Scott Adams Interview (Full Episode) | The Tim Ferriss Show (Podcast)

1. 0:00 – 0:01

   Intro

   1. TFTim Ferriss0:00

      [beep]

2. 0:01 – 21:22

   Affirmations: Scott's Personal Story and Results

   1. TFTim Ferriss0:01

      Uh, could you tell me what you had for breakfast, please?

   2. SAScott Adams0:03

      Um, I had my usual coffee and protein bar while staring out the window and wishing I'd eaten more calories.

   3. TFTim Ferriss0:09

      [laughs] [beep]

   4. SAScott Adams0:12

      Optimal minimal.

   5. TFTim Ferriss0:13

      At this altitude, I can run flat out for a half mile before my hands start shaking.

   6. SAScott Adams0:18

      Can I ask you a personal question?

   7. TFTim Ferriss0:20

      Now would have seemed the perfect time. What if I did the opposite?

   8. SAScott Adams0:24

      I'm a cybernetic organism, living tissue over metal endoskeleton.

   9. TFTim Ferriss0:28

      The Tim Ferriss Show. This episode is brought to you by Vimeo Pro, which is the ideal video hosting platform for entrepreneurs, and in fact, a bunch of my startups already use Vimeo Pro, including Wealthfront, who uses it to explain how Wealthfront works. TaskRabbit uses it to tell their company story, and there are many other names you would recognize among their customers, Airbnb, Etsy, et cetera. Why do they use it? Well, Vimeo Pro provides enterprise-level video hosting for a fraction of the usual cost. Features include gorgeous high-quality playback with no ads, up to twenty gigabytes of video storage every week, unlimited plays and views, and a fully customizable video player, which can include your logo, custom outro, et cetera. You also get VIP support. And you get all of this for just one ninety-nine per year. That's seventeen dollars a month with no complicated bandwidth calculations or hidden fees. And you can try it risk-free for thirty days. So check it out, vimeo.com/business. That's V-I-M-E-O.com/business and use promo code Tim to get twenty-five percent off. That's a special discount just for you guys. So check it out, vimeo.com/business, promo code Tim. This episode is brought to you by 99designs, your one-stop shop for all things graphic design related. I have used 99designs for everything from banner ads to book covers, including sketches and mock-ups that led to The 4-Hour Body, which later became number one New York Times, number one Wall Street Journal. And the brainstorming, a lot of it took place with designers from around the world, and here's how it works. Whether you need a T-shirt, a business card, a website, an app thumbnail, whatever it might be, you submit that project, and designers from around the world will send you sketches and mock-ups and designs. You choose your favorite, and you have an original that you love, or you get your money back. It's that straightforward. And many of you who are listening have already used it and created some amazing things that I'll be sharing in the future. But in the meantime, if you want to see some of my competitions, some of the book covers, as well as get a free ninety-nine dollar upgrade, go to 99designs.com/tim. That's 99designs.com/tim. Hello, my heterogeneous homo sapiens, homicidal tomcats. That doesn't make any sense. I was gonna say homicidal homo sapiens, but heterogeneous. Why don't we say heterogeneous, like rogenous sons? I don't know. This is Tim Ferriss. Welcome to The Tim Ferriss Show. My job every episode is to deconstruct a world-class performer and to show you how they do what they do. What are the favorite books, the routines, the habits? How did they achieve the success they've achieved? Whether they are chess prodigies like Josh Waitzkin or actors like Arnold Schwarzenegger, director like Jon Favreau, comedians, athletes, hedge fund managers. We've got everybody. Startup impresarios like Peter Thiel and so on. This time we have, by request, Scott Adams. Scott Adams is a very famous cartoonist. He's the creator of the Dilbert comic strip and the author of several different books that are nonfiction. And he and I have a very wide-ranging conversation. We've met before, and we cover things such as his use of affirmations, written affirmations for the stock market, for success with women, for his career as a cartoonist. We talk about hypnosis, why he became interested in hypnosis, common misconceptions about hypnosis, and, uh, how he used different techniques or aspects of what he learned to make Dilbert popular. Even the name itself he goes into. We talk about a current fascination of his, which [laughs] I say which, which or who is Donald Trump, and, uh, the negotiator-in-chief that he is, uh, campaigning to become, and, uh, why the political press misses a lot of the genius that perhaps the business press should catch. Uh, we talk about goals versus systems, so how he has approached his life with systems in many cases instead of goals. And he and I oddly, or perhaps not so coincidentally, share a lot in common there. We talk about his first ever Dilbert check, the six dimensions of humor. So how can you engineer humor in, say, a comic strip or elsewhere? We talk about the most underrated comic book strips and comics in his opinion, how he got into the best shape of his life at fifty-eight, and much, much more. It's a really fun conversation. He is one hell of a character, a very hilarious guy as you would hope. And, uh, the banter is, uh, I found a really good time. So I hope that comes across via audio. And without further ado, please enjoy Scott Adams and say hi to him. It is @ScottAdamsSays on Twitter, so give a, give a hello, give a thank you, give him some feedback. And, uh, there you have it. The without further ado is a little premature, but here we go. Without further ado, Scott Adams. Please enjoy. Scott, my good man, welcome to the show.

   10. SAScott Adams5:29

       Hey, thanks for having me.

   11. TFTim Ferriss5:30

       I am so excited to have you on because many of the guests who've been on this podcast are fans of yours. I'm a fan of your work and of you personally, and there, there are a few things I'd like to thank you for. The first is helping me to learn different languages because I bought The Dilbert Principle in many different languages, Chinese, Spanish, German, English, as a way to learn conversational languages, number one. And then number two is for your tennis lesson, which was the first proper tennis lesson I've ever had. So right off the bat, I wanted to thank you for being very good at helping me to make progress in both of those areas.

   12. SAScott Adams6:05

       Oh, there's so much I can teach you, Tim. Uh-

   13. TFTim Ferriss6:07

       [laughs]

   14. SAScott Adams6:07

       ... we're just, we're just getting started.

   15. TFTim Ferriss6:10

       Well, you, you know, the, the languages and tennis go a long way.

   16. SAScott Adams6:13

       [laughs]

   17. TFTim Ferriss6:13

       I feel like, you know, have, have tennis racket and, and a few words will travel. Um-

   18. SAScott Adams6:18

       By the way, I gotta tell you, the first time I saw one of my books translated into Portuguese, I think I had this strange sensation that I could speak the language 'cause I knew what the word said.

   19. TFTim Ferriss6:26

       [laughs]

   20. SAScott Adams6:28

       It was, it was the coolest thing.

   21. TFTim Ferriss6:29

       Well, that is, that is actually really related because I-- what I'll do is, with these languages, if I learn, for instance, uh, Japanese first, then I will use the Japanese in, say, a target language of Spanish to learn the Spanish. In other words, I already know what's in the book on some level, just like memorizing lines in a movie, but I will use the Japanese to help me learn the Spanish so that they're linked together, and that way I get to review previous languages while learning new languages. And I was so impressed with how you were able to teach me tennis, uh, or at least get me up and running with the basics in such a very short period of time, and I feel like you, you're very methodical in many different areas, and you have methods that other people can use. And one of the specific behaviors that I'd love to hear you perhaps elaborate on just right off the bat is the idea of verbal or written affirmations. So Naval, one of our mutual friends, was on this podcast and, and he was mentioning that at some point, at least based on, in, on his recollection, you had gone into your office at the time and gone into the bathroom and said to yourself in the mirror, "I will be a successful cartoonist," or something like that multiple times. I've also heard that you write things down, say ten, fifteen times. Could you perhaps, uh, explain a bit of how you use affirmations if you do?

   22. SAScott Adams7:56

       You have accidentally given me the greatest, um, beginning anecdote to a long explanation anybody ever did.

   23. TFTim Ferriss8:02

       [laughs] All right. All right.

   24. SAScott Adams8:04

       So, uh, true, true story. Just a few days ago, I was having dinner with Naval, and I'm just making conversation, you know, haven't seen him in a while, and just randomly, because I knew I was coming on your podcast, I said, "Naval, have you ever done the, you know, Tim Ferriss podcast?" And he gets this weird expression in his face, and he says, "I just came from there."

   25. TFTim Ferriss8:24

       [laughs]

   26. SAScott Adams8:25

       It was the most, it was the most random thing any two people could have said to each other-

   27. TFTim Ferriss8:29

       [laughs]

   28. SAScott Adams8:30

       -after not seeing for a while. But that, that weird story, um, is a story about coincidence, right? You know, there's no magic that happened there. It was just a, a strange coincidence. It probably wasn't even a coincidence because the fact that we both know you and, you know, there's something in the air and maybe you bunch your, bunch your interviews in a certain way or think about them a certain way. So I'm sure there's no real coincidence there. There's just something we didn't see underlying it all. So that's the backdrop for affirmations. Let me say first that what I'm saying is not my belief that if you say your affirmations, something magical will happen, and the universe will change in, in some non-science way. All right? So I never made that claim, although often people have put that, uh, opinion in my mouth. What I have said is that I've used the technique, and I got a certain experience, which I'll be happy to share, and then I tell the story. All right? You can make of it what you will. I have several explanations for why there seems to be what I would call the, the appearance of an effect, which by the way, would be amazing in itself.

   29. TFTim Ferriss9:34

       Of course.

   30. SAScott Adams9:34

       If you could give yourself a genuine feeling that you had a superpower, even if it wasn't real, as long as it didn't, you know, interfere with your job, nobody thought you were crazy, it'd be a cool feeling. So, so even if it's not real in some sense of reality, still worth having, frankly. So y-we'd have, um... I, I'm gonna take as long as I want for this, and you can just cut me off. It's a fun story from beginning to end.
3. 21:22 – 30:43

   Why Affirmations Might Seem to Work

   1. TFTim Ferriss21:22

      Exactly.

   2. SAScott Adams21:24

      Yeah. I will start by saying... Well, I'll tell you exactly how I did it, but then I'll also tell you that I'm positive the exact method doesn't matter. I think what matters is the degree of focus and the commitment you have to that focus, right? Because the last affirmation I mentioned was, uh, primarily done in my head while driving, but, uh, con... You know, continuously for years. You know, about three years. Um, so the way I did it back in those times was I used a, you know, pencil or a pen and a piece of paper, and I wrote, uh, the same sentence 15 times, uh, once a day, I think. I mean, there would be nothing wrong with doing it twice a day, except it's twice as hard. So I, I don't think there's a reason that you should do it twice a day. I don't know if 15 is magic. I'm sure 10 would get you there. 20 might be better, but I doubt it. I don't think it matters. And by the way, these are the questions that everybody asks me all the time. You know, "Do you save the piece of paper?" No. [laughs] All right, you don't save the paper. The paper is irrelevant. Um, if you type it, I'm positive you'll get the same result. I don't know if this works. I mean, again, I'm not telling you that affirmations is a thing that actually happens as opposed to a perception that you have, but I'm sure the perception at least would be the same if you were typing it as opposed to writing it. So I think all of the details don't matter. Here's why I think it seems to work, and there's several possibilities for that. One is something, uh, I learned long ago, and I forget who coined it, but, uh, have you ever heard the phrase reticular activation?

   3. TFTim Ferriss22:54

      I have. Yeah, yeah.

   4. SAScott Adams22:55

      So it's basically the idea that it's easy to hear your own name spoken in a crowd, all right? So you, you'll hear background noise. Tim Ferriss. And you're like, "How did I hear that one thing in this whole bunch of crowd noise?" So basically, your brain is incapable of, of processing everything in its environment or even coming close. So the best it can do is set up these little filters, and the way it sets its filters is by what you pay attention to, right? It's what you spend the most energy on. It's how you focus your memory. That's how you set your filter. So your filter is automatically set for your name because that's just, you know, the thing that matters most to you. But you can use these affirmations, presumably, this is just a hypothesis, to focus your mind and, and your memory on a very specific thing, and that would allow you to notice things in your environment that might have already been there. It's just that your filter was set to ignore, and then you just tune it through this memory and repetition trick until it widens a little bit to allow, allow some extra stuff in. Now, uh, there's some science to back that. Dr. Richard Wiseman, uh, did some studies on luck, and he was trying to find out if people actually have real luck. You know, can they guess the future better than other people? And the answer, as you might guess, and I'm sure the people listening to this podcast are all rationalists and skeptics, and you know that he found nothing, right? Nobody can guess random events better than other people. But he did another test, which I'll shorten here, but the, the idea was that, uh, people who expected to be lucky, the people who labeled themselves lucky and looked for luck everywhere, were a little bit better at finding it. In other words, just actually noticing it in the environment.

   5. TFTim Ferriss24:35

      Yes.

   6. SAScott Adams24:35

      So if your filter is tuned t- to this thought, "Hey, I think there's something out there lucky. Let me look for it. Where's Waldo? Where's Waldo? Where's... There's Waldo." Right? You're gonna find a little bit more and more often than the guy who says, "There was nothing to look for. I already know everything's gonna go wrong. I'll tell you tomorrow. Tomorrow's gonna be me going wrong. Bad day, Eeyore. Rah, rah."

   7. TFTim Ferriss24:56

      [laughs]

   8. SAScott Adams24:56

      Right? So that guy's just not looking for anything.

   9. TFTim Ferriss24:59

      Right.

   10. SAScott Adams25:00

       So n- now let me give you an anecdote to tie that together. During the time I was telling myself I wanted to be, you know, a cartoonist, how do you do that? Like, you know, where... This was pre-internet. I didn't know where to search for it. I didn't know anybody. Um, I came home, and I noticed, all right, I noticed something I'd never seen before. Maybe it had always been there. I don't know. But I noticed a cart- a show, a TV show about how to become a cartoonist, and I wrote to the host of the show and asked him for some advice. He gave it to me. Short story, uh, even shorter, um, that set me on the road to, to know how to, you know, buy the book that I needed and, and submit my materials and, and that sort of thing. Now, you could say, well, that was just a coincidence because maybe that show only aired once and, uh, I think it was on public TV, so it actually probably aired lots of times. But, um, there might have been other things I would've noticed, you know? It wasn't just that one thing I could have noticed. I might have noticed other things that would've sent me on a different path, but also toward this, this thing I'd been focusing on, right? Now, the other possibility, um, every rational person in the audience is screaming, you know, at their, uh, at their speaker right now, "You idiot, this is selective memory. Um, what, what's really happening is there are lots of times that you were focusing on things and doing affirmations, and you just, you just freaking forgot those times."

   11. TFTim Ferriss26:18

       Right. It's a survivorship bias.

   12. SAScott Adams26:20

       "It didn't work."

   13. TFTim Ferriss26:20

       Right.

   14. SAScott Adams26:20

       Right? Um, I say absolutely. That's completely possible, right? But I just told you my story, and I can tell you that I don't have a memory in all of those years of trying it when it didn't work. I do have plenty of memories of when it hadn't worked yet. [laughs] You know, like I said, the, the voice problem took years. Um, and yeah, I suppose if I were, uh, doing one in particular right now, uh, that I could say it hadn't happened yet. So, so there's that. Um, but there's also just the fact that, um, it may be a self-identification thing. And what I mean by that is, uh, I, I have a view that we're mostly moist robots in the sense that-

   15. TFTim Ferriss27:03

       [laughs]

   16. SAScott Adams27:04

       ... uh, you know, the, the environment, uh, is programming us and, you know, we've got a little DNA that's like our operating system. But basically, you know, you start with that, and it can't vary a lot, right? Your DNA is a little bit, a little bit of a, a window of how much your, you know, your nature can change, but that's like a computer, right? And then the environment, uh, programs it within its parameters. So you got that going on. So you got a, a person who's, who's getting, you know, programmed by their environment, but they don't know that, right? They think they're making decisions and using their free will. So it could be that all that's happening is that a person who is willing to write down their goal 15 times a day has in their dis- at their disposal, without necessarily knowing it, a, a subconscious that is totally on their side. In other words, there's something in the subconscious that is overriding the conscious and saying, "You know, Scott, we're gonna do this thing. You haven't figured it out yet," all right? But I'm doing the affirmations, doing the affirmations. So what I'm, what I'm suggesting is it's not the affirmations that are making something happen. This thing is gonna happen, 'cause my subconscious already decided that I have these objectives, I have these goals, and I'm gonna chew through a freaking wall to make these happen, right? And I have some capabilities, so I can, I can chew. You know, I'm a good chewer. So maybe all that's happening is that a person like me, who has a subconscious that's guiding him towards this very specific outcome, is also the same person who's willing to write it down 15 times.

   17. TFTim Ferriss28:30

       Right.

   18. SAScott Adams28:31

       So in other words, the causation is exactly backwards from how it looks.

   19. TFTim Ferriss28:34

       Right.

   20. SAScott Adams28:35

       Uh, I, I'm already that person who's gonna make this happen, and I'm also, by coincidence, a person who's so intent on it that I'll try anything, and one of those things just happens to be writing stuff down 15 times.

   21. TFTim Ferriss28:45

       Right. Well, it's, it's, uh, uh, it's like looking at parents and, uh, who credit being good parents with buying books A, B, and C, and you're like, well, maybe it's just that the people who are predisposed to being good parents are the same people who are likely to buy a bunch of books and study [laughs] how to be a good parent.

   22. SAScott Adams29:02

       Yeah, and maybe, and maybe, just maybe, I've got three siblings who were raised in identical situations, and we all turned out completely different. Like, j- you just say that to anybody and watch them get the doe in the headli- you know, headlights look like, "Okay, you just changed everything I know about life. I will now erase that. Go on."

   23. TFTim Ferriss29:19

       Yeah, but, but I do think that you-

   24. SAScott Adams29:20

       [laughs]

   25. TFTim Ferriss29:21

       No, you bring up a couple of really important topics and, and I think helpful lenses through which to view behavior. So the first is, uh, this, this potential combination of, uh, optimism and, uh, being an opportunist, which I think perhaps the, um, affirmations triggers, right? So for instance, people might say, well- The people who go to Silicon Valley are more successful because they're driven, they go to Silicon Valley, they build tech companies, and so on. Um, I would argue there's probably more to that story, and one plausible explanation is people in Silicon Valley believe certain impossibles are possible, whereas they wouldn't be in a peer group elsewhere that would support that, right? So they're encouraged to try these things that would see doomed, seem doomed to fail in many other parts of the world. And if you're able to achieve that, uh, in isolation by using these affirmations, then y- you have this sort of, uh, naive optimism that then provides you with this, uh, like you said, selective attention and optimism where you'll, you'll, you'll write to the host of the TV show, right? It's kind of like the sixth sense in noticing the red doorknob. [laughs]

   26. SAScott Adams30:36

       Right.

   27. TFTim Ferriss30:36

       Or you buy a new car, and then you go out, and you see the new car everywhere. It's not that everyone went out and bought the same car to be like you. It's that you're now noticing it.

4. 30:43 – 38:55

   Writing God's Debris and Hypnosis as Persuasion

   1. TFTim Ferriss30:43

      How did you decide to write, what, write, uh, God's Debris? What was, what is the story behind that? Because when I, when I ping my audience to ask what they would like to know from you, um, many people are familiar with Dilbert. I would suspect a lot of people are probably not familiar with God's Debris. But the, the premise and everything about the book is really fascinating. Could you describe how that, how that came about?

   2. SAScott Adams31:07

      Yeah. Um, for the readers not, or the listeners not, uh, familiar with, uh, God's Debris, um, that's a non-humor, non-Dilbert book I wrote, um, 2001, I think. And it's a, essentially a conversation between a delivery man and the s- um, smartest person in the world, um, that he meets by accident, he thinks. And the challenge of the book was to write in the, in the voice of someone who is allegedly the smartest person in the world, someone who literally knows everything. Now, the problem is, since I don't know everything, you know, how do you figure out, that out? So the, my writer solution was a version of Occam's razor, sort of a bastardized version, in which I simply had the alleged smartest person in the world say the things that seemed like the simplest explanations. And it turns out when you read the simplest explanation, even if it's not what you were, you know, already set to believe or already did believe, it's very compelling anyway. It, it's just one of those, uh, ways your brain is wired that simplicity looks compelling. You know, i.e., Ronald Reagan, i.e., Donald Trump. Simplicity is always compelling. But the larger part, you know, the, the content of the book, and this won't mean as much to the people who haven't read it, but it'll mean a whole bunch to the people who have, you're probably wondering how the hell does anybody think of those different ideas and have them fit together in the same book? Uh, that's one of the questions I get asked the most. And the answer is, you don't do it intentionally, right? That stuff does not happen because you had a plan. That book is the result of literally, uh, my lifetime up to that point. It was 40-ish years. I forget. Um, and all the strange thoughts I'd had. And one specific moment in my shower at which I realized, holy hell, these are all the same idea, and they, they have a theme, which I can now weave them together into one grand idea. Which, if I put it in the voice of someone not myself, you know, then put it in the form of fiction, it will give the reader the same feeling that I had when this sense came to me in the shower, where I got a, a full body tingle. I felt like maybe everything I knew was wrong. Um, not really, but, you know, I'm talking about a sensation, just, you know, a feeling. And I thought, is there any way to package that, you know? Is there a way to write that down so somebody could get that feeling I had in the shower when I took things from left field, right field, and married orange with the number 12 and explain to you why it's all really the same thing, right? Could I make somebody have that experience? So that's what I, what I tried to do with the book. And I used throughout it a lot of techniques that I learned in hypnosis classes, uh, to strengthen the, you know, the impact. And in the forward, I, I give the reader, uh, you know, plenty of clues that this is a, a thought experiment. It's not a, a typical novel. It's not a, a story like they're, they're used to.

   3. TFTim Ferriss34:09

      And what, what were some of the techniques from hypnosis that, that you implemented?

   4. SAScott Adams34:14

      Oh, would that-- If I told you, would it be a spoiler? Um-

   5. TFTim Ferriss34:18

      [laughs] That's, okay. Well, if it gives away the plot line. I'm just curi- or maybe the broader question is, how have you incorporated-

   6. SAScott Adams34:24

      Yeah. Let me-

   7. TFTim Ferriss34:25

      Because I'm, I'm a s- a, a, uh, [sighs] an uninformed, uh, when it comes to hypnosis.

   8. SAScott Adams34:32

      Okay.

   9. TFTim Ferriss34:32

      I don't, I don't know anything about it, so I'd be just very curious-

   10. SAScott Adams34:34

       Oh

   11. TFTim Ferriss34:34

       ... how you've im- implemented hypnosis into your life, I suppose-

   12. SAScott Adams34:38

       So-

   13. TFTim Ferriss34:38

       ... is a broader question.

   14. SAScott Adams34:40

       Yeah. So first of all, um, the way I use hypnosis is too broadly for the public. You know? So most people are thinking of a stage hypnotist and something they saw in a movie where somebody was programmed to kill the president or something. Um, I, I'm not talking about any of that stuff, uh, or, or anything that involves a trance, right? I'm talking about, uh, the science of persuasion, stuff that's science tested and things that are pretty well known and understood. So I'll give you one example just to illustrate it. My challenge when I have a book that's, uh, most of it is two people talking, is that you will get bored, right?

   15. TFTim Ferriss35:13

       Right.

   16. SAScott Adams35:13

       So I need to continually put you in the place of one of the characters. You can't be in the place of the smartest person in the world, [laughs] you know? 'Cause by definition, you just can't get there, right? But you can be in the place of the person who's listening to it and not buying it. There's no way you can buy it in its unfinished form, right? It's like somebody's, uh, it's sorta like, um, uh, what's the game that you doodle and people try to guess your doodle?

   17. TFTim Ferriss35:42

       Uh...

   18. SAScott Adams35:43

       Pictionary.

   19. TFTim Ferriss35:44

       Pictionary.

   20. SAScott Adams35:44

       Pic-

   21. TFTim Ferriss35:44

       Pictionary.

   22. SAScott Adams35:45

       Right.

   23. TFTim Ferriss35:45

       Yeah.

   24. SAScott Adams35:45

       So you, you need a certain amount of clues before anybody's gonna get it, right? Nobody gets it on the first line. So that's, that was the, the experience I was going for is that, you know, you get it. I, I completely lost my train of thought thinking about Pictionary 'cause-

   25. TFTim Ferriss35:58

       [laughs] We were, uh, we were talking about persuasion and hypnosis and-

   26. SAScott Adams36:03

       Oh, okay. So right. The method I used was, um, whenever the world's smartest person said something that I knew everyone reading it would think, "Oh, God, there's 10 obvious reasons why that's stupid," I would just have the person say, "I think there's 10 obvious reasons why that's stupid." Now I'm paraphrasing myself, but, uh, in other words, I make, I make my character say the thing you just thought.

   27. TFTim Ferriss36:26

       Right.

   28. SAScott Adams36:26

       Right?

   29. TFTim Ferriss36:27

       Right.

   30. SAScott Adams36:27

       So that's a lit- that's a little different than, uh, tradit- traditional fiction, where I'm making the character lead you all the way.
5. 38:55 – 48:27

   Hypnosis Origins and Its Role in Dilbert

   1. TFTim Ferriss38:55

      how were you introduced to hypnosis? You took this class that you'd mentioned, but what, uh, what sparked your interest? And for those people who are not familiar with hypnosis and have only seen the stage performers and so on, um, h- how do you sniff out someone who's truly a master at hypnosis? And maybe that's too broad. Maybe there are a bunch of different types. And how do you sniff out kind of the charlatans y- that you shouldn't really pay much attention to?

   2. SAScott Adams39:20

      [laughs] Did, did you, uh, did you read my, uh, blog on Trump? I'm not sure if you're asking-

   3. TFTim Ferriss39:25

      Oh. [laughs]

   4. SAScott Adams39:26

      I, I don't know if you're asking-

   5. TFTim Ferriss39:26

      No, I haven't. I'm not, I'm not leading-

   6. SAScott Adams39:28

      Oh

   7. TFTim Ferriss39:28

      ... in this case. [laughs]

   8. SAScott Adams39:29

      Okay. So, so that was the most accidentally, um, perfect question anybody ever asked, so-

   9. TFTim Ferriss39:34

      [laughs]

   10. SAScott Adams39:35

       ... nicely done.

   11. TFTim Ferriss39:36

       It is.

   12. SAScott Adams39:36

       Let me, so let me start-

   13. TFTim Ferriss39:36

       Thanks

   14. SAScott Adams39:36

       ... at the beginning. The, uh, my mother delivered, gave birth to, uh, my little sister while under hypnosis and did not use any painkillers. She did not feel pain, and she was awake the whole time.

   15. TFTim Ferriss39:50

       That's incredible.

   16. SAScott Adams39:51

       Now, now just, like, I, I left a dramatic pause after that, but I forgot we're doing a podcast, and everybody went to check their equipment. [laughs]

   17. TFTim Ferriss39:58

       [laughs]

   18. SAScott Adams39:58

       Sorry about that. Uh, but the, uh, but that had a huge impact on me. Um, so it turns out our family doctor was a trained hypnotist and, you know, he handled the birth, and he just offered her that option. Now, uh, let me be quick to point out that there's sort of a, a rule of one in five in hypnosis, and that is that one in five people are, are able to go into a, um, a state that is that extreme. In, in o- in other words, somebody who could simply block pain or somebody who could see something that wasn't really in the room. Now, keep in mind that in all these cases, these people are completely aware and awake, and they can stop the sensation any way they want, anytime they want. But, you know, if you're giving birth, you're not gonna be going out of your way to stop the sensation of stopping pain, right?

   19. TFTim Ferriss40:42

       [laughs]

   20. SAScott Adams40:43

       So, so it's not nobody's controlling you. It's more like a coach working with a, you know, an elite player. You know, the coach is not doing it. The coach is saying, you know, "Hey, you know, cross over, dribble," you know, "Go under your leg, left, jog right." So that had a huge impact on me. And so it got me interested in, in that and other things. And so when I was in my 20s and I realized that a guy who works as a bank teller and has, drives a car which, uh, one girlfriend, uh, affectionately... [laughs] Oh, she had a terrible name for it, but I can't say it on the air.

   21. TFTim Ferriss41:13

       Oh, sure, you can.

   22. SAScott Adams41:14

       Uh-

   23. TFTim Ferriss41:14

       You can, of course you can say it.

   24. SAScott Adams41:15

       No, but I, I realize there's a reason, not because it's a profanity. I just can't say it.

   25. TFTim Ferriss41:18

       Ah, okay. No problem.

   26. SAScott Adams41:19

       Uh-

   27. TFTim Ferriss41:19

       Just to trade, my, I had a hand-me-down van from my mom, and the back seats were stolen, so all my coworkers started calling it the molester mobile. That was the nickname-

   28. SAScott Adams41:28

       [laughs]

   29. TFTim Ferriss41:29

       ... for my car. [laughs]

   30. SAScott Adams41:30

       [laughs] Uh, okay. You win on the car. Uh, so anyway, I thought I need an edge f- you know, career-wise, you know, dating-wise. And if there's anything to this, at the very least, I'm terribly curious about what it is and what it isn't. And, you know, you figure your mother's not gonna lie to you about childbirth. I mean, not something that became, like, a, a central story of your youth, you know? It's, it was kind of a, a big deal. It doesn't seem like the thing she would've made up. So credibility was high, and I thought, "Well, let me check this thing out." But I-- again, 20% of the people can have that kind of experience. Uh, and the family doctor, obviously, um, you become trained in quickly identifying who those people are, so he knew. Um, but all the rest of the people can get, uh, substantial benefits. So unfortunately, I'm, I'm in the, you know, the 80% that can't get those extreme benefits, but the, the stuff I can get is immense. Um, and it includes, you know, the ability to, uh, craft a book the way I did. It in-includes a lot of technique I use, uh, for making Dilbert popular. For example, um, the reason Dilbert has no last name, the reason you don't know what town he lives in, you don't know the name of his company. And here's a first for a comic strip, I think. The, the second main character is the boss in terms of, you know, time on, on screen. Uh, and he doesn't have any name at all.
6. 48:27 – 1:01:06

   Donald Trump as Master Persuader

   1. SAScott Adams48:27

      This dovetails exactly into my loud defense of Donald Trump's methods, which I've been writing about all week on the internet.

   2. TFTim Ferriss48:35

      [laughs] I've seen, I've seen some of the, some of the fireworks.

   3. SAScott Adams48:37

      [laughs]

   4. TFTim Ferriss48:38

      So please tell ... Say more.

   5. SAScott Adams48:41

      Uh, l- l- let me draw a line for you that, um, y- I- I'll say in advance this is conspiracy, uh, talk, you know, conspiracy theory talk. So you, so you don't have to say it. None of the listeners have to tell me that. So it's just for fun. Um, there is a connection between Donald Trump and me.

   6. TFTim Ferriss48:59

      [laughs]

   7. SAScott Adams49:00

      There is an individual between us. That individual happens to be the father of hypnosis, Milton Erickson. He-

   8. TFTim Ferriss49:06

      Milton Erickson.

   9. SAScott Adams49:08

      Milton Erickson. Um, a name known only to people who study hypnosis usually or psychology. So he was a linguist who, who put a lot of this ... Well, I'm not sure if he was a linguist, but he put a lot of this stuff together mostly by instinct, I think, in the beginning. One of his, um, and his school is the s- school of hypnosis that I ended up going to. It was a different school with a few differences, but basically I grew out of that. Also out of the Erickson school is, um, a couple of, uh, people, I think John Grinder, I think, hope I didn't get the name wrong, who developed, uh, NLP, neuro-linguistic programming, which is a way to use, uh, largely words as a programming language, although they don't market it that way. Now, NLP is marketed with a lot of stuff that I don't buy into, but there's a core of it that comes from hypnosis which, um, matches pretty exactly with what the scientific studies and, you know, current psychology would expect, right? So there's, there's a part of it that's real strong and powerful, but it's probably the minority of it. I mean, most of it is, you know, people being stiff as boards between two chairs and, you know, that sort of stuff. [laughs] Uh, now, the best practicer, most famous practitioner of NL- NLP, the person who got his inspiration from it, is Tony Robbins. Tony Robbins, uh, has been, um, a business associate with Donald Trump. They worked together on some kind of program about success. You can see their videos of them talking one after another. If you Google them, you see them standing together on Google Images, uh, et cetera. Now, I have no reason to believe that they ever had a conversation on the methods of persuasion. All right? I think Trump is, first of all, a natural 'cause he's, he's been doing it for a long time. But if you look at his recent work, that has Erickson's fingerprints all the, [laughs] all over it. Let me give you an example, and I wrote about this, so if you wanna see the details, it's at, you know, dilbert.com in my blog. But, uh, take the debate where, um, he came in as the underprepared buffoon who was gonna blow himself up. And Megyn Kelly of Fox News decided that, yes, that's exactly what was gonna happen, and she started right out with the, uh, "Did you say all these bad things about women?" quote. Now, every other politician would've been smeared off the stage by that because all ... It, it wouldn't matter what he said back, right? It wouldn't matter what the response was because the question itself, like NLP-

   10. TFTim Ferriss51:33

       It's so incriminating. Right

   11. SAScott Adams51:34

       ... Yeah. The, the question is the content. All right? The, the logic of the answer, the, you know, maybe somebody said, "Oh, that was taken out of context," or whatever, which is what people usually say, and it usually is. I mean, that's actually usually true. But the, the public isn't gonna hear that. They're just gonna hear the feeling that they felt when Megyn Kelly said that person's name, bad to women. And that, that's really, like, the beginning and the end of the thinking for, you know, let's say at least 20% of the public, right? About the same 20% that can easily be hypnotized coincidentally. So but what did Trump do? As soon as that question came up, he semi-interrupted her and he said, "Only Rosie O'Donnell." That, my friends, is hypnosis. He took an anchor that everybody could visualize, and his core audience already had a negative impression. Their negative impression of Rosie O'Donnell almost certainly was bigger, stronger, and visual and more important than whatever Megyn Kelly just said, which should have been a full house, right? [laughs]

   12. TFTim Ferriss52:35

       Yeah.

   13. SAScott Adams52:35

       I mean, she, she, she showed him four kings and he beat her hand, and he did it without even trying. And he did it with a method which is well understood, right? It's a negotiating technique. You know, you throw down an anchor, you divert everybody. And so instead of becoming this, you know, sexist, which he could have been on day one, he became the straight talker.

   14. TFTim Ferriss52:54

       Yeah.

   15. SAScott Adams52:54

       He's the guy ... He, he, and, and he admitted in the very next sentence that he'd also said bad things about other women.

   16. TFTim Ferriss53:00

       He, he has some really interesting-

   17. SAScott Adams53:03

       Oh, but wait.

   18. TFTim Ferriss53:04

       Go ahead. Go ahead.

   19. SAScott Adams53:05

       Wait. There, there's a better part.

   20. TFTim Ferriss53:07

       Oh.

   21. SAScott Adams53:07

       It gets better.

   22. TFTim Ferriss53:08

       I'm ready.

   23. SAScott Adams53:08

       Now, I know you follow the headlines, so you know what happened next. Roger Ailes of Fox News, um, you know, weighed in to say, like, "We're gonna need to pa- make peace," right, "with Donald Trump because, um, you know, this is getting out of hand." And Donald Trump made peace with him. How do you interpret that? I'll tell you how I interpret it. I, I interpret it as Donald Trump just bought Fox News without paying a fricking penny. Because if he wants them ... If they want him to appear on his show, that's up to him, and he just proved he doesn't need them. So he's gonna get all the press he wants without Fox News. If they wanna get on the program and support the guy who's probably gonna be the nominee, that's, that's what I've predicted, um, because of his hypnosis sp- skills in particular, having nothing to do with his policies, by the way. I'll get to that. I, I, you know, I'm not a, not a fan of the policies, but I don't think he is either. He's, he's just, you know, they're opening, negotiating gambits as, as he does. So he effectively, um, changed the debate, became the straight talker, took control of Fox News all in one day. And all of that is, is straight out of, you know, the hypnotist playbook. Although it's, you know, he would call it persuasion. He might call it negotiating. He literally wrote the book, The, The Art of the Deal. Let me show this to you again, so you see the pattern. Some of you saw his immigration plan. That's like the most ridiculous thing in the world. It's like, "Build a giant fence. Make Mexico pay for it," as if they wanna do that. Um, "Round up eleven million Mexicans who have been in the country for a while and send them back. Change the Constitution to get rid of their birthright." All right, I'm saying it with my mocking voice.

   24. TFTim Ferriss54:39

       Right.

   25. SAScott Adams54:39

       But, um, you know, then I'm gonna reverse it around and tell you that if you, if, if you evaluate him as a politician, which is what the political writers are all doing incorrectly right now, that's the most ridiculous bag of shit anybody ever proposed to the country 'cause it has no chance of, of happening in that form, right? It's just not gonna happen. But he's not a politician. He's a businessman, and he's a hypnotist, [laughs] and he just gave you an anchor, and his anchor is, "Look at what I'm gonna do. Everybody get excited. Let's talk about changing the Constitution. Let's talk about the cost and the, and the heartbreak and the, and the misery that would cause to these 11 million people I'm planning to... I'm proposing we kick out of the country. Let's talk about how expensive that fence is." And then when he gets to negotiate with Congress, guess what he gives off? He gives it away 'cause the only thing he wanted was the fence.

   26. TFTim Ferriss55:29

       [laughs]

   27. SAScott Adams55:30

       Right? The only thing he wanted was the fence. But can you say in your plan, "I'm gonna give everybody a free pass after we build the fence"? No, because that makes immigration explode for the 10 years it takes you to build a fence. So you have to get there the way he got there, and it's the way a businessman would do it. You come in with this ridiculous first offer. You make all the idiots in the media who think he's a politician, even though he screams that he's not... I mean, he wrote a book on this stuff. [laughs] You, you know, it was a number o- I think it was a number one bestseller, right? He could not be more clear or m- more honest about what he's doing as he does it. But it's still invisible because you're looking at him as a politician and saying, "If his goal is to do this thing, it's a stupid goal. He's not gonna kick out 11 million people. Nobody's gonna, nobody's gonna go for that." That's not the game. It will never be the game. I almost guarantee you that if he gets approval to build the fence, he'll probably get some Mexican funding, not completely, but enough... it'll be enough to say, "Look, nobody else was even gonna ask for half, right? Right? I got you half of this paid for." If he does that, people are gonna wet their pants, right? And then he's gonna say, I guarantee it, I guar-- He, he's gonna say... And now this imagines he gets nominated and becomes president, and so I guess I can't guarantee anything. But, but if it got to this situation, the likely o-outcome would be that he'd say, "Look, yeah, that 11 million people, yeah, I guess it would be hard to round them up. Why don't we say that if you stay out of jail for X number of years, you pay your taxes, you register, you do some useful things, that, uh, you know, uh, we'll make an exception to your case just for practicality 'cause that's what a business person does. And by the way, I got my fence built. Now, my brand, Brand America, is exclusive for the first time, and that's why you hired me. You hired me to be a brand manager. You didn't hire me to, you know, to, to, to tell the truth on my first offer. You offered me to negotiate." He's, he's literally running for the office of negotiator in chief and practicing his craft, and he's doing it with such brilliance that I've, I've literally... I don't think I've ever seen anybody do it this well except... Oh, I can think of one other person. Um, let's see. Um, it was Bill Clinton-

   28. TFTim Ferriss57:41

       Mm-hmm

   29. SAScott Adams57:41

       ... who also is good friends of Tony Robbins.

   30. TFTim Ferriss57:45

       [laughs] I l- I love the web. It's like six, six degrees of Kevin Bacon.
7. 1:01:06 – 1:07:52

   Goals Versus Systems

   1. TFTim Ferriss1:01:06

      I want to shift gears just for a second because I love this type of deconstruction, and I'd love to chat a little bit about goals versus systems and just to hear you perhaps talk about some of... h-how you think about your life in those terms or not.

   2. SAScott Adams1:01:26

      Yes. Um, you want me to just jump right in and define those two things?

   3. TFTim Ferriss1:01:30

      Yes, please.

   4. SAScott Adams1:01:30

      Just, let's go.

   5. TFTim Ferriss1:01:31

      That'd be, that'd be very helpful.

   6. SAScott Adams1:01:32

      All right. So th-this, um, was written in my book, How to Fail at Almost, uh, Everything and Still Win Big. And the idea is that if you have a, a goal, um, goal-oriented approach to the world, that that's an approach that made perfect sense 200 years ago if you were a farmer and you had a simple operation, and you thought if you cleared another 10 acres before winter, you could grow more corn. You're almost certainly right. So clearing those 10 acres before winter was a perfectly good goal, and it made perfect sense to pursue it. But now fast-forward, all right? It's, uh, it's, uh, it's modern times. There's probably more technology, more complexity in your pocket right now, in your smartphone, than the farmer had in his entire operation, all right? Today, if you're focused on one thing for more than a minute and a half, there's a good chance that that thing is no longer worth having, all right? There are people going to school for degrees that won't mean anything even four years from now when they retire or when they get out of school. Um, so you, you've got people who are making plans with a clear focus in a world that no longer supports a clear path to anything. So what's the alternative in a world where you can't... If you can't predict the future, and, um, on top of that, even if you could predict it and you picked a goal and you marched right at it, when you got there, there's a really good chance that you would've said, "You know, I didn't notice there were five other goals that were way better than this one," because they emerged while you were focusing on your goal, right?

   7. TFTim Ferriss1:03:05

      Mm-hmm.

   8. SAScott Adams1:03:06

      So if you're not keeping your eye on the, on the whole of it, and if you're not playing the odds, and you're picking a, you know, a moonshot as your way to go through life, you, you know, you're gonna feel like you're failing, not only if you miss the moon, but you're gonna feel like a failure all the way to the moon 'cause you haven't gotten the moon yet, and you're not quite sure if you're gonna get there. So what's better than that? Um, and by the way, I still recommend goals heartily for simple situations. So if you enter a bowling tournament, your goal is to win the bowling tournament, right? I mean, it's a simple situation.

   9. TFTim Ferriss1:03:38

      Yeah.

   10. SAScott Adams1:03:38

       And usually, when it's a, like a human-made, uh, construct, they are, um, simplified and, and therefore a goal makes sense. Um, here's what may not make sense. Let's say you said, "My goal is to get my boss's job." That's a pretty common goal, right? That's stupid because your boss's job is just one of the many things that could be better than what you're doing now, and the chances are there's something way better than that, you know, your boss's boss's job, for example. You know, what are you doing about that? You know? Um, how about some job at another company? How about a lateral move that, uh, gets you in a better place to go higher later? You know, so as soon as you focus, you've given yourself something to fail at, and you've closed yourself out from the other opportunities. All right. So, um, what I write about instead is what I call a systems way of looking at the world in which you are continually looking at ways to improve your odds in some favorable area, some favorable, uh, focus, you know, without being too specific. Um, so your area might be, you know, business or art or whatever it is. Um, so, uh, the, the hallmark of a good system is that even as things are failing, you're still improving your odds and your personal worth, all right? So if, for example, uh, I start up a company and it doesn't work, I would say, "Oh, I had a goal, and I started that little startup, and it failed, and now I'm a failure." But if I started a company that was in a field that I already work, and I'm, let's say, making all the contacts that I made through the startup, uh, the networking, the things I learned made me more valuable in the things, you know, maybe my day job or the next job I do, then I came out ahead. So that's the system, right?

   11. TFTim Ferriss1:05:21

       Mm-hmm.

   12. SAScott Adams1:05:22

       Let me, let me give you a kind of a non-business example of that. Um, I had a friend in high school who, um, wanted to have a girlfriend, and I wanted to have a girlfriend, but he had a, he had kind of a systems approach, and I had a goal approach. My goal approach is I'd pick out the, uh, the prettiest looking girl in my class, and I'd say, "This, this girl must be my girlfriend. I will do, do everything I can to make this happen." And I'd do my research, and I'd figure out who her friends were and where I could hang out, and, and, you know, it might take me months, and at the end of it, it usually ended this way, right? She'd say, you know, one of two things. Either she had a boyfriend, so I've, you know, wasted three months, or she'd say, "I don't like you."

   13. TFTim Ferriss1:06:03

       [laughs]

   14. SAScott Adams1:06:04

       And then I'd... Then, then I've wasted three months. But every once in a while she'd say... You know, this didn't happen often, but once in a while she'd say I have a boyfriend, and I don't like you. So th- that was my experience with my goal line.

   15. TFTim Ferriss1:06:17

       [laughs]

   16. SAScott Adams1:06:18

       So my, my friend, uh-

   17. TFTim Ferriss1:06:20

       Even if I didn't have a boyfriend, right?

   18. SAScott Adams1:06:22

       Yeah. [laughs] Um, so, uh, w- My best story of rejection in seventh grade was asking the prettiest girl, uh, to dance, the first time I ever asked somebody to slow dance, and she said, "Uh, you know, it's, it's too hot. I'd rather not." And I said, "Perhaps if you took off your down winter jacket." And she said, "Um, and I'm also too tired."

   19. TFTim Ferriss1:06:46

       [laughs]

   20. SAScott Adams1:06:46

       All right, so, so that, that was, that was my dating experience in high school. That was a goal-oriented approach, right? So my friend Manuel, he had a different approach. He had a systems approach. He would simply go wherever there were plenty of, uh, girls, and he would ask them in order of, uh, descending, you know, descending order of looks, "Will you be my girlfriend?" And... Or some version of that. Of course, almost everybody said no. Now, you're probably thinking, "Oh, you're telling me the old story about keep trying, you know, get back on the horse." I'm not telling you that story at all. I'm telling you he was learning a skill while I was wasting my time. That guy knows how to approach strangers. He knows what works, what doesn't. He's got a thicker skin. Um, and he also had a lot of girlfriends, so he was learning a lot that way as well. But, so he, so he, he was failing in a way that put him ahead, no matter what happened. I was failing in a way that didn't put me ahead. It just made me feel like a loser and probably put me behind for the next time I, you know, wanted to, uh, feel confident in front of someone else. Um, so, and l- l- I could give you more examples from, say, fitness and diet, 'cause I know some people have asked about that on-

   21. TFTim Ferriss1:07:48

       Oh, they, they, they would love to hear this, definitely.

8. 1:07:52 – 1:16:50

   Diet and Fitness Without Willpower

   1. SAScott Adams1:07:52

      So a g- a goal o- oriented approach in, let's say, uh, diet would be, "I want to, uh, lose 10 pounds, and I'm gonna do it with my willpower. I'm gonna keep those cookies out of my mouth. I'm gonna put the fork down, and I'm gonna push away from the table. Argh. I'm just gonna try harder 'cause-"

   2. TFTim Ferriss1:08:09

      White knuckle it.

   3. SAScott Adams1:08:09

      "... that's the way."

   4. TFTim Ferriss1:08:10

      Yeah.

   5. SAScott Adams1:08:10

      Right. Now, everybody who's been alive for more than 10 minutes knows that that can work in the short run, but it just doesn't work in the long run. You need something else. You need a system. So here's a system that I've been using that, uh, has me in the best shape of my life at 58 and uses no willpower whatsoever. I eat whatever I want, whenever I want to. It's just that, um, my system is education. I go out of my way, if I see an article that says, "New thing, uh, discovered about the link between this food and what," now, most of that I can ignore. But every once in a while you see something that says, um, you know, you just, uh, eat more protein and less of those simple carbs, uh, good things will happen. And you say, "Okay, I already knew that one." How deep does this knowledge then go, and how much difference does it make? Well, um, let me, let me give you an example. Say you and I go to the salad bar, and, um, it's a terrible salad bar. All there is is a white potato, plain russet potato, and some plain pasta, and we're both trying to watch our weight. All right? What do you get? Do you get the potato or the pasta? Now, I ask this question in live, uh, crowds, and it's about evenly split, half the people. But mostly people don't know. There's only a few people in the whole room who even know the answer, and the answer is actually really clear. It turns out that the p- the white potato, uh, as opposed to the sweet potatoes that are not bad, the white potato has a terrible glycemic index. The pasta probably should, but there's something about the way it processes that isn't fully understood, that it just doesn't. So, you know, pasta isn't the best food in the world if you're wa- trying, looking to watch your weight. But if you had a choice of only those two, I pick the pasta. You pick the potato. You're struggling with your willpower. I'm eating like crazy, and I'm having a good time. 'Cause I've only... I've learned which foods I can eat like crazy and, uh, not stimulate cravings. So if I eat the simple carbs for lunch, I know I'm just gonna be hungrier later. I've learned that, um, sometimes sleep pretends to be the same feeling as hunger. So if I haven't slept, I say, "Oh, I'm not really hungry. Stop eating." You know, I, I need to either take a nap, or I could eat some peanuts because I've read, and I, I've experienced this, so I know it's true, that if you eat fat things, they have a lot of calories, and that part's not great maybe if you're trying to watch your weight. But they have such a good impact on reducing your, uh, your cravings, 'cause fat's good at doing that, that you'll make up for it in the long run. And by the way, it's full of protein and goodness, and, you know, it's not bad to eat peanuts. So the other thing I do as a process to avoid using willpower is that it would be impossible for me, I think, to stop eating, um, both the quantity that I wanna eat, you know, the food. 'Cause sometimes you just gotta shovel a lot into your face. You just, you know, you just gotta eat a lot.

   6. TFTim Ferriss1:10:55

      Right.

   7. SAScott Adams1:10:56

      And sometimes you wanna eat the thing you wanna eat. So sometimes it's about the flavor and the taste, and sometimes it's, you just need a lot of food. So I allow myself to have a lot of food any time I want. Uh, that, I don't put any control on that. I just make sure that it's the f- kind of food you could eat forever, and, you know, you'll not regret it. So, uh, you know, it's, could be salads and yogurts and fruits and vegetables, mostly raw stuff. And if I think I'm overdoing it a little bit, I'll throw in some, you know, peanuts or some, um, you know, roasted, uh, you know, creamed almonds or something.

   8. TFTim Ferriss1:11:28

      And you are-

   9. SAScott Adams1:11:28

      And-

   10. TFTim Ferriss1:11:29

       ... vegetarian? Is that, is that right? Or have-

   11. SAScott Adams1:11:30

       Uh-

   12. TFTim Ferriss1:11:31

       You have been.

   13. SAScott Adams1:11:32

       Mostly. You know, I, I try to introduce fish to my diet, but I'm having a hard time with it 'cause I can't, I can't get past the, the icky factor. Um, that's just personal. I'd like to. I just can't get past it. So in my case, I use zero willpower, right? And one by one, I have ticked off things which were problem cravings, such as Diet Coke. I was drinking, uh, somewhere between 10 and 20 a day, I think, of Diet Cokes.

   14. TFTim Ferriss1:11:58

       Wow.

   15. SAScott Adams1:11:58

       For years. 30 years probably. Uh, now, if I said to myself, "Today's the day I'm gonna go on a healthy eating diet," and Diet Coke was just 1 of the 45 things I was depriving myself of, it would be pretty tough. But instead, I say to myself, "I'm gonna eat everything I want all day long. I'm gonna drink whatever I want, as long as that's on the good list." There's just one thing I can't do today, just one thing, right? It still takes a little willpower, but I noticed that after about a month or so, two months really to be clean, y- the craving goes away. And today, you know, a couple years later, I look at a Diet Coke, and it's actually hard to wrap my head around the thought that I would want to put that in my body. It just looks like a, a little bunch of chemicals. So cravings can be completely managed if you, if you isolate them and pick them out of the herd and, you know, don't put too much of a willpower burden on yourself at the same time. Now, the downside, of course, is that this takes, you know, several years instead of, you know, everybody wants to lose 10 pounds in a month, and I don't have any solution for you if you, if, you know, if that's what you wanna do. Now, having said all this, I'll also say that everybody's different, and my good friend and startup partner, uh, uh, Quinn Harker, he will run a marathon and, you know, go ride his bike and go for a swim after that, Ironman. And for him, the challenge and the pain and the willpower is actually part of the attraction, right? So that's, that's part of what it brings it to him. So it's no, no surprise that his weight is perfect 'cause-

   16. TFTim Ferriss1:13:25

       [laughs]

   17. SAScott Adams1:13:25

       ... you guys w- keep in mind that whatever you hear from me doesn't apply to everybody. Um, so the p- the other part of the system is finding, experimenting continually, and I know you're into this, um, experimenting and trying to isolate one thing and saying, "Okay, I'll do this for a week. Did that make any difference in anything?"

   18. TFTim Ferriss1:13:42

       Absolutely. I mean, the, the tracking... And I just wanted to underscore a few things. The first is that, uh, you have become better at identifying alternate causes for, say, hunger, right? You didn't sleep enough, et cetera. And for instance, uh, many people who cut refined carbohydrates or starchy carbohydrates from their diet will feel like they want carbs, whereas in fact they're just dehydrated because when you cut carbohydrates, you retain less water. So very simple fix for a lot of people is to put some sea salt or sprinkle a little salt into their drinking water, uh, just into a few cups a day, which then eradicates these types of carb cravings. Uh, branched-chain amino acids can do the same thing sometimes. But the, uh, the-- Just to touch on the, the goals versus systems, so I find for myself that I approach it in a, in a very similar way, and, um, I'd love to ask you about your MBA program in a second. But when I, I decided I would not go to an MBA program, but I had fantasized about going to Stanford, uh, GSB, uh, Gr- Gr- Graduate School of Business for many, many, many years, and I always thought that was kind of where I was, I should have gone undergrad, et cetera. And, uh, a v- at the, at the end of it, decided that I would take what that would have cost over two years and invest in startup investments. This was in 2007, right after The 4-Hour Workweek had come out, and decided that I, I would, I would invest based on the assumption that I would lose it all, but that I would try to optimize for skill acquisition. And-

   19. SAScott Adams1:15:18

       There you go. There you go

   20. TFTim Ferriss1:15:20

       ... and-

   21. SAScott Adams1:15:20

       Okay. Perfect

   22. TFTim Ferriss1:15:20

       ... and so, and so when I make decisions these days, whether it's a TV show or The 4-Hour Chef and trying new distribution with Amazon, even if everything goes sideways, I try to stack the deck w- and usually that's kind of the who, what, where, why, and when rundown like a journalist. I'll be like, who am I doing this, right? Let me optimize the people I'm interacting with so that I can acquire as many skills or abilities as possible. Um, you know, when and where. If I can be in novel environments, let me try to optimize for that, et cetera, so that I'll have this goal, and it's usually a big audac- you know, audacious goal of some type. Even if that fails, like The 4-Hour Chef was boycotted by almost every retailer on the planet because it came out of Amazon Publishing, and I was prepared for that, um, and that then allowed me to do experiments with BitTorrent and so on. So I came out of it not entirely happy with missing the goal. Of course, I'm very competitive, but the, there were skills that then carried over to future projects. So I, I, I s- I also view sort of my decisions in a very, very similar way. Not to say it's the only way, but I, I find having both to be very helpful for me.

   23. SAScott Adams1:16:29

       Yeah, I would, I would, uh, kind of summarize that by saying that the product is always yourself, right?

   24. TFTim Ferriss1:16:35

       Right. Right.

   25. SAScott Adams1:16:36

       That the... As soon as you lose sight of that, then you're, um, you're working a 14-hour day, you're sacrificing your health. I mean, [laughs] you probably did all those things, too, but the path is to do less of that and take care of your health and maximize your, your instrument.

9. 1:16:50 – 1:29:08

   From PacBell to Dilbert's Success

   1. TFTim Ferriss1:16:50

      What, uh, what was the first time you were paid for Dilbert, like received payment for Dilbert?

   2. SAScott Adams1:16:59

      Um, it was after being syndicated and then waiting several months for the, um, the accounting to work through the system, and that was probably 1989.

   3. TFTim Ferriss1:17:10

      1989. Um, I gotta... I'm having trouble doing the math here. Roughly how old were you at the time? Let's see.

   4. SAScott Adams1:17:17

      Oh.

   5. TFTim Ferriss1:17:17

      Ninety-

   6. SAScott Adams1:17:17

      Are, are we gonna do math in public? You know, that-

   7. TFTim Ferriss1:17:19

      I'm trying not to, but-

   8. SAScott Adams1:17:20

      ... that, that is a social-

   9. TFTim Ferriss1:17:21

      ... 17, 20. So you were like 30, late 30s, I think? Uh, is that right?

   10. SAScott Adams1:17:27

       Early, early, early 30s.

   11. TFTim Ferriss1:17:27

       Early 30s. And were you at, uh, PacBell at the time, or had you already left?

   12. SAScott Adams1:17:33

       I was at PacBell and stayed there after Dilbert was in newspapers for, um, about eight years. Well, no, I s- I stayed there for several years after Dilbert, but eight years in total.

   13. TFTim Ferriss1:17:45

       And was, was that purely to get the income from cartooning to a point where you could s- you could, uh, you could survive on that, or were there other reasons that you stayed at that job for, for eight years?

   14. SAScott Adams1:18:02

       Uh, I, I'd hate to say skill acquisition, but that's really a big part of the answer. [laughs]

   15. TFTim Ferriss1:18:06

       [laughs]

   16. SAScott Adams1:18:06

       Um, I was working in the technology lab, um, you know, in those years when the internet was new. Uh, literally the first person I knew who heard the word internet, you know, outside of my work- Friends.

   17. TFTim Ferriss1:18:19

       Right.

   18. SAScott Adams1:18:19

       Um, so we were learning things that I knew had, you know, huge impact on my future, and I didn't wanna kinda lose that, that foot in it. Uh, and that actually became critical for the success of Dilbert later, 'cause Dilbert became the first syndicated comic on the internet back when that seemed like a silly idea. So some of it was that, but, um, when I say skills acquisition, I'm counting the fact that I was getting most of my fodder for the cartoon from my actual experiences and what coworkers were suggesting. So I had that going, but, um, yes, I mean, I, uh, I waited until I knew I could do it financially, but I continued waited, waiting long after that because of the skill acquisition and also because the pain of working completely goes away when you don't need to do it.

   19. TFTim Ferriss1:19:06

       [laughs] Right. It's like, uh, it's like dealing with small children, right? As, as, as long as you're not forcing them to do something, uh-

   20. SAScott Adams1:19:13

       Yeah

   21. TFTim Ferriss1:19:13

       ... the likelihood of it, uh, happening goes, goes way up.

   22. SAScott Adams1:19:16

       But, but, but think of, you know, just this simple example where in the real world, well, real work world, I'll say, "I'm gonna try doing X. Oh my God, if X doesn't work, my career, my promotions, my everything." But now, but after I didn't need to be there, I could just say, "Oh, what's better, X or Y? X." [laughs]

   23. TFTim Ferriss1:19:36

       Right.

   24. SAScott Adams1:19:36

       You know? Your mind is free.

   25. TFTim Ferriss1:19:38

       Yeah. No, it's, uh, it's, it's, I think, something that is commonly misinterpreted with, say, some of the writing that I've done, is people are like, "Oh, I should just quit everything and throw a Hail Mary and sort of jump off the cliff and learn to fly on the way down." I'm like, "No, no, no. No, no, no." [laughs] Like, if you can keep your, keep your current gig, do this on the weekends, do this early in the morning, um, moonlight, and then you can decide where on the spectrum you wanna be, whether you wanna have both jobs, whether you wanna do one 20% of the time. But there's no need to sort of put all of your eggs in one basket right at the outset. What was Dogbert's original name?

   26. SAScott Adams1:20:16

       [laughs] So before Dogbert was published, uh, he was a doodle that I would draw on my whiteboard in my cubicle at Pacific Bell and before that at Crocker National Bank. And I had a, uh, you know, contest to, to name the characters, and, uh, the name Dilbert was named by a friend of mine, Mike Goodwin-

   27. TFTim Ferriss1:20:38

       Mm

   28. SAScott Adams1:20:38

       ... um, who didn't know he had seen it in a, a World War II cartoon that was, had the same name, Dilbert. And I found out about that after it got published. I went to use the name, but it's lucky I did, and I guess the original creator, uh, didn't have a problem with it 'cause he never contacted me. Um, but because I had this character, Dilbert, and he was the type of guy who would be a loner, I wanted to give him a dog just so there was somebody to interact with, and I wanted the name of the dog to have some correspondence with Dilbert. And so Dogbert's original name was Dildog.

   29. TFTim Ferriss1:21:11

       [laughs] Now, did he ever m- uh, did he, did he ever make it into a strip with the name Dildog, or no?

   30. SAScott Adams1:21:20

       No. I, I wisely decided that was not a good commercial decision.
10. 1:29:08 – 1:36:40

    Creative Process and Morning Routine

    1. TFTim Ferriss1:29:08

       What are some of the tools that most help you ... tools or routines that most help you cartoon these days, or write for that matter, either?

    2. SAScott Adams1:29:19

       Well, I use my, uh, Wacom Cintiq for the, the drawing. So what that is is a, a special, uh, monitor. In my case, it's a, a really big one. I think it's, uh, 27 inches across. Um, and I can draw on it directly with a stylus, uh, much like you would draw on paper, although you have to learn new techniques and use Photoshop and, you know, a lot of different stuff. So it's just Photoshop and a Cin- Cintiq, uh, Wacom. And, uh, after that, it's, uh ... I just usually peruse the news, drink coffee, eat my protein bar in the morning, and something jumps in my head, and if it doesn't, maybe I'll read a few email messages that I think will have messages or sug- suggestions. Sometimes I'll check the suggestions coming in from various places. Usually, you know, my, uh ... I've got, uh, an email address just for that that runs in the strip every day. So some combination of that gives me some kind of an idea or I, or I jump off of what was the last thing I wrote the day before, 'cause sometimes they lend themselves to a, a serial treatment. But I, I don't have much of a process beyond being in the right frame of moo- frame of mind physically-

    3. TFTim Ferriss1:30:30

       Mm-hmm

    4. SAScott Adams1:30:30

       ... and, and mentally, like getting rid of all the other distractions, which is in part why I do it in the morning, not just because my energy and my mind are better, but because distractions are far less. So, you know, for me, creativity is a process of removing barriers. It's not so much a process of pulling something in that was o- outside me.

    5. TFTim Ferriss1:30:51

       Right. Right. It's, uh, sort of decreasing the, the noise to signal ratio so that what was already there is easier to elicit-

    6. SAScott Adams1:31:03

       I-

    7. TFTim Ferriss1:31:03

       -or put down. Is that how you feel?

    8. SAScott Adams1:31:04

       No. Well, actually, the, uh, the analogy I use is it has more to do with flow rate. That is to say, um, if I'm busy, I'm thinking about lots of things, I might have one good idea in an hour. But if I clear my mind, I can't stop them coming. They're like, bump, bump, bump, bump, bump, bump, bump.

    9. TFTim Ferriss1:31:20

       Mm-hmm.

    10. SAScott Adams1:31:20

        Now, that's the part, unfortunately, everybody wants to know, what's the secret to being, you know, a creative person and having a new idea every day? And unfortunately, there's just some of this that either is a bad childhood experience or DNA. You know, you, you can do a lot to make yourself better at whatever you have, but the flow rate of ideas that I have, I think, probably is unnatural.

    11. TFTim Ferriss1:31:41

        I think that's true. I... But I also think it's a skill that can be cultivated. Uh, James Altucher, who's a friend of mine, has recommended to his readers for some time to develop the habit of just writing down 10 ideas, uh, us- I think usually in the morning each day. And I've spoken to a number of people who have adopted this habit, and it's, it's become, um, sort of exponentially easier over time, uh, to the extent that now they can't contain it to 10. Um, so it's, uh, it's, it's... It is, it is a curious question. I mean, the, the, the question of creativity comes up a lot. But like you, I have to prevent too many extraneous inputs if I want to have any type of unique output. And so I'd love to ask you about your question, w- or your, your morning, rather. If, if you have full control of your day, what does your ideal first 60 to 90 minutes look like in your day? Like, what time do you wake up? What type of protein bar do you eat, et cetera?

    12. SAScott Adams1:32:41

        So depending on when I went to sleep, either 5:00 or 6:00, but let's say 5:00. I get up, and, uh, I walk directly downstairs, um, and get my coffee. So push one button and wait for it. Have my one protein bar, which is always the same, because r- you know, the coffee is always the same, the protein's always the same, and the time's always the same, give or take that hour, because I'm removing decisions.

    13. TFTim Ferriss1:33:06

        What type of protein bar do you eat?

    14. SAScott Adams1:33:08

        Um, I eat a Builder's twenty-gram protein bar, chocolate peanut butter. And I'm so smart that I actually picked it up and had the label in front of me 'cause I expected that question.

    15. TFTim Ferriss1:33:18

        [laughs] Well, you know me well. [laughs]

    16. SAScott Adams1:33:23

        At that point, I usually get on and start looking. I guess I f- I check, you know, Twitter first, um, and check my webpage to see if anything blew up that I don't know about.

    17. TFTim Ferriss1:33:34

        Right.

    18. SAScott Adams1:33:34

        You know, did I, did I say anything yesterday that caused the world to melt down? 'Cause, you know, I'll need to know about that. [laughs]

    19. TFTim Ferriss1:33:40

        Right.

    20. SAScott Adams1:33:42

        Failing that, I usually open, um, Business Insider, 'cause I just like reading it. Or usually while I'm waiting for my coffee, I've looked at my Facebook feed and, you know, just tweeted, you know, played around. Basically, I'm just trying to wake up, get my mind working. And there's a process where, um, once you clear your mind, you have to flood it. And you may use different words for this, but I know you do it. Um, so you empty it, and then you flood it with new input that's not the old input. So I'm looking at the news. I'm looking at stuff I haven't seen. I'm not looking at yesterday's problem for the fifth time. I'm looking at a new problem. I'm thinking of a new idea. So I'm flooding in all the, all the, uh, the new stuff. But then you, then you gotta, um, find out where in that flood is the little, uh, piece that's worth working with. And that's where I, that's where I use the body model. I kinda cycle through all this, this stuff.

    21. TFTim Ferriss1:34:35

        The body model, you said?

    22. SAScott Adams1:34:37

        Yeah. The... So the model is, um, your brain can't find good content.

    23. TFTim Ferriss1:34:41

        [laughs]

    24. SAScott Adams1:34:42

        Right? Not directly in an intellectual sense. Obviously, the brain's involved. But what I mean is that as I'm thinking of these ideas and they're flowing through the, my head, I'm, I'm monitoring my body. I'm not monitoring my mind.

    25. TFTim Ferriss1:34:54

        Hmm.

    26. SAScott Adams1:34:54

        And when my body changes, I have something that other people are gonna care about, too.

    27. TFTim Ferriss1:34:58

        Oh, that's cool. I like that.

    28. SAScott Adams1:34:59

        Right?

    29. TFTim Ferriss1:34:59

        So that means posture or what, what type of indicators are there?

    30. SAScott Adams1:35:04

        Um, I'll tell you, when... If I'm thinking of, let's say, a particular setup for a joke, I'll, I'll think of the joke, and then, uh, quite often I'll audibly go [scoffs] .
11. 1:36:40 – 1:41:19

    Six Dimensions of Humor and Favorite Comics

    1. SAScott Adams1:36:40

       I did. I, I've written about it a number of times. I think if anybody Googles my name, Scott Adams, and six dimensions of humor, you'll see-

    2. TFTim Ferriss1:36:48

       Six dimensions. Mm-hmm.

    3. SAScott Adams1:36:49

       Yeah. You'll see a few references to it.

    4. TFTim Ferriss1:36:51

       Got it. And, um, what, what would be two examples of the six? Just, just for fun.

    5. SAScott Adams1:36:57

       Oh, I know you're good at this, 'cause you know what you just did that was just so smart?

    6. TFTim Ferriss1:37:01

       [laughs]

    7. SAScott Adams1:37:02

       If you had, if you had asked me for the six, I would've changed the subject-

    8. TFTim Ferriss1:37:05

       [laughs]

    9. SAScott Adams1:37:05

       ... 'cause I know I'm not gonna remember.

    10. TFTim Ferriss1:37:06

        [laughs]

    11. SAScott Adams1:37:08

        But you asked me for two 'cause you know I can come up with two.

    12. TFTim Ferriss1:37:10

        [laughs]

    13. SAScott Adams1:37:11

        [laughs] Um, all right. So I'm gonna go for six because you've now made it, you've made it safe for me to do that.

    14. TFTim Ferriss1:37:17

        [laughs] Wonderful.

    15. SAScott Adams1:37:19

        Um, so there's cute, there's bizarre, there's recognizable, there's naughty. Uh, how many was that?

    16. TFTim Ferriss1:37:28

        Yeah, you're already way ahead of the game. You got four. You got cute, bizarre, uh, recognizable, and naughty.

    17. SAScott Adams1:37:34

        Ah, you'll have to Google the rest. But let me, let me give you an example. You know, um, so cute is usually, uh, kids and dogs, right? So, and bizarre is just anything that's out of place. So if you know your cartoon history, you will know that, uh, The Far Side used primarily the dimension of putting something out of place.

    18. TFTim Ferriss1:37:55

        Mm-hmm.

    19. SAScott Adams1:37:55

        So you'd have an animal talking. So as soon as the animal's talking, he's got one dimension, right? So he's, he's basically starting a race, and he's already ahead of you if you're the cartoonist who's sitting there saying, "I think I'll do a comic about anything. Uh, the world is my canvas," right? But he start, he's started ahead of you already. So he's got the bizarre, and then he'll have the animal say something often in the framing or the type of mood that a human would say, right?

    20. TFTim Ferriss1:38:20

        Mm-hmm.

    21. SAScott Adams1:38:20

        So that's the recognizable part. So if you could put yourself in the picture and say, "Oh, God, I recognize that situation, uh, but it's an animal talking," um, clearly there's more to it than that. Again, that's just the... You have to have at least that, two dimensions. Um, take a look at the best comic strip of all time that I think nearly everyone in the world would say, um, Calvin and Hobbes.

    22. TFTim Ferriss1:38:44

        Mm-hmm.

    23. SAScott Adams1:38:45

        There's a, there's a talking tiger that is both bizarre and cute. All right? So he took, um, The Far Side one dimension further as a starting point. All right? The, the moment you start reading Calvin and Hobbes, you already have cute 'cause his drawing is amazing, both of the, the child and the... You know, he's got a double cute. He's got a child and an animal, and it's a cool animal, right?

    24. TFTim Ferriss1:39:11

        Mm-hmm.

    25. SAScott Adams1:39:12

        So he starts that before he even writes a joke. So then if he has the kid doing something, you know, naughty or, um, um... Also anything bad happening to anybody is, of course, um, one of the dimensions. So cruelty, did I mention cruelty?

    26. TFTim Ferriss1:39:26

        You did.

    27. SAScott Adams1:39:26

        Am I up to five yet?

    28. TFTim Ferriss1:39:27

        You're up to five. That's number five.

    29. SAScott Adams1:39:29

        Shoot. By the end of this interview, I will have come up with that sixth one, and I'm gonna, I'm gonna scream it in the middle of whatever other unrelated question you ask. [laughs]

    30. TFTim Ferriss1:39:37

        [laughs] Or you could just leave people with, uh, bated breath to, to tap Google into their keyboards. That's, that's another, another way to get them to go to your site, I'm sure. Uh, but, uh-
12. 1:41:19 – 1:49:58

    Losing and Recovering His Voice

    1. TFTim Ferriss1:41:19

       yeah, yeah. Well, we c- we could do that first. I mean, could you describe what happened to you-

    2. SAScott Adams1:41:25

       [laughs]

    3. TFTim Ferriss1:41:25

       ... and what you learned from that experience? I mean, uh, and there's, there's a fair amount out there for people who wanna dig into the specifics of the condition and so on, but maybe you could just give people an overview of what happened, because it sounds-

    4. SAScott Adams1:41:35

       Yeah, so-

    5. TFTim Ferriss1:41:35

       ... terrifying.

    6. SAScott Adams1:41:36

       Right. So I'm not gonna give, like, a big, scary medical thing on your show. It'd be terrible, and people can Google it. If you Googled, uh, spasmodic dysphonia, you would learn that I, and tens of thousands of other people, have this problem where you lose your voice, um, meaning that it clips, uh, your, your vocal cords spaz at, uh, times when you don't want them to, so you can't get out, um, words that make sense. Uh, it was so unknown that it took me a long time to figure out what it was, and I had to figure out f- uh, using Google and hunting down a doctor, and, you know, doctor to doctor. And, you know, my path went through, you know, Japan down to USC, and finally Dr. Gerald Burke, who had invented a surgery that was not well-publicized, that, uh, worked for me. So I've been-- Since then, I've been active trying to tell people who have spasmodic dysphonia, which by the way, I'm gonna do an audio impression of it, 'cause there are people listening to this, guaranteed, who have it and don't know they have it, 'cause they've never heard anyone else who spoke that way.

    7. TFTim Ferriss1:42:40

       Huh.

    8. SAScott Adams1:42:41

       And they're trying to figure out what it is. So I'm gonna do an impression, and I'm gonna send, uh, like three dozen people to their doctor with a solution. All right? Here's my impression. If I were to order a Diet Coke, um, since my vocal cords would clench, especially on some problem syllables, um, it would come out like a clipped, um, cell phone. So instead of a Diet Coke or, or, "Can I have a Diet Coke?" It would come out as, "And I, um-" Guy cope, like that.

    9. TFTim Ferriss1:43:08

       Mm-hmm.

    10. SAScott Adams1:43:08

        So it sound like you're just dropping syllables. So everybody at home who said, "Holy shit, I know somebody like that," um, the wo- the name for it is spasmodic dysphonia. But I got something much cooler. You wanna hear it?

    11. TFTim Ferriss1:43:21

        I do.

    12. SAScott Adams1:43:22

        That's on this. We might be able to solve this problem today.

    13. TFTim Ferriss1:43:25

        Let's do it.

    14. SAScott Adams1:43:25

        This is literally, this is literally true. I might actually be able to, with your help, solve the entire problem for 50,000 people in this country. Maybe. It's a long shot, right?

    15. TFTim Ferriss1:43:35

        Let's give it a go.

    16. SAScott Adams1:43:36

        But I'm gonna take it. All right. The surgery fixed me, and what that involved was cutting some nerves in my neck that disconnected my brain from my vocal cords for three and a half months. They spliced in a new network that takes three and a half months to regrow, and once it regrows, um, then I could talk, but very weakly, and it took a, you know, years to get my voice back to where it is. Um, what's interesting about that is nobody knows why that works, because the problem has been well identified to be a little, uh, brain hiccup.

    17. TFTim Ferriss1:44:05

        Right.

    18. SAScott Adams1:44:05

        So you don't f- you don't fix your brain by rewiring the nerves in your neck. Now, hold that thought. Nobody knows why the surgery works. Now, the only other thing that works for this that I've personally, uh, verified, 'cause I've talked to the individuals who've done this, and I actually went through this training myself, was a doctor who some thought was a, was a nut, because science was not quite supporting his method. But he would go in and he would say, "Everybody hum at the key of F for weeks, uh, and try to never talk at your natural deeper tone. Instead, just hum." Now, I think it might've worked for 10 or 20% of the people, but keep in mind, this is an incurable problem.

    19. TFTim Ferriss1:44:45

        Right.

    20. SAScott Adams1:44:45

        That 10 to 20% of the people walked out with perfect voices. I, I spoke to, uh, one of them. Actually, several of them I spoke to live, so I verified, and one of them w- crossed over my week, so I know it's a real person, not a, a shill or something. Now, what do these two m- things, the surgery, which nobody knows why it works, and the humming in the key of F, which nobody knows why it works, what do they have in common? In both of those cases, it's the only time the subject takes an extended period without re-injuring the muscles in the vocal cords.

    21. TFTim Ferriss1:45:19

        Hmm.

    22. SAScott Adams1:45:20

        [clears throat] So there is a non-zero chance, and I actually act- um, saw my surgeon, um, like a couple months ago just at a, an event, and I said, "Is it possible that the only reason your surgery works is that you prevented me from re-injuring the muscles of my vocal cords for long enough for them to heal for the first time ever?" 'Cause when you have this problem, you end up straining it every single day 'cause you're trying really hard to talk. It's just not working. So imagine if you had a sprained ankle and you ran a marathon every day.

    23. TFTim Ferriss1:45:50

        It would never heal.

    24. SAScott Adams1:45:51

        Right. So the humming in the key of F uses different equipment. Like, it uses just a, you know, or, or maybe it just has less of a pressure on the, the same equipment. I don't know. And by the way, I'm, I'm talking at what I can best approximate as the key of F. I have, I'm tone deaf, so I'm not sure I'm getting there. Um, my normal speaking voice is actually much lower, and I do that to preserve my, my speaking mechanism. That's one of the things you learn. So put those, like two things together. The only two things, these two things that are the only things that work to, to solve spasmodic dysphonia is people didn't talk, not even a little bit, using their normal voice for an extended period. Um, three and a half months in one case, um, maybe as, as few as a week or two weeks in the other case. But if you have this or you know somebody who does and you're listening to this, somebody out there, I want you to see, if you're in a special situation where this makes sense for you, just don't talk for two weeks. If you've got maybe a spouse who can answer the phone or type of job where you can do an email, just as an experiment, and then email me as, at, uh, you'll see my email address, or you can find me on Twitter or anything. Uh, you'll see my a- addresses in the strip every day, and tell me if it worked. 'Cause if I can get three people in the world that this works for, Tim, we just fixed the problem.

    25. TFTim Ferriss1:47:08

        It could be a really big breakthrough. No-

    26. SAScott Adams1:47:09

        Yeah

    27. TFTim Ferriss1:47:09

        ... I, I love this idea. And, uh, for those people who might be considering this, uh, who think they might be a candidate, uh, you could also look at, um, for instance, uh, silent meditation retreats. There are, uh, 10 to 14-day silent meditation retreats through groups like Spirit Rock and others. So you could actually create a context, uh, wherein that is reinforced, right? Not only, it's, it's not just willpower, but you're in an environment where it's not permitted. So that, that could be also something to look into. But no, this is very exciting. I like this idea.

    28. SAScott Adams1:47:42

        Yes. And, um, I should say that whispering is still, uh, perfectly allowed because that doesn't use your vocal cords. So you can communicate with anybody you want to in a quiet room during this quiet period.

    29. TFTim Ferriss1:47:53

        This is very interesting. Well, I am glad we touched on that. Uh-

    30. SAScott Adams1:47:56

        Yeah. And again, I have to emphasize, it's totally a long shot. But there's somebody who listened to this who's gonna try it, and we'll find out.
13. 1:49:58 – 1:55:37

    Book Recommendations and the Distraction Economy

    1. TFTim Ferriss1:49:58

       Besides your own books, what book or books have you given most as a gift?

    2. SAScott Adams1:50:03

       [laughs] I've never given a book as a gift.

    3. TFTim Ferriss1:50:08

       You haven't? Wow. Okay. No, this is interesting. So what... Uh, do you give gifts?

    4. SAScott Adams1:50:13

       Uh-

    5. TFTim Ferriss1:50:13

       Maybe this sounds like a weird question, but I mean, if you do, I'd be curious to know what you, what you often give as gifts.

    6. SAScott Adams1:50:18

       Um, I retired from the gift-giving business a while ago, um, which takes a long time to train everybody, [laughs] but-

    7. TFTim Ferriss1:50:25

       [laughs]

    8. SAScott Adams1:50:27

       No, I, I replaced that in favor of being, uh, you know, a nice person on a general basis.

    9. TFTim Ferriss1:50:33

       Right.

    10. SAScott Adams1:50:33

        You know?

    11. TFTim Ferriss1:50:34

        Right.

    12. SAScott Adams1:50:34

        Like, um, maybe I wanna buy you something today, you know? Doesn't need to be a reason. So no, I don't, I don't do gifts in particular, but I'd say, uh, if you're looking for a book that I think everybody should read-

    13. TFTim Ferriss1:50:45

        Perfect

    14. SAScott Adams1:50:45

        ... it would be, uh, a book called Influence, um, by, uh, I don't know how to pronounce-

    15. TFTim Ferriss1:50:51

        Robert, Robert Cialdini or Cialdini.

    16. SAScott Adams1:50:54

        Yeah. That's, that's the part I was choking on. I didn't know how to pronounce the first part, but it's C-I-A-L-D-I-N-I.

    17. TFTim Ferriss1:51:01

        Yes.

    18. SAScott Adams1:51:02

        100% of effective people seem to have re- read that book. [laughs]

    19. TFTim Ferriss1:51:06

        Yep. Yeah, yeah. It's-

    20. SAScott Adams1:51:07

        In fact, y- That, that's one of those things that when I meet somebody and they're operating at a pretty high level, if you mention that book, they've all read it. Uh, and-

    21. TFTim Ferriss1:51:14

        Yeah. It's true. It's very consistent.

    22. SAScott Adams1:51:16

        Uh, but if you talk to the general public, it's still not well-known.

    23. TFTim Ferriss1:51:20

        Yes.

    24. SAScott Adams1:51:20

        And then I would add to that, uh, I haven't read these books, but I took the Dale Carnegie course, and if the books say anything that is as useful as the course, that's probably a good thing. I hear good things about him.

    25. TFTim Ferriss1:51:32

        I'm a big fan of, uh, a lot of his work, in particular, not the How to Win Friends and Influence People, but How to Stop Worrying and Start Living, which I think is a fantastically well-written book on anxiety, and there's a l- There's a bit of material f- on the physiology and so on that's, that's outdated, but the vast majority is, is fantastically well done. So-

    26. SAScott Adams1:51:52

        Well, that, uh, that needs an update because I have a theory that there's a, a real, um, there's something like called a digital disease, meaning that if you take the average person and put them in the average simple environment of the past, they were not overwhelmed by its complexity. But I believe that today, the average person is overwhelmed by the complexity of life 'cause it got more complicated, and that, um, I barely know an adult who isn't on some kind of drug, either prescribed or otherwise, to deal with anxiety, and I'm pretty sure that wasn't the case when I was a kid. Maybe we have more options now, I guess. I think there's, like, a l- a real legitimate mental illness plague.

    27. TFTim Ferriss1:52:34

        I agree. I totally agree, and I think, uh, I think, I saw you mentioned something along these lines on Twitter, but it's... We're in an, in a, a, a distraction economy, right? I mean, we, we... And it's-

    28. SAScott Adams1:52:43

        Mm

    29. TFTim Ferriss1:52:43

        ... not only limited to a black box in our living room, but we have, we have obviously the, the phones, the tablets, the laptops. Now we have wearables. Uh-

    30. SAScott Adams1:52:53

        Well, yeah. Let me, let me emphasize that point 'cause I realize I sounded like, uh, old man, get off of my lawn. Um-
14. 1:55:37 – 2:07:03

    Be Useful, Success, Bill Gates and Closing Advice

    1. TFTim Ferriss1:55:37

       If, if you could have one billboard anywhere with anything on it, what would it say, and where would you put it?

    2. SAScott Adams1:55:43

       [laughs] Uh, it would say, "Be useful." It would be everywhere.

    3. TFTim Ferriss1:55:52

       [laughs] I like it.

    4. SAScott Adams1:55:55

       So, so I, I realized one day that I could, um, boil down my entire philosophy of how to live into those two words. Just be useful. That's-

    5. TFTim Ferriss1:56:05

       Be useful.

    6. SAScott Adams1:56:06

       Yeah. That, that comes from my farming, uh, upbringing. My, my mother grew up in a farm, and I grew up next to the farm she grew up on, so I worked on it with my grandparents and stuff. Um, and there, you know, there's no wasted energy, right? 'Cause-

    7. TFTim Ferriss1:56:20

       Right. Can't afford it, yeah

    8. SAScott Adams1:56:21

       ... wa- waste is death. So you, you know, you didn't lean. You always pitched in. You didn't, you didn't wait for somebody to ask. You'd just be useful. And so I, you know, having now made the money that I need to make, I'm, you know, far more focused on the being useful to the rest of the world part of the equation for the, the second half of my life, and far more enjoyable. So if, you know, if somebody says, "How do I be ha- how do I be happy?" You know, the biggest question in the world. I'd say, "Be useful." It works every time. It doesn't sometimes work. It works every time. Be useful 'cause what? Guess what? People like you. They wanna be with you. You're useful.

    9. TFTim Ferriss1:57:00

       Yeah.

    10. SAScott Adams1:57:00

        You know? People wanna hire you. You're useful. Everything comes together if you just do that one thing, and that dovetails back to, you know, the product is you. You know, the, the project is, is semi-relevant whether it succeeds. What really matters is, did you become a more valuable, and therefore, more useful person at the end of it?

    11. TFTim Ferriss1:57:19

        Definitely. And you, you mentioned, you mentioned happy. I think a lot of people strive to be happy. A lot of people also strive to be successful, and that means different things to different people. When you think of the word successful, who is the first person who comes to mind for you?

    12. SAScott Adams1:57:31

        [laughs] Well, Donald Trump, but only 'cause he's in the news. It was, you know. So, so I think the, the, the test was completely polluted. What I think is successful, I would say, um, if I think of it for two seconds, Bill Gates, and, uh, there's nobody in second place.

    13. TFTim Ferriss1:57:48

        Why is that?

    14. SAScott Adams1:57:49

        First of all, he, he amassed a huge amount of money, but do, did so in a way that made the world forever better, all right? And, and I'm sure that, you know, now that you see how the second half of his life is going, I think that he always needed something that didn't just make money, you know? I think the putting the computer on every, on every desk or whatever, uh, was a real thing. Um, I believe he amassed that money largely so he could do the second part of his life. Uh, and now you take the smartest, most rational human, um, the world has ever produced, uh, and find out, well, surprise. Everything you thought about him wasn't exactly what you thought. And years ago, when he said his plan was to give it away, and nobody really took that seriously, guess what? He's doing that, too. And the way he's doing it is he's picking the thing that governments can't do and poor people can't do. He's pa- he's taking not only the place that has the greatest leverage, 'cause, you know, he can go in with his brains, and money, and his scientific ways, and, you know, the, the energy that he can attract to himself, and pick off these things. The, you know, his contribution to Africa by the time he, you know, takes the dirt nap or transfers his, uh, life force into software, which I think is far more likely in his case, they may rename the nation after him. Him, you know, it might, it might be the continent of Bill Gates when he's done, and I'm not sure if everybody sees this coming.

    15. TFTim Ferriss1:59:17

        Right.

    16. SAScott Adams1:59:17

        I mean, he's working on stuff like fixing water [laughs] . You know, like, how would, how would everybody like to have water?

    17. TFTim Ferriss1:59:25

        Yeah.

    18. SAScott Adams1:59:25

        Wouldn't that be good? I mean, he, he's going after the, the biggest targets with some guns that have all the ammunition that you would need to go after those targets, and nobody else can do it.

    19. TFTim Ferriss1:59:34

        Yeah. He's, he's a very impressive guy. I heard a, a first-person anecdote from a friend of mine who, uh, s- uh, uh, somehow ended up going on a bird watching tour with Bill Gates, [laughs] and, uh-

    20. SAScott Adams1:59:47

        Wow

    21. TFTim Ferriss1:59:47

        ... it's a small group of people, and, uh, and Bill Gates spent maybe an hour the night before reading a bird watching guide. And f- according to my friend, I mean, literally had perfect factual recall of that book on the tour the next day to the point where he could talk to this professional bird guide in a tropical environment on a peer level. A, just-

    22. SAScott Adams2:00:11

        [laughs]

    23. TFTim Ferriss2:00:11

        ... mind-boggling. I mean, talk about CPU power.

    24. SAScott Adams2:00:15

        Yeah.

    25. TFTim Ferriss2:00:16

        Um, uh, w- what advice, and I'll just ask you one or two more questions. What advice would you give to your 30-year-old self?

    26. SAScott Adams2:00:24

        Yeah. 30-year-old self. Um, that was a, that was a time of great transition. I would say probably patience.

    27. TFTim Ferriss2:00:34

        Mm-hmm.

    28. SAScott Adams2:00:34

        Because, you know, I've been playing the, the system game and not the goal game since, um, since I got out of college, and literally have a, a diary in which I, I wrote my master plan. If you take, you know, 10 years following a, a process and it's not giving you, uh, results, that's hard to remain patient. So, uh, in retrospect, that was the only thing I needed to, uh, to maybe, [laughs] you know, alleviate some of my pain. But on the other hand, impatience probably drove me harder, so maybe I wouldn't tell myself that either.

    29. TFTim Ferriss2:01:06

        And if, if your 30-year-old self said, "How, how exactly do you propose I be patient," what would you, how would you respond to that?

    30. SAScott Adams2:01:14

        Um, well, my 30-year-old self wouldn't have access to medical marijuana, so I would have to-

Episode duration: 2:07:03