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Tim FerrissTim Ferriss

The Random Show — Bitcoin Pros and Cons, 2021 Resolutions, Fave Books, Lucid Dreaming, and More

Technologist, serial entrepreneur, world-class investor, self-experimenter, and all-around wild and crazy guy Kevin Rose rejoins me for another episode of “The Random Show.”

Kevin RoseguestTim Ferrisshost
Jan 19, 20212h 13mWatch on YouTube

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Transcript

  1. 0:00 – 0:15

    Intro

    1. KR

      [upbeat music]

  2. 0:15 – 1:51

    Reconnecting after a long gap and setting the agenda

    1. KR

      Welcome to another other episode of The Random Show. This is episode number 7,496. Kevin Rose.

    2. TF

      97.

    3. KR

      [laughs] It is-

    4. TF

      Correct

    5. KR

      ... good to see you, my friend.

    6. TF

      You too. You too.

    7. KR

      It's b- it's been too long. The, when was the last time we actually saw each other in person? You were in Portland.

    8. TF

      In Portland. It would've been in Portland 100 years ago because it was, uh, simultaneous with a, I think it was AcroLove Festival, where you had hundreds of people just smothering each other with body contact, one another with body contact. But that is a pre-COVID activity.

    9. KR

      Yes. This was probably-

    10. TF

      And-

    11. KR

      ... a year and a half ago, huh? It's been about that long.

    12. TF

      Yeah.

    13. KR

      It's crazy. It's sad.

    14. TF

      Yeah. It is. It's, it's wild. And what, what, uh, I'm reassured to see is you have your, your Japanese podcasting robe on, and you seem to have new-

    15. KR

      I-

    16. TF

      ... eyeshadow or mascara, which really brings out your eyes nicely.

    17. KR

      It's called, it's called five hours of sleep, dude.

    18. TF

      [laughs]

    19. KR

      It's called, it's called babies-

    20. TF

      [laughs]

    21. KR

      ... is what it is.

    22. TF

      [laughs] Well, I like it. You're converging with the raccoon gods that you-

    23. KR

      Yeah

    24. TF

      ... upset so long ago by tossing one of their brethren downstairs. For people who want that security footage, you can search Kevin Rose raccoon and it'll pop right up.

    25. KR

      You're determined to make that, like, what's on my grave. Like, what I'm best known for is the raccoon toss.

    26. TF

      Your, your Wikipedia legacy. Well, I want it in the first-

    27. KR

      Right

    28. TF

      ... paragraph. [laughs]

    29. KR

      [laughs]

    30. TF

      So we, we shared a Google spreadsheet that you created beforehand of things we might talk about, and I'm sure we'll talk about all sorts of stuff. Where do you wanna start, man?

  3. 1:51 – 5:22

    Tim’s Bitcoin origin story: holding through 2017 and revisiting the hedge thesis

    1. KR

      Yeah, I mean, uh, we can start with the Bitcoin stuff, 'cause you were super excited about that, which is odd, 'cause you're typically not, like, the biggest... I, I'd never seen you as, like, a hardcore crypto guy.

    2. TF

      I would definitely not self-describe as a hardcore crypto guy at all. Uh, I just happen to have this combination of ignorance and laziness which led me to hold onto the Bitcoin that I had. So-

    3. KR

      Oh, so you're stoked. That's why.

    4. TF

      Yeah.

    5. KR

      I'm like, "Why is Tim so excited about this?" 'Cause you have a boatload-

    6. TF

      Yeah

    7. KR

      ... of money right now.

    8. TF

      Well, I mean, I don't know if it's a boat-

    9. KR

      [laughs]

    10. TF

      ... I don't, if it's a boatload, but I've, I've held onto it. I mean, look, anyone who is holding, just to put a timestamp in this, it's January 8th, 2021, Bitcoin, I believe for the first time ever, just crossed $40,000 per Bitcoin.

    11. KR

      It was-

    12. TF

      So anyone-

    13. KR

      ... 41 this morning, yeah.

    14. TF

      Yeah, so anyone who has ever bought Bitcoin, uh, to the unexamined or unexamining eye looks like a complete genius, right? But it's not possible that everyone bought Bitcoin for the right reasons or through the right process, but nonetheless, here we are, and it's exciting to watch, even if it may implode. Uh, and people are drawing comparisons and certainly pointing out the differences between 2017, uh, and now, where we saw this huge spike several years ago and then a consequent crash. Now, I should point out-

    15. KR

      And that's happened several times now.

    16. TF

      It's happened several times, and I should also point out that I got into crypto in a meaningful way right before that crash in 2017. Uh, so if I had consequently sold all of it, I would've done so at a pretty massive loss, and I was like, well, look, I'm playing with house money in the sense that I can afford to lose whatever I am putting into crypto, so I'll just hold onto it. And the premise that I used, or the set of assumptions I used to get into crypto ended up being totally wrong in a lot of ways, at least in the sense that I was investing in crypto as a, as a hedge, specifically against, say, a huge drop in the stock market since I had a few different pending kind of IPOs and so on, uh, with, with angel investments.

    17. KR

      It was like pre-

    18. TF

      Yes

    19. KR

      ... pre-Uber IPO, basically.

    20. TF

      Yeah, exactly.

    21. KR

      Yeah.

    22. TF

      And so I made a, a, a bunch of very tenuous leaps of faith in my logic to look for different ways to, to hedge against the possibility that a market collapse could drag Uber down with it, right? So nothing stock specific, meaning nothing Uber specific in that case. And-

    23. KR

      I mean, you literally could've just hedged the market, though, at the same time, right? [laughs]

    24. TF

      Yeah, I mean, look, you c- there, you could, I could have hedged the market. Uh, I don't know much about shorting or hedging or anything like that, and, uh, when I looked at it even in any cursory way, looking at the stuff that's allowed, no gray hat stuff, uh, it seemed very expensive to do it effectively.

    25. KR

      Yeah.

    26. TF

      So I decided to become involved with crypto, also because if you're in certain social circles with certain very smart people, yourself included, uh, I mean, you've, you've played a lot in the crypto sandbox, so I wanna hear from you more than me. It's easy to get intoxicated, and it's easy to kinda walk into this reality distortion field where you're like, "You know, the world is going to Mad Max for the next 48 hours, and crypto will be all that survives." Um, not saying that's your argument, but the, the point I wanted to make is that

  4. 5:22 – 7:37

    Comparing 2017 vs. now: COVID liquidity, gold, and institutional momentum

    1. TF

      if you look at the timeline, uh, so 2017, boom, right? The sort of tulip bulb craze of, of crypto at the time sort of tanks, or at least, uh, Bitcoin. And, uh, this time around with COVID, a lot of, uh, Bitcoin bulls and so on were expecting that Bitcoin would just, would be inversely correlated with these crashes-

    2. KR

      Right

    3. TF

      ... and it would shoot through the roof, but that's not what would happen.

    4. KR

      Right.

    5. TF

      Um, not what happened with gold either, and I think what was underestimated was how many people would need cash, right? And when you need cash, you sell whatever you happen to have. And if, uh, if you have, for instance, as a lot of people got themselves into trouble by borrowing against assets, so they took out, say, lines of credit based on the value of their stocks, and then when the stocks cratered, those all got called, and, you know, bankers and everyone else calling up You know, Joe Smith, like, "Hey, Joe Smith, we want all our money right now," and they had to sell anything they could sell that was liquid.

    6. KR

      Yeah.

    7. TF

      And that would include a lot of crypto. So it took a few months for crypto to recover to pre-COVID, whereas gold kind of took off immediately after COVID. It did drop in the very short term, like the kind of m- early March to early April, and then kind of picked back up.

    8. KR

      Yeah, it, it wasn't a big run up, though. We never saw kind of massive, like, the crypto-like gains that we've seen with Bitcoin, right? Gold's, gold's picked up-

    9. TF

      Yeah

    10. KR

      ... a bit, but not, not a ton.

    11. TF

      No. No, not that much. And I'm, I'm referring to GLD specifically, for people interested. But, uh-

    12. KR

      Yeah

    13. TF

      ... what are, what are your thoughts right now on all this cryptomania? I mean, uh, there are differences, huge differences, between right now and 2017.

    14. KR

      Sure.

    15. TF

      Uh, namely the entry of, or at least one of them, is the entry of institutional investors.

    16. KR

      Yes.

    17. TF

      And just a few months ago, Paul Tudor Jones and some other legends kind of dipping their toe in the water and beginning to make some allocations in their portfolios. Uh, fund portfolios, which is a big difference, not just personal. I believe that's true. Uh, somebody can fact-check me. But, uh, what do you make of all this? This is a terrain that you're much more familiar with-

    18. KR

      Yeah

    19. TF

      ... than, than I am.

  5. 7:37 – 12:13

    Kevin’s view: adoption drivers, easier access, and custody evolution

    1. KR

      Well, he- here's... M- my take is that i- i- with any new, crazy, wild idea, uh, come just a ton of skeptics, as, as there should be. And when Bitcoin was, was first launched and we were all playing around with the, the very early wallets, and I remember just buying coins and picking them up. And I wasn't really early early. Like, I wasn't, you know, in the pennies, but I was buying them around 10, 12 dollars a coin, something like that. And, uh, you know, it was, it was the Wild West. It was very difficult to do anything. To, l- to buy crypto, to, um... You know, we were all setting up mining rigs back then and trying to mine our own Bitcoin, and then e- eventually pools came out so you could join in with other people to do it more efficiently. But this is fresh, new technology that hadn't been hammered and beaten on. And so, you know, any time there's something that, um, is directly linked to your finances, uh, it takes years or decades for people to get comfortable with a new emerging technology to where they'll commit any serious capital to that technology. So I think largely what we're seeing here is, well, one, it's, it's, you know, there's a lot of stimulus money hitting the market. There's a lot of people buying on Square Cash App. There's l- you know, it's, it's much easier to purchase Bitcoin than it has ever been. You know, it used to be you have to go to some shady exchange somewhere, hold up a picture of your driver's license with, like, literally your, like, date written underneath it to make sure it was you. Like, shady stuff that... I've been on some of these exchanges. My identification has since been hacked on many of these exchanges. Thankfully, I don't live at any of those addresses that I had those IDs I was holding up in front of the camera. But I do get text messages of people trying to phish me all the time, like, trying to, like, get me to, like-

    2. TF

      It's so creepy.

    3. KR

      It's crazy

    4. TF

      So creepy.

    5. KR

      It happens at least twice a week. It's insane. 'Cause my, my information's out there, so whatever. But, uh, the point being is that it was extremely difficult to get, um, to purchase Bitcoin. And now, you know, PayPal came online just a couple months ago and is offering the ability to purchase Bitcoin and Ethereum directly inside of PayPal. Like, it's just insane how easy this is now. So you're unlocking massive customer bases, like hundreds of millions of users with PayPal. You know, Square Cash is the, I think the second or third largest buyer now of, of Bitcoin. Um, that Cash App-

    6. TF

      And this is on the retail side

    7. KR

      ... exploded.

    8. TF

      Right? This is just on the retail side.

    9. KR

      Yeah, so i- that's not even talking about the institutional money going in, right? So, you know, I work at True Ventures, a venture capital firm, several billion dollars under management. We have positions in Bitcoin. You know, we've been doing that for a while. Um, so, you know-

    10. TF

      When you say you guys have positions in Bitcoin, that means you've invested in startups that focus on Bitcoin?

    11. KR

      No-

    12. TF

      Or-

    13. KR

      ... that means we actually own Bitcoin.

    14. TF

      How does that work? As a venture capital fund, you're operating like a private endowment?

    15. KR

      Yeah-

    16. TF

      Or-

    17. KR

      ... I mean, every fund is a little bit different. Um, you know, in our specific case, there, we have allocated as part of our, um, you know, formation documents for the fund, a certain percentage of the fund can be in cryptocurrency or cryptocurrency-related companies.

    18. TF

      Hmm.

    19. KR

      So we can say, I, I'm just throwing out a random number here. I, I, I'd have to go look at the docs, see what the actual number is. But let's just say 10, 15% of the fund, overall fund size, you know, we have a $600 million plus fund, that's, you know, that you can only invest that much from this specific fund into cryptocurrency. And so, uh, you know, if we're going to go into and do a purchase, y- typically dollar cost average your way in over a couple months and, and, and buy in, and in a place that, that has really strong security. Like, we don't hold this ourselves. It's not at our office. [laughs] Like, you're using, like, there's-

    20. TF

      Yeah

    21. KR

      ... there's big f- financial houses like Fidelity and Coinbase Custody and others that now provide these types of services.

    22. TF

      You don't just have a bunch of hardware wallets sitting in your jacket pocket?

    23. KR

      Yeah, it's, uh, right here. [laughs]

    24. TF

      [laughs]

    25. KR

      Just, just at my house. Um, no, I don't, I actually, I don't, I don't mess with that stuff anymore. I used to have wallets and, and I actually had a, a laptop that I would, I bought specifically for cryptocurrency, and I wanted to keep it in cold storage. Meaning that I, back in the day when I was doing the craziest, like, ch- coins that you've never heard of on these weird exchanges, I, I went out, I bought a laptop, it was an Apple, um, hooked it up to the internet, did all the software updates, like, just put the wallets on there, transferred the funds, and then immediately powered it down so that it wouldn't be online anywhere, hackable, and then put it in a safe. And, like, that was the way I kept my cryptocurrency. [laughs] It's crazy.

    26. TF

      Wow. Yeah.

  6. 12:13 – 30:07

    Entering at euphoric highs: dollar-cost averaging and portfolio sizing

    1. KR

      It's crazy. But, but yeah, so there's been enough time has gone on. This current run-up though is just nuts. I mean, the, the thing you have to do with all these things is just- You don't look at the, the last three months, 'cause it looks like a decent graph, and you're like, "Oh, that looks reasonable. Maybe I should buy some."

    2. TF

      [laughs] Look at the last year.

    3. KR

      Like, zoom out to the five... Yeah. Ex-

    4. TF

      Yeah

    5. KR

      ... zoom out to the five-year view, the 10-year view. That, that's when you see really what's happening here. And it's, it's not even like a hockey stick. It's like, it's, [laughs] it's even more... It's, like, insane how the run-up has been. And so I get nervous when you see... You know, it's, it's always a, a good tell around, well, in this case it was, like, the, the virtual, uh, Christmas or Thanksgiving dinner when Uncle Harry is asking you if they should be buying Bitcoin. Like, that's when I, like, my, my spidey sense tingles a little bit and be like, "Huh, everybody wants this now," you know? And there's... It's just, I, I, I wouldn't be... If, if I were going to enter the market now, I would do it in a way that is you pick the dollar amount, let's say it's $1,000. And this is not investment advice, I'm just telling you what I would do. Pick $1,000 and I would say, "Okay, I want to own Bitcoin. I believe in the future of Bitcoin. I think this isn't going away." Which all those things are true and th- they are things that I believe. Uh, it's a proven technology now. Um, let's take that $1,000 and invest it over six months. And so just divide it up by six, and just do those, uh, say, the first of every month. And just go in, don't... Doesn't matter what the price is. You, you don't care. You just buy that set amount. And that way, you know, at least you're averaging your way in over, over six months.

    6. TF

      How do you personally think about crypto for yourself as part of your portfolio or percentage of your total? I mean, you're kind of famous for telling, tell- not famous. Well, you're famous to me for telling me when I should buy stuff and then not telling me when you've sold stuff.

    7. KR

      [laughs]

    8. TF

      Um, which I ap- which I appreciate. Um, so-

    9. KR

      I love that call, by the way. You're like, "Are you still holding this?" I'm like, "No, I sold it for like a 10X like six months ago." And you're like, "I'm down," [laughs] or something bad will happen-

    10. TF

      [laughs]

    11. KR

      ... and you'll have been screwed-

    12. TF

      Yep

    13. KR

      ... by the fact that we didn't talk.

    14. TF

      Yep, that happens with some fair frequency.

    15. KR

      [laughs]

    16. TF

      But, uh, what is, [laughs] what, what is your current thinking in terms of crypto?

    17. KR

      Well, honestly, I think-

    18. TF

      Are you, are you steering clear? Do you s- do you s- do you still have a certain position? Is it an investment for you? Is it an, an insurance policy for you? Some people have drawn that distinction just sort of philosophically as looking at cryptocurrency as a insurance policy-

    19. KR

      I th- I think that-

    20. TF

      ... or a hedge

    21. KR

      ... I think that over time, as, uh... Well, a, a few things. One, let, let's just talk about the ecosystem in general. I think that 99% still today of the coins that you see on the market out there are just garbage. I think a lot of them... And it's hard for them really to go away. The, just the volumes of, of the volume in trades that happen just decrease over time, but they still have these, you know, somewhat impressive looking market caps just sitting out there, very stagnant. Developers kind of drop off. It's just kind of like they're, they're left for dead, but they're still around. So there's a lot of that. Um, a lot of interesting in- innovation happening in the kind of decentralized finance space, so they call it, like, DeFi. It's mostly happening on, on Ethereum. Uh, so there's, there's a handful of projects where I say, "That's really interesting. It's almost like an, an angel investment now. I want to hold some of that," but with the understanding that this could go to 10% of the value it is today. And so extremely high risk, but, you know, still has the ability to have a, a 50X upside, right? So, or at least a 20 or 30X upside. I... If you just look at the market cap of, of Bitcoin today, there's not another 20 or 30X anytime soon coming to, [laughs] coming to Bitcoin. It's just too big, right? Like, the market cap is just too large. You'd be-

    22. TF

      Why do you... Now, what, how do you come to that conclusion?

    23. KR

      Well, I mean, first of all, there, there's a few ways you can do it. I think that you ha- just have to look at the market cap in general, which I don't have in front of me right now, but I can, I can type it in. Um, the other thing is just look at the proxies for this. So, like, what is the market cap of gold, right? Of all gold out there, and it's in the trillions. Uh, let me see here. So Bitcoin right now, the market cap is 82.49 billion. So, you know, where would we be at if that's a, a 10X from now? Like, I mean, that's just insanity. That's, that's... I, I can't imagine that happening anytime soon. It would just be-

    24. TF

      Now, that's insane because of the-

    25. KR

      Because-

    26. TF

      ... comparables that you might put next to it, like gold?

    27. KR

      Yeah. I mean, Apple is worth 2 trillion, right?

    28. TF

      Yeah.

    29. KR

      And so, you know, you just kind of have to... And I know it's not the same in that we're not talking about, um, corporations here with, with, you know, cash flows and PEs and things that we would typically use to, to, to value a company. That, that is not this. The closest proxy that I think most people draw the comparison to is to just gold. You know?

    30. TF

      Mm-hmm.

  7. 30:07 – 33:26

    Rebalancing discipline and risk buckets: from Peloton to Tesla-like charts

    1. KR

      That's why I like the lower percentage points of your overall p- portfolio, because it has to be money that doesn't matter, so you can hold it for the long term if you wanna do, hold it for the next 20 years. But I guess, like, what you're saying is it does get to meaningful money at some point, right? Because naturally-

    2. TF

      Yeah

    3. KR

      ... if it, if it does 5X from here or 10X from here, then it's gonna be no longer 5% of your portfolio, right? So-

    4. TF

      Yeah

    5. KR

      ... in, in that case, like, I would force myself to every year or every other year just rebalance. So, like, if-

    6. TF

      Now, do you, do you actually do that, though? Because there are-

    7. KR

      100%, 100%.

    8. TF

      You do? Now-

    9. KR

      I did it with Peloton

    10. TF

      Okay. All right, so you, so now you would do that, uh, regardless of the, the duration of holding that investment? Or do you wait for long, long-term cap gains, right? I mean, like is there-

    11. KR

      I would, I would wait for long-term cap gains unless it is something just absolute bonkers.

    12. TF

      Yeah.

    13. KR

      So if it's, if it's l- absolute bonkers and you're just like, I mean, look at Tesla right now, just like look at that chart. Click on the five-year and, and, and your Apple Stocks app.

    14. TF

      Yeah.

    15. KR

      It, it's, it's just like the, y- you're like how is it not bending over? I feel like it fall, it should fall backwards it's going so high.

    16. TF

      [laughs]

    17. KR

      Like it's just, it's ridiculous. And, and so you, i- if you, I'm, if I'm holding short-term cap gains there-

    18. TF

      And that's-

    19. KR

      ... I'll just get taxed it

    20. TF

      ... I just wanna point out that you're also, you are also a lover of Tesla products, right? So like you're not saying this as-

    21. KR

      Oh, yeah

    22. TF

      ... as a Tesla hater. You love their stuff.

    23. KR

      Oh, I have, I have, listen, I have two Teslas. They're fantastic vehicles. They're, they're my favorite.

    24. TF

      Yeah.

    25. KR

      I, I have a truck on order.

    26. TF

      Yeah.

    27. KR

      I can't wait to get that thing.

    28. TF

      And yet when it's a straight line, [laughs] yeah.

    29. KR

      Yeah, so it's, you know, it's, it's just one of those things where y- if it is getting an outsized percentage of your portfolio, then it just, it's absolutely smart to... And, and I kinda have this thing where your overall, overall mixture of, of assets in everything that you have kinda put together, like what is your allocations for multiple things look like? And I'm, most of my stuff is just fully diversified, set it and forget it forever, like Wealthfront style, just put it in there and have it be fully diversified and safe. And then I have a category that is like, let's just call it 25% of my overall assets that'll say, these are 5X capable stocks or greater, and those, I know they're super risky. Well, somewhat risky, and they have real cashflow and all that. But, um, I'm g- I'm going to invest in those, and I'll put like, you know, Pelotons in that kinda camp. Some of the re- riskier stuff like the Nios, like the, the Chinese Tesla. Um, you know, a few other things that, that, um, that I've, I've bought over the last few, couple years. So you know, it, it, but then, then always going and pruning and readjusting and saying, "Oh, a- actually, my 5X stocks are now 40% of my portfolio. Let's trim that back to 25."

    30. TF

      Yeah, I appreciated your strong buy recommendation on Pornhub. That was, uh, that was genius.

  8. 33:26 – 58:55

    Decision-making beyond money: time horizons, energy management, and year reviews

    1. TF

      That is a j- that is a joke, people. Joke, joke. Joke, joke, KEV KEV. Uh, now the follow-up is really more a commentary because I, I think some people will be very interested in this conversation, and others will, will find it, uh, inside baseball or just th- they'll think that it's kind of, uh, rarefied air investment talk. And I, I, I would on one level agree with that, and on one level disagree with it because we're sitting here at the beginning of 2021. 2020 has been such a fascinating and punishing laboratory for looking at the consequences of good and bad decisions.

    2. KR

      Mm-hmm.

    3. TF

      And there are many places where it's difficult to quantify those upsides and downsides and risks. Uh, certainly with COVID, with cer- certain information available, other information unavailable or pending, it, it's been challenging. But one of the playing fields in which you can look at decision-making as sort of a, a microcosm of the macro, right? Like you get to see how decision-making that transcends investing shows itself with stocks, crypto, whatever it might be, right? In, in other words, if you are able to observe and hone your decision-making with even very small investments, I believe that that transfers into, if you're, if you're self-aware, that can transfer into better decision-making in other areas, right? Because we're all investors of time, energy, capital, and you can choose to become better at those things, or you can remain blissfully unaware. But one way or another, you are making decisions about investment every day. Uh, so that's, that's another reason why I've paid attention to this a lot in the last year. I mean, I think there have been some incredible opportunities also, uh, in, in the last 12 months. But, uh, more than that, it's just a lens through which you can look at how rational you are, how subject to emotional swings and corresponding bad decisions you are, and it tells you a lot about how you might make decisions or m- or more concretely make rules for yourself in 2021. So you-

    4. KR

      So can you give me an example of that? Like I'm really curious-

    5. TF

      Yeah, yeah

    6. KR

      ... like outside of finance, how have you applied this to other areas of your life?

    7. TF

      Well, uh, so for instance, in, in 2020, one of the biggest lessons, uh, or takeaways that I had for myself in investing, then I'll talk about how I would apply that. This is gonna sound so rudimentary, but you know, I, I've, I've been very lucky and also I think very good at picking things to invest in, uh, over to time, right? If you just look at the last 10 years, 12 years, net-net, things have worked out pretty well, and there are a lot of circumstances, there are certain trends that I accidentally took advantage of, some that I deliberately took advantage of, but blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I'm pretty good at placing bets. I am, I am very weak, I would say, on exit strategy and knowing when to get out of positions And, uh, this past year I realized that three years, looking at a three-year time horizon for anything publicly traded seems to be a incredibly comfortable for me in the sense that I can't predict what things are gonna do, what, what companies are gonna do what in the next three months, six months. I have no fucking idea. No idea.

    8. KR

      Right.

    9. TF

      Uh, I mean, there are just so many curve balls that can be served to any company.

    10. KR

      Mm-hmm.

    11. TF

      Uh, five years? I mean, geez. Five years, now we're talking about, like, Google starting to usurp Yahoo, right? I mean, that's, like, a long enough period of time, especially with exponentially developing technologies, that five years is very hard to call. But, like, three years, if I'm looking at certain types of companies that I feel like I understand pretty well, Amazon, Shopify, uh, would be two examples. I think Spotify also. Um, I'm investors in all of those. And again, this is not investment advice. I don't know how many times we have to say this-

    12. KR

      [laughs]

    13. TF

      ... to cover our asses, but this is, uh, you know, your mileage may vary, and I only invest in things that I feel like I, I really, really understand deeply.

    14. KR

      Yeah.

    15. TF

      And-

    16. KR

      I'm the same way

    17. TF

      ... yeah, so three years, I'm looking at certain trends. I have an audience fortunately, and a lot of friends who are kind of the tip of the spear with early adoption. Not all of those things work out, but when you see then it begin to kinda hop, like, hop the fence from, say, my friends or my audience to people one degree removed, I'm like, "Okay, that, that I think is worth paying a lot of attention to." So that is, that has been a, a new rule that I've established for myself specifically for, uh, publicly traded equities.

    18. KR

      Yeah.

    19. TF

      And, uh, the way that that's applied to my life more broadly, and we're gonna, we're gonna... Don't worry, folks, we're gonna get to other points besides crypto and investing, is, you know, doing a full review of 2020 and then looking forward to 2021. Uh, thinking out three years as opposed to just 2021, and thinking, uh, about what types of sort of regularly occurring practices I wanna have, and I can give some examples when we get into it, over a three-year period is, is really calming for me.

    20. KR

      Mm-hmm.

    21. TF

      It-

    22. KR

      I think s-

    23. TF

      Yeah, like, 10 years? 10 years is kinda like, I don't know, man. I mean, there's just so much that could change. I mean, who knows if, you know, Calif- you know, if, like, Texas is gonna secede along... Like, maybe Texas and Montreal will become sister cities and, you know, [laughs] or ex- whatever-

    24. KR

      Yeah

    25. TF

      ... sister provinces, and they'll secede from the nation. I'm, I'm, I'm being, you know, a bit ridiculous with that, but f- like, 10 years is a long, long time, and a lot can happen. Three years, I, I just find that to be a very calm place for me when it comes to planning now. Uh, also thinking about personal development and, uh, building a family and so on and so forth. Uh, so it's kinda like if you were to paddle out in the ocean at, at, like, a surf break, right? You would... Y- y- when you first paddle out, let's just say it's a beach break for simplicity, like, you're gonna have to get through these, these first sets of waves, and then you're gonna have some calm, and then you're gonna get to, like, the outer breakers-

    26. KR

      Mm

    27. TF

      ... and you're gonna be in the impact zone again, and it's gonna be exciting, but it's also can be really stressful. And I find, like, three years for me is just kind of comfortably in between those two.

    28. KR

      Yeah.

    29. TF

      Yeah.

    30. KR

      I like what you said about also, uh, doing these kind of thematic investing where you say, "Okay, I don't know..." I, I... Like, you ju- you just named off the exact same companies that I pay attention to around e-commerce because, like, obviously we know e-commerce is, is... Well, it's more so online these days than ever, but it's still a fraction of in-person commerce, right?

  9. 58:55 – 1:09:15

    Books, attention, and social media constraints: setting policies that remove decisions

    1. TF

      for me, even though it is very addictive. Uh, so I'm, I'm looking forward to doing things that have nothing to do with investing. And, uh, you know, we were talking about in, in prep for this conversation, talking about, or I guess in the, in the Google spreadsheet talking about this year, meaning 20, 2021, uh, New Year's resolutions last year, and I do every year for the last handful of years a past year review where I go through my calendar week by week from the previous year and look at the things that gave me the most energy, took the most energy. Some of them are worth it, most of them are not, and trying to identify the kinda peak emotional experiences, positive and negative, and who the people and activities are on both of those lists. So I'm sorry to say, Kevin, you ended up on my negative... No, I'm kidding. [laughs]

    2. KR

      [laughs]

    3. TF

      Um, uh, and, and that's how I then go through and look at scheduling things and spending time or not spending time with activities and people for the next year. And the most consistent energy giver was time in nature and activities in nature, which is part of the reason I was so thrilled, and we can kinda go in any direction, but to get as a gift this book, which is Of Wolves and Men by Barry Holston Lopez, and it is probably the best nonfiction book I've read in the last five years. It is so-

    4. KR

      Cool

    5. TF

      ... unbelievably good. Uh, and I have highlights on almost certainly in every chapter, and, uh, uh, it's, it's just... I, I had to modify the way I highlighted because I highlighted so much. His writing is as crisp and clear as Michael Lewis. The structure of his writing is right up there with, like, John McPhee. And the, the, the beauty of his prose and just the wordsmithing and use of metaphor is-

    6. KR

      Mm

    7. TF

      ... right up there, I would say, with Mary Oliver. I was blown away. I kept stopping my friends and wanting to read them paragraphs and chapters, and they got pretty annoyed after a while. But, uh- It is a spectacular nonfiction book.

    8. KR

      Very cool.

    9. TF

      And yeah, it, uh-

    10. KR

      And y- so it's funny, Tim, I don't know if you remember telling me this, but you s- told me, I don't know, maybe was it six months ago, you were like, "I'm not reading any new books." What was it? You were saying-

    11. TF

      Yeah

    12. KR

      ... something like that. What was the deal?

    13. TF

      Uh, yeah. So well, for 2020, I read no books that were printed in 20... Uh, that were published in 2020. So I was reading books, but I, I put up a blog post as a policy, and I think the title of the blog post was Making the Single Decision That Removes a Thousand Decisions. Uh, and that relates to the burden of getting hit up by hundreds of people a year who want me to read their books that are coming out, you know, a week later or two months later. Uh, and it, it's not that they're bad people, but they, they very often have a book coming out, they wanna be on the podcast, and I end up oftentimes, or I have ended up with just stacks of hundreds of books. And the fact of the matter is we don't have that much time on the planet, you know? Unless we figure out how to, you know, recycle, you know, 20-year-old blood like vampires like some people do, who shall not be named, or whatever. Using fancy drugs, rapamycin, metformin, et cetera. Like, maybe you get... You eke out a few more years. Okay, that's possible. But if I look at the average age of death of males in my family going back many generations, as far as I could, like, easily do the math, it's about 85. Like, it doesn't really matter what you do. As long as you don't get hit by a bus or fall off a cliff, like, you're probably gonna die around 85. So I'm 43. That means I've crossed the 50% mark. I think it's helpful to just assume that. And, uh, you can sit down and do the math. Like, how many really good books do you read per year? And people do the math, and maybe they end up at five, maybe they end up at 20. It's hard to read 20 amazing books unless you're really deliberate about it. You probably read a fair amount of garbage. Uh, and so you figure out like, okay, this, you know, this book took me a long time to find, and it was gifted to me. Even though it had been recommended many times, I still didn't read it.

    14. KR

      When you said a long time-

    15. TF

      Yeah

    16. KR

      ... to find, meaning you just hadn't heard of it, or it's out of print?

    17. TF

      No. No, no, it's not out of print. It's, it's, uh, a long time to find... It took a long time f- for it to happen, I guess, is what I'm saying.

    18. KR

      Hmm.

    19. TF

      It had been recommended many times, but we get bombarded with reading assignments all day long, right? Maybe it's just something on TikTok or Instagram or Twitter or whatever. Although I deleted all, all of those from-

    20. KR

      Good

    21. TF

      ... my phone.

    22. KR

      Same.

    23. TF

      I deleted... Yeah, all of those have been deleted from my phone for about six months now, which is great. Uh-

    24. KR

      Wait, I saw you post on Instagram the other day.

    25. TF

      I, okay, there's a workaround.

    26. KR

      I didn't see the post. Daria told me you did, 'cause I don't, I don't have it, uh... I don't, I don't go on Instagram.

    27. TF

      Yeah, yeah. I do know. Uh, so-

    28. KR

      Yeah, no, she, she told me-

    29. TF

      [laughs]

    30. KR

      ... 'cause you, you posted a chocolate bar that we got you.

  10. 1:09:15 – 1:17:02

    Nature practice: building awareness through identification and removing headphones

    1. KR

      Can I ask you-

    2. TF

      Yeah

    3. KR

      ... how you, um... Well, let me, w- I'll, I'll tell you why I'm asking this question. I'm asking this question because as part of the training that I'm doing with, with Henry, who we talked about on a previous, um, podcast, who's a, this Zen master that I, I study with, um, one of the things that I do is when I go for walks in nature, and you mentioned enjoying nature is one of the, the big highlights, um, it, the, the easy thing to do is to put on a podcast or an audiobook, right? And on top of that is to set it at two and a half speed so you can get through it as fast as possible. Um, my instructions have been to take out my headphones and just treat it as a, as a way to listen, just listen to nature, just, like, let it all come in and put your focus and attention on the sounds that are happening around you. I've found that to be a much more... It's like a, a, like a amplifier on top of the already awesome walk, uh, just this idea of, of, of really being there rather than try and do extra things while you're on that walk, right? And so my question is, you know, when I've been listening to audiobooks I've actually said, "Okay, 1X speed," because I really, if I'm going to do a book, I'm gonna give it my full attention. Are, are you doing anything like that, or do you jam through books? Do you read them at night? Like, how, how do you consume?

    4. TF

      Well, so there are a few things I'd love to reflect on that you just said. The, the first, as far as nature goes, uh, I would say that, and, and I try to think about much like the energy management leading then to time management, I, I think a lot, as you know, about the, the sequencing of things. Like, what is the natural kind of waterfall cascade order in which these things belong? And for me, spending time in nature is about cultivating an, a, a very detailed awareness of nature or acute awareness of nature first and foremost. If I do that, the enjoyment or the c- the contentment that I feel in nature automatically goes up-

    5. KR

      Mm-hmm

    6. TF

      ... dramatically. So I, I, I spent... And part of the reason I'm thinking about this so much is I've had a very hard time reacclimating to Austin. Um, and it's not because of all the swarms of locusts, AKA Californians descending upon this fair city, although I'm hypocritical to say that obviously.

    7. KR

      [laughs]

    8. TF

      Uh, it's, it's, it's because it's a city. It's a city, and I spent a lot of time in the wilderness, uh, on a, you know, on a farm, I don't wanna mention locations, but, uh, for the entire summer. So, you know, I spent several months walking through the woods every day where there are black bear and coyotes and so on. And seeing the changes, I, I would walk for hours and I got to recognize these very minor, or I should say minute changes on my walks. I would see which trees changed color first as we got closer to autumn. I would see, uh, how tracks presented themselves in certain places at certain times of the day, um, and dependent on weather. And when I came back to Austin, I wanna say one, one thing also. One of the ways that I increased my appreciation for what was around me, 'cause I think if, if the walk isn't interesting enough for you, you're probably just not interested enough. Uh, so I, I asked and, uh, I'm going to be, you know, finding someone to pay to, to help me with this in Austin, uh, found, uh, wildlife biologists and, uh, specialists or even people who work at, say, you know, garden shops and things like that, uh, to walk with me through the woods to identify things, to point things out to me. And, you know, the recommendation they gave me at one point was start with trees because flowers and wildflowers are very complex. There, there are going to be dozens if not hundreds of different varieties. Start with the trees because in, in any given location you might have, at least where I was- Let's just call it eight to 12 trees, and if you learn the classifications and how to tell them apart and how to describe the different characteristics that separate them or distinguish them, uh, you're going to be able to identify 90% of the trees that you see. How cool is that? You know, before that point in time, they're just trees. You might identify a maple, let's say, 'cause the leaf looks like the Ca- [laughs] you know, something you'd see in Canada. Uh, but, uh, by and large, it's just trees. It's green stuff that's really high. And after that, uh, you suddenly kind of click the dial a few notches towards high def, and your experience of the walk-

    9. KR

      Hmm

    10. TF

      ... changes tremendously. So, um, you know, I would occasionally take phone calls when I was walking, but I spent, I would say, at least 70, 80% of my time listening to bird calls, learning to identify birds. Uh, there is-

    11. KR

      You're a birder now. Are you a birder?

    12. TF

      I'm not a birder. I'm not a birder, but there is-

    13. KR

      It's okay if you are.

    14. TF

      No, no, I'm not a birder. Someone will be able to find this. There's actually an app on Android, sadly not... Last I checked, it wasn't on iOS, that is like Shazam for bird calls. It's amazing. In other words, you can hold your phone up, click a button, and it will identify which bird is calling, which is awesome. The other thing-

    15. KR

      Are you doing this? Are, are you doing Shazam for birds out in the forest? [laughs]

    16. TF

      No, because I use iOS. I use iOS, so I had to do it the old-fashioned way and, like, go online and listen to different bird calls and try to compare them. The-

    17. KR

      [laughs]

    18. TF

      The, uh, the other thing that I, that I found really fun to do, because not everyone's gonna have access to someone who can point out different plants, is to use the Google app to do, uh, image searches on different plants. And, uh, it is incredibly accurate most of the time. I was stunned. It's so cool. Like, just walk around your house. Like, how many people, and I'm gonna plead guilty here, know the names or the types of all the plants they might have in, in or around their houses? Very, very few-

    19. KR

      Yeah

    20. TF

      ... I would guess, right? And, uh, using the Google app and image search, which is very easy, you can pretty quickly identify the vast majority of plants, trees, and so on. It's awesome. I've used it on walks here in Austin to identify trees.

    21. KR

      I love that.

    22. TF

      Uh, yeah. So those, those are a few of the ways that I think about nature, of which we are a part, right? It's very easy to feel separate from nature, and I think that feeling of separateness is intensified if you have earbuds in and you're listening to something at rapid speed. Nature doesn't really rush, right? So to, to meet it at its own cadence without listening to anything but what is around you, I, I find really therapeutic. As far as reading, uh, these days I definitely don't rush. Like, if I'm rushing through a book, I should generally just drop the book. It's not good enough. Uh, like this book, like you should be, you should only be choosing books that you are sad to see end.

    23. KR

      Hmm.

    24. TF

      Right? Like, if you're not like, "Oh, man, what am I gonna do now that I've fini- oh, no, I have to find another book," if you don't have that feeling, then you're not reading the right books.

    25. KR

      Mm-hmm.

  11. 1:17:02 – 1:25:24

    Lucid dreaming: definitions, lab proof, recall training, and practical applications

    1. TF

      I'll give you another example. So this book is one that I was, uh, uh, I was given, uh, by my girlfriend for Christmas, and it's an awesome book. Uh, I hadn't read it in probably 20 years, and it's, it's this. It's called Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming by Stephen LaBerge, L-A-B-E-R-G-E, and Howard Rheingold. Uh, this is an incredibly detailed, uh, tactical how-to book about lucid dreaming and developing the, uh, different skills related to lucid dreaming. And lucid dreaming, I was really, really dedicated to a lot of these practices i- towards the very end of high school or certainly the first few years of college, and I actually reached out to Stephen LaBerge or his team when I was in college. I couldn't get ahold of him, but I did get the attention of his team because I said, "You may wanna look at, if you haven't already, huperzine A." Huperzine A is a supplement, you can get it anywhere, well, certainly online, which acts as acetylcholinesterase inhibitor. And this, this is just a very long-winded way of saying-

    2. KR

      Ooh, it sounds bad.

    3. TF

      Well, I mean, it's-

    4. KR

      Is, is-

    5. TF

      ... it's not just-

    6. KR

      ... it acetylcholine in the brain?

    7. TF

      Well, it's, it's not turning off acetylcholine production, but it, it has anecdotally the ability to help one induce lucidity. Uh, how and why that happens, I don't know. At the time, I had a very, you know, well-developed pet theory for why this, uh, sort of mechanistically a- and plausibly why it worked. But, uh, the point being that Stephen LaBerge came out of Stanford. Lucid dreaming, to define that, is the phenomenon of realizing that you are dreaming when you are dreaming. So you, you effectively wake up in your dream and you're like, "Holy shit, I'm dreaming." And normally you get excited and then you wake up. Um, but-

    8. KR

      Yeah, they call that, they call that... In Zen they call that enlightenment, but it's not when you're dreaming.

    9. TF

      There you go. Yeah. So-

    10. KR

      It's when you're awake and you wake up to, and you realize-

    11. TF

      Yeah

    12. KR

      ... this is a dream. [laughs]

    13. TF

      Yeah. So y- the, you can start with, you could start with the lucid dreaming.

    14. KR

      Yeah, [laughs] exactly.

    15. TF

      See how you do with that. Uh, but, uh, this is, this is actually a phenomenon that can be demonstrated in laboratory settings because your eye movements during REM sleep, uh, correspond to your eye movements in dreams. So you could hook someone up to, uh, I suppose it would be an EEG, in a sleep lab. Uh, you will know when they are sleeping be- Uh, and in REM states and so on based on brainwave activity. And then if, if they have, uh, agreed with the experimenter on a predefined set of eye movements, let's just say like, right, right, left, right, right, left or something like that-

    16. KR

      Oh

    17. TF

      ... then they become lucid in their dream. They could look in that, uh, following that pattern and indicate to someone who is in the lab that they are in fact aware they're dreaming. It's pretty cool.

    18. KR

      Or they could just be closing their eyes and doing that.

    19. TF

      Well, they wouldn't be able to pull that off because-

    20. KR

      Because the, the, uh, EE- EEG wouldn't show it, right?

    21. TF

      That's right. The EEG wouldn't, would, would just show that they're-

    22. KR

      Yeah

    23. TF

      ... being dickheads and trying to-

    24. KR

      Right [laughs]

    25. TF

      ... bullshit. Uh, but the, the lucid dreaming makes you more aware in your normal waking life because you develop the habit of doing what some people might call reality checks, and that is asking yourself the question, "Am I dreaming or am I awake?" while you're awake. And you would l- and then you would test it, and the way you would test that, for instance, if you had a book cover like this with text on it, in a dream you looked at the cover, at the text, you look away, you look back. The text is generally going to change because your brain is producing the entire experience moment by moment. Uh, so, so that would be one test. It'd be like looking at text, looking away, looking back. Another would be looking at patterns, like I'm looking at the wall in front of me in, in my kitchen, and the tiles are laid a certain way. If I looked away and looked back at those tiles, they might be running the opposite direction or at a diagonal.

    26. KR

      So are your dreams that vivid? Like, my, my REM dreams are just kind of like, eh, I never really believe that they're real. Do you actually like-

    27. TF

      Well, if you never believed they were real, you would always be lucid, right? So, um-

    28. KR

      Right, but I don't, I don't think like I c- I don't ever remember like picking up a book and being like, "Oh, it has text on it." Like, that doesn't, I don't get to that high fidelity.

    29. TF

      Yeah.

    30. KR

      Like, do you-

  12. 1:25:24 – 1:39:18

    Kevin’s 2021 reset: walking, sauna, alcohol rules, and couples therapy

    1. KR

      Yeah, I mean, I think there was, there was two things e- looking, I, I, uh, similar to you in that I, I spent, you know, a good chunk of time looking back on the year and, and I didn't go through a calendar, but I, I did look at my news resolutions from last year, which were, I failed at all of them. And so I, I just-

    2. TF

      [laughs]

    3. KR

      I mean- Th- th... A- and I look at what I wanna do differently this year, and so I've set up some procedures in place. And then there were some things, some wins that I did have midyear, but they weren't resolutions 'cause I didn't wa- know we were gonna be in COVID.

    4. TF

      Yeah.

    5. KR

      And so, you know, I, I think that COVID, uh, what it did for me is immediately caused me to start drinking more.

    6. TF

      [laughs] Yeah.

    7. KR

      You know? It was, like, very easy to finish a bottle of wine with my wife, like, you know, and where you'd typically be like, "Oh, we have some left over from last night. Should we pour a little?" It's like, no, we cleared a bottle out no problem and then went for a beer or something, you know?

    8. TF

      [laughs]

    9. KR

      It was just like... 'Cause we were like, "We're gonna die."

    10. TF

      Yeah.

    11. KR

      And it, it's [laughs] if you're gonna die, might as well drink. So I was, I was basically just freaking out there for the first couple months. Um, and you know, that, that kicked off, uh, a point to where I got to and I said, "I'm fat, I feel like I've drank too much, and I need to course-correct." And so, um, if I'm honest with myself, I, I felt really depressed. You know, not in a clinical way, but in a just this has really beat me down. I miss my friends. I miss traveling. I miss, like... You know, there's things that... A- and then part of me is like, well, you know, we have clean drinking water, we have food, we have jobs. Like, life is good. So but, but I think it in, it's, it's impacted everyone a little bit differently, and what I immediately went to is said, "Well, how can I stop and cut back on drinking?" And then given that I only have so much free time with two little girls, what can I introduce that is new that gives me some relief and brings my spirits back to a, into a positive place? And so I tried a bunch of stuff. You know, I tried, you know, walking through the, the forest, 'cause I, I live in Oregon and we... I got a forest in my backyard. Um, tried sauna, tried cold plunge, meditation, Pilates, uh, working out, lifting weights, like, all those things. And I would do a couple weeks of them and say, "Okay, which one of these, if you had to, like, stack rank them, which ones are having the biggest impact on me? 'Cause I can't do 'em all. Which ones can I do that are having the biggest impact?" And, um, uh, without a doubt I would say the two things are, are walking and, and, and sauna. Those are the two things that, that are just so key. And, um, I walk every single day now, and it is a, a no phone, no earpo- uh, it's, like, AirPods, like, kinda walk. And it is, um, it's crazy what 45 minutes in the forest will, uh, will, will get you in terms of just, like, a mood boost. You know, like, swinging the arms, moving the legs. Like, it's, it's fantastic. So, so that's been huge. Um, also, uh, in being totally transparent, uh, I did some couples therapy, which I thought was fantastic. Like, and it's not because I thought I was gonna end my marriage. Like, it never got that crazy, but it's just when, like, you know, you're cooped up with somebody else with a couple of, like, little toddlers, and it gets chaotic sometimes, you know? And it's like you're, there's no work escape. Work is in the home. Like, you know, there's no, there's no way to have that natural kinda break that you get, um, whether it be grabbing a beer with another friend and then coming back to your spouse or, like... There's none of that. You're just on top of each other. And so, um, you know, we had done couples therapy back, um, uh, before and after we got married as kind of like a t- to give us a c- a toolkit to deal with issues. Um, and it's fantastic. I highly recommend it. It's every single time I've done it I've never been pissed that I did it. And you know, and I've always learned-

    12. TF

      What recommendations would you give to people who are listening to this and considering it as an option? What, any best practices or recommendations for people?

    13. KR

      Well, I would say at, at first I was curious, like, are there any new tech plays that I can get into here, like these Talkspaces and some of these other things that are out there? And I find that those are really kind of, like, lightweight, not really meant for couples. It was just, like, you know, text your therapist, and I was like, "I don- I don't, I don't need this." So, um, w- I, I found someone that I could actually meet with over, like, a secure Zoom-type connection that is a real licensed therapist. Not that they aren't on, on that, but a dedicated person to you that's gonna give you a full hour, you know? Um, is not, not texting back and forth. And I would say, um, you know, I have another buddy that did the same thing, and he had to get to a second therapist to find the right one. So it's not like just because you find one that you're, you go to and you're like, "Oh, this, this isn't, this isn't what I expected," that doesn't mean the, the idea of the practice is wrong. You might just not have the right person. And so we found a fantastic woman that is, um, just really good at driving me back to the source of why am I feeling this way, and just opening up the lines of communication to let us and remind us that we're both on the same team, we both want what's best for each other, and to support each other and help each other, because we're coming from a loving place. But, um, sometimes we get caught up in, in other things and other loops and cycles and scorekeeping. I'm a big scorekeeper. 'Cause I m- I've, I've always avoided confrontation. Like, my dad was a very verbally aggressive, abusive guy to my mom, and, um, had many, many, many good traits. I always like to say that about my dad, 'cause he did, but definitely not, uh, teaching me on the relationship side. Um, fantastic father, uh, horrible husband, v- m- confusing for me as all hell [laughs] right? As a kid.

    14. TF

      Yeah, yeah. Totally.

    15. KR

      But, um, you know, I think that, uh, i- I tend to avoid confrontation and then just kinda keep track of things, and then I, then I get upset- And, and I have something that, that's like I, I've... All these things, ah, you know, just come out. And so just like trying to address things in more real time has been a big help for me. Um, and yeah, there's been a ton of little things that I've picked up. But anyway, I just wanted to tell people out there, if you're going through rough times, 'cause I hear divorce rates are like through the roof right now, 'cause like the courts are backlogged, it's, it doesn't mean necessarily that you found the wrong person. You might just need a little help, and that's okay.

    16. TF

      Yeah. I think the real time versus dropping the motherlode of, like, 17 complaints and-

    17. KR

      Yes

    18. TF

      ... sort of freeze-framed infractions is, is really important. [laughs]

    19. KR

      Would you share that line that you told me that you use that I think is really helpful?

    20. TF

      Uh, which one?

    21. KR

      The one that you said-

    22. TF

      Uh, oh, oh, I think-

    23. KR

      Yeah

    24. TF

      ... yeah, I, I mean, so my... I, I owe my girlfriend for all of these, 'cause certainly I didn't come up with these on my own. And I, I think she's been... She is very conscientious about how she uses wording and language. And you would expect that I would have that as, as a writer, or supposedly, but when I get upset, I think I, I, I tend to, to throw haymakers, right? Not literally, but I'm, I'm less care-

    25. KR

      [laughs]

    26. TF

      I'm less, I'm less careful with my wording when I'm upset.

    27. KR

      Yeah.

    28. TF

      And it, it usually escalates or damages things more than it helps. And I'm not like, I'm not a yeller. I never yell. Uh, but I can be very blunt. And the wording that, uh, that she used, and I noted it and I have also used, is really simple. It's, it's just, "The story I am making up in my head is..." Right? And then you have that, you know, you, the, the dishes are left in the sink because you expect me to clean them up. And when I th- when I believe that thought, I feel-

    29. KR

      Right

    30. TF

      ... X, right? So you're not saying-

  13. 1:39:18 – 2:12:46

    Themes for the year, sleep supports, and closing recommendations (docs and shows)

    1. TF

      Uh, that, that, that certainly for my girlfriend and I was very impactful. Uh, Kevin, if you had to choose a word for 2021 for you, like a theme.

    2. KR

      Patience.

    3. TF

      Patience?

    4. KR

      Yes.

    5. TF

      Okay.

    6. KR

      That's something I'm really trying to cultivate is, uh-

    7. TF

      I feel like you're a pretty patient guy. Are you an, an impatient guy?

    8. KR

      Well, I mean, I just think about what we have ahead of us in terms of vaccines that who knows when we're gonna get them. Um, you know, the crazy scariness of potential mutations of a virus. A new incoming administration. The, all the anks- the anxiety and unrest out in the streets. Like, there's a lot of things where I just, like I'm very anxious, and so I want things to be resolved and I want, I'm, I'm a problem solver. And it's like, I just need to have a little bit more patience. Just like slow down-

    9. TF

      Mm

    10. KR

      ... and just let things unfold the way they're gonna unfold and stop trying to, to, to project my mind into the future into some crazy scenario, you know?

    11. TF

      Yeah.

    12. KR

      That's a, that's a big one for me. And the other thing for 2021 is, is just really asking myself, like for the drinking thing, that I've, I've been really, really good lately. Um, and it, it, I, I, this is COVID drinking, so it's like, you know, I'm not going crazy, but like it, more than I'd like to drink. So our, our new kind of... Well, my new kind of, um, uh, framework that I've put together for myself has been-

    13. TF

      Blackouts only on Tuesdays

    14. KR

      ... Tuesdays, no less than 10. [laughs]

    15. TF

      [laughs]

    16. KR

      No. No, on, on, um, yeah. [laughs] No, so what, what I'm doing is no more than two. I have found that, uh, anything above and beyond two drinks just does not serve me well. I'm too old. I wake up like hot in the middle of the night for no reason.

    17. TF

      It's the worst. So bad.

    18. KR

      Like hot red wa- wine sweats, you know?

    19. TF

      [laughs]

    20. KR

      And, and then the other thing is never, never two nights in a row.

    21. TF

      Yeah. That's a good one.

    22. KR

      So I may say to myself, I may be on night number two, and I say, you, you know, like or I wanna drink the second night, and I just tell myself like, "Can you go one day?" Oh, of course I can. And then you go one day, and it turns out the next day you don't wanna drink.

    23. TF

      Yeah.

    24. KR

      And so then it's two nights in a row. So it's funny how just separating drinks by a night will help a ton. And then the, the last thing, and I think this is the most important and the, the one I don't have a good answer for, but I'm working on, this is part of my, my, uh, um, Zen friend who's coaching me on some of this stuff, is really asking yourself when you're having a drink, um, like really who is getting nourished right now.

    25. TF

      Hmm.

    26. KR

      Like-

    27. TF

      That's a good, that's a good one

    28. KR

      ... it's a really good one because w- what's happening? W- what part of me? Is, is there something that... 'Cause there's, there's something inside that's getting nourished, and just trying to like... And I, I don't have an answer for that yet, but it's, it's a deep one to sit with, you know?

    29. TF

      Yeah. I like that. I like that a lot. So question for you, when you look at your graph of drink consumption, as it goes down, is your consumption of edible gummies going through the roof?

    30. KR

      No. It, you know, also-

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