Good Life Project - Mark Manson: On Pain, Possibility and Profanity

Episode Date: September 12, 2016

The first time I stumbled upon Mark Manson's writing, I didn't know what to do. It was a complete pattern interrupt.The issues were raw and real, the ideas were rich and his lens was so contrarian and refreshing it made me think. Really think. But, then, there was the language. This particular essay was wall-to-wall F-bombs.I was having trouble reconciling the depth of thought with the width of profanity. I found myself diving into more of his work, and discovered that I wasn't the only one. Some 2 million people read him every month. Waiting for his next philosophical provocation.When I heard Mark had a new book out, I figured it was the perfect opportunity to sit down with him and dive into his bigger story. To get to know the person behind the writing. In this week's conversation, Mark and I take a meandering road through everything from global travel and which country emotes more than others to a more nuanced conversation of pain, possibility, writing and exactly how, when and why he began to insert profanity into his work, what it's done both for and to him.His latest book is The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living A Good Life. As you might guess from the title, the first few chapters are a pretty in-your-face setup, but as the book continues, Manson settles into a deeper, you might even say gentler voice. He explores ideas like choosing the pain you want to live with, rather than the outcome you want to attain. Just like his essay before, it made me think. I hope it'll do the same for you.Mentioned in This Episode:Connect with Mark: Mark Manson| InstagramThe Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck article (with epic cat photo)Why I Have a Potty MouthTony Robbins: I Am Not Your Guru documentaryGeorge Carlin - 7 Words You Can't Say On TVAmerican stand-up comedian Bill Hicks +++My new book - How to Live a Good Life: Soulful Stories, Surprising Science and Practical Wisdom - is available for pre-order now! It's a joyful, story-driven, engaging and eye-opening deep dive into what really makes a difference in your pursuit of a meaningful, alive and connected life. Click here now to download and read the first chapter for free. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hey, did you hear? I've got a new book out. It's called How to Live a Good Life, Soulful Stories, Surprising Science, and Practical Wisdom. I've been working on this baby for a number of years now. It's the distillation of about 50 years, 50 plus years now, on the planet. The opportunity to sit down with hundreds of astonishing teachers and find patterns, you know, things that really, really moved the needle. And also sharing a single idea, a single model, a lens on life that you'll hear once, you'll remember forever. And it may guide the way that you move into the world from this moment forward and hopefully make a really big difference.

We have a really cool pre-order initiative going on where we're working with a foundation to plant trees as well. So when you pre-order your book, you'll get some pretty hardcore, amazing extra bonuses and gifts. And at the same time, you will help us plant what we hope to become a good life for us. We are on a mission to plant 10,000 trees as part of bringing this book to life. And I would love your help. I'd be so grateful for it. So if you want to learn more about how to get your copy of the book or maybe become an ambassador, actually, we have an amazing ambassador experience as well. And also help us plant trees, plant that Good Life Forest. Check out all the details at goodlifeproject.com slash book.

Or you can just go ahead and click on the link in the show notes now. Thanks so much. I'm Jonathan Fields. On to our show. Life has problems. Like, get used to it. You know, just decide which ones are useful and important and which ones are just a distraction. So before we get into today's guest, just a quick, not a warning, but just letting you know that there is adult language in this conversation. Now, some of you may find that offensive, but actually what you'll find is that about halfway through the

conversation, we actually get into a conversation about the use of that language, why it's there, what the purpose is, what some of the misconceptions are, why today's guest actually chose very deliberately to use words like the F word and stuff like that. And I think it's a conversation that actually is worth listening to. If again, though, you are completely offended and you don't want to be exposed to that, probably just listen until next week's episode. But my guest this week is Mark Manson. Mark has been writing a, I guess you could consider it a blog, although he tends to write these long and deep philosophical essays. But one thing that you'll notice about those essays is that every once in a while, they will be laden with vulgarity.

And the interesting thing is he doesn't do it because he's lazy. He does it very tactically and strategically. And there's a specific reason for it. He made it onto my radar, I want to say a couple of years ago when he came out with an essay. And the title of that essay was The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck. And that has now turned into a book, which is being published. And I got curious as he expanded on that philosophy. I got curious about a lot of what he was writing about, about his life. And again, I got curious about his writing voice, why he chooses to actually incorporate some really big, deep ideas and some really important conversations, conversations that I think would and should be

had by a lot of people and couch them in a very strong voice, a voice that is clearly designed to fiercely attract some people and fiercely repel others. So we get deep into that conversation and into him as a writer and the choices that he's made. And so I'm really excited to share that and to share this conversation with you. I'm Jonathan Fields. This is Good Life Project. Tell me how to fly this thing. Mark Wahlberg. You know what the difference between me and you is? You're going to die. Don't shoot him. We need him. Y'all need a pilot. Flight risk. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here.

It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch, getting you eight hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series X. Available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum.

Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required, charge time and actual results will vary. Where were you right before New York? I was in Brazil, actually. Were you living there? Yeah. Oh, that's right. Tell me what was that about.

So I actually first went down there in 2012. Right. And then my fiance is Brazilian. So I stayed there for a little while, and then I left. She and I kept in touch, and I got pulled back. And then I lived there on and off up until last year and then uh we got engaged last year and it was like okay we need to start figuring out like green card process and all that stuff so we went back there um to do like a lot of wedding

planning and just logistical stuff and then basically preparing for like the permanent move here right this year yeah so as the world has been focusing on brazil for the last two weeks you guys like we want nothing to do it's it's bittersweet you know um i think it's easier for me because i'm not brazilian so it's easier for me to just detach and just feel like oh it's brazil being brazil um but it's it's it's fun and and in kind of you know watching her on these emotional highs and lows with the Brazil being Brazil. But it's fun. And kind of watching her on these emotional highs and lows with the Olympics and everything. It was the same with the World Cup.

And the country is an interesting place. It's full of extremes. Extreme good and extreme bad at the same time. Yeah. It's funny. Because in a weird way way a lot of people would probably say that about the united states these days but probably for different reasons yeah have you found because you've traveled a lot yeah um some 60 countries or something like that right i'm curious have you and you're somebody like you know from my sense have you really just kind of like observes your

environment and how people interact with each other yeah this has always been a curiosity of mine so i'm going to pick your brain a little bit. It's been in a lot of cultures. If there was a scale on how much people emote, and you were going to rank the United States compared to these 60 other countries, what do you think would happen? Would we be at the top, the bottom, the middle? I would say somewhere in the middle.

But I would say for Anglo-slash- slash Western European cultures, we're towards the top. People are a little bit more subdued in, you know, if you go to like Ireland or Scotland or Scandinavia. But in the grand scheme of things, it's the Latino cultures the African cultures definitely like they make us look like a bunch of boars but I mean often I think that that's an amazing thing to be able to just sort of

like let whatever is in your heart pour out and we just like stomp that down so much I really fell in love with Latin culture for that reason. And I grew up in a family that was pretty emotionally stifled. It wasn't acceptable to express too much. And so when I discovered Latin culture, especially once I started to learn the languages a little bit, it was just this breath of fresh air. It was just like, oh my God, how have i been living without this my whole life but it's interesting because then you spend more time

in it and you start to realize that there's kind of like a there's a downside of that too like there's i have a saying that i that i always tell people i say the best thing about a country or a culture is also the worst thing and so if if you take like Americans, like the United States, we're extremely driven, extremely ambitious. We're very good at business. We have all these beliefs about like, you know, anybody can work and be successful

and everybody deserves like free enterprise and everything. And in many ways, that's the best thing about our culture. It's the thing that we've contributed to the world. But at the same time, it also creates all of our problems is that like, we look at poor and homeless people and we're like, oh, well, that guy's lazy. He needs to go

get a job. And it creates a lot of like very kind of superficial aspects of the culture and everything's a sales job and people are very transactional in their relationships. And the same applies with, I think, the emotional stuff. You know, what I love about Brazil and my friends and my fiance's family down there is just that, like, things are just so loving and open and warm. And it's, you know, if somebody's happy, they're just happy with you. And if something bad happens, they're just sad with you. And it's a really beautiful thing. But then the downside of that is that things don't really get done because people are just like, well, you know, we've got this project coming up, but, you know, it's so beautiful

outside. Like, why don't we just, let's take off work early and go to the beach, you know? They get to the beach and they're like, oh, well, let's have some caipirinhas. And then, you know, they have this great time. And then the next thing you know, three weeks have gone by and that project's still not finished and like there's a cool part of that but it's you know when the whole society is operating on that way you know things just break down constantly yeah i mean you could probably make a similar argument it's almost like the east coast west coast thing in the united states it's like you know you, I mean, because I know friends who are kind of hardcore entrepreneurs

and business people on the east coast, and then they go to the west coast, especially Southern California. And they're like, okay, so people, we're hiring people, but they're not actually showing up. And I shouldn't make big sweeping generalizations. I'm sorry, everybody, I just insulted everybody in Southern California. Yeah, right. So I'm completely sorry about that sorry. Everybody, I just insulted everybody in Southern California. Yeah, right.

So I'm completely sorry about that. They're awesome, industrious people in Southern California. Working so hard with their surfboards. But it begs a bigger question though, right? And that is, okay, so if you take it to the most extreme that you were saying, if literally sort of like that, you know, like such is life, enjoy the moment, attitude, makes it so that people are just so much more there and present and enjoying the moment. But at the same time, on almost a countrywide level, like industriousness and stuff doesn't happen. Is that a bad thing?

Yes. I mean, I think a society can function with a certain amount of that, and maybe even a certain amount of that inefficiency is healthy for it. I think the ideal middle is, you know, I really wish I could take the best parts about Latin culture and the best parts about US culture, and just merge them into this mythical, amazing country. because the problem in latin america is so yes it's it's nice to have that attitude and you know when it comes to certain maybe industries or or projects like it's it's fine to be like you know what if it's a few weeks late it's late it's not a big problem but the problem in latin america is is their infrastructure is failing. The police are not reliable.

The legal system is not reliable. The politicians aren't reliable. And once you start getting into that, everything starts to kind of break down a little bit. Yeah, I guess like you said, there's the light side and the dark side of everything. There's no – you got to kind of embrace it all until you figure out how to make that humanoid clone of, like, the best of all things. But according to, I think, your philosophy, like, that perfect person, that perfect existence would also be maybe the worst thing that could end up happening. Yeah. I mean, I don't think it can exist.

I think it's, there's no, I mean, and I talk about this in my book, like there's no such thing as a problem-free life. You know, it basically, it's about picking your, life's about picking your problems. Which problems do you want, you know? And some problems are better for others, you know, objectively. Some problems are better for others based on their personality or their preferences, their values. But I think really, it's, you know, one of the central themes of the book is like, stop avoiding problems, choose the problems you want, choose the problems that are important, invigorate you, make you feel inspired, give your life meaning. Yeah, which is the exact opposite of what so many people think of, which is to avoid

all of that stuff. I mean, it's interesting. One of the things you talk about is suffering. It's something that I'm deeply fascinated in. And it's funny. I'm reading your book, and you start telling this story, a parable about a guy, and I'm like, three sentences, I'm like, I know who this is, even though it takes like three pages to reveal it and it ends up being the Buddha. But take me deeper into your understanding of suffering and maybe some of the, what you feel are some of the misunderstandings around it and where the value really is. Sure. Buddhism has been very influential on my life. And one of the things, one of the things I like about Buddhism is I feel like it's much more realistic in terms of like, for lack of a better term, like life is shit. You know, it's like everything kind of sucks, but that's okay.

You know, like we're not here to like fix everything. We're here to just be with it and get comfortable with it. And so in the book, I talk about how it's, you know, basically that's like the first tenet of Buddhism is that life is suffering. You know, everything you experience in your life will cause some form of suffering or another. And the Buddha, you know, I don't get too deep in it, but you know, in Buddhism, it has to do with attachment and attaching yourself to different ideas or feelings or emotions

or whatever. I kind of take like a different left turn or something when I talk about it. And that I just say that, you know, suffering, pain in general, it evolved for a reason. You know, it's not, pain is not this like horrible accident that was just kind of thrust upon humanity. Like we evolved over millions of years with a pain system in our body for a reason. And it's a feedback mechanism that tells us that we're doing something that's not healthy or not good for us. And the argument I make in the book is that, therefore, we should not ignore it. Because if we become very adept at ignoring pain or shutting pain out or

distracting ourselves from pain, then we're not getting that necessary feedback that we need to maintain a healthy, stable life. Yeah. I think one of the challenges that people have with that idea, and it's funny, like I've gone fairly deep down the Buddhism rabbit hole too, and a lot of the philosophy really resonates with me as well. And unfortunately, I have many friends who have followed different paths and been able to have these great conversations. The idea that we actually need pain to be there, that it has value,

that it's not something that we, like you shouldn't spend your life trying to remove all occurrences of pain, but actually not necessarily invite it, but know that like it's okay if it's there and it actually needs to be there. And that there's, there's value and that actually a life completely devoid of pain, which a lot of people think they want is actually not a life that you want.

Yeah. Cause then it would be meaningless. There's nothing to strive for. there's nothing to struggle for there's nothing to accomplish there's nothing to to move towards there'd be no sense of purpose if everything just felt good all the time you know it's like if you imagine like a heroin addict you know like and i think i even use that example in the book it's like yeah there's there's a word we have for people who just chase pleasure all the time. And it's like hedonism. It's a heroin addict.

It's a drug addict. And if you see those people, they've become controlled by this, just like chasing this feeling over and over again. Yeah. So I guess the question is, if you accept the fact that a certain amount of suffering, a certain amount of pain is there, and there's value in that, what do you do with that? Where do you go from there? Because how do you extract the value from the pain, from the suffering? I think the first step is you need to choose, you need to decide what the pain means. And that's such a simple thing to say, but it's like you can go so many different directions with

that and actually probably the majority of the book is just about that like what does your pain mean like what are you deciding your pain means how are you measuring success and failure for yourself that's a hard process that that requires a lot of self-questioning, requires either discovering or getting back to your personal values, like understanding what you've decided is important for you. And that's an extremely personal and difficult thing for a lot of people to do, I think. Yeah, I totally agree with that.

I think it's a process that most of us run from. Actually, I don't even think it's a process we run from. I think it's a process we most of us run from. I don't even think it's a process we run from. I think it's a process we've never been taught or encouraged to learn. Yes, I definitely agree with that. And so we've never learned how to like get good at it or like, you know, it's, we're all kind of figuring it out as we go. And I think the other difficulty is that it's a process that never completely ends. It's something that's always evolved. Like the meaning of our suffering and the meaning of our problems, it's always changing as our life goes on.

And so we have to continually reevaluate, ask ourselves the same question year after year after year. Yeah, we don't like that. No, we want like final solutions. Like I want to take a pill and be happy. Can we just lock this down now? It's like, okay, I checked the box, I know myself.

We're good, right? But it's, I think culturally we're so uncomfortable with the notion that it's a process that never ends. Yeah. But I think that's also, my sense is that that's something that's relatively unique to Western society. Yeah. What do you think? My observation is I think consumerism for all of its problems, it definitely has kind of a psychological side effect on us

in that it kind of conditions us to just want immediate resolution to our problems or our desires. know so it's i mean if you pretty much every commercial advertisement ever made it's like you know feel bad about your body buy this you know feel bad about are you hungry buy this you know and it's it's just this simple like two-step feel pain buy something problem solved process and i think that kind of just like gets inculcated into us and we get kind of fixated on it and we don't and so yeah and i mean you could probably talk about the education system as well where everything is kind of like a definitive like performance based or result based but yeah i find that process know, some people describe it as like a process-oriented mentality and a result-oriented mentality.

I think a lot of like just the structures in Western society is based on results, you know? Yeah. It's goal striving. Yeah, it's all clearly measured, but there are many aspects of our psychology that it's always a process-oriented. Like give me, take, give me an example. Um,

well, I mean, if you just take, so just take happiness in general, you know, like there's no single thing in your life or my life that we will ever do that will, it's like,

okay, happiness accomplished, you know, into like, I'm done, you know, I'm going to go retire. You know, it's the things that make us feel great today are often the same things that drive us crazy next week or next year. And just the way kind of our brains work is that happiness requires action. It requires change. It requires like this process of, I guess, evolving. You know, it's moving the goalposts back repeatedly. It's just the way our brain works. And, you know, these things in society, it's not built that way. And so, you get a lot of situations where, you know, you have people who are worth $20 million

who feel like they haven't made enough money yet. And you have people who are worth 20 million dollars who feel like they haven't made enough money yet and you get people who own six bmws who feel like they need to buy a seven and so there's there's there's a little bit of an inconsistency there yeah so i think so much i still agree with that i think uh there's great research around that too you talk about i talk about it as well about the more you actually maniacally pursue happiness as a general rule, the more miserable you become over time. It's counterintuitive, but actually it kind of makes sense when you really deconstruct it. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever.

It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch, getting you eight hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series X. Available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required, charge time and actual results will vary.

Mayday, mayday. We've been compromised. The pilot's a hitman. I knew you were going to be fun. On January 24th. Tell me how to fly this thing. Mark Wahlberg. You know what the difference between me and you is?

You're going to die. Don't shoot him, we need him. Y'all need a pilot? Flight risk. You were kind of alluding to something else. I want to go a little bit deeper into it, which is the idea of sort of like rating your happiness in comparison to others around oh yeah you have this great sort of like set of contrasting stories dave mustang and pete best yeah can you share that a little bit and why you you brought those two up in relation to each other so yeah i'm i'm a huge

rock music fanatic nerd and everything. And I love these two stories. So Dave Mustaine, he was actually the original guitarist of Metallica. And literally like the week before, a couple weeks before, Metallica was going to record their very first album. The rest of the guys in the band just woke him up from a hangover and were like hey dude you're out of the band and gave him a bus ticket to go home and there was like no explanation there was no like argument about it it was just he was done he was out and he was devastated by this and he got very he got very upset and angry and he decided when he got home that he that he resolved that he was going to start the biggest, best,

most badass metal band the world had ever seen. And he went out and found better musicians than the Metallica guys, and he started a band called Megadeth, which actually went on to sell like 30 million records, toured the world, played stadium crowds, guy made millions of dollars. It's really fascinating because about 10 years ago, there was a documentary made about Metallica and they interviewed Dave Mustaine and he actually broke down in the interview and was like, I still feel like a failure because I'm still, despite all of like the platinum records and everything that I've done, I'm still the guy who got kicked out of Metallica, you know?

And, and what I love about that story too, is that by a lot of the conventional wisdom in our culture, Dave Mustaine did everything right. You know, like it's suffered adversity. And so he resolved that he was going to come back better and stronger than ever.

And he was going to succeed no matter what. And he did it. He accomplished everything he wanted to do. But what I say in the book is that the problem is that he wasn't measuring himself by being a successful musician anymore. Once he got kicked out of Metallica, he started measuring himself by, am I better than Metallica? And because of that, no matter how many millions of records he sold,

he would never be better than them. Right. And Metallica, by the way, which has sold 180, 200 million. Yeah. I mean, they're arguably one of the biggest bands that have ever existed. And then Pete Best. So there's a really odd kind of parallel if you go back to like the 1960s so pete best was the original drummer of the beatles an eerily similar story beatles were about to record their

first album about a month before the recording the beatles didn't even want to do it themselves so john paul and george went and told their manager, they're like, hey, kick Pete out of the band. And the manager was like, why? Pete's great. Actually, apparently, back then, Pete was the only responsible one who showed up for rehearsal and wasn't doing drugs. So the manager was like, wait, why do you guys want to get rid of Pete? Come on, he's a nice guy. And they're like, no, get rid of Pete. So a couple weeks before the recording started, the manager kicked pete out and they went and got they got ringo and pete went through pretty much the opposite of dave

mustaine like he he tried to start other bands they failed miserably the beatles were not very gracious with him apparently they like talked really badly about him in the media they like made fun of him and said that he was a terrible musician and all this stuff and he became incredibly depressed and almost suicidal and again if you jump ahead like 20 30 years later he in an interview he said getting kicked out of the beatles is one of the best things that ever happened to me and his line of reasoning was it it forced him out of kind of like this transient music life down another career path. He was still involved in the music industry, but he wasn't like a touring musician.

And he met his wife. He had kids. He had a family. Actually built a very successful life doing like music engineering, studio production, things like that. And he said, yeah, actually, like, now I'm pretty glad I got kicked out because, you know, I would, he's like, I would never have privacy again. Like, I would, my family life would be all screwed up. I wouldn't have met my wife. And so, I think that's a beautiful contrast to Mustang because it shows that really the only thing that changes Pete Best just changed how he was measuring himself.

Well, I think he started out trying to be better than the Beatles, and that quickly made him really depressed. And then once he realized that he couldn't do that, he needed to go find a new way to measure what success or meaning was in his life. And he found that, and he actually lived a very happy and healthy life yeah i mean it's interesting too because objectively if you looked at those two stories side by side right and you asked them without having heard like those final things from either of them and you're like who's more successful yeah you know like probably almost everyone will point to uh mustang right you know like start you know like the second best you know like metal band ever and

all this stuff because we define success so kind of weirdly um and whereas in truth you know like that he was torturing himself and he was miserable um but that that experience is not unique to him i mean there's really interesting research on sort of like comparison and how it destroys us yeah you know how have you seen this this study is done where it kind of shows that ask people, would you rather make, I'm making up the numbers here, but the point is the same. You can either make $75,000 and know that, you know, all of your friends and colleagues are making a hundred or you can make 50, but be making 25,000 more than everybody else that you know. And they chose the lower number as long as they knew they were making more than everybody else around them

because we're so wired to try and derive satisfaction through comparison rather than just something more internal. We're weird that way. I mean, it's almost like a curse and i mean i definitely fall into the school of thought that like i don't think you can get rid of comparison like i think like you said we're wired for it and for me the question is is what we because that it's such a precarious thing because if we start comparing ourselves with everybody around us we're just going to end up on this like treadmill taking us to nowhere for me it's like okay if we have to compare ourselves to something like then we need to be very careful about what we decide to compare ourselves to like how are we

going to decide like what is the standard that we're going to set for ourself is it going to be selling more albums than metallica or is it going to be having happy healthy relationships in our life you know it's like we we get to decide what those comparisons are and we get to choose how we how we measure ourselves essentially yeah and i think that's one of the things that you tend to focus on also is what to care about and what not to care about yeah it's fundamental that's the fundamental part of your philosophy what to give a fuck about what exactly right it's like that's at the bottom line, like that's what it's all about. Yeah. Tell me more, a little bit more about that. So you first came onto my radar,

it was probably a couple of years ago when I guess you wrote the essay that eventually turned into your book, or at least like the beginning parts of your book, which is the same name as your book, which had one of the most brilliant top panels ever, by the way. You guys have to check this out. The entire screen is just like it's a photo of a cat just kind of walking out with this giant explosion behind it. And the title of the pose is like The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck.

And you're just like, what? It's this crazy pattern interrupt. There's no way that you can just like, what? It's this crazy pattern interrupt. You're like, there's no way that you can just tab past that without having to go further. The blend of that was brilliant. But I mean, what inspired, clearly you had something to get off your chest and that persisted with you until you expanded into something much bigger. Well, it's funny because I actually, I started writing this book about six months before that article. And I knew from the beginning that I wanted to write kind of a self-help book or a personal development book that, you know,

I wanted to come at things from not trying to gain more of everything, but trying to, you know, a self-help book based on having less, simplifying your life, like getting rid of all like the extraneous distractions and stuff. And I wanted to talk about a lot of these things about like how, you know, life is, life has problems, like get used to it, you know, just decide which ones are useful and important and which ones are just a distraction. And I've been kind of hammering on these concepts for a while. I had a good outline.

I had a bunch of rough drafts of chapters and stuff. And it was just one, it was like a really crappy winter day. And sometimes I just get in these very irreverent moods where I just, I don't know, I just want to be like flimp it and say like just absurd things on my blog and i probably have one or two posts a year that i just i just go nuts and um and i had always had this idea like i've got a sheet where i keep my my article ideas and i just had an idea for a title and and it was called The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck, and I just always thought that was an awesome title. And so on this gray afternoon, I was like,

you know what, I'm going to write an article, and I'm going to say the word fuck as many times as I can. The whole goal of the article is to just say fuck, but I'm not just going to do that. I'm not just going to that like i'm not just gonna be like crude and vulgar like i want to also try to combine it with like really really good life advice so that just people won't know what to do with it like they'll find this disgusting vulgar article that like is just saying these like really gross things but then the information

itself will actually be very powerful and useful. And so, I was like, okay, that sounds like fun. And so, I just said across, you know, I started writing it. And I got to the end. And I remember reading over the draft and I'm like, this is absolutely ridiculous. So, I always send my articles to my assistant before I post them and just kind of get his feedback and and I sent it to him I'm like all right man this one's a little bit weird I don't know if anybody like I don't even know if we we should post this and he's like okay I'll take a look and he comes back like 15 minutes later and he said look man you can fire me

I'm posting this he's like I don't care what you say. Like, we have to post this. There's nothing you can do to stop me from posting it. I was like, okay, okay. And he went and found the cat picture and everything. And so we posted it, and it went nuts. I think it ended up with like 7 million page views, 8 million page views, something insane like that.

Touched a nerve. Yeah. And I had already been wrestling with a lot of these ideas and how to express them. And it's like those early drafts of the book too, they were very kind of intellectual and philosophical. And I would show sections to people and they'd be like, well, this is interesting, but it's really dry and boring. And so, when I hit this article, I was like, okay, this is how it needs to be. And if you think about it, it makes sense. If you're basically going to write a self-help book that's all about pain, just get used to your pain, you're not that special. It needs to be written in a very fun way that can keep the reader enjoying what they're

reading. Because a lot of this stuff, I think a lot of this stuff, it's hard for people to hear. Yeah, I mean, it's interesting to me. So I've been reading your stuff since I found it a couple years ago, and then I read the book. And I've had this conversation with a number of people over the years who are who are writers and also just people who are readers and blog readers stuff like that and it's about dropping f-bomb it's about you know like just using language in your writing yeah and like there's and i'm i'm sure at this point you have had this art these arguments

ad nauseum too about you know is it laziness it just like, what are you trying to do with it? You can make the exact same point without it. And it's interesting as I'm reading your book, it there's, I don't know if this was intentional, but there's actually a progression in your book of like, if you analyze, if you did sort of like an F bomb count per page from the first page to the end, at least it felt to me like the first quarter was loaded.

Yeah. And like as you go through the book, it drops away and drops away and drops away. Almost like – I almost got the feeling like, okay, he's using and try and just keep rattling me long enough so that I keep reading enough of these ideas so that I start to ask deeper questions. And then it's almost like if I get to a point where I'm still reading, then it's almost like you feel there's almost like less of a need to keep doing those pattern interrupts. So now you drop into more straight philosophy and stories and stuff like that. Was that deliberate? It wasn't.

It was definitely deliberate in the first couple chapters. I knew that the first two chapters in particular are like the most kind of irreverent. Yeah. And just like very aggressive. In your face, yeah. Yeah, they're very aggressive. And I was very conscious of doing that for a lot of the reasons you said.

And I've discovered this over the years with my blog too, because like I've gotten complaints about my language for years and years and years and years. And so I've sat down with myself many times and said, you know, do I really need to use this language? Is it helping me? Is there a reason to keep doing it? And I eventually came to the conclusion that yes. And I think what you summarized it perfectly. It's a way to shake up people's attention, you know, because people who are reading self-development advice online. Like, at this point, we've all read like 5,000 articles that say like more or less similar things. And so it's not like there's any,

a lot of times it's not like people really need to be taught something new. The problem is it's just like they know what to do, they're just not doing it. And I think a big part of that is just people get too comfortable. They're just, they're stuck in their comfort zone. They like their day to day.

And so it's fun to like kind of read this stuff, but they don't actually ever let themselves experience the discomfort of having to consider it. And so I try to kind of use the vulgarity as like a hammer to like chip away at that comfort you know it's like if i can just throw in a joke that makes you really uncomfortable reading it and then hit you with like a difficult personal question immediately after like i i feel like it makes it easier for a lot of people like to go to that place because they're already uncomfortable yeah from the joke or whatever. That was definitely at play in the book. And then the other thing about the book too, and I had conversations with my editor about this, is that a lot of the deeper philosophical stuff is towards the back.

And my editor told me, there was some rearranging that went on, and my editor told me, he said, look, this stuff is great, but he he said you've got to earn it like you can't just like throw out questions about people thinking about their own death like in the middle of chapter three he's like you got to build up to this man like you can't just you know like just open up the whole pandora's box to begin with yeah yeah it is i mean it's really interesting because for you it's not laziness because you definitely have you have an ability with words and you've been writing for a number of years now you know it's very tactical yeah but i think if you haven't read enough of you you probably don't realize that yeah you know i think eventually you're like oh

he's using it for very specific reasons in a specific way in a specific place. But if you just kind of land on something, you will immediately be either fiercely repelled or fiercely drawn in. There's no middle reaction to some of these things. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping.

And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch, getting you 8 hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series 10. Available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required. Charge time and actual results will vary. Mayday, mayday. We've been compromised. The pilot's a hitman.

I knew you were going to be fun. On January 24th. Tell me how to fly this thing. Mark Wahlberg. You know what the difference between me and you is? You're going to die. Don't shoot him, we need him. Y'all need a pilot. Flight Risk. But it's interesting to hear you say that.

Yeah, it actually is tactical. It's specific. It kind of reminds me, have you seen the documentary that's floating around now, the Tony Robbins documentary? I have not yet. I want to see it. So it's like, you know, it's basically, it's a documentary that kind of follows this, you know, his six or seven day thing. And he drops F-bombs left and behavior. And you can argue about whether and when that's appropriate in the context of a particular conversation or intervention or person. Right.

But you actually, like, it's not that he just has, you know, like a potty mouth. It's that he's doing it in a very deliberate, strategic way. And I get the same sensibility with you. Yeah. I actually wrote an article a couple years ago called why i have a potty mouth and uh and it was just because i i i got so many complaints from so many people that i finally was like i need to like just lay it out there yeah i just put my sword and the line put the line in the stand or whatever and um it's interesting i did some you know when all these issues were coming up i I did some research about, like, where vulgarity comes from. Because it's very interesting that, you know, tying it back in the cultures, like, every culture, every language has profanity.

And so, it's not something that's just unique to our history or our culture or the English language. Like, it's a natural thing that's ingrained into us. And it exists everywhere. And so then the next question becomes like, okay, why do we have that? And the theory goes is that basically societies kind of rope off a group of words, and it changes as the generations go by. Things that, you know, the word fuck

was like not considered vulgar at all. And then there was a really funny one. I think it was like the word impale or something like that was like extremely vulgar in like the 17th century. And it was like, it was the equivalent of like fuck. That was extremely crude, you know, back then. And now it's just like another random word. But anyway, we always kind of like rope off these groups of words and just all agree that like, okay, those were bad words. And the reason is that it creates social cohesion because it's like, and it allows us to, like that shock value that happens when something is said, like it provides value in communication. It provides value in communication. It provides

value within the culture. Like, it is a signifier of, like, this is something that is of high intensity or importance or requires extra attention. And so, yeah, there's, like, to me, it's just, it makes sense. And I understand that it's going to alienate a large group of people but you know for my style and for how i like to communicate and like it just i like to to leverage it not to go off on too much of a tangent but like i think one of my big this show is basically back to yeah this is the whole show is just one big tangent okay it's all good um you know one of my big inspirations growing up, I was a huge George Carlin fan. And there was another guy named Bill Hicks that I loved too. And what I loved about them is that they were crude and hilarious.

But Carlin especially, he would make really profound. Deep social commentary. Yeah, really interesting critiques. And you would just be laughing so hard while he did it and i've just always really admired that and i think i i've took a lot of inspiration from that yeah well carlin's it was a like his famous like seven dirty words yeah yeah i mean that's like the bit that i think kind of like you know everyone just kind of got to know him by at least for me actually, actually, that's where I was like, whoa. Yeah.

And I'm telling all my friends, you know, and then I remember at some point, like years later, I literally remember like the first time I heard one of his seven dirty words on TV. Yeah. And I'm like, wow, culture has changed, hasn't it? Yeah. Yeah. You know?

And so it is interesting because like what you were saying before, it's like, you know, Yeah, yeah. If you look at the language that was used, a lot of the language that we don't really understand or doesn't do anything to us now actually were the functional equivalents of all these Neal Hicksware works. Yeah. That's interesting. Back in his time, and it was just part of what was woven into the stories. That's fascinating. Yeah. Huh. So it is really interesting, because the single biggest argument that's every once in a long while I drop stuff into my writing.

But as a general rule, I don't. But what's interesting is it's deliberate with me not to because I write way more cleanly than I speak. Yeah. If I'm hanging out with my friends, I'm a New Yorker. Yeah. You know, we have – I have a number of friends that will, you know, like basically they use four-letter words as commas and sentences. And at certain times, if I'm riled up, I will too. And so I have to make a very deliberate – and there are times where I just want to let loose.

And every once in a while I do, and I get a lot of either, wow, that was amazing, or I'm never reading a thing that you write again. It's polarizing. It's massively disrespectful. And so you have to be willing to be that lightning rod, you know, that both attracts and repels in a really strong way. And sort of, like, stand in that and say, yeah, it is what it is. Yeah. I'm not ready to go there. Yeah, yeah. Not there yet.

But it's amazing to me. So I'm always fascinated by people who are and what's underneath it. And also, like, really getting clear of the fact that this is this is not laziness with language yeah this is deliberate strategic and that that bugs me like i i understand you know so i get a lot of emails from people who are like i wish i could show this article to my kids or i'm a high school teacher i would love to assign this to my students but i can't because of this and that that i get that and i and i that's what i feel like i'm missing out on or what i'm giving up by using this but yeah what drives me crazy is when you get kind of these like cranky grandmothers who

are like you know if you can't say it without the f word then you're too stupid to say it at all you know whatever and and it's yeah it's it's just a lack of understanding that profanity, like words have meaning, like they exist for a reason. And their meaning exists for a reason. Yeah, but at the same time, I think there are also plenty of examples of people who use words because they're, who aren't using them tactically or strategically. It's not because it's the right word to describe an emotion or something that's being felt, and there's no other word to describe it. It's that they're just like – there is a certain amount of laziness or just a lack of craft.

Yeah, and they just want attention. So people want to lump everybody into the same basket. So I can understand the arguments on both sides, but it's something that I'm sort of constantly dancing with and exploring. But there are also times where I've written, I told a story once about this moment that I experienced in an elevator where one person who was in deep pain and clearly very ill turned to her parent after getting really bad news and just whispered in her mom's

ears, like, fuck. There's no way to tell that story using any other word. A, it was what was actually said. B, there's no other word that expresses that emotion in that window of time. There is just, you know, like, oh, damn. Shucks. That's not what was being felt. And that's the biggest thing for me is if what you're feeling, like, bone deep in that moment is that, then to use another word because you don't want to offend is doing a disservice.

Yeah. Because you're not conveying the truth of the story that you're trying to tell or the message or a real-life scenario that unfolded, and you diminish the power of it at the same time. So it's a really interesting line that I'm always sort of exploring as a writer. There's another curiosity around, because you consider yourself, I mean, you don't just write as a side thing. You're a writer. There's another curiosity around, because you consider yourself, I mean, you don't just write as like a side thing. You're a writer, right? And you've written that a number of years back. You kind of realize that after trying a zillion different things, one of the things that you seem to be decent at and you really decided to focus on is you can write. And so writing is something that you, I'm assuming you kind of hold dear, that you really value you as a writer.

Do you get concerned ever that you don't know whether people are responding to the integrity of the message versus the provocation of the package that it's wrapped in as a writer to try and figure out, like, are my ideas really landing? I think the reactions for me, they kind of land on two different levels. So there is that kind of more superficial level of, like, oh, cool, this article got a lot of Facebook likes, or, you know, or I got a lot of traffic from this one, you know, and that's pleasing. Like, it's obviously, it always feels good to see things read and passed around. But, you know, for me, it's like the baseline or what I really kind of look at to determine, I guess, whether, you know, my measuring stick for whether I did a good job

really comes from like the reader reaction themselves. The emails I get, there's kind of a core readership that follows me very vocally. And so I look at what they're saying, what their responses are. A lot of people send me stories of how certain things affected them. So I get kind of a sense of which articles are really hitting a nerve with people and which ones are not. And the interesting thing is that, you know, those two layers, sometimes they happen together. So like with this article that spawned this book, it happened, they both happened together with that one. So I got a flood of people coming in, probably just because they saw the cat picture and the word fuck in the title. And

they're like, okay, got to click on this. But I also got a flood of people who are like, wow, like, I never thought about this before. Like, this is amazing. But there are other articles where I get that flood of attention, but I don't get that flood of like, people going, oh, wow, this is like, this really affected me on a deep level. So, so those articles I can kind of look at and be like, all right, that was a little bit more sizzle than steak.

Yeah. And you would rather have the, the emails that say this mattered. Yeah. If I had to only have one. Yeah. Yeah. I would rather have that.

I go for both, but you know, I try to cast a very wide net. I guess I go for breadth and depth at the same time. But sometimes you only get one. And if I had to choose one, I would just choose depth. Yeah. Even though it would also very likely narrow your audience a lot. Probably, yeah.

Yeah, I mean, it's... Well, this is kind of getting more into the nitty gritty of writing, but like, I feel like it's much easier to take something that's deep and kind of package it in a way that's exciting and catches attention, you know, because that's almost like quasi marketing at that point, you know, it's like, and I have tons of blog of blog ideas that it's a really nerdy idea. It's super intellectual and dorky. And I spend time kind of like, all right, what language can I put around this that the average person on the street will read it and understand it and be interested in it? So, there's that aspect of it. I think doing that is easier than creating depth where there isn't any.

Yeah. What was interesting, though, is that the story you told about where this original essay and then eventually the book came from was, and it's funny because I do this too, is you just had a title that you fell in love with. I have a running list of titles. I'm like, someday I'm going to figure out what to write underneath that title. Yeah, exactly. And I'm not going to waste it because it's so good.

It may take years, but someday I'll figure out something worthy of that title to write. And so in a way, you could call that a marketing-driven essay. But in the truth, it's not because you just know that there's something about the title that conveys so much. It's the right words. It's beautiful. It just says so much. With this one, this title sat around for over a year.

The feeling I get with that situation is, I remember I was like, this is such a good title. I need to think of something that deserves it. I can't write this article until I find the ideas that are good enough to match how good it is. Yeah, it also reminds me of the 100 URLs that I have reserved. I actually had a business that my last brick-and-mortar company that I owned, where I actually reserved the URL a couple years before. And I wasn't sure why. I was just like, this is good, and someday I'm going to do something with it.

And I actually ended up building an entire company around it. Oh, wow. So yeah, but I think sometimes we get those hits of things where we're not sure what it's, but we know something has to happen around it. We're hanging out literally on the verge of this book coming out. By the time this airs, actually, it'll be right about out. Why a book? Because you've got a tremendous audience.

You have total freedom to write what you want to write. People are responding to you. You're able a tremendous audience. You have total freedom to write what you want to write. People are responding to you. You're able to support yourself. So why a book? I think, I mean, first and foremost, I love books. I genuinely, you were asking me before we started recording about podcasts. And like I said, I dabble in podcasts. I download a few episodes of this guy here, a few of there. before we started recording about podcasts. And like I said, I dabble in podcasts.

I download a few episodes of this guy here, a few of there. Like you, I've probably listened to five or six of your interviews. They were probably spaced so far apart, I wouldn't even know. It's just like I see something interesting, I'm like, okay, I'll listen to that. But books are the thing that I fall in love with. And so for me, there's just kind of a natural urge to pursue that, you know, because that's just kind of where my own passion lies. The other explanation is I just, I think I'm a much better writer than I am speaker or, you know, video personality. It's something that I'm way more comfortable with, that I'm more confident in.

I imagine I could, if I put the time in and built up my chops doing audio or video or something, I could probably get good at it, but I've already put in my chops writing. How has the process of writing books surprised you? What was the coming into it? What was one big expectation that you had where you're like, oh, that wasn't what I thought it was.

There was a really big realization for me about halfway through. And that was when I realized that the amount of time I put in per day writing was not, the input and output weren't like matched. So what that means is when I started writing this book, it was like, all right, I'm just going to like write like a madman. And I would block off entire days and I would write for like eight or 10 hours. And I would, you know, I'd write like 4,000 words and I'm like, come on, let's get to 5,000. And I would just like push myself the power through, get the 5,000 or whatever. I was just like, I was like treating myself like a workhorse. And it took me months to figure out because in the early stages of this book, it was just it was kind of a disaster

like it was just disorganized and all over the place and and i kept having to like delete stuff and rewrite it and delete stuff and rewrite it and i finally took some time off and i i kind of realized that i don't remember where it came from i think i was talking to to a friend who's also a writer but it occurred to me that if like like, the first few hours I write, I generally, you know, generally, like, the best stuff I produce, it comes in the first two to three hours that I'm writing. After that, you know, hour, say, like, four through eight, it's really hit and miss. And what occurred to me is that if I'm forcing myself to output like three or four hours a day of crappy writing, I'm actually like creating more work for myself.

Because all that crappy writing, you got to go back through. You got to edit it, revise it, cut it, rewrite it, shift it around, redo the outline. And I realized I was like, you know, maybe I should just go as long as I feel like I'm doing, I'm writing really well, like, it's coming easily and fluidly, and then just stop, and just see how that goes, and what I discovered is that actually, like, writing maybe, like, three hours a day, and then getting to that point where my brain's a little bit fried, and I start, like, bumping into the wall. If I stop there, I'm actually way more productive than if I like force myself to power through like eight hours a day.

That was just, that blew my mind on so many levels. And it didn't even, it felt like it was unfair. Like, you know, it's like, it feels like, like, man, I had so much discipline. I was working so hard, you know? And it's like, now it's like I wake up, I write until it's time to have lunch and then I'm done for the day. And it's like, that's more efficient. This is more productive. Like, this isn't even fair.

Right. It's like you wouldn't, I'm the same way. I think we're all the same way, actually. Like, all the research shows that we don't actually have all that much bandwidth available for really high-level creative work. It's sort of like when you're cooked, you're cooked. And we keep pushing through because we're trained to work an 8 or a 10 or a 12-hour day.

That's just the expectation. But the fact is the other 70% is just largely just gobbledygook. Yeah, exactly. And like you were saying, it's actually worse than nothing because then you have to go back and figure out like parse it to find out if there are any nuggets and that takes additional work on top of it yeah it's really interesting to hear you say that it's uh my i'm the same way like i wake up first thing and i try and do my sort of fierce creative stuff my writing like as early as i can because i know i'm cooked by generally too, like for deep creative stuff by lunchtime, I'm pretty much done.

Yeah. Like it's over. Yeah. And it's, it was a big lesson to learn that creative energy and just mental energy. They're not the same thing. You know, it's,

it's, if you, if I want to work on my website, I could do that all day, all night and still be productive. But yeah, like writing a book, writing an article, three hours, I'm probably almost done. Yeah, that sounds about right for me, too. I want to start to come full circle.

One, it's so interesting for me to spend time reading somebody and then just hang out with you. Yeah. Because one of my curiosities is always, is the voice that I, because when you read an author and when you start to actually read enough of them, you start to create a persona in your head of who they are and what they're about. And then when I get to sit down with somebody,

I'm always really curious. I'm like, okay, is hanging out in person, just having a regular conversation, is he the person that I felt on the page? And it's interesting. There is a certain yes to that but there's also a certain no to me so it's interesting to just hang out with you there's a certain sort of like abrasive machismo on the page that comes out when you're right and just hang out here it's much more like you're kind of like a regular guy who wants to do good in the world. And he's deeply philosophical and always exploring what it means to give to and get from life.

And you happen to have figured out a writing voice that really kind of allows you to build an audience and make a difference. And so you kind of step into that. Is that accurate or is that just like... It's funny. All the time I meet readers and all the time they're like, wow, you're so much nicer in person than I thought you would be. It gets really awkward because I'm like, is this a compliment because I, I've heard things similar to that before. And it's interesting you say like the machismo thing, like all I know is that I write, like when I sit down to write,

my only goal is to write something that I want to read, you know? And the voice that comes out for me, like once I write something that I've decided is good, like the voice that comes out for me, once I write something that I've decided is good, the voice that comes out is like, all right, that's awesome. I want to read that. But that makes sense. I'm a pretty laid back dude. And I definitely, there's an intensity in a lot of my work, this kind of aggressiveness.

Yeah. But I think it probably also speaks to there are – and it's probably not just you. It's probably all of us, right? We're not just one person with one. Right. We have light sides. We have shadow sides. And we each have different elements of ourselves that we bring to – that we show the world in different ways and different, you know, like channels and stuff like that. So it's kind of fun to sort of like see like these two things then.

And I've actually had enough conversations with writers too, where I know their work, where it's just, it's this fascination of mine now to kind of see that. Is it common? Really common. Yeah. From what I've seen. That's interesting. Yeah.

It's been really interesting to kind of see over the years. Yeah, there are a couple of people that come to mind who write with this, like a voice which is, yeah, you would never guess that it's sort of like the same person just kind of hanging out across the table. So it's always really kind of fascinating to see that. That's cool. Yeah, and I come out of a marketing background where I know some of the top copywriters, too.

And they will literally step into a persona in order to write this deep, aggressive, powerfully persuasive copy. They'll literally change clothes and not shave for three days. And they'll have their hat that they put on and they like drop into a persona and just write. And I sense that maybe not as deliberately, but a lot of writers do that to a lesser extent to kind of like, like they step into that persona, which is like, okay, now like this is me as a writer. And now I'm kind of stepping back into this is just me kind of hanging out in life because maybe it, maybe it emboldens you to go somewhere that you might not do if you're you don't feel like you're that person at that moment in time that's

interesting i can see that with myself when i sit down the right because there is like and it's not like i'm yeah it's i'm accessing a part of my personality definitely more so than the others and i think and that's where like a lot of that aggressiveness comes from and i think a lot of that is just i guess over the years i've been shown by people my readers that that's that's effective you know and so it kind of like subconsciously encourages me to keep stepping into that part of my personality when I'm writing. That's interesting, though. Yeah. I feel like I should lay down on this couch and start telling you about my childhood.

For you guys listening, we're actually between studios. We're hanging out in my living room right now on these really cushy couches. The fact that your eyes are still open right now because the air conditioning is off, it's getting a little bit warm. So let's take it full circle. So the name of this is Good Life Project. So if I offer that term out to you, a guy who spends a lot of time thinking about these questions, what does it mean to live a good life? What does it mean to live a good life? Living a good life means you have good problems.

You have problems that invigorate you, excite you and bring meaning into your life. That's what I would say. Thank you. Yeah, thank you. This was fun. Hey, thanks so much for listening.

We love sharing real unscripted conversations and ideas that matter. And if you enjoy that too and if you enjoy what we're up to, I'd be so grateful if you would take just a few seconds and rate and review the podcast. It really helps us get the word out. You can actually do that now right from the podcast app on your phone. If you have an iPhone, you just click on the reviews tab and take a few seconds and jam

over there. And if you haven't yet subscribed while you're there, then make sure you hit the subscribe button while you're at it. And then you'll be sure to never miss out on any of our incredible guests or conversations or riffs. And for those of you, our awesome community who are on other platforms, any love that you might be able to offer sharing our message would just be so appreciated. Until next time, this is Jonathan Fields signing

off for Good Life Project. I knew you were going to be fun. Tell me how to fly this thing. You know what the difference between me and you is? You're going to die. Don't shoot him, we need him! Y'all need a pilot? The Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever,

making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch, getting you eight hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series X, available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required, charge time and actual results will vary.