's like Worcestershire sauce. Worcester sauce. I can't ever pronounce those damn words. In any case,

13. 35:06 – 38:38

    What would I go back and tell my younger self?

    1. TFTim Ferriss35:06

       what would you go back and tell your younger self? I've thought about this a lot, and my answer for a long time was, you know, nothing. I wouldn't change anything 'cause these, these questions are related. What would you change if you could go back to age 20 or 25? What would you do differently? They're very closely related. The only thing that I've been able to think of, and this is only very recently that I realized this, is start meditating. Uh, I think that I would recommend to myself that I start meditating earlier. I've talked about this quite a lot, um, and, and 80-plus percent of the people I interview for the podcast who are all world-class performers, best of the best, have some type of meditative practice. And, um, there are some very good books related to that. Uh, Wherever You Go, There You Are, I think it is, Jon Kabat-Zinn. Uh, there's also, uh, a book called Radical Acceptance by Tara Brach that I like a lot. B-R-A-C-H. That's, that covers more than just meditation. Um, and then, uh, last but not least, I-- well, I should say I practice transcendental meditation and Vipassana meditation, but there are many different types. Um, trans-- uh, TM, transcendental meditation, is just tm.org. You can find info there. There's things I dislike about it. I think it should be much less expensive to get training, but that's what I needed, i.e., someone to hold me accountable to get into it. Other things, apps like Headspace and Calm, very, very good for getting started. And, uh, do less than you think you can do for meditation. This is key for a lot of behavioral change, but if you think you can sit for 10 minutes, do it for five. Uh, give yourself a margin for error and for frustration. So if you think you can do 15 minutes, great, do 10. Uh, but do what will allow you to win in the beginning. The habit is more important than hitting home runs every day in the beginning. Uh, and then last, I will say check out Waking Up. Uh, this is the, the lecture by Sam Harris, uh, who is, is, is just an incredible human being, a PhD in neuroscience, a friend of mine. He's also on the podcast. And, uh, Waking Up is an outstanding introduction and, uh, and, uh, collection of instruction really related to meditation. Uh, so sort of A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion is his subtitle. But, uh, Waking Up is a great video. You can check it out, as I mentioned at the very beginning, at fourhourworkweek.com/vimeo, all spelled out, fourhourworkweek.com/vimeo. And in terms of that brain dump and relaxing, you can also find other things that I've watched, uh, before bed or on the weekends to chill out, like The Greasy Hands Preachers. Uh, they're all there. Shake the Dust, Valley Uprising, uh, World of Tomorrow, Maiden Trip, et cetera. Active Killing, not so relaxing, but a fantastic documentary nonetheless. The most brutal thing probably you will ever watch in your life. So those are my picks. I'll be adding to this over time, so check that out at fourhourworkweek.com/vimeo. And, uh, for those of you who are listening, if you have a company or product or brand and you're interested in sponsoring this podcast, then I would like to hear from you, uh, because I'm gonna be doing a lot of really fun stuff coming up soon. Just go to 4 Hour Work Week, all spelled out, fourhourworkweek.com/sponsor. Uh, and, uh, there's a short form. Fill it out and, uh, I or my team will check it out soon. So, uh, please let me know, fourhourworkweek.com/sponsor. That is it. Have a wonderful day, evening, week, month, life, uh, until I speak to you next time. Thanks for listening and kia kaha. Keep it real.

Episode duration: 38:50