A Bit of Optimism - AI Can Do Everything… Except This (Why Humans Still Win) With Restaurateur Will Guidara

Episode Date: March 24, 2026

As businesses race toward faster systems, smarter tools, and total automation, something critical is getting lost: human connection. And ironically, the rise of AI is making that gap impossible to ignore. In this episode, I sit down with returning guest and close friend Will Guidara, former co-owner of Eleven Madison Park, to explore why humanity is becoming the ultimate competitive advantage in the age of AI. Will helped transform a restaurant into the best in the world, not by reinventing the food being served, but by reinventing the experience around it. He calls this philosophy "Unreasonable Hospitality," which is the practice of going beyond what’s expected or required to make someone feel genuinely seen, valued, and cared for to create a memorable human experience. He argues that in a world where people expect excellence, the real differentiator is care. And Will isn’t alone in this belief. His book Unreasonable Hospitality, which I’m the proud publisher of, is a global bestseller. And his follow up book, Unreasonable Hospitality: The Field Guide, comes out April 28, 2026. In this conversation, Will and I unpack why human value will continue to rise in an automated world, how the smallest moments of care can create lasting loyalty, how we can turn automation’s efficiency into better experiences, and why the things that matter most in our lives are the hardest to measure. And fair warning, Will and I do giggle our way through some of this conversation about why technology can’t replace human connection, the hidden cost of achievement, and a story about how a single piece of Basque cheesecake delivered to a hotel room is a gesture thoughtful enough to make someone feel seen. That’s just the kind of friendship we have. So if you’re wondering how to stand out and live a more meaningful life in a world increasingly shaped by AI… and share a laugh with us… this is a conversation for you. This… is A Bit of Optimism. --------------------------- To stay in the loop with Will or purchase his best-selling book Unreasonable Hospitality, head to: https://www.unreasonablehospitality.com/ If you’d like to pre-order Unreasonable Hospitality: The Field Guide, out April 28, 2026, check out: https://uhthefieldguide.com/ ---------------------------  

I just need to share it with people that this is how we actually have conversations. Whether we were being recorded or not. Like, this is the way we actually talk. We interrupt each other more. We're being polite. We're trying to interrupt a little bit less. We're trying to interrupt each other less, but we actually would have this conversation with our cameras. A hundred percent.

AI is the hot topic right now. There are so many people talking about all the tools that can help us do things faster, cheaper, more efficiently than ever before. All of this is true. But it's also revealing something interesting that the more automated our world becomes, the more valuable the human being is becoming. Being thoughtful, paying attention,

being genuinely nice to people, making people feel seen and heard. It turns out things like kindness are pretty much AI proof, which is why I was so excited to welcome my dear friend Will Godera back to the podcast. Fair warning that if you listen to this podcast, when Will and I get together, it always turns into what somebody once described as a giggle fest.

Will is pretty incredible. He is the former co-owner of Eleven Madison Park, which was the number one restaurant in the world. He is the executive producer of the TV show The Bear. And he is the best-selling author of the New York Times bestseller, Unreasonable Hospitality, of which I am the proud publisher. And I'm also the proud publisher of Will's new book, Unreasonable Hospital. the field guide, which is remarkable. Will has accomplished all those things and built his entire career around one simple philosophy,

that if we go further than anyone expects, that's when we can make people feel truly cared for. Though usually Will is the one going above and beyond, he recently found himself on the receiving end of his own philosophy, in a hotel room, in Los Angeles, involving a piece of Basque cheesecake, and somehow me, this is a bit of optimism. Okay, I got to tell you something. So I got to L.A. two nights ago and then I had to go to Anaheim and then I came back. And the night I stayed at the Waldorf from Beverly Hills. Now, you know what the story is going to be about, but other people don't.

So when I say Basque cheesecake, what does that mean to you? Okay. So a while ago, you came to visit L.A. and you and I went out for, something that I'd never done before. You said, we're going to go out for dinner, and you said, do you want to do bang bang? And I said, what's bang bang? And what bang bang is, is you go to a different restaurant for each course. So you and I went to one restaurant for an appetizer. We went to a different restaurant for the main course. And while we're sitting in the restaurant having our main course, we were planning where we should go for dessert. And you said, I know where we're going.

You said there's this restaurant called Pajolet in Santa Monica. And they have what you described as one of the top five desserts you've ever had. had in your life. Now, coming from the top restaurateur in the world, that's a bold statement right there. It means something. And you said, here's the problem. You can't order it. It's off the menu. They give you a slice if they like you. If you see somebody else getting one and you say, hey, can I have one? They say no. You can't pay for it. You can't order it. And they make one a night. That's it. Let me text to see if they've got a slice. I know the chef. So you text the owner and he says, we have one slice left. Get over here. And you're like, we're going to

Pajolet. We went to Pajolet. They spoiled us. We had our slice of vast cheesecake. And it was easily one of the top five desserts I've ever had in my life. One of the greatest things ever. Okay. So I've never told that story before. I get to the hotel. I go up to the room and there's a really awesome note from the guest relations manager. Her name is Abby. She says, Will, welcome. Congrats on the field guide. Since you probably aren't going to make it to Santa Monica, we decided to bring a piece of Santa Monica to you. Check the fridge. I open the fridge and it's a piece of the Basque cheesecake from

Pajolet. No. So I would have like freaking out. But how do they even know? Well, so I crush it. I get to bed. The next morning, have a breakfast on my way out. I'm about to leave.

And I said, I need to see Abby. And she comes out. I was like, how? And she starts saying all this nice stuff, not unreasonable. I said, no, no, no, no. I don't care about any of that. How? You apparently told this story somewhere else.

I think I did it with Phil Rosenthal when he came on the podcast. Holy crap. This is a basque cheesecake. It is. This is the Basque cheesecake from Pajolet in Santa Monica. Oh, boy. Yes, I've been there, but I haven't had their best cheesecake. Okay, so now I'm going to tell you, now I'm going to tell you the story behind this cheesecake. God, that's beautiful. Okay, so my friend Will Godera, who I think you know, he was the former owner of 11 Madison Park. Oh, absolutely. So Will's a foodie, right?

Yes. To say the least. So she did a deep dive on me, somehow ended up listening to something you did that I wasn't even on. It's not even about you. And it was the It was one of the coolest things ever. And by the way, that cheesecake continues to be so unbelievably good. And it's really cool when you write a book about an idea. It's almost like a magician having someone else do their own magic trick on them. Right. Because you do that.

You are so good at giving gifts to people and like freaking them out to have you get freaked. Because nobody can freak you out. No. I did it once kind of a little bit. Anyway, did I tell you the follow-on story to the bass cheesecake story at Pajolet? Wait, yes, but you need to tell it. You need to tell it here. I want a date.

Wait, but hold on. So for context, the bang-bang dinner we had was probably two or three years ago. It was a while ago now. It was a while ago, yeah. Three or four years ago. It was a while ago, yeah. So here's the following story to the bass cheese cake. So I'm on a date, and I'm telling the story of our bang-bang night and the story of our bang-bang night

and this amazing cheesecake that's off the menu, you can't order it. It's a French restaurant. That's why they can't serve bass cheesecake on the menu. And I said to the girl, I'm like, I met the owner. I bet we could get a slice. So we go to the restaurant.

It's after, you know, it's later, it's like 9.30 or something. So dinner service is winding down. We get a great spot at the bar, right on the edge of the bar. I've towed to the bartender. And I bring up the owner's name. Like, hey, is he in? You know, dropping the hint, you know? And he's like, now he's not in tonight.

I'm like, oh, okay, well, sorry, I missed him. And then I sort of like, sort of, sort of syriptitious thing. The side of your mouth. I'm the side of my mouth. Like, I think we could get a slice of cheesecake? And the bartender looks at me and sort of like, he's like, yeah, I think we could arrange that. And I am like, you're just the man. I'm just the man.

You're going to look so good. So they bring out the cheesecake. The girl is like, oh my God, this is one of the top five desserts I've had in my life. I'm like, I told you, right? This is this amazing. And like we got a slice, isn't this amazing? Because I am, like, I am known, I am seen. Yeah, exactly.

You are on a date with an important man. Right, exactly. I got cheesecake pole. And we had a nice time. We're like, let's get another dessert. So we're like, excuse me, can we have the menu? And he gives me the menu. And right there on the menu, it says basque cheesecake.

It's on the menu now. They put it on the menu. Those basheses. So all I did was surreptitiously order something off the menu. She's seen that it was on the video. And the bartender's like, what is wrong with this? I'm like pulling him aside, ordering something off the menu. So anyway, if you want to go and have one of the top five desserts you've had in your life,

just go to Pasovi in Santa Monica. Whatever. And now everyone can have his life is a basque cheesecake in Pasoile. But it's still one of the top five desserts, but yeah, anyone can get it. It's not so special. This is a treat for me because you've come on the podcast a few times before, but this is the first time we've ever done it in person. I know.

I love this. And this is what, you know, I want people to appreciate, which is you and I are actually very, very close friends. And so anytime I get with you as a treat. For the many, many reasons I love you. One is how your brain works. And it doesn't work like mine. Opposite to try.

I don't know if it's opposite, but it's, and your brain doesn't work like a lot of people. you know, for somebody who's extremely good at business. I mean, you're a good, shrewd business person who understands the levers of business. You're one of the most creative people I've ever met. And I love bragging about unreasonable hospitality, and I love telling people, you know,

where most restaurants find themselves number one in the world because they reinvented food, to come up with the idea that you can become the number one restaurant in the world by reinventing hospitality. The thing that I found amazing about that is for the, hundred years of, you know, we've been rating restaurants that it was always about the food. Yeah. Anybody could have come up with, wait, what about the hospitality?

Like, it literally, it's not like, it's not like you're the only version that could have brought up with that. And it's both exciting and depressing at the same time. Like, amazing you came up with that, kind of depressing, nobody came up with that. When in your restaurant career, because you're a front of house guy, when at your restaurant career, you start to recognize that treating people was the thing that everybody else wasn't focusing. I mean, I think where we did something different was thinking about this approach at the very high end. Like Danny Meyer, who was my boss and mentor, was focused on hospitality. And I mean, he gave me the foundation upon which I built all this stuff.

where we took it in a different direction was do it at the three Michelin Star level, and we doubled down on hospitality at that level. I think for the following reason, it's easy to have a hospitable restaurant when you are less concerned with the details, right? Excellence in hospitality don't necessarily go hand in hand. But when you're so maniacally focused on perfection, hospitality would normally take a back seat. because you care more about serving a perfect clear of food and having every detail of the service be executed at a certain level.

And that always took precedence over how you made people feel. I think our thing where we challenged that was to say, hey, yeah, we want to be excellent. We want to have food that is extraordinary and service that is as close to technically perfect as possible in an amazing dining room. And yet those are table six. Like that's just fulfilling the base level obligation. You have the promise you are making when you choose to operate a restaurant like that. We believe that in our hospitality, that's where we can really make. So here's where my mind is going, right?

Here's where my mind is going. And this is where I think from a brand standpoint, from a marketing standpoint, from a product standpoint, where so many businesses get it wrong is they can. infuse excellent and unreasonable. And here's where my mind is going, right? The number of companies that offer usually some sort of back office service, whether it's accounting or some sort of organizational software, whatever it is, their value proposition in their marketing is always the same.

We do all the dot, dot, dot, dot, dot, so that you can go focus on dot, dot, dot, right? Yes. Like, we'll do the accounting so you can focus on building the business. And they all kind of have the same, you know, value proposition. And in reality, like, that's what your product is supposed to do. Like, the reason I'm paying you money is for you to do this stuff that I don't want to do, that is why I hired you. Yes.

Right. Like, and the way you're talking about excellence and surface, like, you have to do that. Minimally. Exactly. And now, you could argue you do it better than others. Fine. That's a different conversation. But if you accept that that's the minimal standard to do that excellently, now what?

It opens up an entirely new door for how to build a brand, how to understand marketing, how to understand customer service. If you accept that, doing that brilliantly is the table sticks. That's how you should describe the product, not how you should sell it. Like, this is the product. We're going to do all this. The reason you should work with us, though, is this. As I've traveled around, because I've been all over the country, around the world for the last few years, spending time with companies across pretty much every industry. everyone is trying to identify their competitive advantage, right?

What is it about their business that will prevent someone else from coming in and taking it away? And yet, those conversations to that point almost always censure around the quality of the product, sometimes the strength of the brand. But here's the thing, it does not just matter how good the product is or how strong the brand is. Because eventually, this is not my opinion. It's a fact. Time has proven it to be true. Someone will build a better product or they will. create a stronger brand. They may be better capitalized. They may be newer and shinier,

younger and more innovative. They may just be more talented than you are. The only competitive advantage that exists in the long term, in my view, is hospitalitying, insistently, generously, creatively, investing in relationships because those take a long time to build. I think your message is more timely than I think people realize, which is the rise of AI. The rise of AI, What the technologists all forget is people. They always leave the people at it. Yes. Right?

They have these visions of the world that will exist. And they always forget that people fundamentally are legacy machines. We're tens of thousands of years old, older than that, 100,000 years old. And our software has not been updated at all, ever. And, you know, you look at the world where technology has attempted to sort of take over. you know, Amazon is removing all the palm scanners from Whole Foods because of unbelievably low adoption. The economics no longer makes sense.

Yes. Right. Amazon had those stores where you could just walk in, take stuff off the shop and walk out. Sounds like a dream. Yeah. They're closing them all because they're not working. I mean, yeah. Because ones in the airport.

It's the worst. And what they're forgetting is I don't want to look on an app to find out where the thing is. the reason I like having a guy stacking the shelf is not because I want a person stacking a shelf, it's because I want a person randomly in an aisle that's nearby that I can say, where's the peanut butter? And they either point or take me, either one, I don't care. But the point is that tiny little interaction makes me feel seen and heard as a human being. And even if it's a basic thing, talking to another person, even though the AI could do it,

is delight. And the airlines know this and hotels know this. and anybody in the service industry knows this, but the problem is that a person has become a luxury. That you have to earn a person. You have to earn access to. You have to earn access to human being. And all the technologists and sort of the air is like,

we're taking all the people away. And this is why your work is more prescient and more important than simply being a competitive advantage. It reinforces the importance of the human being in any commercial transaction. Well, and yeah, gosh, I love that. And I think it's only going to grow and it's important. Which is a good thing.

Your book is selling gangbusters and your stuff is spreading like crazy. And I think that is a good sign that as AI and automation grows, that at least a class of people are recognizing that we cannot do it at the sacrifice of people. It has to be done in parallel with people. Well, and, by the way, if everything we're saying is true, humans are a form of luxury. Now, that will only become increasingly so. Like, even you pick up the phone and you call someone, and whether it's one year, two, year, five years, who knows how long it's going to be?

We're not going to know whatever talking to a human being anymore. That technology is getting so good that we won't be able to trust. I'll get off the phone and I'll be like, I think I was talking to a human and I really don't know. which means, I really do believe that I've seen enough of it now to feel pretty convicted that we're going to get close to that. Which means, yes, and, but go on. I think the moments like this, the truly human moments, they're going to need to be as human as humanly possible. Yeah. And I think right acrossroads and how companies are beginning to adopt the technology.

Let me finish. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Where there are plenty of companies, listen, with a lot of the financial pressure, people are right now. AI represents like a pretty good lever that you can pull to get your profitability of money. You can adopt some of this technology. You can throw out a bunch of people. You can put some more money to the bottom line. You can get, you can save the day. And many people

will do that. I think the ones that are very, very smart though are going to be those that recognize that yeah, maybe you need to save a little bit of money. But if you reinvest some of the money you save into making those human moments, even more human. You'll make a little bit less today, but you will make so much more down that road because those are going to be the people we turn to

when we are failing that way. And when things go wrong. Yeah. You're like, enough with the computer, I need a person. And you'll know who you can go to. And you'll know what you can interest. I think that's right. This is an amazing opportunity for something like

unreasonable hospitality as a concept, not as a book, is because if people are concerned about job loss, Well, why not expand hospitality jobs? Why not make more jobs, service jobs? And you talk about the nobility of service. And it's not like we're trading in, you know, I used to be a knowledge worker, computer programmer or whatever I was doing.

And now, you know, I'm digging ditches, you know, to build roads. You thought that's not what we're talking about here, which is the sophisticated problem solving, highly engaged, emotional intelligence required to be good at, service and the joy that is derived from helping another human being could be way more fulfilling or at least equally fulfilling as any job you loved. And so why not reinvest some of those savings, as you said, and convert some of those jobs into service jobs. Let's double down on Pete. So listen to this. I want to tell you a story from the restaurant back to the day, which is pre-AI, but analogous to what we're going through now. For a long time, I believed strongly that you should

make reservations over the phone. I wanted every experience with us to begin with a human voice. And so even when Open Table came around and you could book reservations online, we had Open Table because an interface. You have to. Yeah, but we blocked every reservation online. You had to call in a restaurant to make a, because I had awesome reservationists. I wanted to start with the Cambridge voice. And then thankfully, you know Laura, it was like the person on my team that I trusted so much and she trusted me enough to be able to call me out when I was doing something done. She said, hey, have you ever been tried to make a reservation here? And I said, well, no. She goes, why do you try? Because the team was getting upset at me for this decision. So,

next day at 9 a.m. 28 days before we opened to the books, I called, only to be put on hold, to wait on hold for 30 minutes, to be taken off hold. To say, I'm so sorry, we're fully reserved. Can we add your knee a little bit? I was like, oh. And so she was right. I, In pursuit of human connection, I was doing something that was definitively less hospitable. So instead I went in the opposite direction. Now you couldn't put reservations on the phone anymore. They were only available online.

Which meant you going on at 9 a.m. And it was very clear when we had reservations, what we didn't. No one had to waste their time. But here's what I did. And I think I didn't write about this in unreasonable hospitality. And that was a mistake because I think it's one of the most important decisions I ever made. we did not fire a single person from our reservations team.

Now we had no one answering phones all day. They didn't have to do that. Rather, we redeploy them to spend all the same time they were telling people no and adding people to the wait list to spend proper time with people who had gotten a reservation on the phone, getting to know them, and understanding how we could make their meal more special. That's what I'm talking about right, though.

As we shift, and no, I'm not going to blame anyone for saying, all right, we have 10 people. I'm going to get rid of a couple people because we're really over budget, all labor perspective. I need a little bit of that back. But keep the eight people and through a bit of creativity

and a lot of intention to figure out how you can deploy them so that the experience feels more connective, more memorable, that you can build that loyalty. Yeah. Listen, the greatest capital we have is loyalty from the people we serve.

So it takes a long time to a road. And I'm sure you've had relationships with companies where they drop the ball big of time. And if they've done enough to earn your loyalty, you're going to give them one, two, three, more chances. I've had people come in who maybe do a little bit better job for less money. Because this person has been good to me for such a long time, I'm loyal. I don't want to stick with them. And I don't think that's a unique trait to me. Well, this is exactly the conversation we're having, which is the technologists, but forget about the people.

And there's one thing that every human being on the planet needs, it's other human being. Yeah. Right? And we know this. We know that, you know, a solitary confinement is formed torture. And we know that solitary confidant literally makes people lose their minds. At one point, once upon a time, an economist said the words, what gets measured, gets managed. And I understand, obviously, there's a lot of benefit to thinking that way.

And yet, I think that one idea has been so destructive to so many companies because the reality is, Some of the things that are the most important to do, you cannot measure the return in as easily or immediate a way as these companies have been trained to think. Yeah, if you start investing in hospitality, if you start really putting resource to making the people you work with and those that you serve feel truly seen and valued and cared for, will it benefit you over the long term?

Yes, is it easy to measure in, three, six, nine-month increments? No. But just because it's harder to measure doesn't mean it matters less. In fact, it means it matters more. And I think that those who don't invest in it because they can't clearly calculate it in the short term are being reckless in the long term. Let's reveal it here. You're operating at a level that's beyond. Like the amount that you invested in unreasonable hospitality is more than you're even expecting others to. Yes. And yes, you became the number one restaurant in the world. Right here, on camera, did your company lose money? No. Exactly. The company didn't lose money. No, we made more than money. You made more money.

I think we're one of the most profitable fine dining restaurants in America. There you go. One of the most profitable fine dining restaurants. That's an important detail for the people who are, who question your work, which is you may not have seen it in month one or month two. No. But you were one of the most profitable, fine dining restaurants in the world, not just number one, because of unreasonable hospitality, right? For sure. And when we say what gets measured, gets managed or what gets measured gets done, that's 100% true when we're talking about systems and processes and things like that.

But you cannot apply mechanical thinking to a human being, right? It's the same reason you can level load a factory, but you can't level load people. You're like, well, if they're working a 50-hour work week, how do we get them to work 50 hours? You know, can we restrict bathroom breaks? Can we intravenously feed them? Yeah. You know, in no more water cooler chat. By the way, there might be some people who listen to your podcast that will actually be inspired by what you just said.

This is a PSA. That was a joke. It was sarcasm. But that's my point, which is technologists always forget that people will always be. people. I remember in the days and the rising days of internet and e-commerce, they're like, this is the death of bricks and mortar. Now, I understand the economic challenges of a bricks and mortar trying to compete with an online pricing and an online delivery. I get that. But that's a different conversation, right? That's an economic and supply chain challenge, right? But people still like

going shopping, because at the end of the day, we're hunter-gatherers, and we like going to stores. Not for everything, but for a lot of things. And retail isn't going away. They're just finding new ways to remain profitable in this changing world. But I will say that if you look at the brick and mortars that really struggled, they were the ones that never cared about actually delivering

the kind of experience that sparked joy for those that walked in. Because the reality is, if going to a physical store is just a utility, then yeah, do it online. then use them to it. It's the ones that were like, hey, no, I don't want to go online

because I really enjoy going there. And you can tell who trains their employees that way. Because when you feel like they basically are bots, you know? There's places where you literally feel like you're annoying someone by trying to shop at the store.

Oh, I'm thinking of a store right now where I went and be like, do you have these in, you know, whatever it was? And they went, yeah, over there and then went back to their work. And I'm like, I don't know where there is. There's like four places that could be. And the stuff wasn't there.

I went to a store recently. The same exact thing happened. And I just went on Amazon while I was in the store and bought it instead and walked out. And walked out. I've had experiences where I'm so enjoying the person who's helping me that I literally look online and it's cheaper. And I'm like, and I buy it. And I buy it there because I like. And you want to reward cultures that show up in the world in that way.

Maybe you and I are unusual. I think there's more. Yeah. I mean, I don't want to presume everyone. like us. But I'm sure. I just need to share it with people. Yes.

That this is how we actually have conversations. Whether we were being recorded or not. Like this is the way we actually talk. We interrupt each other more. We're being polite. We're trying to interrupt a little bit less. We're not doing a great job. We interrupt each other.

We interrupt each other less. But we actually would have this conversation without cameras. 100%. The other area of the supplies to do is marketing. And I see this all the time. Like you can see. See, I remember back in the day, we did a lot of brand partnerships.

And the question that drives me crazy whenever I'd go to someone with an idea was, okay, how many social media impressions are we going to get out of this? And like that is how, still to this day, a lot of brands are deciding where to invest their money is based on how many social media impressions they're going to get. Now, why? Because that is the easiest thing to measure. what will the impact be on how much people love their brand for having done that thing, it's much, much harder to measure.

So they take the easy way out, which is also the thing that is the most meaningless in terms of people's love for that brand. I'll give an example. When we did EMPS Summer House in the Hamptons, we closed 11 Madison Park to renovate, and we moved to the restaurant for three months to the Hamptons. We needed a sponsor to do that. Because the whole point of it was 11 Madison was what it was because of my team.

I could not lose them. So I had to move 120 people to the Hamptons for the summer, which meant housing for 130 people in one of the most expensive places on earth. So I had the idea to go to American Express and say, hey, will you sponsor this? This is how much money I need from you. And what I'll do is I will only accept American Express cards and cash, but no other credit cards.

And I had to go through meeting after meeting after meeting with all these people, more junior in the company. And they were ready to say no because they didn't think they were getting enough clicks. They couldn't figure out a way to measure it. Thankfully, I had a relationship with someone at the top. I ended up just going to him instead. He greenlit it. They had more people in the Hampton sign up for an American Express card that summer than ever before.

It was one of their best investments ever, and now they're doing stuff like that all the time. but it takes someone with creative vision who's able to look at things over the long term who's less concerned with the short term which by the way

is not necessarily even a testament to the people I was talking to before it's a testament to how their compensation was structured 100%. Like they can only operate within the confidence of how... I see it with advertisers who want to come for this show. It only goes through some agents

because nobody does it themselves. They all use agencies. The agencies are all compensated based on just clicks. And they'll compare me to some other podcast that does more clicky-baity stuff that maybe has more listeners. And they're just not interested.

They don't think about the brand halo. They don't think about, you know, who are the people that are actually listening? So, yeah, I mean, it's, I see it in publishing, you know, where, like, to get a book deal these days, the first thing they're going to do is look at your social media following. And in the words, they're looking at the quality

of your idea after. Yes. After the looking at your social media. I mean, it's embarrassing, right? Your work and my work. You know, I'm very open about the fact that most companies do not use my work. Most companies, even if they know about it, don't care about starting with why. They don't care about the infinite game.

Like, most companies do not use my work. And I know the reason why. It's because my work, like your work, is much more akin to exercise, right? If you work out every single day for 20 minutes, 100% of people will get into shape. Yes. 100%. Can I take a day off?

Yes, you can. How many days can I take off? I don't know. Not too many. Right? But if you work out every day for 20 minutes, 100% of people will get into shape. But here's the problem.

When? I don't know and neither does any doctor. Yes. But if you trust in the process, if you have faith and the data proves it out, then just stick with it. and it will work. Your work is the same. My work is the same. And the reason most companies are not interested in my work is I cannot guarantee that the result that you want to happen

will happen on the day of your financial year. Yeah, will happen as quickly as you want it to or need it to based on whatever. It may. But because I can't promise, and I'm going to tell you're going to have to stick with it regardless. Their incentive structure disincentivizes them to do what is the right thing for their business. And I know this because my entire career, your entire career, we are both guinea pigs and experiments we did on ourselves for our own ideas. And we were disciplined and we did that, that believed in the process in the 20 minutes every day. We didn't know when it would work or when it would pop. But for both of us, we believed in it enough that we've made guinea pigs out of ourselves. Like if you want proof, here you go. I built my

brand with a zero marketing budget to prove that if you learn to start with why and you obey the law diffusion of innovations and you focus on the early adopters. And the way you talk to early adopters is by starting with why. That is the way you talk to an early adopter. That at some point, a tipping point will happen. And I literally, when I started in the early days, I restarted my business, I reset, I closed my office, the whole thing. I started from scratch because I wanted to prove the idea could work and I did it without any marketing budget. And it worked. Not because I'm smarter, not because the timing was lucky, it's because I did the thing. You stuck with it.

I stuck with it. And there were days that were hard, but the discipline to turn down the wrong customers, the wrong clients who weren't early adopters and say yes to lower paying clients who were the right. I did those things. You know, I did those things. And people say to me now, oh, but you can afford to turn down business. No, no, no. I was turning down business when I couldn't afford to. Yeah, I could afford to. Yeah. But I was turning down business when I couldn't afford to because I needed to prove the point. Yeah. I mean, by the way, with marketing, that's why I think the overlap between our stuff is, it's very different and it's very similar. I've never spent any money on marketing ever.

Because I just think if you spend all that money on just being relentlessly gracious with the people you serve, creating memories and giving them stories to share, one day you're going to wake up and you have legions of ambassadors out there in the world doing your marketing on your behalf far better than you could ever do it yourself. But I mean, I'm not anti-marketing, but I also know that companies that are built solely with sale, sale, sale, promotion, promotion,

the minute you stop that, the minute you turn that off, the business disappears. The good part of my marketing is you do something, a lot of people see it right away. Yeah. What we're talking about, it just takes a lot more time to trickle out into the world. Yeah, and I think you can,

I think smart companies know that you can do both. The dumb companies ignore the one because they get the hit from the ad. Let me change tax on you entirely. Okay. I wanted to share just a funny theory that I was telling your wife yesterday and she said, you have to tell Will.

I firmly believe that grades should be given as a ratio, not as an absolute. So it should be the level of accomplishment, A, B, C, D, over, the number of hours you studied. Right? By the way, as I'm listening to this, I'm trying to figure out why my,

before I even hear what you say, I'm like, my wife told you to tell this to me, and that's either a display of praise or insult from her. I know which one it is because we talked about it, and we'll get there. I'm just doing it on camera.

This is a private conversation that I'm going to do on camera. Anyway, So the grades be giving as a ratio, right? And that way, you know much more about the kind of person, right? So if you need somebody who does A work and you're willing to give them 50 hours to do it, hire that person. If you need somebody who can work well under pressure, but you're not going to get A work, you know, you'll get B plus work, you know, then hire the other person. So like my friends in college, you know, one friend I'm thinking of, he was an A over 50, right?

He's a straight A student, he worked his brains out. I was a B plus over three. occasionally in a minus but a solid B plus over three was me less investment pretty good results okay but so now that's just

from a hiring standpoint now let's think of it as a lifestyle right now let's leave college alone and let's come into the real world right which is because I've stressed out about like is my work good enough am I doing all enough

and then I realize hold on I'm actually very comfortable with a B plus you know why because I worked three hours and like there's I've accepted that there's always going to be people who are going to make more money than me

sell more books than me like I know a guy he sells an insane number of books I also know he works his freaking brains out I do well like my books are good you know solid A minus work you know

I didn't do 50 you know and so the reason I bring this up is because I think because there's no ratio The only thing we have to judge each other or worse, judge ourselves, is the first number. So we compare how much money we make, how many followers we've got, all of the very simple to measure metrics. The easier to measure.

The easier to measure. And so what ends up happening is people either work extremely hard to chase those metrics, followers, clicks, likes, revenue, whatever it is, right? or worse, they're comparing their actual worth, their own self-worth to somebody whose numbers are higher. Until you add the ratio. I was always very stressed out with people who are my peers who, like,

they're making bigger deals, they're making more money, their social media following is bigger than mine. I was always intimidated by it. And I beat myself up. I'm not good enough, I'm smart enough, I don't have the work ethic they have. And that's when it occurred to me.

Hold on, they're A is over 50, and I'm a B plus over 3. I'm very happy with my B plus in the world. And the difference is, I really like my life. I really like my lifestyle. And if I wanted to change, and again, there's no judgment. That's really important. I do not judge the A over 50s. If that's the life you choose so long as you're happy with it, go forth.

But my point is, without the ratio, we only judge our value and our worth by the level of accomplishment, but not the lifestyle we're living to get there. So if you want to have an amazing relationship with your kids, an amazing relationship with your spouse, if you want to go on vacations, if you want to have hobbies, odds are you're going to have to do B plus A minus work for the rest of your life.

And if you're okay with that, that sounds like a bang and good life to me. I mean, I was talking, by the way, I'm still not sure. Does my wife think I work too much or not enough? Do you want me to answer the question? Yeah, yeah. you set a goal for yourself, an aggressive goal, let's call it an A.

Yes. You know, and I know what your goals are and you know what your goals are. Yes. And you worked 50 hours to get your A, and you got your A. Yeah. And now the question is,

is why are you still working 50 hours if you got your A? That's where that came from. I was really hoping it was going to be that I was a slacker. I'm an A over 50. You're an A over 50, and there's nothing wrong

with being an A over 50 but if you keep moving the goalposts and it's the same, it's the equivalent of I'm going to make a million dollars, I'm going to make $2 million. I will only be happy if and then you keep moving the goalposts then you're going to spend your life chasing A's

and always working 50s. And at some point you have to be like, I did that and now a B plus over three is the life I want to live. Again, these are lifestyle choices. There's no judgment, there's no right or wrong, these are lifestyle choices. And the only reason I wanted to bring it up is because I myself has suffered

the extreme stress of, let's call it, chasing the grade, or not even chasing it, being intimidated that I was incapable of getting the grade when I compared myself to people who were outperforming me on every metric until I recognized that my life was different.

And I was okay with that. Yeah. I think, listen, there's a couple things that this is... I'll add one more thing, which makes it even worse. For me? No. in general. Oh, she also told me to tell you

that she wants a divorce. Sorry, sorry, I forgot that bit. Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. I forgot. My bad. Barry the lead, sorry. She wanted to do that on your podcast. Yeah, she wanted me to tell you on the podcast.

That's cool. Yeah, yeah. The other thing is, which is the worst part and the most insidious part about the A over 50 mentality, is we pick our own metrics. Let's just compare you and me, right, just for fun. If metrics is book sales, right?

You blow me out of the water. Like, the speed at which your book has achieved book sales, I mean, if I only look at my momentum on books and I look at your momentum at books, at any time in my own career, I will feel nothing but dejected and lesser than and incapable if that's the metric I compare with you. But if I look at my social media following,

And compare it to yours. Yeah, yeah. I'm a frickin rock star. Then you're the winner. And then I'm the winner. So the problem is, is we pick our own metrics. So you can be a hero or zero, no matter which metric you want to choose compared to somebody else. And that's the problem.

The A that you're chasing is sometimes arbitrary. And by the way, this is true for companies as well. Are you chasing revenues or profit or market share or price of your stock? Yeah. your equity price, or longevity, over what time period? Like, those A's are very largely arbitrary, and so you either have a hero complex, which is also stupid, or you have a zero complex,

the ratio solves all of those things. Yeah. I think everything that you're saying, there's a couple things that it's making me think. One, it's funny how we've talked about, like, three different things, and they all boil down to one idea, which is how the things that are harder to measure seem to matter more. Yes.

Which is just interesting, right? Like, everything that goes into the grade is easy to measure. B plus over three, the thing that's not implicitly stated or not explicitly stated is what's happening with the other 47. And that's time that's being invested into things that are harder to measure. Yes. But if we actually look through what is on that list, those are the things that matter the most. Yes.

And it helps reconfigure, right? Because if you're doing C minus over 50, yeah. Okay? If you're doing C minus over 50, then either you're in the wrong job, like your talent's not being leveraged, or you have to change the way in which you're working, right?

So again, if you're doing C plus work and you're working your brains out, you kind of stand, you're not dumb. Yeah. The ratio helps you understand. where the configuration needs to be. Because if you have that level of work ethic, you should be doing good work, be and above.

That's why both metrics matter. Level of accomplishment still matters. It's still an indicator, right? But I think you're right. I think the very interesting thing that we're talking about here is the stuff that doesn't get measured seems more important. For the long term. By the way, in work and in life.

In work and in life. Unreasonable hospitality and what I'm talking about are, yeah, they're the same thing. It almost makes me like, it's almost like everyone should be doing an audit of themselves. Yeah. Are you investing too much of your time into things that are too easy to measure? And if you are, you might be missing out on some of the best things that life has to offer. Beautifully put.

And by the way, you can change. Like if you want to start your career, because I definitely started, like, when I was trying to prove my point that the Golden Circle worked out on the road, you know, doing all my speaking engagements. You know, I joke that one year I was in my apartment for one full week, once the entire year. Was that the best year of my career or the worst year of my career? Yeah. You know? I knew that I was working, I had the 50. But then I chose to change. Neither of them are absolute. They're choices that you can adapt over the course of a life. Like if you have a family that maybe it's okay to make less money.

Maybe it's okay to get the promotion slower. Like maybe that's okay. And it's also okay to work nonstop for measures as well. Like that's the one thing when you see some of these people on Instagram and they're very successful, wealthy people later in life. And they're like, you got to take more time to relax. And it's like, okay, hold on.

What were you doing in your 20s? Yeah, exactly. And when you actually get to know them a little bit, they were A over 150, right? Like every single week working nonstop, and they earned the right to have that kind of privilege. Yeah. And so the point, I think, is there's not a wrong way

so long as you're aware of what's happening. It's not a wrong way. It's information. You know, if we say what gets measured, gets done, what gets measured gets managed, then if you only have half a metric. Yes. If you only have... You need a little more information.

A little of accomplishment, but you don't have the ratio. It's an incomplete metric. And so if we say what gets measured, gets done, and what do I do with those other 47 hours? Oh, my goodness. I went to movies. I traveled. I have a hobby that I love.

I pursued friendship. I pursued friendship. And the irony is, if you take that mentality and now you sort of like, we are in a world right now that's obsessed with like longevity and supplements and all these other things. And the thing is people are applying that A over 50 mentality to their longevity.

And what they're missing, it's the 47 hours. of time to just relax and enjoy your friends, that is actually what makes you live longer. There's a great irony in this. No, I mean, Bob Walminker's stuff, I'm like, all right, so hold on, I don't need to work out for 20 minutes a day as long as I'm a really good friend. No, you need to work out some. No, I'm just kidding.

But this is what I think is interesting. You need to work out some. I mean, I was talking to somebody who measures the inflammation of our cells. and because inflammation, you know, it's the root of a lot of problems in our bodies, heart disease, cancer, and all the rest of it. So you want inflammation down, right? You don't need to overdose some blueberries

to keep the inflammation down, you know? Just reduce stress. That's what keeps inflammation down. And what they were telling me in their work and studying this stuff is that elite athletes don't live longer than the rest of us. And the people who are obsessed with their health, like their longevity nuts, who are doing intermittent fasting and an extreme workout,

then a sauna and then a cold plunge. What they're doing, it's okay. All of those things are healthy, but not when you do them all every day. And so it's called stress stacking. So yes, a certain level of stress on the body does make you healthier, right? But stress stacking, which is what it's called, actually makes you unhealthy. So they're obsessed with the metrics that they actually cause themselves more stress when they don't hit the number of steps

that they promised they would hit. The increase of stress actually outweighs there's a great one that I read a bunch of years ago that when we stress, like real stress about eating the chocolate cake, the cortisol that's released in our bodies from the stress is worse for us than the chocolate cake. Have a piece of chocolate cake, enjoy it.

You're fine. And if you do it every now and then, it's not like you're eating McDonald's for every meal. If you had a McDonald's once a year, it'll do a total of zero to your body. You know? And that's the point. which is exercise in a reasonable amount.

Stress your body a reasonable amount. Some stress is good. Stress stacking bad. But all of these things come to light when you start to play with ratios. So, hold on. I want to go back because the other thing that was going through my mind

as you were talking about this, A, all the good stuff, it's harder to measure. But over the last week, I've hung out with three different people, all very successful. and there's been one conversation that's come up which is even the most successful people I know

there's a little piece of them that no matter how well things have gone or are going that's scared it's all going to go away and I know I feel that sometimes and so when you say you worked 50 hours you've got the A why are you still doing it well, because what if you wake up one day and it's all gone? And by the way, intellectually.

I know, intellect, it's madness. It's insane. Obviously, I know. But people have a hard time talking about it because they feel weak for acknowledging either the fear around it or the insecurity around it. But that is what keeps people working 50 because they fear they will wake up one day and there's no opportunity left. I think it's more insidious. Yes, the fear is absolutely there,

but I think it's actually more insidious. I knew this billionaire who, when the economy went into recession, he lost an unbelievable amount of money and went into, like, serious depression, right? So his wife was like, can you do me a favorite? He can just talk to him, right?

And he's an arrogant guy. You know, he's whatever stereotype you have in your mind of yeah it's all true right and I walk into the room and he's sitting on the table in the dining room with his head in his hands on the dining room table

I've never seen anything like this I sit down and I talk to him and he's telling me he's going through how awful he feels and the depression and I'm just listening and I can't help it I'm so curious I say I have to ask like how much did you lose

you know and he said 80%. So I'm doing some quick math in my head. Okay, you got a billion. You've lost 80%. You still have 200 million. It's not like you have to like

start eating like ramen noodles or sell a house. You're going to be fine. Like it changes your lifestyle zero. Right? Zero. So I said something

that I thought would help. Right? I said, oh, you're not upset because you lost the money. You're upset because of the score. I wanted him to see it was an abstract score, and the score was down, which is why he was depressed, and it made him feel worse. And that's why I say it's more insidious,

which is there are some people who are so driven by the score that the money ceases to be money. It's a score that they compare. themselves to each other and the humiliation of having a low score compared to other people with a high score. You know, Bezos and Musk are obsessed with each other. Why? Yeah. You know? Why? Who cares? Right? And that's the point, which is when you reach a certain level, money ceases to be the thing because you have more than you could possibly, you have more than

countries, right? It's the score. And I think, people who are raised, and this now goes into sort of like parenting, I guess, that the people who are raised, the grade is everything. The A is everything. You better get an A. I think confuse worth, that the score and self-worth become somehow melded together. Because, again, the score is easier to measure. When you start to combine your self-worth with the score, It's a level of accomplishment. It's not the value of the person. But it is a part of it.

It is a part of it. Like you work really hard. Like you invest a lot. Like you have ideas. People react to them. You want to see fruit to your labor. And like that is a part of yourself. And every human being.

But it's not everything. Because we're talking about people with wealth. And that's nothing to do with it. They're just examples and they're extreme examples, which is why they're easy to point to because the metrics are using. Yeah, exactly. But every human being on the planet, when you're working with the most junior person to the most senior person, everybody wants to see that the hard work that they invest pays off in some way,

that the product gets shipped, that the person gets helped, that we save a life, that the blood, sweat, and tears was worth something. So yes, that's 100% true. We want to know that our work matters. And it's harder to calculate the score of being the person that always shows up for your friends. It's hard to calculate the person who calls... And, you know, somebody who's already got a reservation and just because then they hang up

and you don't hear the, oh, oh, that was a great phone call. You don't hear that. It's one of the things that's hard about our work. Which is intellectually, I know, but I don't know. I don't have an instant gratification. It's kind of a kind of faith that you have to just believe in the miracle of it all that and keep the faith and stay true to the belief set.

You know, there is an element of that. That's wild. It's actually one of the really funny differences between restaurants in my world, when I ran restaurants in my world now. Like restaurants, you serve people a meal. You're right there. You can see whether they like it or not.

They'll tell you. You put out a book. You're like, I think, I mean, like, sometimes I wish I could just like sit next to a stranger and watch them read my book and be like, hey, are you enjoying the book so far? Like, how's your entree? That's really interesting

That you've grown up with instant gratification Or not even instant gratification Instant feedback Because if they don't like the meal, they'll tell you And it's totally normal and expected For someone to come over and ask you While you're eating your meal In so many words, are you enjoying the meal?

Right Which is not really normal in almost any other industry It's not like the person from wherever I got this. Buck Mason is going to be like, are you enjoying the sweater? Or like, do you like the book? But in restaurants, you always, and the reason is because you can make changes on the fly.

Okay, okay. So what we're talking about, okay, now this gets interesting, right? Which is the reason I pursue the A. Yes. The A over 50 is not simply because it's easier to measure. It's because there's no other feedback mechanism for me to know that my work is valuable other than the A.

Hmm. So I don't know if people like wearing my sweaters, but I can count how many sweaters I've sold. Yeah. And I can draw some loose conclusion that if they're selling a lot, I'm guessing they're liking them. Right?

And so what we're talking about, which is totally fair, which is, and maybe they do desire everything we're talking about, and they are frustrated with the metric system, but without an immediate feedback loop, and sure, I can send out surveys that, you know, 5% fill out, or only the angry people, you know, respond,

you know, all of this stuff, that the best I can do to know that I'm doing okay is the business is growing. And so maybe, just maybe, like my A over 50, which is it's fine to count the revenues, totally fine, but maybe there's another metric

that should serve as the ratio. Yeah. This is going to end up being like a 17 different things going to do. No, I don't think it's, I think things like, repeat sales. Yeah. Like, I know a company, the true story, this is hilarious to me.

And this is how misguided. This is a funded company, spending millions of dollars, blah, blah, blah. I think they're in the financial world. And their sales team is knocking it out of the park, but the product isn't so great. And so customers aren't renewing, right? So do you know what the CEO did? Okay. Yield at the sales team.

Huh. And the sales team was like, talk to the engineers. The clients are calling us and say, we love you, but it's not. working. We can't, we can't do this. So the CEO is yelling at the sales team, right? And I'm listening to this going, no, right? So like in our business, right, I am fully aware that first time sales, that's a marketer. Like marketers should drive first time sales. Second sales, that's my product guy. If the product's good, I can only measure that on a resubscription. A first time subscription, marketing. A second time subscription product. Yeah. Right? But I know that.

And my point is in this modern sophisticated world, this is a modern company that's yelling at their sales team because resubscriptions are down. Which is insane. Which is insane. So this is what I'm saying. I think all metrics that we should be looking at, stock prices, revenues, all of these things need a ratio that gives us some indication of value or quality. So if A over 50 is quantity over quality, I mean that's kind of what it is. The A is the quantity that I achieved and the 50 is the quality. of the life that it took me to get there,

that there should be a quantity over quality metric for everything. So if the quantity is revenues, then what's the quality metric? Maybe it's second time purchases. Or in the case, let's play the game. You know, EMP, right? If quantity was revenues,

you had a business to run, what would be the quality metric? Because it's insufficient for us to say, you know, you just have to trust. Restaurants are a little weird because four stars, this, accolade, this, all those things which you could. Yeah, but sometimes four-star restaurants go to business.

What I was thinking, as you started saying that, was during the Recession, the Great Recession, 09, we were working our butts off. We were losing money. And the people that came into the restaurant were leaving so unbelievably happy. And that's something I could measure because I was in the room with them every single night.

And it was the thing that actually kept us going, which is... So could you have... Could you have, and for the sake of this little hypothetical, how many tables does one server work? Five tables, ten tables? Like, depends. Yeah, somewhere in between those.

Somewhere between five and ten. Yeah. So at the end of the night, you could go to each server, and they're not judged by it, right? They could fill out a form and say, table one, on a scale of one to five, how happy were they? Or just thumbs up, thumbs down.

Table two, how happy were they? Table three, how happy were they? You could keep a satisfied customer metric. For sure. And that would be an indication, though even though revenues are down, we're doing good work guys. We're on the right path. We're making people happy if we stay the course.

Because otherwise, you only have revenues down and everybody's like, we got to work harder. But we're working our brains out. Or revenues are down and we have to change the product. No, maybe you need to change the sales strategy. Yeah. But don't change the product because it's working. People are enjoying it. So this is what's helping me understand this, right?

Which is the level of achievement over the hours it took to achieve that is a quantity versus quality ratio. And I've always wanted to do something called a Y index, which is to measure the Y of a company or measure the Y of an economy. And so when you look at the Dow Jones, it says the Dow Jones is up X percent.

Okay, at what cost? Or for a single equity. Like, look at their stock price going up. I'm like, but what's their Y index? Right? And so the whole idea is that if the stock price is going up, but the Y index, which would be a combination of like,

you know, employee happiness, engagement, all those things, is going down. that's a short-term investment. Yes, yeah, for sure. If the windings is way up, but the stock price is down, good long-term investment.

And ideally, you want them both in parallel. And again, because even looking at stock price, it's only half a metric. That stock price is going up doesn't tell me that the company's healthy. It just tell me that the stock price is up. Same thing with the stock market and the economy. Because you know this.

When you announce layoffs, stock prices go up, and when you announce R&D, stock prices go down. Yeah, yeah. Yes. That makes sense. It is one of the cool things about the restaurant industry. It also, I mean, we're talking about how much you give of yourself to others and at what cost. I mean, in hospitality, like, I really like making other people happy.

And if I'm not careful, I end up being an A50 for the rest of my life because I don't like letting other people down. And at the end of the day, I end up letting some of the people that are most important to me down. And that's the problem, which is there's nothing wrong with the 50. You just have to weigh the cost of that 50. And there's an entire group of people. And again, it's not a good thing or a bad thing. It's just, let's be honest with ourselves. Who spends, I'll give you the real life example.

Yeah. I'll use myself as the guinea pig, right? So for years, I had close friends accused me of being a bad listener. That was my answer That's exactly I mean I don't see it Never in a million years And I would say things like

You know what I do for a living right You know you're wrong And I'm a really good listener right I mean that's pretty much how those conversations went You're like I'm sorry what did you just say Yeah exactly Huh? What?

So I ended up I took this listening class And that's when I discovered That I am an unbelievably Good listener with people I will never see again for the rest of my life. But for the people closest to me, terrible. Wow.

So all of the skills I had learned about listening and being focused and reflective listening and being present, all of that. I was doing it with strangers. I was doing it with clients. I was doing it with, you know, one-time interactions.

But the people who had regular ongoing relationships with, I applied none of those skills. I think I'm guilty of this sometimes. Right? And I simply assumed that I was good at it because I had the capacity and knew that I could do it

and in the public world people are like, you're such a good listener. And the random people that are more prone to praise you were saying you're really good at it because you're good at it with them. Exactly. And I ended up taking the people around me for granted. So that is akin to,

I appreciate the 50, but who's paying for that 50? Are you paying for that 50? Like if you're unmarried, no friends making the investment in you and you're the only one paying the price for that 50? Great. Go, go, go.

Go invest in you, you 22-year-old. Like, I love it, right? But if you start having relationships and family and close friends or family in need, I'm sorry I can't come to your funeral. I have a meeting. You know?

I don't think you'd say sorry to the person who died. I can't come to you from a book. You get the idea. I'm saying it. I'm sorry, I can't come to the funeral. Like now who's paying the price of that 50? Who's bearing the load of that 50?

It's no longer just you. I'd also dial that back just to make sure the idea is clear. The funeral's almost too big. I'm sorry I didn't answer the phone the last couple times you called. I've been busy at work. And you and I have done this with each other, right? Because I'm guilty of not calling my friend because you and I can't talk for less than many hours.

Right? Like the conversation we're having now, this is what people don't understand. This is like a normal conversation with fewer interruptions, but this is pretty much how it goes. where we start feeding off of each other. And because I crave it and love it, and I laugh more with you than any other friend, and I enjoy it so much that I put it off and put it off

because I don't have an hour. I don't have an hour. Oh, I don't have an hour. And then before I know it, three months go by and I haven't talked to Will. And I've made a very conscientious change in my life, which is as much as I crave the hour, I would rather have an imperfect 10 minutes

or an imperfect five minutes. And you know this, because I've done it with you, I'm in the car, I only have 10 minutes. I wanted to just call and say, bye. Or you've, you've answered the phone when I've called you and you've said, I'm on a call in two minutes. But, which by the way, it's cool. Yeah. Because normally if it's 928, you're meeting at 930. Someone calls, you're not answering. Yeah, you turn it down. But just to be like, hey, I only two minutes, but just nice to your voice. Yeah. Love you. And it's amazing how little it takes for the other person to feel mattered. Yeah. That's nice when you call someone on the answer to the phone.

And now this goes all the way back to the beginning of our conversation about AI, which is it took two minutes of an inconsequential, useless conversation that accomplished nothing for a friend to feel like a friend. Yes. And think about the incredibly light lift. Like sometimes unreasonable is simply, thank you, please, nice to see you, come back again. The usual for a barista to say to you,

the usual? Hey Will, the usual? I mean, that means they know who you are. It's not even a little bit hard. It just requires trying a little bit harder. I mean, that's some, why don't we end right there? It's not even a little bit hard. It just requires trying a little bit harder. I really love you. I love you too. You're so smart. Now you better call your wife. I'm so sorry. Find out who's bearing the cost of the 50. And when she's to starts telling you, don't say, but look what we get for that 50. Look how good the A is. Don't say that. A bit of optimism is a production of the optimism company. Lovingly produced by our team Lindsay Garbenius, Phoebe Bradford, and Devin Johnson. Subscribe wherever you enjoy listening to

podcasts. And if you want even more cool stuff, visit simic.com. Thanks for listening. Take care of yourself. Take care of each other. Thank you.