Embracing Unpredictability: Lessons from Chris Sacca and Tim Ferriss on Life, Business, and Humanity

I need to memorialize these things for the benefit of humanity before we're all obviated like these kids who have these

incredible GPA in this test taking I think it might be useless I think they might have optimized for useless skills

and I think the only thing that might keep us going is that Randomness that unpredictability those flaws those

fuckups the things that make us banged up the things where we make bad decisions where we're self-indulgent

I've had to teach our team the number one thing you can be in this business is unpredict ictable I am known as

Mercurial I burn Bridges like I will not hesitate to [ __ ] fight you I wear the stupid shirts I don't give a [ __ ] about

much like I've been known to just light it on fire and guess what people take me seriously as a result right I haven't

backed down from all those [ __ ] character flaws I have that are very self-destructive but like I am all gas

no [ __ ] breaks as you know although in our line we call it no gas no breaks we need to cultivate more of that if we

have any hope as a [ __ ] species we just need to I'm [Music]

sorry you know my host today as the human guinea pig the sample size of one and the only clinical trial on two feet

and New York Times bestselling author of The 4our work week the 4-Hour Body the 4-Hour chef and the 4minute intimacy

guide this man has inspired Millions to learn Mandarin Chinese in just 3 hours while doing handstand keal during their

optimal billing cycle as one of the founders of the life hacking movement he leads by example and not having checked

his email since the Clinton Administration and Outsourcing all of his sneezes and existential crises to

Bolivia his chart topping podcast practically gave birth to the manosphere and spawned

an entire generation of wannabe pod Bros who think dropping references to stoicism makes them philosophical sages

as they read un's ads from man's basement while promoting pseudoscientific creatine enema

regimens if it's cool today my host blogged about it in the 9s wrote a 13-point checklist for optimizing in it

and has the lab results to prove it when he's not interviewing worldclass performers with pauses so pregnant they

wear elastic waistbands you can find him meticulously organizing his pharmaceutical grade kitchen fridge full

of blood urine and stool samples and his bathroom cabinet looks like a GNC nutrition store [ __ ] a Japanese

vending machine he is only 14 months away from having supplemented every possible molecular combination from the

known periodic table he has hot boxed with Himalayan monks ice bath with arctic Shaman and achieved ego death

with cultures that anthropologists haven't even discovered yet on four separate continents there are sacred

psychedelic ceremonies that tribes have named after him and twice his meditations have opened portals to

another dimension he's given lectures on Sena in 27 languages can ask for warm body oil and CBD cream in

31 and say whoo brother we just tripped balls and 38 I challenge any of you to identify a medieval weapon with which he

hasn't competed at the international level this is a man who enchants the world's most powerful and influential

people with the insatiable curiosity of a 4-year-old the energy level of a 7-year-old who just ate three boxes of

M&M's and when texting memes to his friends the emotional maturity of a 10-year-old he's already prepared

interview questions for future podcasts who have yet to be born carbs fear Him to-do lists quake in

his presence his morning routine starts before he goes to sleep and his gratitude lists kick off by individually

thanking each of his gut bacteria his circadian rhythm is so optimized that he experiences next

week's REM sleep during yesterday's power naap he's had romantic relationships with kettle bells but we

are told he is holding out for a human lady long term the world's most eligible bachelor

who just last week stopped requiring potential dates to submit 3 years of sleep tracking data the man the myth the

legend the guy who would absolutely wi gold if self-experimentation and self-pleasure

were an Olympic sport it's the one and thank God for all of us the only Tim Ferris everyone Tim Ferris Tim Ferris

everyone now for people who have not heard the first episode but maybe they see the headline which is Chris Saka on

being different and making billions would you like to just give a quick snippet of where you grew up I believe

it was somewhere in Connecticut as the sign on of a wealthy family I get that wrong yeah I grew up in Lockport New

York a little town on the Eerie Canal just north of Buffalo a town that is as middle class working class as it gets we

had a town employer it was the GM plant where they made radiators and air conditioners for GM cars most of my

buddies dads worked at the plant and I feel really lucky to have grown up in that kind of place a safe place a fun

place I wasn't exposed to any extreme wealth and I also wasn't Expos any extreme poverty but at the same time I

also feel lucky to have seen the canary and the coal mine and what happens when the you know company Town Factory

shuts down and the jobs ship off to Mexico and the pensions bankrupted my buddies dads who were retired suddenly

had to work as greeters at Walmart and before long we had the largest trailer park in the Northeast in our town drugs

that ultimately became fentanyl in Modern Times Really set in and there was just a lot of angst and depression and I

watched that town go from reliably Union Democrat to hardcore Maga but along the way really saw the

empathetic roots for it like why is this happening what happens when people lose agency over their lives when they feel

like they can't provide for their kids the way their parents provide for them when they lose their small businesses

and those are replaced by a Walmart or Home Depot and I feel like that's something that I've really tried to stay

in touch with and I know we're not really going to talk about politics but it leaves me with the state of America

today never being a surprise I mean I was just back in Buffalo this weekend go bills and nothing about what's happening

in America is surprising I don't love it but it doesn't shock me and so I feel really grateful to have grown up there

now what it means is by the time I got into this business I didn't have a network I didn't know anybody I didn't

even know what money really was I had to make my own way and everything I did and I had these incredibly bright and

supportive parents who went way out of their way to create opportunities for us me and my brother but it's the same time

I was an outsider to the kind of stuff we do now for sure and I still feel like that you know

I lived in the valley for a while in Silicon Valley but as you know Tim because you

visited me various places I've spent more of my time outside I live in the Rockies now I live in Montana before

that Wyoming before that trucky I really try to stay in places where real

people live and work and you know our kids go to public school and you know I would never claim to be fully in touch

cuz my life is ridiculously special but at the same time I feel really lucky the way I grew up going to public schools

and being one among many and I worry that you know the kind of people Tim you and I know and the kind of people we

work with aren't those people anymore you know and have really lost touch and you can see it in the decisions they

make and the stuff they say did we start this out light-hearted enough are we on to a like did we yeah I was going to do

some knock knock jokes but I'm not sure that's an appropriate segue I mean there's other stuff we said in the old

episode like look I was really good at school I went to University for math starting in seventh grade I think one

thing that I've talked about before but I will bring up because I see it missing these days is

I always had a hustle I always had a little bit of a side business I mean from the time I was six years old I was

going around the neighborhood selling wallnuts that I'd poke holes in and call air fresheners or rocks that I'd found

in a parking lot I was literally going door too what was your JT Marlin and Associates 100% I mean I started trading

Commodities when I was 13 or 14 I had a pager that had a 45 second delay to the Chicago Board of Trade talk about

latency and I was trading live Hogs I just always had a business mowing lawns washing cars detailing a paper route I'm

not sure we talked about at the live Hogs somehow we ski that how did you even get into Commodities I'll tell you

my dad's best friend ran basically a Construction and Equipment Rental business that I have talked to you about

where it was a gritty ass job you know my mom and dad believed in the sweet and sour this is the sweet and sour yeah

exactly so it was just grind it out work your ass off in a job job and my boss there who is my dad's best friend you

know he was under strict instructions to my dad to just kick our asses and make us appreciate everything we had and

hopefully go on to work our asses off in school and maybe you know not have to do a job like that someday a lot of my

co-workers were on parole and it was a tough dead- end situation but that guy had a Commodities

account on a computer up in the attic of the building I worked in and he said come here like you probably know what

the hell is going on with this stuff I didn't but he showed it to me I went to the library I started learning about

stochastics about charts and technical analysis and then I was reading about seasonality of you know literally frozen

orange juice concentrate like Trading Places and cocoa and coffee and oil and I identified what I thought was a

pattern anomaly in live Hogs and he had this deal with me he said look I've got like $3,000 this

account you make a trade take a week I want you to think about it you make a trade if you make money we'll split the

upside if you lose money I'll cover it by the way that's called venture capital I went all in I read everything

I studied everything I looked at these charts and imagine charts on like a low res green monitor right I mean old

school yeah like War Games style yeah and I had this pager and I'm like trying to go to school and also monitor my

quotes on my I think it was called a quotron pager and eventually I placed this trade and two weeks later I cashed

out and I netted $171 for myself nice and I just remember thinking downstairs I'm making $425 an hour upstairs I just

made $171 by pushing a button and using my brain I was like I want to be the guy

who works upstairs I can't tell you how how seminal that experience was for me the

rest of my life like there's only so far you can lever a manh hour Bob haos is that guy's name I feel incredibly

indebted to him for that kind of exposure you know in the Rich Dad Poor Dad world my mom and dad they didn't own

stocks they weren't really investors like that they had a rental property once but but Bob H was kind of like my

rich dad a guy who got me exposed to Capital markets Amazing Life hugs yeah I mean but I also had hustles like in high

school I ran a card room you know I started one in junior high but by the time I was in high school I ran a

full-on card room I paid off a teacher rest in peace Mr Maine he was on the rake and so we were always hustling I

was selling Blow Pops with my buddy Hawkeye we ran a little sports book Hawkeye did he give himself that

nickname no no no that was given to him at his birth actually I was just at the Bills game all my high school buddies

and I turn around I'm talking to some other people I had some family I turn around and I my daughters who are 13 11

and N playing beer pong with my high school buddies and we'd been deep in the tailgate with pinto Ron if anyone

follows the bills the girls were eating baking off of pinto Ron's car and making pizza with pizza Pete who cooks Pizza in

the file cabinet literally go Google that Pinto Ron and pizza Pete are absolute Legends it only happens in

Buffalo but then the girls are actually playing beer pong with my high school degenerate buddies and they're like is

this okay and I was like it's better than okay now they weren't slamming beers they were slamming sodas but I was

just like I feel like these skills aren't taught to Children anymore and it was funny our 13-year-old

when they're like hey CeCe come jump in the game she's like all right but I haven't played this in a while and my

buddies all piss themselves like in a while you're 13 this is amazing and our kids were talking [ __ ] placing side bets

like you know a little bit of gambling I feel like we've got a generation of kids who's lost that edge completely and so

again I feel very lucky to have grown up in a place where I had opportunities to you know commit small

misdemeanors and you know I had more than one detention I definitely appeared before the principles on many occasions

you know just some light Mischief we're going to come back to that is there anything though from our last

conversation that you would revise or that you think was missing given your last 10 years of life roughly did

anything jump out at you I don't think so nothing jumped out tremendously I mean I think

that the kernel of who you and I are has remained remarkably intact hopefully for better yeah and I at the same time

recognize that you've had a lot of Life Changes you've had a lot of professional changes so there are probably maybe not

some revisions but addendums at the very least and you sent me to your own description the world's longest text

message about what we might chat about which was very help and my response was in addition to all

of this because they were great topics and we're going to touch on a bunch of them the lessons that Chris Saka has

learned yeah right since last time and I was leading with the I suppose precautionary note of avoiding a lot of

politics but what comes up for you just as a human yeah as a man as a parent as a husband anything I'll tell you what

was interesting about Rel listening to that was I actually felt a lot of pressure

because I was like [ __ ] I don't have a lot of new material we used to just roll tape right

like you would just hit record the sound quality on that is abysmal there's seagulls going in the background there's

people partying down below you and I are maxing out mics in the Red Zone like you couldn't hear [ __ ] but back then there

wasn't like an industry of professional podcast guests right you know those conversations weren't optimized for like

what is going to be the p takeaway quote what's going to be the title card of this one right the Oprah moment where I

get you to cry and then make a thumbnail out of you with a red arrow pointing at your face I'm good at that [ __ ] yeah I'm

good at that [ __ ] if we have a few minutes I am actually authentic and vulnerable but you know what I don't

have like no one's written the naval Almanac of [ __ ] that chisaka says right that guy's intimidating like he's

brilliant and he reduces everything to 80 characters you're like [ __ ] that's true like I don't know if that guy just

sits up in a cave on a mountain side and you got to hike up to see Nal these days so I listen to these episodes where I'm

like okay this is a real conversation where I am happy to Bear my soul I am accountable to an audience of me my wife

and my kids and that's it so I will just say what I really want to say you asked me last time what changed between 30 and

40 and I talked a lot about reorienting myself around cuz you also asked like who is someone I looked up to and a

mentor Etc and I would say right now I have few if zero of them because I started to

realize and I started to touch upon this last time and it's only become truer anytime I put somebody on a pedestal I

realized it holds them to a universal purity test across everything you know I gave the example of Bill Gates in the

last one I was like I just had dinner with him and Melinda and so yeah yeah exactly just changed my name on

Riverside to Chris's Idol and Mentor well I had already put mine as idle and so I left out the mentor part

but I mean Bill Gates is amazing in so many regards and he's also a [ __ ] disaster in so many regards right and so

if I were to say like he's an idol and a mentor Etc it implies this like I've taken all of it and I think if there's

anything that's a Scourge in today's society it's these Purity tests it's this like you have to be perfect in all

regards or we toss you out yeah and I am going to be political for a second that is one of the major flaws of the

Democratic Party is you either sign up to everything they believe in or [ __ ] you you're out and the Republican party

has been like hey choose from this menu you anything here bro high five let's go and I think that's one of the things is

that people to the left have just made each other feel bad and have held each other to these

impossible [ __ ] standards that don't allow for growth that don't allow for imperfection that don't even allow for

just the wobby saabi of a human experience and so I've really tried to demystify putting people on a pedestal

and instead looking to people for examples of one aspect of a life MH I mean I will say

like I really look up to Rich and Sarah Barton so rich founded Expedia Zillow Crystal and I look up to them as

a family as parents as business people and entrepreneurs they're ahead of us on the kid game so their kids are in

college and you know our kids are in middle school and so I would say I kind of do look at them as the total package

a bit I've spent some time with Rich amazing human being what about them specifically jumps out to you like what

is it that you'd like to emulate or that you think is rare or that you'd like to model anything I mean look I think the

biggest danger of raising kids with privilege is that they turn out to be [ __ ] yeah right look you press the

[ __ ] red you know mute button like the end of the Oscar speech anytime I say it but Donald Trump is an example of

what happens when someone is raised without anyone ever saying no to them yeah no matter how you vote we can agree

no one has ever said [ __ ] no to that guy and that's what you get but the Richer you get the Temptation is to

raise your kids in a way that they're surrounded by people who are like I I you know and increasingly Elon Musk is

what you get when no one says no to you and you've been exposed to lots of people who've been very successful and

once they see that you're on that ride it's very easy to be surrounded only by scants who are there to say yes to every

idea out of and opportunistic interest and so I think that happens when you're raising kids who are lucky enough to not

stay in motel sixes or ride in the you know seating group E on Southwest and so I love the kids that rich and Sarah have

raised how collegial how balanced how hardworking while while also unapologetically bright they are how

different they are from each other but how driven they still are I rich and Sarah a couple I think they balance

working their faces off with also having a good time and so you know I've had deeply

introspective reflective conversations about work with them I mean frankly they were the ones who convinced me and

Crystal to get back to work and start lower carbon when we were very pleasantly enjoying not working

full-time and there are some days when we curse rich and Sarah as a result no how did they convince you to do that

what was the logic behind it or what did they see that led them to Stage an intervention they just said you are

uniquely positioned to do it and you need to do it for the planet and we were like begrudgingly yes and then I'm

telling you there are definitely days where rich and Sarah Barton are a bad word in our house because I'm like [ __ ]

rich like he is probably [ __ ] skiing right now and I'm dealing with some horeshit or I've been staring at Montana

out the window and have not steo from this [ __ ] computer today the Bartons actually wrote out

their family Creed I guess I would say like I'm not going to give any insight into

what's in there but they wrote out like what does it mean to be a Barton and like that exercise alone is so powerful

and as Crystal and I started writing that for ourselves wow nobody ever really takes

that time to like what do we stand for if we were gone tomorrow what would we want our kids to take away from who we

were how we got here you know there's this amazing data on how the children of people who are rich but when those

parents grew up middle class or poor those kids end up all right but their children are

[ __ ] I mean there's like actual sociological data on this because we can teach our kids about spending about

saving and Thrift and hard work etc but they don't have the empirical basis for it it's a learned lesson right yeah they

have no real deep root in their DNA for passing it along and so we've tried tried to codify it a little bit what

does that look like like how long is it like 18 Pages 18 Pages what kind of stuff did you try to cover ultimately

the kids will be in there the kids will be part of the conversation Crystal spent six years writing biographies of

my grandmother before she passed at age 94 and then her parents now her parents are two of the most fascinating people

who' have ever walked the planet will'll just say that they spent over 40 years each in the service of the government in

various roles you know known and unknown etc etc etc but and the biographies she wrote were great they cannot be

published because they would have to go through certain agencies for stuff to be cleared but incredible public servants

two of the most honorable people I've ever known I met them when I was 18 years old you know Crystal and I were

besties starting at age 18 I asked her out and she friend zoned me for 14 years but my grandmother's biography was

interesting my grandmother from the Midwest lived most of her life in Omaha Nebraska and had this real

quotidian wonder and beauty and treasure to her life a mom of seven a volunteer she worked in prison she was a leader of

a of a National Organization of Catholics school teacher but here was this woman who's a leader of a National

Organization of Catholics and one of the things she put in her biography that cryst did was I think it's really

important that men and women live together before they get married because I think divorce is a much bigger problem

than premarital sex I think she was 92 when she said that and like that paying it forward as

a as a leader of a Catholic organization I really just think she did an incredible service I loved hearing

her priorization like hey here's what the Creed says here's what the doctrine says Etc but here's the reality I would

rather see a family to make sure that parents are compatible and a family stayed together for their lifetimes then

deal with the breakups Etc like it was really incredible so we cover everything in there how we would like to

communicate how Crystal and I think about making up after a fight how we think about making decisions we put

stuff in there that's almost therapeutic like hey when we first made a lot of money we bought a bunch of houses for

everyone in our family we thought that was an incredible way to thank them and paid off mortgages and stuff and moved

parents out from the east coast to California and then we soon realized [ __ ] we're property managers like the

[ __ ] we own owns us like that's all we [ __ ] do I don't know if we talked about this last conversation probably

not but you texted me at some point and you were like if a raccoon dies in The hbac is Eric Schmidt getting these texts

like what the [ __ ] right dude Eric Schmidt's team reached out yesterday to update like his email address and I

wrote back to them hey team like do you think we could do a check in I'm just curious how the flow is working around

Eric's email his calls his travel like I just kind of want to know and they're kind of like what and I'm like yeah no I

like Eric's cool give him my best but I kind of want to talk to you guys about like What flows up to Eric what doesn't

like how is he handle this [ __ ] right now I'm constantly interviewing people about that because there's finite amount

of time in this space and the [ __ ] you own does own you you know every single object at some point has commanded some

of your attention MH and you know you and I one of our close friends lost everything this week mhm [ __ ] it's Kevin

Rose cuz he's talked about it out loud but you know I said it's totally devastating but if there was one person

I know who will actually end up teaching us something from this it's Kevin Kevin is this guy who loves stuff

but is also untethered to it y it's this weird Duality he has where he is Zen as [ __ ] while also loving a good pair of

sneakers like dude check out this [ __ ] watch but his watch is melted into a puddle and he's like whoops and

you know and Kevin was like you know what I miss I miss the drawings for my kids and I missed the Box my dad made me

and I'm really hoping I can learn from him here yeah yeah it's cataclysmic and I'm not trying to to diminish it at all

and you know folks in Palisades most of them can take care of the next STS folks in Altadena I'm way more worried about

about but I have realized like just [ __ ] gets complicated really fast you think you want all this [ __ ] and so I spend

most of my time trying to get rid of it or downsize it speaking of Tim yes I could have bought an ad slot but there

is an incredible Ranch for sale in Jackson Wyoming right now in Wilson it's two contiguous lots a main house on some

Lakes a ranch house you'll find it it's just south of of Wilson off of Fall Creek Road hey hey

take a look everybody you got your crypto gains with a z that you need to shelter you know there's no state tax no

estate tax in Wyoming the skiing's great abundant Wildlife I'm just saying I'm just saying people think that Chris is

joking about an ad slot but you actually did text me to ask me how much it would cost I didn't realize you were going to

invite me on the Pod later but I was very close to buying an ad God damn it I'm like okay who is actually doing well

in this market and has some gains to shelter it's the crypto investors bro like that [ __ ] is up so you want to take

a little money off the table I'm just saying those California taxes so coming back to Kevin for a sec

I mean he is remarkable in so many respects they've known him forever and one is I do think Kevin does a great job

of working hard playing hard but that's not really a dignified enough way to put it like he savers life he enjoys the

stuff but he's very unattached to it and I can't say that for a lot of people sort of in our circles I'm not

sure I could say that for the vast majority like they do get attached yeah I'm curious for you right

last time we spoke you just appeared as a cover story for the Midas issue of Forbes and you've done a lot since what

has become more and less important and I suppose a better way of asking that is like what have you simplified what are

ways that you have tried to simplify hold on I was just going to say do you remember that line in Steve Martin's The

Jerk where he's walking out of the house you know he's losing his money and he's been rich and he's like I don't need any

of this except this ashtray and he just starts picking up stuff until his arms are bundled as he's walking out of his

house like I don't need any of this at all like I think that's the perfectly opposite of Kevin Rose where just like I

don't need any of these trappings of wealth except this car and this watch is really nice and God damn those shoes

were like limited release and sorry so I missed the question because I was trying to think of Steve Martin since we last

spoke 2015 you were sort of still I mean not to say you aren't anymore but certainly

in a steep Ascent at that point doing a lot of stuff meeting a lot of people getting the toys and I'm just wondering

how you have thought about simplifying or have simplified I've never did the toys thing I mean you like real estate I

was just gonna say Zillow is my not sayfe for work situation when that Satur Live skit came out I was like look

looking over my shoulder like which writer has been watching me I probably put more product suggestions and

feedback into Zillow because rich is one of my close friends than anyone who doesn't work there I notice things about

that app that no one else there does I spend way too much time by the way I I think it's a weird missed opportunity

that Zillow doesn't have a social network attached to it and so I think there should be a comment section I

think you should be able to build playlists of Zillow houses it's a missed opportunity I'm just throwing it out

there just saying wouldn't it be cool to have a playlist of houses like generated by the community I don't even know what

that means what does that mean it's just like real estate poring that flashes for you in front of you so there are blogs

that do this that like keep track of the cool houses I love is it Zillow gone wild that Twitter account is amazing

that finds the craziest [ __ ] happening on Zillow but I think like it'd be cool to just be like look 10 places I would

love to live someday or you know 15 best places where you could shoot a scene in a 1970s adult

film makes me think that you've thought about this yeah favorite locations from you know the big Labowski or best

examples of mid-century modern architecture or something like that yeah okay I got it I think there's a missed

opportunity for influencers to build stuff feature it anyway simplification but real estate is my soft spot toys

real estate yeah part of it is I'm a recluse and I think you know that Amy Schumer once wrote an essay since the

last time we spoke it was about being an introvert who makes a living on stage and I lit up and was like I feel

seen you know me Tim my ideal social situation is Danish sized like four six is huge I love getting four great

buddies together for a weekend and interacting with no other human beings and so I like space so I like to live in

places that are out of the mix where I can be very specific and opt into my social interactions because they drain

me what happens is I don't like being in big groups or around lots of people so I get there and I overcompensate by being

loud and boisterous and amazing and like or Larger than Life but really what I'm doing it's like cranking your iPhone

screen up to 100% I'm just draining my battery and I need that time to recover so I've Loved creating spaces for myself

to be alone MH and so I think that's an absolute Vice okay and then have you divested yourself of things

relationships things you used to prize heavily that you no longer value heavily or highly Tim have you heard of Jackson

Hole Wyoming because there's a ranch for sale just south of the city that would fit that theme dude

there's abundant Wildlife there's moose and elk and you can see Bears it's really incredible fishing it's on the

oris's first Blue Ribbon certified fishing property I'm just saying yes the first thing we sold was hard to sell you

know people still think about us living in trucky but we haven't been trucky since 2011 mhm and that was the first

thing Crystal and I bought together and to let go of that was weird and disorienting but since then yeah I've

gotten pretty good at selling and letting go and realizing and more importantly not buying it's like having

premarital Abode before the messy divorce yeah exactly that's a really good way of putting it but you always

ask people their favorite books Etc like one is Morgan's the psychology of money oh Morgan hle yeah great book that

Echoes a lot of refrains but a lot of that like The Millionaire Next Door that kind of stuff all of them are just like

look the way you get rich is by not spending it in the first place and so what Crystal and I have started to

realize is it's not the check you write it's the [ __ ] time you spend mhm we were just about to build a house and we

realized oh God do you know how many decisions that is and it turns out if you ask me about something I am gonna

have an opinion shocker if you just make it I wouldn't noticed but like when we renovated a

house in La they're like hey how do you want this wood to meet that wood to meet that wood I'm like you [ __ ] I never

would have seen it but now that I've seen it I'm going to sketch it for you and there's going to be an eigh inch of

Tolerance we're going to have a hold back now I'm tortured by those details and Crystal is even more of a detail and

design and you know flow person than I am and so but what we start to realize is like those projects that we buy and

build they're jobs yeah I think that number one area where we try to lighten stuff up is let's not take that project

on in the first place you know we bought a piece of land recently an incredible setting we've always had on the

list we finally found the place we started sketch it out we were working with the right Architects our nephew uh

Mike is an architect at BCA angles group one of the greats and he was helping us out and really really loved it and then

we took a step back and we're like this is going to be a job for the next couple years do we really or can we just Airbnb

it and literally as part of that I wrote to our travel agent can you show me 15 places within the same realm as this

that we could rent and just show up with our bags have a great week and then [ __ ] leave and never think about I

was like if you do this you about to save me two years of my life and many many dollars and it worked I was like

thrilled and so anyway so many questions so let's just say no super fancy cars that I'm aware of you might have some

utvs but you have plenty of beavers to keep you company last time I checked although

that might be a past Hobby and then the real estate question for you if all of that vanished right it burned down or

otherwise was just removed how much of that would you repurchase can I just say our now nine-year-old when she was

eight she's our hippie kid who's like always on mushrooms not literally no not literally sorry we don't feed our kids

mushrooms yet but no she's just our kid who we just end up writing down so many of the things that come out of her mouth

she's just untethered by reality she's the one who when we moved to Jackson we signed up for this Teton

Science school it was like a Expeditionary Learning Academy and we toured the school and then after a

couple weeks there we checked on on the other girls they were doing like Traditional School and Tiny classes with

some Outdoor Learning but we went to Center Sky's preschool kindergarten situation and we were like hey to the

teacher like when you guys start doing like I don't know the math or the writing and she's

like oh there'll be no math here and we're like what and she's like this is this is a forest

preschool other than when the kids come in and write their names that's it the rest is just play based and we're like

wait what and so we ended up watching some videos on these Swedish Forest schools and we're like I mean what do we

got to lose right and it turns out that kid is so exceptionally

resilient incapable of being bored none of the three kids get bored but I go for a hike every day and when she was like

four she said to me can I come with you and I'm like it's dark and it's starting to hail and she's like Dad that's just

ice falling from the sky and I was like all right suit up and we spent two hours with numb fingers throwing [ __ ] in the

river and digging in the mud and having a blast and she's an academic Superstar didn't hold her back at all but I really

love that skill set anyway it's a long way of saying she once said to Crystal and I last year she said Mom

Dad someday if we're lucky maybe we can live in a smaller house we were

wrecked if I can answer your question anyway it's that okay we live in a house now that has a lot of perks and features

and maybe we could do without them sharks with lasers downsize and then dude you got a new project yeah it's

about but what was the actual title The Working title yeah the working title is the book of no and I'm excited about

that I mean I say no for a living and I think one of the challenges is like how to stay an optimistic open-minded person

when you say no all day what's your take on that because a popular position would be you have to say yes to everything

when you're building and then you have to learn to say no I don't know if I totally subscribe to that at least I've

done a lot of writing on this and yeah I think that if you look at a lot of of examples of Mega successful people and

there's a survivorship bias so who the [ __ ] knows what's actually causal in some level but a lot of them get good at

focusing early and by virtue of definition Focus means saying no to a lot of things outside of that Focus

what's your take well first of all and investing in anything I think one of the big traps is being too thematic like

having a thesis ahead of time I've watched people write like the Canon blog post on the shared economy then people

come pitch them shared economy deals which makes their blog post feel writer and writer and that confirmation bias

causes them to light money on fire and then their fund goes away and they're like but my blog post was

awesome and so I have this big rule at lower carbon about never actually having a thesis written in stone we are very

big on electrification of the economy lithium we have a way of extracting lithium that's $10,000 times faster so

Chris let's pause for a second so yeah we have not explained because it didn't exist at the time yeah what lower carbon

capital is okay let me go back to just saying no then because it's important because you're writing a book about it

so my point is is if I have too many rules about saying no or I have too many then I'm going to say it to the wrong

[ __ ] I'm G to turn down the wrong stuff I'm GNA have too much predisposition so what I have to know ahead of time the

work I have to do ahead of a time is to know as we were just talking about with the houses what's the actual cost what's

the actual downside risk so what is the actual cost of saying yes to this if the cost of saying

yes is I end up at a three-hour dinner party that's boring that's actually pretty low cost right I prefer not to

blow three hours like hanging out with some lame people o

but I would prefer not to blow a night you know yeah but on the other hand that's pretty low cost whereas saying

yes to a meeting that I have to fly to well that's a whole [ __ ] disruption to my world like I am not going to see

my kids or and wife and I gotta [ __ ] pack some stuff and transport all that [ __ ] you know I mean Paul Graham a long

time ago used to talk about the true cost of a cup of coffee you know like what does it actually take to stop your

day and go meet somebody and let them pick your brain and all that [ __ ] so I just talked about the real cost of

building something everyone thinks about the cost of building a house is the amount of money you put into it that's

real at the same time it's the amount of time and crazy [ __ ] and like [ __ ] breaks all the time that you put into it

and so I think for me it's doing the work ahead of time to understand what are my actual priorities what really

matters to me and what's the true cost of those things so when you come to me with a proposal an invitation I can

assess am I going to just risk 50 Grand here and like that's my total downside okay what's 50 Grand Worth to me oh God

I was almost quoting Jay-Z right there can you please remind me whereas if what you're talking to me is like hey Chris I

want to start a project I want you to join my board ETA I'm like whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa what's the real cost of

that you know it's easy to say yes to that but what's the real cost and then I think the second part is just getting

comfortable with the fact that this is going to be uncomfortable for a minute but I'm just going to say no bro I

appreciate you how do I let you know that you're my homie and I deeply appreciate and respect you and I'm

flattered by the invitation but we're not going down that path and that can be really tough I think everyone can attach

themselves to the dramatic Narrative of God my thing would be awesome even more awesome if Tim Tim were on it you know

if Tim Ferris is attached godamn I'm going places but they're not you they don't know what your scorecard is they

don't know what your actual to-do list says we've said many many times and I wasn't the first person to say it but

your inbox is a too list to which anyone else can add an action item right y so you're the only one who sees your to-do

list I love all these questions where you ask people like what's your daily routine and then every single time I'm

like that is someone who doesn't have anyone in their house attending Elementary

School yeah there's truth to that yeah for sure last night we had a kid with an ear infection sleeping in our bed two

nights ago I had a kid puking out the side of the car as we drove home from the Bills game cuz I had stuffed her

full of pizza and other [ __ ] I love these people are like this is when I peacefully do this [ __ ] and I'm like oh

this is when I [ __ ] wipe asses I love all those I know somebody writes out their intentions and then

hand stitches them together at the beginning of the day God bless God bless I'm not mocking

I'm just saying like anyway so I think the no is feeling comfortable and by the way as we grow up

I mean you know one of the things Crystal and I find with employees is I think younger managers

are too slow to fire employees emplo es mhm employees who cost too much it's never the financial cost it's literally

like when we make a decision on somebody it's not like what their salary is or what their benefits cost is it's just

are they creating more work than they're eating than they're consuming you know are they creating more administrative

overhead somebody else once said if we have to talk about an employee three times in bed oh I know who it was a

local entrepreneur I met here in Boseman a guy whose pickle ball court doubles as a gun

range just amazing dude he and his wife were small business people retired now but they said they had a rule if they

had to talk about someone they worked with three times in bed while falling asleep at night they were gone from that

org like that was the true cost of that person I think younger people are sometimes afraid to have those

uncomfortable moments it's easier to live with the status quot then just be like sorry it's not happening we got to

go because they're afraid of the loss but the real loss all that [ __ ] time along the way so all right that's my

diet tribe on nose well hold on one sec so now the three-hour dinner I imagine you get dozens of these

invitations so you wouldn't be able to say I imagine yes to all of them so how do you choose not the big things to say

yes to we could talk about that too but the inbound that you say yes to that are along the lines of the three-hour dinner

because you still have finite time finite dinners and if you do a dinner with a group of 10 people that's also

away from your family presumably right yeah I'll tell you I'm the [ __ ] who's like I would infinitely rather host and

control the situation yeah you've been to our events there's no automatic plus ones unless the other person is

independently awesome yeah that's a real thing we have deeply offended people even at our wedding we're like sorry no

like never met your wife I bet you she's great but like I need to know no this is going to sound ruthless as [ __ ] and

somebody in the comments would be like this guy's a [ __ ] sociopath but here's the thing I don't want to have to

have a seating chart I want to know that whoever's here can sit next to anyone else and be enthralled by how

interesting that person is no matter what they do for a living and so you've been to our events before Where We

Gather 30 incredible people for a weekend or we host a party and I just know whoever you are talking to is

independently great in whatever field and I've seen many of them end up as guests on your podcast I love when

people end up on each other's boards or do a collaborative art project together or performance because that's what I'm

vouching for if I'm gathering people I'm vouching for every single person there as being awesome and so I don't know if

everyone else has that standard and if I'm getting up in front of an audience I want to make sure that hopefully I'm

delivering the aggregate value of all the time people just took out of their day to be there like I don't get nervous

about giving speeches but I feel like I want to bring my aame MH that's what I was saying I felt the pressure of like

oh my God if some [ __ ] kid is home taking notes about this episode what are they going to actually write down oh my

God I need pithier quotes but the reality is I want to make sure I'm delivering something of value

and I don't know if everyone else lives by that standard and I do like to live like I'm running out of time well we're

all running out of time my best friend Teddy Ringold who you knew well he died at 46 you know one of the all-time great

people yeah great human I feel like I've gotten three years a bonus time past him MH and I don't take it for granted I

mean I get all the scans and I did treat my body like a rental car for many years but I just at the same time if you asked

me like what's changed since I was 30 or 40 I am way less patient it's harder to work for me as a result and for people

who don't know Chris well you didn't really start off that patient to begin with no it's funny we had this thing at

work recently where I wanted to promote somebody we hired somebody Junior who we could just realize very soon was like a

5x employee you know somewhere between 5 and 10x you know those kinds of people where you're like wait they're just

different I do yeah for sure and Chris and I are like we should promote her and our partner was like okay well her

review is coming up and Chris and are like no no no no we should promote her by

Friday and we're like well there's and I was like do you want to tell her or are we going to tell her today I'm like why

would we wait she's [ __ ] amazing she knows it it's so weird that it would just hang in The Ether in an email

account somewhere in the metime that we haven't told her she's that [ __ ] great and that we give her a new title

and get her [ __ ] going because she's just that great I just have no [ __ ] time for that that idea I told you about

that came up over the weekend where we were talking to our team and I was like okay I appreciate all your input but

we're [ __ ] doing it and they're like okay like q1 Q2 and I'm like no Q Friday write it up what do we talking

about here and so I'm just like we are men of action you know lies do not become us but I'm just like I have no

[ __ ] time for that and so I worry I worry it's way too easy to let this stuff slip away is that a pending

tangible sense of mortality or is there something else to it or is it just getting old and cantankerous Tim does

any of the [ __ ] you've built happen I mean you built it yourself literally I would say the same for me right and so

no one's ever going to call me an entrepreneur though but I built all this from scratch right with Crystal M but if

I don't do it it doesn't [ __ ] happen if I don't move it it doesn't [ __ ] happen Y and I tried resting for a

little bit I was horrible at it and so I regret being 70 hours a week employed again this

sucks but at the same time like I was awful at not doing much MH but if I don't move it and if I have an idea if I

have a business idea I got to do it before anyone else [ __ ] picks up on it before the fast followers come I want

to just be out there with whatever my anomalous Advantage is I want to go press that MH you remember when I was

trying to convince people that Twitter was a real business for years and then I finally was like all right I'm no longer

here to convince you just sell me your [ __ ] stock I just wasted so much time not buying it all and then eventually

bought it all but I don't want to like convince people to do something I want to go own it all first and then convince

them to buy it from me we have the world's only dedicated nuclear fusion fund and so we had been

dabbling in Fusion investment for a while people poo pooed it do you want to take a second to explain what lower

carbon capital is and then I'm going to come back to that kid taking notes because I have a question for that kid

but do you want to just give a quick background I got yelled at for calling people on their 20s kids what they

should be so flattered and my 360 review on my org we had a kid who started harassing me in my inbox when he was

like 19 from college we hired him directly out of graduation his name was har duie amazing

name if you know you know yeah har duie is one of the hardest working most insightful young people I've ever

[ __ ] worked with he worked with us for a couple years and then he went and joined one of our portfolio companies

you know the guy is a legend he is welcome back to lower carbon any day we'll explain lower carbon in a second

but I once referred to harsh dubie on a podcast as a kid I was like we had this kid he came he was sending me all these

ideas we hired him God he executes he's amazing and then later an employee not harsh duie but another employee was like

hey you can't refer to people in their 20s as kids and I'm like God [ __ ] damn it I can't do anything right by the

way that was in the same six months that I was accused of promoting hustle culture and Crystal and are like wait

what's hustle culture I really felt I'd [ __ ] up and they're like this whole thing about the work never sleeps and

sometimes [ __ ] blows up on a Sunday and so you got to get your laptop out no matter where you are and like you know

if you're going to be a partner to an entrepreneur you got to just feel like you're an owner too and be available for

them no matter what else is going on and we're like yeah and we're like and wait where's the accusation part oh that was

it oh [ __ ] you yes that's exactly what we do this is hustle culture what the [ __ ] like I don't have successories

posters on the wall but just hang in there with the kitten you don't have that but at the

same time for [ __ ] sake you know and we haven't asked anyone Crystal slept under her desk literally slept under her

desk missed every wedding for 10 years I haven't asked that of anyone I had no [ __ ] life outside of speda and Google

like I can see the direct correlation between the entrepreneurial risk we took and the hours we put in and what we got

I don't think there's a way to shortcut that I don't think you have to like work yourself to a state of unhealthiness

anymore but I also think you can't [ __ ] phone this in and I'm sick of apologizing for it all right no more

apologies you got to stop your apologizing and we're gonna come back to the fusion fund and lower carbon but for

the kid who's taking notes I would be very curious to know because those who may not be familiar with you wait wait

hold on hold on hold on no this is a good place to insert the commercial break for like the self-help therapy app

or whatever after Chris goes on a rant about how you have to work yourself to the [ __ ] bone until you're teetering

on the edge of a nervous breakdown put in a meditation app throw in a sponsorship ad for the way hi this is

Tim taking a quick break to let you know that you got to take care of your mental health

all right so the question for the kid who may be listening to you for the first time he's like wow that guy has a

lot of energy and sounds very impatient I can't wait to work for him but also he like well he also did college math when

he was seven and was trading live Hogs when he was fetus and [ __ ] like I can't emulate this guy if you were to teach a

seminar could be College High School doesn't really matter just like entrepreneurship what could you teach

what would you teach that is not dependent on the hard wirring of a Saka specimen so I told you what I'm working

on next and I hate that I don't have like a URL or deliverable to announce because this podcast came up really

quickly but I feel like there is a massive cultural hole I mean my working title has been no permanent record so

Tim you and I are of the same generation where our teachers our parents would be like that's going to go on your

permanent record like you [ __ ] up that's going to go on your permanent record Tim I was 19 years old before I realized

that document didn't exist I swear I thought something had followed me from George Souther Elementary School to

North Park Middle School to lockr high school to Georgetown University like Santa Claus yes I felt like there was a

document that had been hand delivered over there and they're like oh oh did you really do that in gym class

Jesus people talk all the time about how we were the last feral generation the last kids allowed to free range you know

Crystal I showed the young adults who work for us I won't say the kids the young professionals who work

for us we showed them that PSA that used to play on television that said it's 10:00 Do You Know Where Your Children

Are yeah yeah and people were like where would the children be and we're like that was it we were out we were just

[ __ ] gone often times your parents are like get the [ __ ] out of the house and don't come back and what the TV was

basically telling your parents was before you have one more gimlet and get all [ __ ] wasted maybe do a bed check

see if anyone made it home like so we would leave the house without water how the [ __ ] did we survive without water

Tim like kids these days can't go anywhere without a [ __ ] water bottle we would maybe find a garden hose

somewhere we had no [ __ ] snacks and so we would just go like we had no [ __ ] Band-Aids or neopor we just like

would [ __ ] rub a little dirt in it when we wiped out no helmets we were a disaster at least once each of us was

propos position to get into a van for some candy it was the wild [ __ ] West Tim

but we learned to be resilient and resourceful and I worry about it and along the way Tim we learned how to tell

stories yeah we learned how to convince our friends because there are no parents there hey let's go do my idea no let's

go do my idea and we negotiate right we would talk our way into situations we would talk our way out of situations I

recently was back at my alma mater and we were being honored Crystal and I were back there you know

being FedEd and being interviewed in front of the student body and first thing I covered was cheers to all you

[ __ ] nerds your test scores and grades are so great that Crystal and I wouldn't even get in here now so I love

that you're applauding all our accomplishments but we wouldn't make it right now because you're all so [ __ ]

smart but I said hey how many of you here have ever gotten in trouble how many of you here have ever had to talk

your way out of a situation with the cops one black kid raised his hand and I was like you have every [ __ ] iic

reason for doing that yes I agree but I was like how many of you here have ever snuck into something how many of you

have ever committed the mildest crime if you vandalized anything how many of you have ever actually scammed someone or

even been scammed have you ever been on the wrong side of a flimflam how many of you have

placed a bet on Sports how many of you have played cards how many of you been blackout drunk how many of you have had

a regrettable hookup I just kept going down how many of you have worked a tipping job how many of you have had a

[ __ ] horrible boss who is incredibly you know aggressive with his language right none of them none of them and I

was just like I'm sorry Dean but this is why you're all [ __ ] useless to us you've done none of the things that

actually inform the kind of work we do so you know what I'm seeing right now we actually have across our portfolio and

across our team there are some really hard workers I don't think you can paint in the broadest Strokes around who's

willing to work hard and who's not we have some really [ __ ] hard workers you know and so it's easy to always like

get off my lawn and the Next Generation and like these kids don't want to work there are definitely some [ __ ]

lifestyle kids and bless them but we have some really [ __ ] hard workers I've just started noticing things like

well they can't tell when somebody's lying to them literally we have a generation of young people who cannot

tell when they're being bullshitted because Mom and Dad were helicopter and snowplow parenting for them and so now

when somebody is literally staring him in the face and lying to them I'm like wait you're believing that [ __ ] holy

[ __ ] you're [ __ ] what oh my God because they've never been in a situation where somebody was taking

advantage of them they've never had to Bluff their way out with some cards how do you fix that other than sending them

to stranger things reality Camp 1980s theme park you know what's crazy my way in on the H1B Visa just to get political

again beep like push that just gonna play elevator music as soon the people know this [ __ ] are either the American

kids who grew up broke as [ __ ] or the kids from India and China yeah who grew up hustling scrapping basically not only

fending for themselves in school but also helping run their mom and dad's restaurant or store and taking care of a

kid along the way and having to fend for themselves in a market you know I worry like most of the investors and

entrepreneurs I know in their 20s right now would get eaten alive in a bizaar just eaten alive tears might happen you

know whereas Crystal my wife who grew up in India it's a [ __ ] sport for her it's almost uncomfortable I'm like we

once had a big fight in Morocco because I'm like you are arguing with this man over seven cents right now and she's

like yeah but if I don't he's going to be disrespected and I'm going to be disrespected so [ __ ] this and like I'm

gonna walk away again I'm like it's one derum we got to go and she's like [ __ ] that we're in this [ __ ] like if you

don't have the [ __ ] stones to stay in this conversation get the [ __ ] out of here but like I miss that Alpha I worry

that we just don't have people who are put in a position where they had to fight and fend for themselves and

they're [ __ ] brilliant man but they've never had to take any risks they've never had to mix it up they've

never been in a fight I'm not encouraging people to go beat the [ __ ] out of each other but they've never been

in a fight no I get it so is there anything to be done like is there anything to counteract this nefarious

slippage into impotence and oversensitivity yeah take your [ __ ] phone and throw it in the bin I'm a

Jonathan hyp [ __ ] disciple but like the phones are killing everybody parents included I am a wealthy happily married

got everything I need almost 50-year-old white dude and when I get on Instagram I feel so much [ __ ] fomo my life feels

so inadequate I'm like Jesus look at that guy oh [ __ ] where are they they're having so much fun [ __ ] that guy's so

much fitter than me right now [ __ ] and it makes me unhappy and so maybe maybe me and 13-year-old girls have a lot in

common you left out technologist too right as you put it I think in your text to me your fingerprints are on the

weapon it's like if the gloves do fit you cannot equit we reinvented cigarettes you know fenal lace

cigarettes when we started social media with all the best intentions but it's a [ __ ] disaster I mean dude you know

this when I quit Twitter in November of 2022 I lost 11bs in 6 weeks with no lifestyle changes I had just been eating

the cortisol of my mentions for years like frog boiling you know 2006 it was all nice and [ __ ] by

2022 everything I was saying was either being responded to by activist [ __ ] or Russian [ __ ] and you can't tell

the difference anymore the Russians are so good at imitating the you know liberal Elite College [ __ ] that it

was just a wave of hate no matter what [ __ ] you parting your hair on the right side the Nazis used to part their hair

on the right side you piece of [ __ ] once I went off Twitter and went off Instagram oh my god did I feel a

lightness in my life so here's what I would do my seminar yeah I would stomp on everyone's phones then we would go to

a bar but like a dirty bar and I would tell people to try and start a political conversation and not get their ass

kicked and so bring them to a bar here in Montana a Cowboy Bar and just be like I want you to advocate for the

IRA and see if you can get out of here without being punched so come to cattle country and oil and gas country and

let's talk about green politics and see if you can get out of here let's see if you can actually tell a [ __ ] story

let's see if you can show any empathy and put yourself in the shoes of the other person you know one of the things

that made clay our partner who runs lower carbon with us so effective was he had to go door too in Ohio Republican

Ohio on behalf of a guy named Brock who hsein Obama and convince people to vote for

the guy the same [ __ ] I did in Elco Nevada where I am going to a place where John krey got 11% of the vote and I'm

knocking on trailers and saying like hey I'm here to talk to you about the election most of those people if their

gun was closer Within Reach would have pulled it out and told me to get off their [ __ ] porch but I have to learn

how to put myself in their shoes and try and get a conversation going and so I think no one sells [ __ ] anymore no one

has to walk up to their neighbor door and sell [ __ ] you know one of the things my kids had to do was convince the

neighbors can we cut across your lawn to get into the other neighborhood where the kids are and like they had a

negotiated deal it's one batch of cookies per year but I was like you got to go figure that [ __ ] out because

otherwise it's a long [ __ ] bike ride for you and so you got to go up there and convince them that you are not going

to damage their lawn but if they let you cross that lawn it'd be a very patriotic thing to