Kind: captions
Language: en
[music]
Robert Green, welcome back to the show.
Thanks for having me, Tom. My pleasure.
I am super excited. I love your work
beyond all reason and measure. I have
loved everything of yours that I've ever
read. Um,
what I like about the approach that you
take is you and I are obsessed with a
very similar idea which I think is
critically important for people to
understand, which is deal with the world
the way that it actually is and not the
way that you wish it were. And I think
there are few people that are able to
look unflinchingly at both sides of the
human experience. The sublime, which
you're getting into in your new book,
which you certainly touch on in this
one. Uh and then the dark side, the you
know the power struggles and all of
that. Um help us understand what the
world is really like. What what do you
think is that key thing that people
misunderstand?
Well, the key thing is it goes back to
our nature and how we evolved as as
conscious animals. The key thing is
there's an animal part of our nature
which is we completely take appearances
for reality. That's sort of the source
of our problems and our misery to be
honest with in life. So the front that
people present, the way they look, the
way they talk to was their words, we
sort of take at face value. And although
we might think or we might know from
reading a book or whatever that you
can't always trust appearances, it's
kind of a cliche, we can't control
ourselves.
So it makes us extremely vulnerable to
charming people, to charlatans, to con
artists, to politicians who say one
thing, who do another, to relationships,
terrible relationships where we fall in
love with exactly the wrong person, to
the worst kind of hirers. You know, I do
a lot of consulting work. I've been
doing it for over 20 years now. The
number one problem I deal with is I
hired the worst person in the world and
they're making my life hell, right? And
why did you hire the wrong person?
because you judge them on their charming
smiles, their appearance, their their
smooth talk, their resume, which you can
conceal a lot with your resume. You
didn't look behind the facade and look
at what's underneath the character. So,
this is kind of ingrained in our nature.
It goes back thousands and thousands of
years. It's extremely difficult to
overcome, right? And I have the problem,
too. I deal with it all the time. and
and I have to go through a process where
I I step back and I say, "I don't want
to be paranoid, but this person is so
nice and pleasant. Is there something
else going on behind behind the curtain
that that's there?" You know, and then
sometimes I tell myself, "No, I have
ways of judging that there that there's
a consistency between the face and the
reality, but often times there is not."
And I've become very good at that kind
of [ __ ] dete detection which I've
been doing my whole life.
How do you get good at that?
Well, you know, some things are hard to
put into words which is why I struggle
so diff much with my books. Um because a
lot of human communication I estimated
95% it's just a number is non-verbal,
right?
So we don't pay much attention to that
because we're so word oriented, right?
We're so embedded in language that we
think everything in terms of what people
say, but unconsciously, without even
realizing it, we're continually judging
people on their non-verbal behavior,
right? So there's their their eyes,
their smile
are different from what they actually
say, but we're not really. So in a kind
of a pre a natural intuitive way we
understand that but we don't trust those
kind of judgments right so we we rely
more on what they say than what the
signals that we pick up from their body
language. So years and years of training
and being sensitive to it is probably
something that has to go back to my
childhood. If you put me on a couch and
psychoanalyze me right here. There was
probably something in my childhood where
I had to learn how to really read people
not by what they said by but everything
about them. And I have a kind of a feel
an intuitive feel for the energy the
vibrations the mood that people give off
not through what they say but through
their body through particularly their
tone of voice and all the other signals.
That is a number that is the main way of
judging you know what's going what's
really going on. The other thing you
look at are people's patterns of
behavior right things that have happened
in the past. As I said in in laws of
human nature nobody ever does one
something just once right if somebody
[ __ ] up and does something kind of
hurts you in some way and they say oh
I'm sorry I don't know what came over me
that that's not me. Don't trust that.
It'll [laughter] happen again for sure.
It will happen again a second, a third,
fourth time.
What do you think is going on there? Cuz
when you were going through the list of
things, being in a bad relationship was
the one that really jumped out of, you
know, you hear people ending in these
just like horrendous cycles of being
stuck in this abusive relationship and
the person manages to reel them back in.
What is going on on the side of the
person who convinces themselves
to go back into that relationship? Is
there the need to be loved? Is there a
wound or something that you're that
they're trying to deal with? And how do
you advise people that are stuck in a
loop like that?
Well, it's probably from some kind of
primal wound, right? So, there's a
perverse part of human nature which is
often times in early childhood
something happened to us often something
that didn't happen to us like the love
we didn't get or the feel the the
nurturing that we didn't get. there's
this kind of wound, this emptiness, this
lack, right? And we grow up and we're
not really aware of it and kind of
things grow over this wound. But what
also happens, which is the perverse side
of human nature, is that early on our
kind of sexual excitement is sort of
kind of grows up around that wound.
Why that is so weird and yet seems so
self-evidently true. Yeah. But
why?
[sighs] Well, I I'd have to be like I'd
have to go into something, you know, hit
my go inside my own psychoanalytic uh,
you know, mindset here. But, um, you
know, when you're when you're very
young, you're extremely vulnerable.
You're extremely open to the energies of
other people in ways we don't understand
right now, right? It's it's it's hard to
imagine something what I'm writing about
right now in my new book. When you're
two years old, one years old, before you
even had really mastered language,
you're so dependent on other people.
You're so open to them that their energy
gets infused. It's inter completely
internalized. And also children at that
age also have their their sort of sexual
nature is being created at that moment
at a very very early age. Certain
desires you know for us sex is not just
a physical thing. It's an emotional
thing.
right? We have this it's psychological.
So things that we didn't get are charged
with all of this kind of energy that
then could later on turn into sort of
desires. So let's say for instance you
had a mother um who was very
narcissistic
who really wasn't giving you the normal
mother nurturing empathetic energy. It
was more about her and you had to pay
attention to her. Right? [clears throat]
Well, that kind of creates this sort of
desire. This you're you're as an infant,
you really want that love from that
mother. You're trying to drag, you're
trying to attract and pull it out of her
as best you can. And your energy, your
desire is is surrounding her with this
kind of emotional charge, sexual energy.
And you're going to find throughout your
life, you're going to be attracted to
narcissistic women. It's going to be
your your Achilles heel throughout your
life. because you want to kind of re
heal that wound. You want to be able to
play back that initial trauma and sort
of rewrite the way it ended up where now
you're going to find this narcissistic
woman and she's going to give you
finally what you never had before.
Right? It's a very very common pattern,
right? And so you're not even aware of
this and it's extremely difficult to
break out of because your desire is for
this type of person. So, you might meet
a woman, just doing it from a man's
point of view, who isn't narcissistic,
who's very empathetic and very caring,
and she would be perfect for you, and
you may even have a relationship with
her. But the excitement, the energy,
that charge isn't going to be as strong
as with that other type, and you're
going to fall back into the old patterns
again and again and again. And the only
way out of it is to go back and look at
your early childhood and look at these
wounds and confront them face to face
and understand that you're a prisoner of
this kind of of these kind of things
that were ingrained in you at a very
very early age.
And what does that process look like?
Like how do you confront something like
that? Well, how do you even develop the
awareness of the problem?
Well, you have to look at what's going
on in the present right now. You have to
be first of all it depends on how old
you are and how many relationships you
have but you have to see your own
patterns and if you have unhealthy
patterns where you have fallen again and
again and again for the wrong person you
have to see a sort of a through line
there what ties it all together what's
going on right so um you know a common
scenario that I wrote about in human
nature is in this particular scenario
where your mother is giving you the
attention that you think you want,
right? You have this feeling when you're
a child 3 or four years old that that
mother is abandoning you, that it's
almost your fault in that case, right?
Because you don't want to believe that a
parent could be wrong or flawed because
it's too painful a thought. So, you want
to think that you are flawed and she has
abandoned you for some reason. It's very
painful. So, what you're going to do
throughout your life is you're always
going to be the one cutting off a
relationship before it gets too intense
so that you don't ever have to go
through that abandonment feeling again.
Right? That's your pattern, right? So,
after 6 months, the relationship is kind
of, you know, growing. You'll find some
excuse. She's not right for me. She's
saying the wrong things. She's duh.
you'll break off the relationship
blaming her when in fact you're afraid,
deeply afraid that she's going to
abandon you and you can't stand that.
So, you've got to see these patterns and
they're very painful and they're very
difficult because they're touching upon
things that go to the heart of who we
are. You know, it's not just in your
relationships. You're going to probably
be doing that with your jobs as well.
You're going to be quitting jobs before
they, you know, before you get to the
point where you have too much
responsibility.
They're very very deeply ingrained in
you and you have to be able to look at
them. So awareness is everything. The
ability to look at yourself
realistically and understand you're
saying see things as they are, see the
world as it is. It begins with yourself.
Seeing yourself as you are, right? and
seeing that your adult self that's so
confident and has this, you know, this
way about the world is covering over
some wounds, some vulnerabilities from
your deep childhood. Not everybody, but
for a lot of people that's the case. You
have to be willing to to rip away the
skin and look underneath and see that
wound and touch upon it and then kind of
analyze it and sort of see the patterns
in your life before you can begin to
One thing that you do really well which
I think is definitely part of your
appeal is that you're able to write
about these difficult things in human
nature without needing to remove
yourself. So you're not doing it as a
spectator. Oh, oh those humans over
there, they've got problems. Um you're
able to really look at it yourself. So,
as you think about this process of
ripping the skin away, I think was the
the phrase that you said, um, and
confronting that,
how do you begin to to translate what's
actually happening without the need for
the ego to step in and say, "No, no, no.
You're it." to not go in either
direction, quite frankly, to either then
say, "Oh, because you have this flaw,
you are a loser." or to blind yourself
to the flaw and say, "No, no, no, that's
it's not a problem." Like, how do people
find that middle ground of acknowledging
it without succumbing to negative
emotion around it?
That's a great question. Um, you know,
so sometimes, you know, you need help in
these areas. It depending on the depth
of the wound. So, sometimes you need a
third person's eyes on it. you can't
necessarily analyze it yourself, which
is why you might want to go into therapy
or you might want a spouse or
significant other or someone you love
and trust who can tell you these things
because sometimes it's very hard for you
to have any kind of distance from them,
you know. But um the the the ability to
detach yourself from your own emotions
is extremely important in life. It
doesn't mean that you become a cold
rational person at all. I don't believe
in that at all. Emotions are extremely
important for us. It's what makes us
creative. It what's feeds our
imagination, gives us drive. But the
ability that you can gain over your life
in this instant and in every other
instant to have a degree of detachment,
not a only a matter of degree where you
can stand back and you feel something
very powerfully. You feel attracted to
something or a person. You feel excited
or repulsed and to not react and to step
back and analyze and go why am I feeling
this right now? Is it because of what
somebody is saying right now or does it
go deeper to that? Is it related to some
other issue? That is a skill that is not
easy but you can develop it day by day
by day taking little steps. And so if
you're able to slowly detach yourself
from your day-to-day emotional
reactions,
it gives you a little bit of distance
between you and your ego. Right? So I
meditate every morning. I've been doing
it now for 11 years for like 40 over 40
minutes. It's a a ritual that if I don't
do, I feel extremely depressed.
Something's wrong.
Okay? And when I'm meditating, I become
deeply aware. These thoughts start
coming up. They bubble up. you can't
control them. You become deeply aware of
your ego, of certain patterns in your
thinking, of certain anxieties, of
certain kind of neurotic thought
patterns, right? You're seeing it before
your eyes. It's floating there. This is
your ego, Robert. It's going here,
there, and there. You can see it. And
now, when you're in that state, you can
almost see it as if it's another person.
And it's very powerful. It's very
liberating. Now, in the case of someone
who's dealing with a deep wound, I don't
know if you can go, you can't go there
like tomorrow and do this. I'm a
realistic person. I'm very practical. I
don't want to advise people something
that's not going to happen. It's
something that you're going to have to
it's a life skill that you have to build
the the the the power to take take a
step back and look at yourself with some
distance and see that ego as if it's
over there. It's floating in front of
you. It's giving you signs of who you
are. You know, you can develop that and
it's very powerful and it will give you
the ability to look at your own wounds
objectively, but you're never going to
reach a a degree of 100% detachment. Me,
who has been practicing this for many
years, I still get caught up in those
wounds. I still get caught up in my ego.
It's just a matter of degree that that's
all I'm talking about.
This is such an insanely complicated
issue when I think about okay so if the
number one problem is people aren't
aware that there's a game being played
basically you can't take things sort of
at their surface and then understanding
that as you were saying that
self-awareness is also this critical
part then there are the studies that
have shown that your mind will give you
a reason for something even when that
reason is obviously not true and I don't
know if you heard about that study where
people that have had the ability to form
uh long-term memories damaged. So, they
can do short-term memories, but you
could reintroduce yourself to them every
3 minutes and they'd be like, "Oh my
god." They'd greet you a new each time.
And the doctor put a pin in his hand.
And he walked in and he shook hands and
it poked the person. They jerked their
hand back like, you know, "Why'd you do
that?" They leave. They come back 3
minutes later. The person does not
remember meeting them at all. They stick
out their hand and the person will
refuse to shake it. And so they don't
remember ever meeting them before. And
so they'll say, "Why won't you shake my
hand?" Oh, well, you know, I've had a
long-standing rule. I don't shake the
hand of people with white lab coats. And
they come up with all these different
excuses because the brain can't like sit
there in this ignorance. And so you have
something that's clearly hardwired in us
to to so we I have heard humans referred
to as meaning making machines, which
makes a lot of sense to me. We make
meaning out of something, right? So if
we have this hardwired propensity to
come up with some sort of meaning
something somewhere and we have the
psychological immune system which
doesn't want me to feel badly about
myself. So now I have an inclination to
lie to myself basically from some like
deepseated part of me that survives even
damage to the ability to make long-term
memories. And so when I think about the
deck being stacked against people in
terms of really figuring out what's
actually going on inside themselves, it
gets a little scary. And this is where
so for me when I think about okay, if
all of the things that I just said are
true nested inside of all the stuff
you've been talking about,
the only path I see out of that is you
because everyone needs self-esteem. So
your psychological immune system is
trying to make you feel good about
yourself. Got it. So you need to take
conscious control of feeling good about
yourself, but you need to wrap it around
something antifragile. So that for the
only answer I've come up with in my own
life is to be the learner. That way if I
do something stupid, I make a mistake,
whatever, I can just go, hey, that sucks
and it does make me feel badly, but I
only value myself for being a learner.
And since recognizing how I actually am
would be useful, then I'll face the
truth of what this is. and then I can
learn and move on.
Well, you touch on an extremely
important critical thing here, the
element that I'm I'm trying to hit at,
which is your level of desire for
change. So, if you're trapped in these
patterns and you feel a great degree of
pain and your life isn't going anywhere
and you're having bad relationships, bad
work habits, and you say, "I can't deal
with this anymore."
you're extremely motivated to go through
the process that you just mentioned
which is after every event that occurs
you go through a kind of an autopsy
right and you analyze you can do this on
a daily basis with a journal or you can
do it on a weekly basis you know what
did I do there what was the element of
where I actually might have created the
problem between me and another person
and I have to be reasonably rational and
I have to be reasonably realistic you're
right if if we saw completely into
ourselves, we would hate ourselves so
thoroughly that we wouldn't get out of
bed. We would all be killing ourselves.
You do need a degree of illusion. You do
need a degree of self-esteem and
confidence, right? And what happens is,
you know, it's kind of like an internal
thermostat. And so, you have like people
who are what I call deep narcissists who
have no kind of sense, no anchor inside
of them, no real sense self-esteem to
hold on to. And when that self-esteem
starts going down, down, they have no
way of dealing with it. And their only
way of dealing with it is acting out in
the way that narcissists act out. So, we
all have, if we're not a deep
narcissist, we have that thermostat
where things start hurting us a little
bit and we bring ourselves back up
through this self-esteem mechanism so we
don't get too depressed and too down.
And there's an element of unreality to
that, but it's very valuable. And I
would never ever ever want to burst
that. You need a degree of illusion in
your life. It's very important. But if
you really want change, if you're really
fed up, if you're not kidding yourself,
if you're not going through this
[ __ ] process, yeah, I kind of want
to change my life, but you don't really
mean it, then nothing you no words, no
no therapy will ever get you to that
point. You almost have to hit bottom.
You almost have to tell yourself, I
can't take this anymore. And now the
motivation is so deep that you're able
now to go through to begin the process
of going through that kind of
selfanalysis because it's the only way
you're going to get out of it. It's the
only way. You know, a lot of the of of
our culture is making this worse in a
way, unfortunately. I mean, there's good
things in our culture now, but there are
bad things.
Give me some of the bad. Well, I think
social media for all the good that it
does makes it very hard to be
self-reflective.
Interesting. I I thought for sure you
were going to say just leads us to
compare ourselves. Why does it make it
hard to be self-reflective?
Well, it does. Well, comparing yourself
is not self-reflective.
When you compare yourself, your standard
is always what other people are doing.
Right? They're on these great vacations.
He's got a great job. Tom has this
amazing house where I'm living in this
havl in Los Felis, right? That's not
looking at myself. That's always having
the other person as the standard. It
makes us so out in the world in other
people, what other people are saying,
what other people are doing makes us
continually think in the social sense
and not able to turn inside and look at
how who we are, what makes us different.
We're so attuned to what's cool, to what
other people are doing out there, what
other people are saying that we lose
kind of an intuitive grasp of who we
are. Right? So the psychologist Abraham
Maslo talked of impulse voices. He said
that a child of one years old has this
impulse voice that says, "I like this
fruit. I don't like this fruit. I'm
going to throw it away." Right? and and
then other things the these voices
inside that make them that individual.
This is what they like and what they
hate. Right? These are very very
important as you develop later in life.
You know this is what you love. These
are the subjects that interest you.
These are subjects you're not
interested. These are the people you
like. These are the people you don't
like. It's who you are in the deepest
sense of it. It's your what I call your
primal inclinations. It's you at its
core. And if you're so attuned to what
other people are saying and doing and
telling you and thinking, that voice
gets drowned out by a million other
voices and you're not able to hear
yourself anymore. And it's very hard to
take a step back and actually look at
yourself and analyze yourself. So I
think that in some ways this this
dilemma that we're talking about is
getting more and more difficult because
to be able to do what we're talking
about, you have to be willing to be
alone.
You have to be willing to close the door
in your room, write down and say, "This
is what's going on. This is what
happened. This is what I did. This is
what they did." You can't be out there
in the world and do this. It's
impossible to do that process because
you're going to be sucked into the
social dynamic and you won't be able to
think about yourself. So, I think it's
made things a little bit harder for
people.
That's really interesting. And oh man,
the the human condition is utterly
fascinating. it does not seem designed
to uh make us enjoy it or you know it
literally seems [laughter]
survival is like the only uh
consideration and that can be obviously
very difficult for people. So
as people navigate the modern world as
they try to make their way through
something like that, what are the tools
and approaches um that you recommend to
people?
Well, it's kind of what the subject of
sort of what the daily laws is about.
There's there's two things. So, um you
know, the the the the source of your
power in life is your attitude towards
the world. And in in human nature, I
kind of describe what I believe an
attitude is. It's your lens. It's your
way of looking at the world. Everybody's
lens is different. You're not seeing
things exactly as they are. You're
seeing them filtered through how you
look at them.
Some people are
so important.
Yeah. Some people are optimistic and
adventurous. Some people are anxious and
closed. And you could put two people in
the same circumstances visiting the same
place. The pessimistic anxious person
will find it unpleasant. People are
rude. I don't like it. The adventurous
exploring type will find the
circumstances very exciting. But it's
the same thing. It's just you're judging
in a different way. So the lens that you
want, you want a lens that clarifies
things. You want a lens that's
realistic, that you're trying to see
things as they are, right? It's good to
be excited, but sometimes if you're too
excited and too adventurous, you're
going to walk right up to that tiger and
they're going to eat you alive.
[clears throat]
Sometimes you have to be a little bit
wary of things. You have to see your
circumstances for what for what they
are. In military terms, they call it
situational awareness. You're very
aware, crystal clear about who you are,
about who other people are, about what
the world is like. So that's the
attitude that you want to craft for
yourself in this world. And it's very
difficult. As you've been saying very
eloquently, the cards are stacked
against you. A because of how we're
wired. You know, our brains developed
200,000 years ago in circumstances that
certainly aren't the way things are now.
So we're so there's kind of a a gap
there between you know how how we're
wired to think and what's going on in
the 21st century and B we're dealing
with technology that's making things
harder. So you your goal in life is to
become more realistic to be able to step
back and look at things as they are and
how do you get there is the question.
So, first you have to see that as your
goal and it has to be important to you
and it has to be something that you want
and it's not just something that's cold
and dry and scientific.
Really fast. Why is that the right goal?
Why is that the right goal?
Yeah. To see I agree with you. I just
want to see how you explain it to
people. Why it matters to see the world
the way that it actually is.
Well, okay. Imagine it this way. So,
there's yourself. Everything begins with
you, right? You're filled with all kinds
of illusions about who you are, about
what you're good at, what you're bad at,
what your weaknesses are, what your
strengths are. If you're able to see
inside of yourself with a degree of
realism, you'll be able to understand
this is what I was destined to be in
life. This is what I call my life's
task. This is the career that's that
fits me, that suits me. So, if you're
able to have that realism when you're 22
years old, you're not going to suddenly
go off on this wrong career path that's
going to make you miserable, make you an
alcoholic by the time you're 30. You're
going to have a degree of direction in
life. It's incredibly liberating. It's
incredibly powerful to be able to see
inside of yourself and know what you
were destined for and what makes you
you. Other people other people wear
masks. They smile, but they doesn't
their smile doesn't mean anything. There
are toxic people out there. It's not
everybody. I don't mean to make you
paranoid. Maybe there's like 5% of the
world that's truly toxic. Every single
human being, I can guarantee you, has
had to deal with these toxic people in a
way that's painful. And you don't see
them. You know, they're very tricky.
These are people who've learned to
disguise themselves. You're going to get
sucked into all these dramas and traumas
with these people can make your life
miserable. Imagine that you had a
realistic attitude and you could see
through these people. you could catch
before you get involved with them signs
of that they might be one of these
types. Another thing that's incredibly
liberating, the world that you live in,
there's a zeitgeist. There's a spirit of
the times. There are trends. There's
things that are going on right now in
your career, in the world at large. And
we're fed with so much [ __ ] in the
media. We have no idea what's really
going on. The ability to see this is
where the world headed is headed. This
is where business will be in two years.
This is where things are going to be.
These are the trends. The power. So the
power to see inside yourself. The power
inside to see other people to see the
world. You know, you're Superman. If you
can do that, if you can have a degree of
that, the world is at your feet
basically. So, you know, I don't think
there's any counterargument to that
where you don't want that kind of
realism. And it's not this ugly thing.
It's incredibly sexy because it's
incredibly powerful.
Right? So, we've now come to the point,
you and I, we agree that that's what you
want. The person out there is going,
"Yeah, I want that as well." Okay,
Robert, that's fine. How do I get there?
Aha. Well, you have to be patient. You
have to know it's a process. You can't
get ahead of yourself. You can't get
ahead of your skis. It's going to take
day by day by day by day. You have to
build it up. You're working against your
own nature. You're working against the
times. So be patient, be compassionate
with yourself and learn to take these
baby steps. And in the book Daily Laws,
I have a lot of different ways of
attacking that. The main way of
attacking it is a learning the ability,
as we talked about earlier, to be able
to detach yourself from the immediate
events going on and to be able to look
at yourself with a degree of dispassion
and say,
"This is what I did really did. What
really happened here?" So just a simple
example, something kind of doesn't go
the way you want it to, which will
happen almost every day or every week,
you know, with your children, with your
spouse, with your boss, wherever. Okay?
What is your normal reaction? Every
single human, including myself, blame
that person. They're not caring. They're
not empathetic. They're an [ __ ]
There's they're they're narcissistic.
Blah blah blah. Stop it. Stop it right
now. Don't do that again. step back and
say, "What did I do?" Okay, if that
person is toxic, why am I involved with
them? There's something wrong about me.
If that person got reactive and
resentful and they had a bad tone of
voice, something that I said, maybe
there was something in me that was
projecting kind of negativity, maybe my
own mood wasn't really was kind of
creating this atmosphere that made them
react that way. Look at yourself instead
of blaming other people. You know, these
are parts of the process. There are many
others, but yeah,
dude, that is so huge.
People always So, I have a saying that I
like that most people [ __ ] hate,
which is everything is my fault.
And I love it.
It's so useful.
So, uh, fault is a word that gives
people, I don't know, emotional distress
or something. And so, they don't like
when I use that phrase. Um, but what I
like to remind myself is that if I did
something different, I could get a
different outcome, right?
And that's so powerful to me to not by
blaming somebody else, by making it
their fault, I give away all my power
and there's nothing I can do about it
and now I'm sort of a victim of
circumstance.
But man, when you take 100% ownership
and you look at your life and say, "My
life is an exact reflection of choices
that I've made." Yeah.
Now, if I want it to be different, then
I just need to only make different
choices.
Completely. And and and one of the
things that that's like that is if
something went wrong
maybe and I'm to blame. Just accept it.
Just accept the fact that it happened.
Don't try to change it, but just say
that this has happened and I'm not going
to fight it and it's just my fate in
life. You know, it's okay. Right? So the
ability to accept things is also taking
ownership of them. So if something bad
happens and you can't really control it
because let's be honest, there are times
that you can't control things. They're
just going to happen. Who predicted a a
pandemic? You can't control that, right?
So your first reaction is to get all
pissy and go, "Damn it. Why'd it happen?
[ __ ] [ __ ] [ __ ] I'm a victim." Blah,
blah, blah. Well, okay. That's just
going to make you more depressed, more
inward, more harder to act in the world.
Whereas if you say, "Okay,
I can't control the pandemic. It's a
terrible thing, but I'm going to roll
with the punches. I'm going to accept
the way things are. I'm not going to
fight it. This is the way the world is.
What can I get out of it? What kind of
benefit? Well, maybe I can reassess my
career. Maybe before the pandemic
happened, I was just headed in this path
and I wasn't I was kind of blind. Maybe
I'm not really happy with what I am. I'm
not happy with my relationships, with my
career. Maybe I need to reassess it.
Maybe it's time for me to be alone and
read books and and study and and learn
new skills etc. So the ability to not to
accept things that you can't change and
to see some benefit from them is also
part of that.
I want to go back to emotions. So we've
talked about how emotions are incredibly
powerful. you um I don't think you use
this example in the book, but it was
certainly along these lines that if you
damage the region of somebody's brain
that deals with the emotional centers,
they can't make decisions, which is
absolutely just insane to me.
Um and you also have a quote in the book
though that I wrote down that I would
like to share with people now. And for
clarity sake, I actually agree with both
sides of this. So, you've got the side
that you talked about where if you
damage the emotional centers of
somebody's brain, they can't make a
decision. And then you also had um a
quote, and I don't know why my the app
has crashed that I have the quote in. I
can paraphrase it if I can't get this.
Oh, here we go. I think I can get it
now. Um
nope, it's not opening. So, the
paraphrase of the quote is that emotions
are essentially a disease looking for a
remedy. And I was like, "Yes, yes, you
can't just believe your emotions." Or
maybe that's not the right way to think
about it, but you can't just take them
on board and because I have this
feeling, I'm going to act on it or it
represents truth,
right?
Help people understand first give us
that like what do you mean? How is it
possible that my emotions aren't
necessarily useful or true
and then we'll balance it with the idea
of how important emotions actually are?
Well, in in in a Japanese Zen way, your
emotions are truth because you are
feeling the way you're feeling. Okay?
So, that's real, right? But it could
stem from a very false source as well.
Okay? So, let's just go back to that
example that I gave earlier of the young
boy who was felt abandoned by his
mother, right? And his whole pattern in
his life is to be the one that's doing
the abandoning. So he's not abandoning
himself. So in the moment that he's with
this woman within this relationship
that's been going on, he's starting to
feel something's wrong with her. She's
bad. She's she's not right for me. She's
going to, you know, I better leave this
relationship, right? He's not reacting
on what she's doing. His emotions are
not coming from what she could be
perfectly fine. She could be totally
loving. He's projecting onto her his own
emotions. What he feels is genuine. He
genuinely feels that something is wrong.
But it doesn't come from the truth
itself. It comes from some deeper, much
deeper pain. So your emotions,
you feeling them, but the source of
them, you have no idea what the source
is, right? So, you know, you explode at
somebody in your office tomorrow because
of something and then you don't realize
that in the morning you were already put
in a bad mood by something that somebody
else said and that kind of made you
prone to like exploding later on in the
day. You are seeing that other person
that triggered you, but you're not
seeing what happened earlier in the day
that set the tone for it that planted
the scene for you being triggered.
Right?
So, you don't have access to the source
of what's really causing your emotions.
Now, I'll be honest, you're never going
to get true access to the actual source
of it because there's something buried
very deep inside. Who knows where it
came from? Who knows how young you were?
Who knows really the unconscious
processes that were going on? Okay. So,
you're never going to get at the core
the real truth, but you can get closer
to it. You can and you cannot react in
the moment. You can say if this you're
this young man who's trapped in this
pattern, it's very difficult a thing to
go. But am I being is it true that she's
actually being like that? If I actually
step back and analyzed her words,
they're totally neutral. She's not being
mean or vicious. She's not about to do
leave me, right? Or she's not betraying
me in any way. It's totally neutral,
right? And I often go through that
process. I've been in a relationship for
a long time where I get a little bit
upset and angry and I'm blaming her and
blah blah blah and I have to go back
like takes a couple hours for the
microwave to kind of cool down, right?
And you go, "No way, man. She Why does
she feel the way she's feeling?" Well,
it probably comes from me, but I'm I'm
totally projecting onto her, right?
So just the idea that you are projecting
your emotions onto people, just the idea
that you're reacting to something that's
an illusion, it's a mirage, is
liberating enough because it's going to
prevent you from doing stupid things.
How many times I've had this problem. Do
you get angry and you send that angry
email voicing all of your upset and
displeasure and then two hours later you
go, "Shit, I wish I hadn't said that.
I wish I hadn't revealed my
vulnerability. I wish I had maybe I was
it was I overreacted, right? So, the
ability to to write that email and then
put it in the draft folder and never
send it. And you know, I have this thing
in my my own uh computer where in my
email that draft folder is getting
larger and larger. It's got 12, it's got
20, it's got 80 things in it that shows
me 80 times I have put that thing into
the draft folder and I have a degree of
control. So
yeah, the idea that there one that you
don't have full access to everything
that led you to react the way that you
did and two that to some extent it's an
illusion. So you call it attitude, I
call it frame of reference. I've given
my entire um professional life to the
idea that frame of reference may be the
single most important thing in the
determining the outcome of your life.
Uh, so looking at right now in much of
the developed world, your zip code is
the number one predictor of your future
success. So were it your IQ, I could
understand that. But the fact that it
just is where you happen to grow up,
that's really really distressing to me.
And so having worked in the inner cities
a lot and seen up close what the problem
is, you encounter people with incredible
intellect, but as you watch them process
the data, they're processing it through
a filter. And that filter is what you
call attitude. And when it encounters an
attitude that isn't helpful, you get an
outcome that's like a funhouse mirror.
And you're like, the way that you're
looking at this doesn't make sense in
the following way. you have a goal and
the way you're thinking about things
either your goal makes no sense, it
won't optimize for fulfillment or joy.
Um, or you have a goal that makes sense
and the way that you're parsing the data
does not lead you to take actions that
will actually move you towards that
goal. Right? And so it becomes this
really um distressing question of okay
somebody gets to adulthood they have an
attitude or a frame of reference that
isn't helping them accurately it isn't
helping them process data in a way that
will move them towards a useful goal.
That's the the cleanest most truthful
way to say it. So then the question
becomes, what can you do to begin
reformulating
that attitude, that frame of reference
in order to get you where you want to
go? Do you think at all about the like
what is the atomized thing that makes up
the attitude? For me, it's beliefs. Your
frame of reference is is a reflection of
I'll call it roughly 25 beliefs that you
have. Get those beliefs right, you're
a-okay. get those beliefs wrong and
you've got a real problem. But the
atomized thing for me is a belief.
What's the atomized version of an
attitude for you?
Well, I'm not quite sure I understand
the belief part, but I I'm trying to.
Um,
do you want me to explain it?
Do you want me to explain it?
Yeah.
All right. So, the most important one.
So, I've actually written down the 25
that I think make this up, but there's
one that's really important. It's what I
call the only belief that matters, which
is that, in fact, you talk about this in
your book. Mastery is essentially about
this idea that if you put time and
energy into getting good at something,
you will actually get good at it,
right?
And that thing has utility in the real
world. Now, if you believe that, then
you'll pick up the guitar and you'll
start practicing. You'll sit down at the
typewriter and you'll start writing. If
you don't believe it,
it wouldn't make sense to pick up a
guitar. You're either good at it from
birth or you're not. And so why would
you bother? Right?
That one belief will bifurcate your
entire life because you're either going
to lean into just the things you think
you're already naturally gifted at and
your life will be limited by whatever
that is or you will spend a massive
amount of time and energy gaining
mastery, right?
And those two, same person,
but those are wildly divergent outcomes.
Yeah. U I I think that's that's that's
very true. Um I don't know atomizing. I
think I might just basically being agree
with you. I would maybe say the stories
that we tell ourselves which comes down
to the same thing because I've
discovered in my meditation that the way
the brain works is it's continually
telling us stories about the world about
ourselves about the way people are and I
don't mean stories in it's literally
what I'm saying it's like constructed
like a story it has a narrative arc to
it right this is what happened to me and
and and the story is constructed and
this the result and what the story I'm
telling myself might not be the correct
story at all. Right? So being able to
understand what really happened, what is
the actually the story that that
occurred there is extremely important.
And so you're hitting on the bedrock
which is extremely fundamental which is
do you believe that you're capable of
change? Do you believe that good things
happen when you go through a process of
learning and taking steps? Do you
believe, going back to your belief, that
you can actually get out of your
patterns? Because you can be fooling
yourself. You can be bullshitting. You
can be saying, "Yeah, I kind of do." But
deep down inside, you don't really want
to do it. Because believe it or not,
your bad patterns give you a degree of
comfort, right? It's something that you
know. and to get out of them, you're
suddenly thrust into the unknown and
that could be very frightening. So, you
could be holding on to these bad
patterns. So, the belief that I can
change, I can actually do some something
different in my life. I can actually
recreate myself. I can actually learn
things. I can actually rewire my brain
because the brain is incredibly plastic.
Even at the age of 40, 50, you can
change your career. You can learn new
skills. You know, I've reached 60. I'm
constantly learning as well. The brain
is insanely plastic. Do you believe
that? Do you believe that you have the
possibility to change yourself, to alter
your patterns? That's probably the
single most important thing right there.
And to get people to believe that, as I
said, there's two levels. There's the
people who will shake their head. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. They'll read mastery, but it
won't mean anything to them because
they're afraid of the change. They're
comfortable with a degree of failure. I
hate to say, because if you don't try
things, you never have to deal with the
responsibility, the pain of failure,
right? So, you don't really want to
change deep down inside. You don't
really believe in Tom's number one
bedrock belief, right? You're kind of
fooling yourself.
So it's not a fairy tale. It's not a
bunch of a myth that we're creating.
It's true that you have the power. The
brain, if you just understood this one
thing that the brain is like a
landscape. It's like a landscape out in
the world that you've seen where things
can be lush and tropical or they can be
completely aid and dead.
You create that landscape yourself. You
create the brain that you have by the
degree of how you're open to experience,
by the degree of how much you learn, by
the degree of how many different sources
of information you take in. You can
create this incredibly alive brain
that's very creative, imaginative, and
how much more fun will your life be if
you're open and and you let things come
in and new ideas come in. So, it's up to
you. You're the one that's creating your
misery, that's creating your patterns.
It's and it comes down to that bedrock
one belief that you just mentioned.
I think we touched on it a little bit
the last time we spoke. It's an
incredibly interesting idea that you
feel like the right person to explore.
Partly because you do take a certainly a
darker look at life than I do. And for
some reason I find myself completely
drawn to that flame uh of the way that
you look at the world. Maybe because
it's good sort of disisconfirming
evidence for me. It doesn't just put me
in my own loop. Um but the guy who
people say some people say that you know
uh Robert you shouldn't write these
books this is like evil Machavevelian
content the world is better off not you
know sort of turning a blind eye to this
um which I hardily disagree with but for
that person to now be touching on the
sublime. What drew you to that?
Well um it's it's I could go on forever
about this. I'll try and keep it
reasonably short, but I've been
interested in this idea for 15 probably
20 years. It's I don't know. I read an
article I read a book about it a long
time ago. Really excited me and I meant
to be my fourth book after I finished
war. I started researching it and then I
got um disrupt distracted by the 50 cent
book that I did. Then came mastery and
then came human nature. And finally I
took a breath and said, "All right, this
is the time for the sublime. It's going
to be my next book. And the 18th chapter
of the law of human nature is about
confronting your mortality. And I talk
about that the sublime in that chapter.
And the idea is that here's how I
explain the sublime. It's kind of like a
circle. If you can imagine human life as
a circle, social life to be a human
means in any time period, the culture
that we live in creates a circle. And in
that circle is a limit to what you're
you're allowed to believe in, what
you're allowed to think, your behavior.
There are codes and conventions and
rules that we all ascribe to. They're
not the same as that they were in
ancient Egypt 3,500 years ago. But back
then they had a circle. It was just a
different circle, right? Okay. So,
you're not supposed to think these
thoughts. You're not supposed to do this
this that. This is the circle that we
live in. Just outside that circle is the
realm of the sublime. It's something
that we're not really ever supposed to
think about or we're not really supposed
to ever do. It's something that's filled
with a slight transgressive energy, a
level of excitement because deep down
inside in human nature, we don't like
limits. We rebel against them. We want
to be free. Our spirits are yearning to
be free. And that sense of these are
codes that you have to abide by is very
restricting. It feels like a prison
almost. So, we're inevitably attracted
to things outside of that. And that is
the realm of the sublime. And it's
incredibly exciting. It contains so much
energy because in that circle, all of
your energy is kind of crushed and
compounded inside of you. It's kind of
you have to feel this. You have to do
this. When you let go and you go explore
outside of it, it's like suddenly you're
tapping into something that's in the
cosmos. Incredibly energizing. It's what
Maslo called a peak experience. Right?
Okay. So the ultimate form of going
beyond that circle is death itself.
Death is the ultimate limit obviously to
our lives. And people who have peered
through that door because the word
sublime literally means up to the
threshold.
That's the Latin. Up to the threshold of
a door. So imagine that circle has all
these little doors in it and you're
peering through it. This is something
that I haven't thought of before. Right.
Um, the ultimate door is death, right?
And people who have peered through that
door have had a near-death experience a
little bit to some degree. It changes
you. It's like that is the biggest blast
of the sublime that you can get. That's
the strongest form of the drug
imaginable. You no longer look at being
alive anymore the same way. You no
longer see the trees, the birds, the
people that you love in the same way. Do
you think universally that people see
something better than they did before?
No, it's not true. It's good point.
There have been studies of near-death
experiences.
I don't remember the percentage, but
there is a percentage, the smaller
percentage that has a negative
experience. It's very painful and ugly
and demonic and hellish. And no, they're
not having this. So, thank you for
bringing that up. That's true. But most
people for most people it has this
effect where uh and there reasons why
people have the hellish view. There are
other things going on. It's not that's
just not normal. Um is you know you you
came very close to death and you're
alive. So everything has a different
meaning to you, right? Things that you
took for granted before no longer have
that same sense. And there are other
things that go on. Well, anyway, the to
my story here, I wrote that chapter with
those ideas in mind and then two three
months later, I came this close to dying
myself. So, what had been this
intellectual abstract argument about
near-death sublime blah blah blah became
very real, right? I was in a coma. I was
driving my car. If my girlfriend hadn't
stopped, made me pull over.
If the meatics hadn't come quickly, I
would have permanent brain damage or I
would be dead. I came very close. I was
in a coma. I didn't have like visions of
of, you know, angels, etc., and all the
other things that people sometimes claim
they have, but I had some very strange
things, some feelings in my body that
not as often anymore, but I still
sometimes get a feeling that my bones
were kind of melting from the inside.
Oh, there was kind of like a sort of
dissolving. What was solid about me was
dissolving, right? And then a sense of a
very it's only for a brief second and
sometimes I'm not even sure if it's true
or not, but I had an image of me up
above looking down and I had I had died
and people were talking about me, right?
I'm not sure whether my brain in memory
is playing a trick on me, but I seem to
have that recollection. Anyway, it
became very real to me this subject,
right? And so now it wasn't just this
intellectual arg thing about writing a
book about the sublime. It was very very
real. The last thing I'll say is when I
had originally planned the book back in
2005 or so, I was going to be jetting
off to Tiara del Fuego to see, you know,
the the the South Pole. I was going to
go swimming with dolphins in the
Caribbean. I was going to be going on
top of, you know, Mount Evers. I don't
know, whatever. That kind of stuff.
Having sublime experiences.
Obviously, I had a stroke. I can't even
really walk outside my house and take a
normal hike. I can barely walk a few
blocks. I can't do any of these things,
right? So, what I've had to discover is
because I can only write a book if I'm
in the mood of the book, right? So, I
have to be feeling sublime to write the
book. I have to find it in everyday
things. I have to find it in the little
garden in my house. I have to find it in
the cats in my house, in my girlfriend,
you know, and how and in in her eyes
looking outside my window, in the books
that I'm reading. I have to suck the
sublime out of every little trivial
little affair that I goes on in my life.
And putting that in the book, I think,
will So, if I had written that other
book, people would go, "Oh, that's
great." But this guy, this kind of rich
white guy, he's able to fly off here.
That has nothing to do with my life. I'm
living as restricted of a life as you
can imagine. There are people much more
restricted than me, but pretty damn
restricted. And yet, I'm able to find
this in my daily life. If I can find it,
there's no barrier for other people. No
matter if you're flipping burgers and
McDonald's, the world is sublime
and it's all around you. And you don't
have to go to tiara del fuego to to
experience that.
I want to get more into what the sublime
is actually. So I honestly it's a word
that I never really thought of.
Okay. I feel like I have an intuitive
understanding that it's something sort
of surprising and wonderful, but with a
not sort of big
um amplitude is the wrong word, but
there's there's something relaxed about
it like a a warm bath is sublime, you
know, but this idea of it being a
threshold, something that you're seeing
beyond into something new, that's a new
take on it for me, which is far more
interesting. Well, it's it's the sublime
is not a warm bath. Quite the opposite.
It's a mix of pleasure and pain. It's a
mix of two opposing emotions. A sense of
fear and a sense of awe almost
consecutively or at the same time.
Right? So if you go to see a horror
movie or you're on a roller coaster, the
excitement comes from the fact that you
feel kind of at risk that there's sort
of danger there, but you're safe, right?
So you're feeling two things at the same
time, a kind of anxiety and kind of
about the pleasure that you're actually
not being threatened. So neur
neuroscientists have shown that the
mixing of two sort of contrary emotions
creates an incredible intensity of
affect much more than just a single
emotion. So the quintessential
experience of the sublime when it was
first written about in the 18th century
was climbing uh the Alps, the Matterhorn
or wherever it was, right? And you got a
sense of how small you were, how, you
know, you could die very easily if
there's an avalanche
and how, you know, how fragile you were
in the face of this immensity. And yet
the awesomeness of it, the beauty of it
was overwhelming. And so they were
fascinated with this idea of being able
to feel these two contrary emotions at
the same time. So it's not at all a warm
bath. Um, I can only the the sublime is
an experience. It's hard to it's
something hard to put into words. So,
Robert's trying to write a book about
it. Yeah, I know. Believe me. Believe
me, I know. But let me give you an idea.
Give me one example of something that is
so insanely sublime that you can't ever
think the same about the world after you
contemplate this. Okay. So, here you and
I are sitting here talking in this
incredibly high-tech, amazing house with
all the insane technology around us. All
right, consider this. Our planet's some
4 billion years old. Around 3.1 billion
years, in some little bit of pond,
some kind of organic life began. We
don't know how or why or what triggered,
although scientists are getting closer.
some form of single-sellled bacteria
self-created itself out of chemicals
that came from other planets, right?
Carbon, etc. Okay, this single-sellled
bacteria dominated the planet for
billions of years. It was the only form
of life, right? Okay. And then sometime
in the past, I I've forgotten the exact
time frame in my mind. It's in my book.
The first multisellular creature was
created. Maybe that was two billion
years ago or so. Okay? And it was a
complete freak accident. One piece of
bacteria swallowed another bacteria and
created a multisellular organism. It's
only happened once in the history of our
planet. Once. Contemplate that. be we
know that because there's only one line
of DNA that we can trace back to the
first time that it happened. There's not
a second line of DNA. Only one. So it
happened once. It's never happened
again. It was a freakish example. If
that happened happened, forget
everything else that occurred on this
planet. Okay? But it did happen. Okay?
So these are called bottlenecks. certain
things occurred that created um
evolution to go in a certain direction
and they could have occurred
differently. I'll skip to 60 million
years ago when a an asteroid the size of
New York City hit Earth, hit in in the
Yucatan Peninsula and it was the most
insane explosion ever. Like the
equivalent of all the nuclear bombs on
our planet. It destroyed the dinosaurs.
It destroyed 99% of the life on this
planet, right? It was the holocaust of
all holocausts. If it and this meteor
almost missed the Earth asteroid very
easily could have missed the planet
because think of the emptiness of space
and the smallalness of Earth. It was a
freak accident. If that hadn't happened,
dinosaurs would still be walking around
here. Mammals would have never emerged
as the dominant creature. I'll skip to
80,000 years ago. Humans at that point,
there were only like 10,000 humans left
on the planet.
If one single virus,
I'm talking about homo sapiens, one
single virus would have wiped us out at
that point. We were extremely
vulnerable. If that number had gotten
down further, anything could have wiped
us out, right? A change in the climate,
etc. Okay? If that had happened, we
wouldn't be here. and Neanderthalss
would have probably taken over the
planet and who knows what that would
look like right now. Okay, then think of
your own parents and how unlikely was
there ever meeting and and the cir the
fate that happened there. If they hadn't
met, Tom wouldn't be here or you'd be
somebody else, right?
There are 70,000 generations more or
less going into you going back to the
first homo sapien. All right. That one
time encounter between you and your
parents multiplied by 70,000 chance
encounters. So to bring us to the
present that you and I are sitting here
together in this office with all this
stuff around us. It's you and it's me.
The odds against it are so unbelievably
astronomical that you can't even
compute. So what does that make you
think about the what you what's
happening to you right now? If you
really contemplate it, it will alter how
you think about everything. Everything
you see around you, the plants, the
animals, they didn't have to be that
way. It's extremely unlikely. It's a
weird world that we live in, right? So,
that is an example of a sublime thought.
It's a little bit scary because it has
to do with annihilation, holocausts,
deaths, but it's also an awesome thought
about the fact that you're just alive.
So that's that's sort of and it's
something I went into in the second
chapter of my book.
I find this so interesting. So how how
do we make use of that and why is it so
useful?
Well, the reason it's so useful and this
is what I just did in my third chapter
is it's wired into our nature. So a lot
of things are wired that aren't so good
that we could talk about. But the need
for transcendent experiences, the need
to be taken out of ourselves, which is
the source of all of our religious, all
of our spiritual beliefs, and all of our
the art that we create, almost
everything that we humans do, goes back
to our earliest ancestors, right? And
being the first conscious beings on this
on this planet, conscious in the way
that our brains are conscious. They
looked at this world and they saw
things. They go, you know, I'm talking
about aboriges in Australia. How did
this world happen? How did this occur?
How could it be that there are stars and
plants and kangaroos? It's insane. And
right, and they had these kind of
sublime thoughts and out of that they
created gods and spirits and all sorts
of forces. Okay, but that awesome
feeling, that feeling of why, why are
things the way they are? Why is there
something and not nothing is very much
wired into our nature. And to deny it is
very painful. And so what I talk about
in the book is if you're not going after
the sublime, you're going to go after
the false sublime. And the false sublime
will be drugs. It'll be alcohol. It'll
be joining some kind of ugly political
campaign in which you get all your yaas
out and you feel angry and violent, blah
blah blah, right? You know, on and on
and on. It could be porn, you know,
online porn, etc. The kind of drugs that
take you outside of yourself, but are
kind of ugly and they're and they're
addicting and they're not liberating.
So, if you're not going after this,
you're going to find it in some other
way and it's not going to be healthy
and you want this in your life because
it gives you a kind of peace and it
gives you a scale of priorities.
You know, if if the Big Bang occurred
some 13 14 billion years ago and started
this whole thing off, what does my
little 80 90 years of existence mean?
This is like a flash. It's like a pop of
a popcorn in in in this in in the
eternity of time. It doesn't mean
anything. It's it's so small. So, why
does it matter? So, it's calming
actually. It's calming you down. It's
making you think the things that are
happening right now aren't as big as I
think they are. So, you want this in
your life. Then you asked me, "How do
you get it?" Is that your question?
Yeah. So, as you were explaining it, I
thought some people I think are
[sighs and gasps] going to brush it off.
Maybe they don't um stop to really let
that hit them. And so, when you were
talking, I thought, "Okay, is this why?"
So, I've never done psychedelics, but I
have a feeling that
whether it's a Zen Cohen, whether it's a
psychedelic, whether it's using your
ability to shape your own attitude to
suck the sublime out of these simple
moments. There's something to your point
about we're hardwired for it. There's
something necessary about jarring us out
of our frame of reference,
right? that is if evolution is selected
for it, there's something necessary
maybe to combat
our ideas calcifying into dogma. There's
something in there that's critically
important. And so I'm just curious for
people that don't know how to suck the
sublime out of the marrow of a simple
moment, how they do it.
Well, the how they do it is is is is
through my book, I'm afraid. Because
the book you haven't finished writing
yet.
Yeah. that I'm only four of the way
through.
You give us tidbits in in the Daily
Laws, so I will I will thank you for
that.
Yeah, a couple chapters are in there.
Um, the reason I say that, I'm not
trying to hype myself, is there are lots
of books written about the sublime,
particularly in terms of art and in
terms of like cultural history, but
they're very academic. They're very kind
of boring, which is very paradoxical
because it's the last subject in the
world that should be boring. So the book
that I'm trying to write is in obviously
inspirational, but it's also very
practical. So each chapter, the last
section, I include exercises for you to
practice in your life. They're going to
make what I just wrote about actionable.
And in the very end, I give you
meditations, three things to meditate on
every day that'll make this part of your
daily life, part of your daily practice,
right? So I'm trying to make it as as
practical as possible. So for instance,
the first chapter is about the cosmic
sublime which is in the daily laws about
the big bang about the origin of stars
about our own sun and our own planet and
how insane all that is. Right? And I
talk to you about how you can have that
feeling of the cosmos being created by
doing certain things in your daily life.
You can visit certain landscapes. You
don't have to climb Mount Everest. You
can just go to the nearest mountain
around you. Put your phone away,
[snorts] right? Leave that behind. Go
alone if you can or bring somebody with
you and you don't talk.
Interesting.
Just so you can think.
No, just immerse yourself in this world.
I've given you now pages of how unlikely
it is that a mountain exists. I've
explained to you where that mountain
came from. I've explained to you how
unlikely the birds in the sky are and
how unlikely life is. And now you're
you're in it. And now you're seeing at
night if you if you camp out, you're
seeing the night sky. You don't have to
have money to do that. You can go out
anytime to the nearest mountain or hill
and have that experience. Right? There
are other landscapes as well. anything
having to do with water.
Water is the most weird thing if you
ever think about it because as far as we
know, we're the only planet that we know
of that has the form of water that we
have. And we're looking for other
planets that have it.
Form of water.
Yeah. Well, there's no more water on
Mars. It might be buried underneath
underground or they have liquid they
have liquid on it's liquid gas on
Jupiter and Saturn but they don't have
our form of water. There's certainly a
planet out there that will have it. But
water came to us from from the sky. It
didn't it's not something natural to
Earth. It came from rain. It came from
comets and asteroids that left left it
here. These are molecules that aren't
natural to our planet. When you're
swimming in water, you're like inside of
it. It's the only element. When you're
in a mountain, you're not inside the
mountain. You're not inside the dirt and
the stone, but you're in water. You're
in it. It's part of your body. It's
incorporated in you. And to imagine the
vastness of water. So the cosmos is this
vastness, this infinity.
Water is like a touch of that infinity.
There's no beginning or end to water.
There's no kind of limit to it. So, I'm
giving you these places like deserts
that you can go to where you can have a
touch of that. I also tell you on the
internet and I give you all the links.
Here's where you can look at things that
um uh what's it called? The Hubble
telescope has photographed.
It is insane the images that we can now
look at. It is one of the most beautiful
things about living in the 21st century.
They have photographed a black hole. I
describe in that chapter what a black
hole is to black hole is something you
can't even imagine and yet they have
photographed it but just photographing
the farthest reaches of our galaxy the
thoughts that'll inspire so it is very
practical but you have to read my book
I'm very open all you have to do is
publish it [clears throat]
uh that's incredible so I find it very
um I don't know the right way to frame
this other than to say that while I
wouldn't wish a stroke on anybody, the
fact that you in particular are able to
bring back the lessons from that, um
what are you doing on a daily basis to
get those um joyful moments despite all
the restrictions?
Well, I have to be honest, it's a
struggle. You know, some days I'm very
successful
and I feel very excited and happy. Some
days it's like I've got Tourette's
syndrome. I'm just walking around going
[ __ ] [ __ ] [ __ ] [ __ ] [ __ ] I'm so
upset. I'm so frustrated.
And so I'm daily having to struggle with
myself. And um so whenever I feel that
level, the frustration is very easy to
explain. Imagine that you can't really
button your shirt. That your left hand
is so weak that you it it it takes you
forever to button your shirt. To get
dressed in the morning takes like 10 20
minutes to like get my vitamins off the
shelf is this kind of ordeal. I can't
type. So just my hands. So you take for
granted you out there. You take for
granted your use of your hands. Brother,
I can tell you the hand or sister that
hand is a miracle. You have no idea if
you lost one of your hands what a
nightmare it would be. Don't take it for
granted the fine little things that your
hands can do because I can't do them
anymore. You know, I can't walk in a
normal way. I'm always kind of losing my
balance. I have to hold on to things,
etc. I So, the frustration is every
single day there's a tenseness like am I
going to fall? Am I going to drop this?
Can I hold on to this? Can I get this
done? And it builds up until your your
body starts getting tense before
anything ever happens. So I have to
fight that and I have to feel it before
it happens. And I have to go through
kind of a mantra of
you are getting better. You're just not
aware of it. Robert, it's something you
can't see. It's so gradual that it's
going to take three or four more years.
Calm down. It's not like it's this is
going to be you forever, etc., etc.
Other times I don't believe my mantra
and I get upset. So it is a daily daily
struggle and I can go through weeks
where the struggle seems great and I'm
fine and then suddenly I'll fall through
this hole where I'm just like damn it.
You know I see people walking by on the
street taking a hike. Just three years
ago that was who I was. It's not who I
am now. I'm like a different person. I
want to cry. You know, I can't do the
things that gave me pleasure. So
sometimes I can't control it when I see
things in the world that remind me of my
past life. But I had to find
compensation. So I can't take a hike up
into the beautiful Griffith Park, which
is very beautiful with incredible woods
up there. Something I love doing. I
can't ride a bicycle, but I found a a
recumbent bike.
It's basically a tricycle, a souped-up
tricycle, right? But I got the
top-of-the-line
trike, recumbent trike, right? The best
you can get, the fastest, the lightest
weight one. And now I'm able to go up
these incredible hills. Hills, obviously
slower than normal people, a normal
bike, but I can go up the biggest hill
you can imagine. And I do it and I go up
into the hills in the woods and I'm
alone and it's my therapy
and I know that it's ephemeral that it
only lasts for like half an hour, an
hour. I'm suck every second of joy out
of that being in the woods that I can
being alone and being away from
everything. So I've had to find
compensations, you know. I had to look
at the little things around me and find
insanely
beautiful things about them. Also,
I had the kind of stroke that damages
the right side of the brain, which has
an effect on you in many ways, but the
main thing is it you can't your right
side of your brain isn't communicating
to the left side. So, your left arm,
your left leg isn't getting signals from
the brain. That's why I can't do the
things I can't do.
But it saved my cognitive abilities. So
if it had hit in my left side, which
people have strokes, that's the kind of
people that lose the ability to talk,
that can't really think straight. I
wouldn't be able to write a book. So
every day 3:00, if I'm lucky after I've
exercised, I sit down. I'm with my
Sublime book with my notebook. I'm in
heaven.
Nobody bothering me. Please don't call
me. If you call me, I'm gonna cuss you.
I'm gonna make Get the [ __ ] out of my
hair. I'm only working on my book. I am
the happiest little baby in the world,
you know, because that book is saving
me. It's it's my therapy. So, I found
compensations.
But, you know, we talked earlier about
patience.
I'm patient in some sense, you know, to
write a book, but I'm also impatient in
another sense, right? I'm impatient with
my body, with my physical things. I want
to be able to do things now. And so I've
had to learn
a different form like a meta patience
and a whole other level of patience and
and and it's a work in progress. That's
all I can say.
Talk to me about hope. How is it, you
know, as you do physical therapy and try
things and you make some progress but
not as much as you want. How do you
continue to renew your hope?
It's it's the most hardest thing and
it's the most important thing I can tell
you. Um because the moments that I don't
feel hope,
I'm just kind of ready to give up, you
know? I mean, what's the point of this?
So, I have to continually rekindle it.
And it's been a roller coaster ride
because in the beginning, people will
say, "Robert, you've got to try this.
You've got to try um hyperbaric
chambers. You've got to try this this
acoscope that this guy has. You have to
try the stem cell research. you have to
go this and that. I get my hopes up. Oh,
all right. I'll spend thousands of
dollars on this new form of therapy. I
do it.
Little bit of change, but nothing really
happens. Then my hope sinks.
It's like um well, I don't know what the
expression is, a god that dies every
single time this happens is how I
explain it. Like I had this belief in
something and then it got burst. It's
very painful.
And so, you know, people are constantly
suggesting new forms of therapy. my hope
rises and I have to be able to control
that and know there is no quick fix on
this. The actress Sharon Stone had a
stroke very similar to mine
at an age at a comparable age and I
actually was going to try and contact
her. It sounded like we had very similar
experiences. She wrote that it took her
seven years
whoa
to get back to a normal kind of life.
I've done three years so far. So, I have
to tell myself that there are no quick
fixes. And she herself did every form of
therapy imaginable. And believe me,
people are well-meaning and they come,
they say, "Robert, you got to try this.
You got to try that." I've gotten to the
point where like, "Please don't tell me
that anymore." You know, I don't believe
in quick fixes. I have to do this day by
day by day. I have to retrain my body,
you know. So, I'm trying a new form of
therapy right now. It didn't instantly
give me results. Um, it's something very
interesting. It's based on Felden
Christ. Fascinating new way.
What is Feldon Christ?
It's a whole different way of looking at
your body and I find it fascinating.
It's just not hyperdesigned for a stroke
victim, but I think somebody will come
someday. It's based on this idea that
the body is a whole unit, right? So you
can't isolate the parts. The body works
as a whole. It's an complete organic
whole. So if you have back pain doesn't
stem from your back. It stems from your
pelvis. It stems from your hamstrings.
It stems from how you move your legs.
Stems from your neck. The whole body.
And we have built in tensions all over
our body.
We use muscles that we don't need to
use, right? So, every time you're about
to lift something or do something
arduous or even psychologically do
something arduous, the chest muscles
tense up as if that will help you
somehow get over what you're doing. But
you don't need the chest muscles.
They're not designed for that. You're
using muscles that you don't need.
They're expending energy. If only the
muscles that were necessary to do the
job were firing, everything would work.
so much better. So the felt in Christ,
this is called the Anat Banil method.
She was a student of felt in Christ is
there's an ideal of the body that I can
sense when I do the lessons where you're
on a whole other level. You're like only
using the muscles that are necessary.
You're moving with this kind of grace
and elegance and efficiency that wasn't
existing before. all the bad habits with
our necks, our shoulders,
and and the psychological stuff that
they put you through. It's very
powerful. It's just not geared
specifically for a stroke victim.
Then I'm doing another form of therapy.
Tom, you have no idea how boring this
physical therapy is, right? So, when I'm
used to exercises, that's kind of fun. I
even lifting weights can be fun because
you see your muscles building, right?
You feel your heart pounding. swimming,
running, it's all kind of fun. This is
like little micro movements with your
knee, with your leg. It's so boring. So,
I have to like put music on. I have to
watch the ball game. I have to do
something to distract myself. So, I
mean, I'm going through all the the
weeds here of of my process. But
it's well so what I find interesting
about it is just inevitably all of us
are going to go through something or
have gone through something and how we
deal with that crisis is so telling and
the fact that you've you know we were
talking before we started rolling that
typing is hard and so here you have an
author and you've taken away one of the
ways by which they get that out and as
somebody who's thought so I'm a late
bloomer and I have this real sense of
wanting to make the most of the time
that I have.
Late blooming meaning when? How how late
were you blooming? [sighs and gasps]
The the skills stack, right? So, I feel
like I'm getting better, but like when I
think about things that I'm I'm 45 now
and I'm only just now getting confident
in certain abilities.
Thank you.
What's your secret?
Diet,
exercise, sleep, meditation. That really
there's nothing magical. I do not come
from great genes. I'm very sad to
report.
Um, so
when I think about the things that are
just now beginning to click for me and
I'm like, oh my god, like I see even
people on my own team that are 10 years,
15 years ahead of where I was, it's very
easy to be jealous that, oh my god, you
have this insight, you know, so many
years before I did. You know, how much
more time will you be able to make use
of? But very quickly you realize it's
not a fruitful way to approach it. And
so I,
this was years ago now, maybe five years
ago, I did this thing to celebrate, I
forget how many subscribers we had on
Facebook or YouTube or something, and I
went live for 24 hours. So I was on
camera for 24 hours without all I the
only breaks I took were to pee.
Wow. And then 3 days later I was in
England and I gave a speech and um I
didn't have a microphone and so for 9
hours I was essentially yelling um to
this large crowd and then I woke up and
my voice was weird and it didn't go
away. It didn't go away and I felt like
I had a lump in my throat and then like
when I would turn my head I could feel
something click and I was like oo. So
then of course I'm like is this cancer?
Like what is this? and you start
thinking, what would happen if I lost my
voice as a leader, even just in
business, forget being on camera,
my ability to persuade, to um galvanize
a team, to get people excited and
focused, I have learned to do it all
with my voice. And so I started
thinking, what would happen if I lost my
voice? And it's like, okay, like I would
definitely have to mourn. I would have
to go through a period where it's like,
I'm just going to feel badly for myself
for a while. Um, but then it's like you
you make use of what you have. But it
really made me take stock of I had taken
my ability to speak for granted for at
the time whatever 39 40 years and now I
don't and now I'm very thoughtful and so
getting the kind of insights of the
struggle that you're having um it's very
useful.
Yeah. I mean it's unfortunately it's
inevitable for everyone. You may not you
may not go through a stroke but you're
going to deal with some kind of
adversity
where the physical things that you took
for granted are taken away from you that
just happens. It's just the nature of
life and it can occur at any age. Um, so
these are skills that you have to
develop and you but the main thing I try
and tell people is I don't know how much
how how powerfully I can I can implant
this in your brain but do not take for
granted what you have right now because
I can tell you I did. I thought I'd be
swimming the rest of my life. It was my
life. It meant so much to me. Do not
take for granted what you have now when
you're doing these activities. Feel
insane amounts of gratitude that you
have a body that can perform these
things because it could be taken away
from you tomorrow. Right? So that's the
number one thing I want to tell people.
It's not to get anxious and paranoid and
fearful about the future. That's not
going to help you at all. You need to
have a joyful life, a happy life. So,
but look at what you have right now and
look at the marvels, the things you
don't realize, as I said, what your
hands and legs and brain can do. It's
absolutely miraculous and awesome. So,
just look at it that way. And then if
these things happen,
we are creatures that are able to
accommodate ourselves to things. We can
be very good at that, right? You know,
we find compensations for it. I mean the
other thing you you know being 45 I was
even late more a later bloomer than you
I think. I mean I didn't start writing
the 48 laws until I was about 36 37. You
were probably you were doing things well
before that if I remember
from a business standpoint. Yeah. Yeah.
It your story of late blooming is really
extraordinary. Like it's amazing.
Well yeah I mean um so you know until I
was 36 I was pretty lost. I wasn't like
starting a great business like Quest and
all these other things. I was a
struggling, depressed, penniless
screenwriter in Santa Monica in a
one-bedroom apartment, you know, in this
kind of rundown apartment building,
right? And then suddenly my life
changed. So, I'm as late a bloomer as
you can get. But there's a reason why
you bloom late, if you bloom at all,
which is it comes at the moment that
you're ready for it, right?
So people who are 32, 33 that you might
be envious of,
they're not ready to create what you're
able to create now with all of your
experience and all the things you've
learned with all the businesses you've
started, all your entrepreneurial
skills, all the people you've
interviewed. You have that rich
landscape of a brain that we're talking
about. that 32 year old, they may have
more, you know, some more experiences
than you had, but they have nowhere near
the ability to to exploit it like you
have now, you know. So,
yeah, I like to run the brain in a vat
experiment and that I find it really
useful and every time I explain to this
this to people, I never see the sort of
spark in their eye that I want to see.
But for me, this has been really
liberating, which anytime I find myself
thinking, you know, woe is me or
whatever, I say, hold on, imagine for a
second that all of this is just the
frame of reference that you need.
Literally, you came into existence in
this moment. You're a brain in a vat
somewhere and all the trauma, sadnesses,
um, failings, all of that is the context
to your point about emotions is the
emotional context becomes necessary for
you to make decisions and move forward.
So rather than lament, it just like make
sure that you're making decisions that
propel you forward. And even though I
don't believe that, I think my life was
lived and it is exactly what I think it
is and the traumas and all of that are
all real and they're just a part of me.
But there's something about running that
thought experiment that allows me to
recontextualize the purpose of, you
know, whether it's lamenting being a
late bloomer or my big lament, which you
talk about in the book. Um, you know,
just not being as smart as I want to be.
Like when I see people that can really
process data quickly, oh, I get so
jealous to this day that everybody has
their thing. That's my thing. And uh but
realizing that with if you look at it
from just a slightly different angle,
all of a sudden it's like, "All right,
I'm good."
You process data very quickly.
You think that because you're talking to
me about subjects that I've already
thought about if you were talking to me
about a subject that's totally new. Uh
it it certainly startles me every time
how long it takes me to really like I
would never be a debater on national
television. I will just tell you that.
So that does not speak to my strength.
specialized skill
that I wish I had.
No, really.
Definitely.
Yeah. I mean, I've been around I've been
at social gatherings where there'll be
uh uh this one person I know who has
these meetings with the smartest people
around and these these whipper snappers
who are 25, 26 and they're doing what
you're doing. They're they've got all
this information, all this snappy stuff,
all these anecdotes. Damn, where's that
coming from? You know, I'm just not like
that animal, right? I'm slow. I'm
deliberate. I need to read about I need
to process things and I go slowness is a
good thing right they may be a whipper
snapper but they may be not being able
to like go into depth about anything
they're on the surfaces they're kind of
regurgitating ideas and beliefs that are
kind of on the surface that they're good
at at fooling people but they're not
going into the depths. People who go
into the depths are slow, are
deliberate, take time to think, who are
more thoughtful, you know, and are more
patient. So, I wouldn't want to be that
fast, you know, that high-speed
processor that they have because I don't
think that's where great things come
from.
It's interesting. That's a very good way
to think about it. The harder way to
think about it, though, is to say, what
if they really are just better than me?
And now facing that. So the one that I
always pose to people is I want you to
imagine that someone you really respect
doesn't respect you. That's hard. Now if
you can deal with that, like if I can
stare nakedly at my own inadequacies,
compare myself to somebody who just
objectively is better at something that
I want to be good at. Not even
discounting like there might be
trade-offs, but can I look naked at
somebody who is truly better than me at
that great and still find joy and
fulfillment in my life? That to me is
like that's the question. And so I've
tried to get myself to a place, you
talked earlier, I thought this is so
brilliant, that your ego gets knocked
down, but you have these mechanisms like
a thermostat to reset your sense of
self. That to me is the juice. You have
to get good at that. And so I used to
really get in emotional twists over this
stuff, but I have learned some very
useful techniques to keep my emotional
equilibrium. So I can say that I'm
envious of people that have that without
diminishing my sense of self or, you
know, losing time and energy to worrying
about it anymore. I used to. I don't
want to paint that this was easy, but
that to me is is the trick.
Okay. But I still think your process of
that they're so much better than me is a
bit of an illusion or the reason for
being envious. Okay? So you combat your
envy. All right? But I'm trying to tell
you I don't think there is a reason for
your envy in the first place. So people
they're not as brilliant as you think
they are. Right? People are good at
faking things generally. Right? And then
maybe they're not as happy as they seem
to be. maybe their life. You're just
seeing them on television or with their
snappy answers, but they're covering up
everything else that's going on
underneath, right? You're not seeing the
full picture there, right? So, there's
generally your envy is always kind of
exaggerated because you're beginning
from a place of insecurity. You're
beginning from a place of inferiority
where you're primed to feel envious of
people like that. So, it's almost
starting with you. you're almost
projecting onto them their superior
qualities, you know, and I find myself
doing that. Yes, there are people who
are better than me. I certainly know
that. There's a writer I deeply admire
who passed away recently. He's much more
of an academic, an intellectual.
His name is Roberto Colasso. He was an
Italian writer. Wrote a lot about
ancient Greece. That guy is far more
brilliant than I am. He's amazing what
he wrote about. I'm in awe of it and I
really mourn his passing. But I think
it's important to feel for that not envy
but just disinterested and admiration
for people who are superior to you and
to recognize it. I know there are plenty
of writers and thinkers who are superior
to me. And if they are genuinely that
way, they're not bullshitting.
All my hats off to them. We need people
like that. It it it in it reaffirms my
faith in humanity when I see someone
that I think is vastly superior or great
at what they do. I wish I could be like
them. Okay, there are other humans on
this world. It's not as bad as we think
it is who are absolutely [snorts]
brilliant. And you know, I feel that way
about great scientists as well. I'm kind
of a a scientist mon.
So, um
what's a mon?
Oh, sorry.
No, I love it. You're teaching me
something.
It's a French word.
Mon means a failed, you know, I wanted
to be a wannabe. I'm a scientist wannabe
sort of thing. I missed the boat. It
literally means missed. Um
so, you know, I deeply admire it and um
and if I detect creativity in people in
their work, I'm in awe of it, you know,
and there are people who can do
creativity that I can't even begin to
imagine. That's where I feel awe and
genuine admiration. I never feel envy.
Believe me, I feel envy all the time,
but not for people who are incredibly
creative.
Yeah, it's interesting. That's a great
frame. I love that. Like you, when I
meet somebody that blows me away, I love
it. Like I'm stoked. I'd be lying if I
said that I didn't want it also for
myself, but I'm stoked that it exists in
the world. Um, yeah, that is very
exciting when you see what humans are
capable of and then when you take us as
a collective, it's really interesting.
So, I just I was interviewed by a guy
named Brian Keading yesterday who wrote
a book about um I think it's called Into
the Impossible. Uh, but he talks or no,
sorry, his book is about um beyond like
getting rid of the Nobel Prize. I forget
the exact title, Brian, forgive me. Um,
but
he was talking about how the Nobel Prize
has like caused some of the greatest
scientists on planet Earth to commit
suicide and like all this crazy [ __ ]
And I was like, "What?" And he was like,
"Oh yeah, you you um get these guys are
nominated for a Nobel Prize, but because
they never win, it becomes so
devastating that they can't live with
it." And I'm like, "You're nominated for
a Nobel Prize, something that like
0.00001%
of humanity will ever, you know,
achieve." Uh but he was like yeah it's
like a really a devastating thing for
people and he he of course remembered
all the people that had won and I guess
you have to sign this book when you win.
And so in the book you see like um
Albert Einstein and all these other
people and he said you know Fineman was
like well I'm never going to be an
Einstein. Einstein was like I'm never
going to be a Newton. Newton was like
I'm never going to be a Galileo or
whatever. And it was like,
you know, that all of these people were
just like we look at them and like, oh
my god, like that would be insane to hit
that level. And each and every one of
them had someone that they were like,
well, but I'll never be that person. So
fascinating.
Well, that's that's that's human nature
in a nutshell because I talk about that
in the laws of human nature in the
chapter about envy that our brains
operate by comparison. That's how it
operates on the most basic level to a
piece of information comes through our
senses and our brain immediately
processes it by comparing it to previous
things that we that we've experienced.
So the brain only operates by comparing.
So when you create a social animal that
has a brain that operates that way and
is conscious, obviously they're going to
be primed to continually compare
themselves to other people, right? So
Albert Einstein was comparing himself to
Neil's Boore to other people who he had
insecurities as well. People who were
into quantum mechanics and making these
great discoveries. He felt that kind of
little wound of envy as well. And it's
been written about. So yeah, it's
impossible to get over. The most
powerful person in the world is going to
feel that envy. And in fact, the higher
up you go,
the more insecure you might tend to
become, you know, and you wonder, do I
still have it? I'm getting older. A lot
of scientists reach their prime when
they're 30, 35. Now they're 45 and
they're 50 and that Nobel Prize slip
through their hands even though they're
absolutely brilliant. So, they're going
to be feeling envy. Envy is deeply
deeply human and nobody wants to talk
about it. It's the most common human
emotion and it's the least common topic
that we ever discuss
except in your books where you go into
it beautifully which I love and that's
part of the fun of your books is it's
all the things that nobody wants to talk
about and talked about well and
articulately with stories and evidence.
I mean, it's really fascinating and for
anybody that wants to, you know, do what
we were talking about earlier and
develop that self-awareness, just
hearing about it talked about so clearly
is very helpful.
Oh, well, thank you.
Very helpful, dude. I love your work. I
It has been a [clears throat] joy to
have you on the show as many times I
have. I cannot wait for the next one.
Yeah, this is what my fourth time.
Three or four? Yeah. And hopefully there
will be five, six. That's incredible.
Yeah, I [clears throat] love having you
on the show.
Big on your show.
Thank you for being here.
Yeah.
Where can people follow along as you
write the next one?
Well, we have the the new book out,
Daily Laws, which came out last week,
which is amazing.
Okay.
I did the audio version. I highly
recommend it. You you make multiple
appearances.
I did. Yeah. How do I sound?
Fantastic.
Okay.
Now, secretly, I wish you had read the
whole book. Was there a reason that you
didn't?
How's the other person?
Great. It was wonderful. But when I mean
I want Robert Green.
Well, um it's it's a bit stressful. Um I
I love it. I would have done the whole
book, but just to do the parts that I
did took about 3 hours and it's about 5%
of the book.
So, you know, you do the math. It would
have taken like two solid days.
No doubt.
And um I'm not a trained actor.
I'm going to do the Sublime book.
That would be
I'll be narrating that because I do
enjoy it. It's kind of fun. And because
I wrote it, I think I kind of give it an
extra flavor.
So yeah. Um, so you can I have a new
website. It's robertgreenofficial.com.
I hope I have that right. I'm really
Robert Greenofficial. Your socials are
robert greenofficial.
Yes. And there you will find Instagram.
I have Tik Tok, believe it or not,
my man.
Yeah.
That's good. That's good. This new
generation needs to know.
Okay. So I have Tik T if I need Tik Tok,
Instagram, Facebook, uh Twitter, and
then uh website where you can get links
to all of my books and some of my
ancient blog posts and things like and
interviews. It's and my YouTube channel.
Incredible. Well, as always, thank you
for being here. It was wonderful. I
can't wait to read
enjoy my in discussions with you.
Thank you, guys. Trust me when I say you
don't want to miss a single word that
this man says. So, be sure to check it
out. And speaking of things you don't
want to miss, if you haven't already, be
sure to subscribe. And until next time,
my friends, be legendary. Take care.
Peace.