Q&A with Tim — Exercise And Morning Routines, Holotropic Breathwork, and More | The Tim Ferriss Show

He describes a consistent start: about 20 minutes of meditation (often transcendental meditation), then basic self-care, then pu-erh tea and/or coffee, with the rest of the morning varying by the day’s theme.

His weekly baseline includes acroyoga/inversion training twice per week, climbing twice per week, basic weight training one to two times per week mainly for injury prevention, and frequent walking (including long walk-and-talk call days).

He says he uses a two-column 80/20 review: the small set of people/activities producing most peak positive emotional states versus those producing peak negative emotional states, and he also uses sleep-related signals (how he feels at bedtime and upon waking) as a directional indicator.

He says he’s personally had persistent thoughts about meaninglessness and death, and his near-term “reboot” plan includes rereading Viktor Frankl, reading “Smile at Fear,” and studying biographies of people who found or chose meaning.

He explains holotropic breathwork as a legal, non-drug route to non-ordinary states of consciousness, created by Stan Grof as an alternative after psychedelics became illegal; he often suggests people try breathwork first (unless contraindicated) before psychedelic work.