My First Million - MFM Goes to Jail - Plus Startup Cities, Prospera, Julian Shapiro Building a Ranch, Testing Out Big Purchases, and More

Episode Date: October 26, 2021

Sam Parr (@theSamParr) and Shaan Puri (@ShaanVP) discuss Sam’s recent trip to a federal prison and what he learned there, whether startup cities are the wave of the future, why more people should test out big purchases, and much more. _____ * Do you love MFM and want to see Sam and Shaan's smiling faces? Subscribe to our Youtube channel. * Want more insights like MFM? Check out Shaan's newsletter. _____ Show Notes: (00:20) - Sam shares his experience helping to educate inmates at a prison in Indiana. (08:42) - Shaan shares his experiences also working to educate inmates (25:58) - Prospera and startup cities (37:19) - Why Julian Shapiro is building a ranch in the middle of nowhere (44:55) - Testing out your big dreams (01:03:00) - Teddy Roosevelt and Vladimir Putin _____ Links: * Prospera * Julian Shapiro’s thread on his ranch * The Rise of Teddy Roosevelt * How to Take Over the World - Vladimir Putin

And he's like, he's like, you afraid of me, huh? And I was like, I was like, yeah, I'm afraid. And he goes, that's your truth, huh? I feel like I can rule the world. I know I could be what I want to. I put my all in it like no days off. On the road, let's travel, never looking back. What's going on?

How was, uh, Wednesday? Uh, it was good, man. Ramone was on. So, no, you know, Ramon. Ramon, Ramon's the best. So, Ramon came on and did his thing. He was the best. Good.

I'm, uh, I'm happy for him. He's getting a bunch of, wins right now and that makes me happy for him. Yeah. Where were you? So you were doing something interesting. That's why you're out. Let me tell you. Come back. Tell us a story. Yeah, let me tell you what I did. So I volunteer with this program called The Last Mile. It was started by my friend Chris Redlitz. Chris started, he did a bunch of stuff. He was early at Reebok. So he's 65 years old. He was an early employee at Reebok when he probably became very financially successful there. Then he started a company that he took public. And then he started a VC fund that I believe was quite successful. They

in on wish.com and a few other things. And he started this charity or nonprofit called the last mile. And the whole vision behind this thing is basically, I'm not supposed to use the word inmates. They've asked me not to use the word inmates, but sometimes I'm still going to use that word because that's what most people know what it means. But basically prison inmates, they are going to get out. What do they want you to say? Well, and it's a good terminology and good way of thinking, but basically they're like, well, look, we're trying to get them out of prison and into the mindset of they're going to be working and having a job. We don't want to refer to them as offenders as inmates, but students. But that would be confusing in this context.

Okay. In this context, yes. And so I'm going to kind of go against his rules in this context. So there's something like a million people in prison, right? And a lot of guys are there for 10, 20, 30 years, for manslaughter, for doing whatever. They're going to get out. And whether you like that, whether you forgive them, for their crime or not. The fact is, is that they're going to get out. And so the last mile is

teaching them how to code for about two or three years through a program and then helping them get jobs at like Slack, I believe eBay, things like that. And they've graduated, I think, 800 people out of prison who have went through their program and none of them have gone back to prison. And I believe the average prison, the average person who goes to prison, I think it's like a 65% chance that they go back to prison. Right. So the fact is that these guys, like for example, I was with this one guy who basically he caught his wife cheating and they got into an argument. According to the news, I googled it. She like went to fight him with a hammer. He grabbed the hammer and killed her. And he was in prison for 20 years. And I was hanging out with this guy, which is weird. That's weird. You know, that's like a mind fuck. And he was like, yeah, I'm going to get out in three years. Prior to this. I was. I was hanging out. I was an engineer, or sorry, I was a sales person at a pharmaceutical company. I had a great job.

And I'm learning how to do JavaScript and MongoDB so I can get a job at a tech company, hopefully, because no one's going to hire me unless I go through this program. And that's crazy, right? Isn't that weird? Like, I'm hanging out. And I was with my wife, Sarah. We're walking around this prison, just hanging out with these guys. And I get to know them.

And I'm like, I would hang. I mean, you're nice enough. We would get along fine. I had no idea you'd ever done this. and they start opening up and telling me what they did. And it's pretty amazing. And it's amazing for a couple of reasons. The first reason is that when you're in this, like when you're,

so some guys are just like habitual criminals. Like I talked to this one guy. I was like, what was your job before this? He was like, oh, I was a meth dealer. Right. I sold meth. And I killed the guy. We went to rob this house and I killed someone.

And, and he was like, besides killing them, I was just like criminal. I just did all types of crazy shit. But once I learned how to do coding, I actually got more, logical where I realize that if I do this, then this other thing is going to happen. And so I started learning a lot about impulse control and I started learning about myself. And so it's like learning how to code, but also learning about yourself type of thing. Like an if then statement for your life. Yes. And so that's quite fascinating. The second thing is, you know, there's not a lot of black coders, but unfortunately there's a lot of black folks in prison. And so these guys are learning how to

code. We are in Indiana. It was mostly white people, but I've done this in San Quentin. But like for someone who graduates and leaves jail and they go back to an all black neighborhood. A lot of times it's these these kids, these young kids, it's the first time they're going to meet a programmer who's black and who looks like them. And so not only are we helping these folks stay out of prison, but it's kind of cool that like, you know, you're actually like helping the diversity issue in tech. And so it's pretty cool. How the heck did this guy, Chris Redlett, start this? That seems so random from like, you know, your employee at a Reebok and then you start a VC fund and where did this come from?

I believe the story is 10 years ago. He was dating a woman and she volunteered at a prison and she was teaching, I think, math. Like she just got pulled into it at San Quentin. She lived in San Francisco and someone was like, hey, we need like, or no, sorry, someone was like, Chris, can you come and talk about entrepreneurship to these inmates? And he was like, I guess I'll go. And he goes and they're like, can you come again? Can you come again?

He's like, I guess. And then eventually he was like, wow, you know, this is a major problem that I'm I'm passionate and I care about. And so him and his wife, they started a thing where they go, hey, they went to Sacramento, the capital of California. And they basically lobbied for this program. They go, hey, everyone, we'll put up the $100,000. You know, they're talking to the politicians.

Would it be okay if we did a cohort for entrepreneurship in San Quentin? And they like, through friends of friends, they got in front of the right people and it approved. And then they're like, well, you know, entrepreneurship is okay, but teaching them out of code is way better. And so he starts doing that. And then he goes and convinces Apple. I believe the Trump administration, the Koch brothers, rich people to donate money. And now they have this like huge program. That's kind of amazing.

They've trained some huge number of people, right? Like there are a lot of people in this program. Is that right? Yeah, they've got, I believe that they only allow like 20 or 30 people per like cohort. And they have like 15 prisons doing it. By the way, if you're listening to that. this, well, they graduated, I think, a thousand people. And I was going to say, by the way, if you're listening to this, I'm getting some of these numbers wrong. I didn't like write all this

down. So whatever I'm saying, divide by two and multiply by two. So I think they have like a thousand people. But let me tell you something that's interesting. So I was in this prison and you want to know what's crazy, dude. Most everyone was really fat and out of shape. And as a fitness influencer, you just, you couldn't help yourself. Well, here's why this is interesting to be. So I was talking to Chris and I was like, you know, everyone was like fat. And like the food that they give these folks, it's horrible. It was like white bread and bologna and like generic like Oreo cookies. And you can buy stuff. But he was like, yeah, well, you know, at some of the longer maximum, uh, maximum security prisons are a little bit more fit. But yeah, it's a huge problem. And in China, I was like,

Chris, like, if we gave these guys like, look, they're, I understand like the idea of like, you committed a crime, you sacrificed privileges, whatever. But I think if we just gave them like, some better meat and vegetables for every meal and force them to exercise. Like you've got to get up at 7 am. And as a prison, we're going to do jumping jacks, pushups, calisthenics. And like, you know, it's like the military. I think they would behave better. And ultimately, like, if your body works better, you're going to maybe behave and act

a little bit better. And he was like, yeah, you know, I think I agree. But even in American prisons, you can't force people to do anything. It's like against the law or against the rules. But I started thinking about this. And I think that's kind of interesting. And they do this in China. And he was like, yeah,

we like got some, we like saw Chinese prisons and everyone shredded because they make you do this. Wow. Okay. Did you know I've done a very similar thing? So I got a couple of like when you said you were doing this. I like remembered back when I did this. So there's a group in the Bay Area that does this called the Inside Inside Circle, I think it's called. And nonprofit, they basically go into it.

It's like a men's group. So for people who listen to this that don't know what a men's group is, it's a, I do. idea that's been around for a long time. There's many different flavors of this. There's some that are like kind of business oriented. There's some that are oriented around just changing your life. I forgot. What's the,

what's the famous one in the Bay Area that people think is a cult? That's like a men's group. I don't know if you know the name of it. It's like a weekend. It's like a weekend thing you do. But there's a whole bunch of these. Like maybe backwater or something. Yeah,

something like that. Not that, but there's something like that. So anyways, a men's group is where a bunch of men get together. They sit in a circle and they talk about their feelings. And they talk about what's going on. and they have like a whole process that's like basically helps people unpack what's going on inside

so that they when you unpack what's going on inside you're not carrying all this baggage around and then you you will act more like the way you want to act because you don't have this sort of suppressed and pent up stuff inside that's my like layman's version of I'm sure there's a much fancier better way of explaining it so I went to Folsom prison did the same same sort of thing two-day program you go in I met this guy Gino he was kind of like you know you get a pen pal buddy basically. So you know, you meet your buddy and he was in there. He's been in there since he was 18 and he had murdered somebody when he was 18 and he's like been in there for 20 years now. So he's 38 and he was like, you know, yeah, I did this horrible thing when I was 18 and like

I'm in here for life basically. Like my whole life is basically in prison. And he had a great, great attitude about him, funny guy. And he was, you know, he was just, it was kind of unreal. because I had been, you know, kind of embarrassed to admit it, but I had been kind of, you know, in my head, I just sort of wrote this off. Like, I just wrote off people in prison. Like I think society writes them off. And I had sort of just thought like, yeah, I'm not, not super interested in and meeting people who have murdered people before. But, you know, it's really not that simple once you meet them. It's really not that simple to sort of like bucket people like that as good and bad.

And so, you know, kind of, you know, it's kind of embarrassing to even say that out. loud. It sounds obvious. But, you know, it was kind of a, I don't know, it was kind of an awakening moment. And then we, we did these exercises. So we did these exercise where you're like, you know, you sit in your little group and you talk about what's going on. And it's so funny because it was basically half successful tech guys and then half people from Folsom Prison. And, and it would be like, you know, the tech guy is like, oh, you know, just a stereotype for a second. Like my kids trying to get into this private school and the admissions process. My wife is really blah, blah, blah. And then like, the next guy, he's like, you know, um, I haven't seen my daughter in 25 years. And I just hope she's

okay. And I heard something, heard something happen to her. And I'm not able to help. And it's just gutting me. And then the tech guy's like, you know, my company, we raised our A. We're just trying to raise our B. Like, like, it's like, it's so funny. Like, real problems? Fake problems. Real problems. And, uh, but like, this is sort of like no judgment, right? That's the idea is like, Actually, it's funny, the guys who lead you in there, they're very like sort of wise people. There's one guy, BJ who runs the program and then I forgot the name of the other guy. He's awesome guy. And he's like, he's like recognized as a shaman and like seven different civilizations in Africa.

Like this guy is just a beast in all ways. In fact, they call his nickname as Beastmaster because he sort of is able to tame the beasts in the prison. And he's got this like presence about him that you wouldn't believe. Like, imagine Ray Lewis does volunteer in work. He was in prison, but he was in prison. he got out and then he, you know, devoted his life to this work. And he's like sort of one of the most wise guys ever. And he said this early on.

He's like, you know, let's set some ground rules before we go in here, man. Like, okay, what do we? And one guy was like, you know, no judgment. I want to be going here. I don't want to judge the guys in there. He goes, okay, so we're going to lie to ourselves. And he's like, what do you mean? He's like, you're going to make a judgment.

When somebody says something or does something, the brain is instantaneously going to make a judgment. And you can sit there and say, no, no, no, I'm not doing it. I don't want to do it. You can try to resist it, but you're going to fail. He goes, instead, let's just agree to this. You'll make the judgment, but then just agree to this. The judgment says more about you than it does about them. He's like, so just use that, that reaction to teach you about yourself. Don't use it to define the other people in there. That's something that I still use to this day, kind of like in every walk of life because it's so true. So anyways, I had this like crazy experience in there. So I was talking, or I guess like, I don't know if I should even tell the story, but basically I, when I went in, there was one guy in there that just looked like the baddest dude in the prison. He was wearing his sunglasses. Nobody else was wearing sunglasses. He had like a cane. He wasn't the strongest or the biggest, but you could tell he had the respect of everybody in there and almost like the fear, like a fear version of respect, or at least that's what I perceived. Because, you know, you go into the situation, you sort of quickly scope it out and you're trying to like understand the lay out of the land.

So instantaneously, my brain's judgment was that's the baddest dude in here. Like, don't piss that guy off. Don't say the wrong thing in front of that person. He kind of scares me. And of course, as fate would have it, we get into a group of four. We get matched up. And he's my buddy in the group of four. And this guy basically, I was, you know, so then you're supposed to like, again,

talk about your problems. And I was kind of conscious to be like, okay, I'm not going to talk about these like first world problems. So I tried to say some shit that was like deeper than that. But he saw straight through it because these people have a very good. you know, bullshit detector. And he was like, he's like, man, you're just saying what we want to hear. He just cut me off like two minutes in.

Oh, that's bad. And I was in the middle of my big kind of like heartfelt thing. And I'm a good talker. I'm a good storyteller. I'm a good liar, frankly. And he immediately was like, man, don't come in here and just say what we want to hear. And I was like, oh, shit. And then I'm like my, the guy I was already afraid of is now calling me out specifically

for basically one of the worst things you could do in these situations, which is be inauthentic. Be fake. It's like, you really didn't have to do anything. That was the one thing. Just don't be fake. And I was, I was being fake. And this guy called me out on it.

He's like, what's you really thinking? And I was like, and I just said what was on my mind. I go, I go, I really just don't want to sound like an idiot in front of you. And he starts laughing. And he goes, he goes, you're afraid of me? I was like, yeah, I'm afraid. I'm afraid. He goes.

So if I get closer, you'd be afraid? He gets closer. Closer. It gets right up to my face, like one inch for my face. And he's like, he's like, you're afraid of me, huh? And I was like, I was like, yeah, I'm afraid. And he goes, that's your truth, huh? I go, yeah.

And he goes, I go, yeah, I'm like, in my head, I'm like, oh, okay, I think I did it. Right. I just said what I was thinking of that. I think, you know, and so then the brain, the voice in my head that was like judging every word I was saying, kind of like relaxed for a second because this guy put him at ease. And he was like, he's like, he's like, I can respect that. And he's like, he starts telling a story about a time, like his life when he was afraid.

And like, you know, I'm off the hook. I go sit down now. And at the end, the guy like, you know, basically gave me a hug on the way out. And he was like, you know, he's like, I hope I see you again sometime. And I was like, wow, that was just like a little life moment that it doesn't like, I don't know, I'm telling the story now. I don't think this even means anything to anybody. But I remember this like it, like it happened yesterday.

And there's very few moments of my life that I can remember so vividly. But this was one of them. And I think it was because it was like a primal moment where I didn't know what was going to happen. There was real fear. You talk about this a lot. Like we're very rarely in real danger situations. And even though this wasn't actual danger, this guy wasn't going to do anything to me,

it definitely felt that way. And I remember it. And the crazy part, and we can move on after this, but the crazy part is like, I think what separates you and me or anyone listening to this podcast, which by the way, I learned,

well, I'll talk about that a second. What separates us from someone like these folks. Like I met a bunch of people who were like habitual criminals. They were like, yeah, you know, I just like I was a drug addict or I was just,

I hated authority. And I've changed. but I was young and mean. And I met a bunch of other people who worked. I met a guy who worked at Abbott. I met a guy who worked at Ford. I met a guy who as engineers. Like, you know,

they were probably making six figures. And they go, my marriage went horrible. One of us cheated. And I got into a fist fight and I killed someone or I hurt someone really badly. And I was like, I don't think I'm ever going to like hurt someone, but I could.

Like it's not like in a, in a thing of rage. Like you could flip out or I could get drunk and kill someone and driving. You know, like you could. And it's not that, we're not that different, some of these guys. And so that was really crazy. And while there, so let's get, we'll talk about business.

There's this, there's, these guys have like iPads. They're not Apple, but they're like a different brand of like iPad type of like tablet. Okay. And you can be an approved podcast. And so if we go through the process of getting approved, we can go on there. And there's about, and there's about a million incarcerated folks in America. And there's not that many podcasts on this, on this thing. Growth tech.

I was like, oh, I was like, dude, let's boost our numbers. And so I'm working with the right people. There's like a company that makes these like iPad. Amazing. And we're going to get on there. It's called Microsoft and it's a surface. The Microsoft manages this in shambles as you keep calling it an iPad. Dude, I looked it up on Wikipedia.

It's this company and they were, they sold to a PE company for $2 billion. And they basically make things that the prison gives to, you know, and they can buy, they can like buy movies. shit. And you basically, if you have enough money on your accounts, you can watch movies your entire stay. And so, uh, anyway, it was kind of cool. So that's my story. I have a related thing. Do you know the guy Mike Posner? Of course. The musician. So he, I know who he is. Yeah.

So he's like kind of like rapper, singer type dude. I took a pill in a Biza. That's like a I took a pill at a Beezza cooler than me. He's got a couple big, big, big, big songs. He went to Duke, right? He went to Duke. So he was there while I was there. We were in the same. And I remember meeting him or seeing him and he said with this white kid. He said he's going to be a white kid from Detroit. He said he's going to be a rapper. I was like, all right. Like, Eminent.

Like, you know, that's. Who goes to Duke. Yeah, like you went to Duke. Yeah, that's not really the path, my friend. But he killed it. He did amazing. And actually, like, one of the things I remember from that was he released his song on iTunes You because he was in school.

So he could only somebody, only a student or professor could put content on iTunes you, which was like this. subsection of iTunes. And because most of the things that go up there are like extremely academic, right? It's like a lecture from this random biology class at Duke. So now all of a sudden you get this like rap song that goes on iTunes, You. And he hit the top of the charts on iTunes you. And he would tell, so he put out there like, you know, I'm number one on iTunes. You know, like parentheses. And so that's how I think he got booked on. First, that's how we got a lot of college. It's like a growth hack. Like a lot of college students heard his song.

iTunes You had like a like there was like the rankings. Like show the top 10 iTunes songs, which is super competitive. You got to be like mega famous to do that. And then right below it was top 10 iTunes You downloads. And his was number one. And so I think he got a lot of fans that way. And then he booked a bunch of early gigs when he had no name to say it by saying,

yeah, I'm number one on college campuses on iTunes. And they were like, well, okay, sounds decent. All right, we'll give you a shot. And then he went on a college tour. And that's how he built his following. So he did a very similar thing to what you're talking about. that's badass i like him a lot so that's a good that's a good story it's like it's like

bork getting famous in iceland or something like it's better to be like have like a local maximum like to be famous on a local on a local level and then you leverage that um so i'll tell you about one more quick prison one before we switch off that so um so my buddy did my buddy my best friend Trevor did this thing called a book storm which i think is a great idea in general which is he wanted to write a book and so he's like all right books normally take a long time. What if I did it differently? He's like, so let me, he did like a quick, not a draft, but like just a quick kind of concept of the book. And then he flew out the five most badass people he knew. And he put us all up in a hotel and he said, I want you here for basically

a day and a half to just help me think through this book. And he's like, we'll brainstorm it together. And he's like, I think if I just do this with deep intensity, I can make way more progress than if I just kind of like lightly touch this book every day. For like two years. Yeah, for two years. And it totally works. What's their last name? What's Trevor's last name? Reagan.

R-A-G-A-N. So he, now he has the book. It's coming out. It did like a, I forget what he called it, like a patio book. It's like a podcast of the book or something like that. So anyways, he flew out, it was me because I was like his best friend from college. And then it was like this person who was like the Olympic coach for the women's volleyball team. And so the U.S. women's volleyball has just kicked ass internationally, which is not

expected because volleyball is a much bigger sport in other countries. But this guy like turned the program around and like, so he was amazing. He was there. And this one guy was there and he had been in prison for 20 years and he had gotten out. And he, Trevor does a lot of pro bono like talking in prisons. And so he had met this guy in the process and he was like, wow, this is this guy's amazing. And this guy shared two things. And I was like, he came out and I was like, man, this guy's like, he is so wise. He is so articulate. I feel like he's read every fucking book because he keeps referencing really insightful pieces from all these different books. And so I was like, what's your story, man?

He's like, actually, I was in prison for 20 years. I was like, whoa, no shit. And he goes, you know, I said, so you read all these books while you're there? He goes, he goes, yeah, he goes, my first year when I was there, he was like, I was 20 years old or something like that. He's like, I decided, I'm going to see what I want to see. He goes, so I decided, like you said, they're calling, they're called them students there. That's what he did.

That's what he did for himself in his brain. He goes, I told myself, I'm not in prison. I'm in university. He's like, and every day I won. I said, I'm getting a 20-year PhD in life. And he said, every day I woke up and I just, I would tell everybody around me in the line, we're getting food. This is the student union.

I'm at the student union. I'm getting food from the, from the meal hall. I'm going to the library. I am in university right now. I am not in prison. He just literally like worked himself up into a frenzy where his mind only saw that and he saw everything as as university. So he read all these different books.

And then similarly he said, you know, I would look around on the, on the yard. And on the yard, you'd see all kinds of bad shit going on. You know, the black guys, the white guys and the Mexican guys and all that. And you'd see broken, you know, just broken down, you know, our basketball hoop was half crooked, all that. And he's like, I just played a game every day. In my mind, I would change what I saw. So I would see a beautiful green field. I would see that.

He's like, every day. He's like, if I saw a broken glass, I would see roses. And this guy's mindset impressed me so much. It's another one that stuck with me, which was like, create your own reality. And like, how many times, if this guy could do that in prison, then when I'm, I'm waiting in line at Starbucks. I'm not waiting in line board. I change it in my head, just like the guy changed his university things. That was another one that was like a huge life thing that I took away from that guy. Dude, I love this prison talk. We should, I got a, we got, I think

we should do like an entire episode on this. There's like all these guys who are blowing up on YouTube who like are, it's all about crime and, and prison talk and whatnot. And I learned so much from those folks. Do you watch these videos that's basically like a guy? These are not insightful and deep, but they're just entertaining to me. Have you seen these ones where guys will go, they'll film around a police station? And then the cop comes out and he's like, hey, why are you filming, man? What are you doing here?

Let me see your license. Let me see your ID. He's like, nope, I'm not going to show you my ID. And he's like, what? He's like, let me see your ID. Watch that shit all the time. And he's like, no, but I know my rights. I'm in a public place.

I'm allowed to film. He's like, yeah, but what are you doing here? He's like, do you not know the rights? And they just like talk back to cops. And there's something about this about just talking back to cops. It's called justice. And it's fun. Exactly. It's like it's just as porn. That's what I call it. And the comments are super polarized. Half the people are like, what an asshole, dude. You're just making, you're just being

annoying to the cops. They're like, you're provoking them. And then they take the bait and then you like jump on them with because you, you, why did you spend your day doing this? And then the other half people are sort of like me. They're like, God, I don't know why. I find this so entertaining. I just love when somebody like most of the car accident. Yeah, there's something to it, man. I can't, I can't resist. That's my junk. That's my new reality TV. Yeah. Go to Reddit.com slash justice porn and there's a whole subreddit for that and there's like a million

subscribers. It's pretty crazy. Yeah. It's nuts. There'll be a guy gets pulled over and he's like let me see your ID and he shows him a passport from another country and he's like, no, I need your ID. He's like, no, you don't. There's a treaty that says if I show you this password, blah, blah, blah, and you cannot arrest me. He's like, know some random ass like loophole and he's just driving around fast hoping to get pulled over just so he can do this thing on camera and get a of views. It's kind of sick, but I like it. Speaking about the countries, let me tell you about

something interesting. Have you heard of Prospera? Have you heard of Prospera? Para, it sounds very familiar. What is it? Okay. So I almost, or I'm in the process, and I hope I can make it happen of investing in this company call mini circle. So Prospera is this new, like, private charter city. We've talked about private charter cities a bunch. Right. Okay. And so it was set up in part by Peter Thiel, who's a very controversial, weirdo type of guy. I like them, but a lot of people don't. And so he basically set up this country or the city in Honduras, and they have their own rules and their own laws and weird things like that. So do you know what gene therapy is? Have you heard of gene therapy? Yeah. Is it basically like, would CRISPR

be part of gene therapy? So it's basically the modification of your DNA in order to like fight disease. Is that a good description? Yeah. So it's this very, experimental kind of technique, kind of like medical procedure, where basically you insert and modify genes in order to replace surgeries or drugs. So for example, there's this kid in Syria. He had some weird disorder where like all this skin started deteriorating. He was about to die. And they did this gene editing stuff and he was able to regrow back his skin. And a lot of people, but it's very controversial because you're doing a couple things. You're kind of like playing God, which I don't buy in, but that's an argument.

People don't like that. Yeah, and people don't like it. And also it's experimental. And so the FDA, like, very closely monitors this stuff. And they'll say, like, yeah. And so there's a lot of, like, weird, like, biohacker fringe types who are interested in this stuff. And so it's all, like, controversial kind of. But nonetheless, it's cool.

So I'm trying to invest in this company called MiniCircle. And they're making this new gene therapy that, like, increases muscle mass, bone density, helps you with insulin sensitivity and does all this like crazy shit to you but in order to get it done in America you got to go to the FDA and it's like this big process and so they've moved their company to Prospera

this Peter Thiel city in order to make all this shit happen and they're doing their testing on people or is this the one in Latin America Latin America it's in Honduras and so they're doing it like so basically they're like we're working with fully informed

and trusted I'm reading off something we're working with fully informed and trusted study participants who are choosing to do this. Right. But we couldn't get this done in America. It would take 40 years to do this. We're going to do this on this land on this weird city type of thing. Yep.

And I'm trying to invest in this company. I think it's ridiculous. I think it's crazy. But kind of cool. It is very cool. I invested in one charter city called Praxis. And what they did was pretty smart. They were like they first created just a bunch of like like a group here in America.

So they invited a bunch of cool people from New York, L.A., San Francisco, and they're just like host events. So they're dope parties. So these people, they're like in a community, they get to meet each other at these events. And there's like an online component. And they keep doing this. They keep doing this. And meanwhile, they're searching. They're going around to like all around the world.

And they're basically negotiating with governments. And they're saying, hey, give us some free land and let us have our own rule of law and rule of financial law in the, like our, like our. our own financial regulations and our own rule of law in this zone. We're going to create a new city and we're going to bring all these cool people plus like development dollars to your place. Right. So in the U.S. you could never say, hey, U.S.

government, go give us, you know, a little piece of Wyoming. They're not really going to give you that. But, you know, you go to whatever, you know, you go just in the Mediterranean and the Balkans and you find some random piece of land. You say, oh, this is beautiful. It's right on the ocean. It's undeveloped. And you go to the government.

you say, look, what if I could get a bunch of people from America, you know, successful people who want to kind of live in a new charter city? And so it's this like really wild moonshot idea. I totally fully expect this investment to go to zero. I put in a very small check, but I had to participate because the founder was so convinced that like, yeah, of course people will do this. And that if you did it, it would be very large. It'd be like owning the raw land, you know, you know, the land under Manhattan where all the buildings are going to get built. And you can either do development yourself or you could sell off the pads and make a ton of money. So the business is great if you can kick off a new charter city.

And one of the ways you attract people is this. Like if you own, if you have your own rule of law, you can say, hey, biohackers come here because you're allowed to do, you know, you're allowed to run your experiments here because we have our own kind of like free zone where we can do our own shit. And so I think it's really cool what's happening. Bologi is pretty convinced that in the next 10 years we're going to see. charter cities, you know, pop up startup cities. Yeah. And on one hand to say to explain why this like why the haters exist on this and why I definitely hate on them a little bit or you know, there's like some negativity, which is like

it's most likely like fringe libertarian types, kind of like how all the Bitcoin rich folks are going to Puerto Rico to avoid taxes. You know, you could say like the FDA exists for a good reason. Rules exist for a good reason. You guys are freaks just trying to like avoid the reality. And there's definitely a truth to that. And there are like probably, that's a solid argument, some parts of that. And then on the other side, you can say, well, like, that's like what the fucking

America started, right? Yeah, exactly. We bailed on. We were the free experimentation zone, right? Yeah, like we wrote a ship across like, you know, 3,000 miles not knowing what to expect. And we just landed and we figured it out. So it is interesting. I think even the people who like startup cities would say, yeah, great.

There should be the FDA. there should be all the stuff for most people in most places. But if it covers all, all land and all people within a country, then you stamp out the wild experimentation. So I know that Google guys have been talking about this before, which is that they need a, there should be a free space where if you opt in, you can go and you can do some of the experimental things that you can't do here. And the learnings from that, let's say nine out of the ten things don't work out

or they have bad consequences. Okay, fine. But if one breakthrough innovation or discovery is made, then that can be exported back to the mainland. And we can say, look, let's go, let's take this through proper testing and let's roll it out to everybody. So like, you know, people go to Germany to go get, you know, stem cell treatments and things like that because it's not legal here. But in other countries, they're more liberal about it. So like, you know, I started a company once, a biotech company. And the technology was made in the U.S.

The government, U.S. government had funded $40 million of R&D for this. technology. But you couldn't go use it anywhere in the U.S. because you would never get the permits. The people would say, why would we will not let you put these microbes into the ground. It was basically these little microbugs that could eat coal underground so you don't have to mine it. And they would basically just like fart or breathe out natural gas. So they will just mine the coal themselves and you just collect the natural gas. You don't have to frack the earth and you don't have to mine the coal. But the U.S. would never let us pump these microbes into the ground because they're like, we don't have to. Life is pretty good here.

We don't have to do that. So we went to Indonesia and we went to India where they were like, yeah, hey, here's a huge plot of land. How much money do you need to go do this? We love this, right? We want economic activity. We want innovation. And if this works, then we want to capture some of the upside of being able to like sell this technology to others. And so we got quick permits in Indonesia and India where we couldn't, you know, the company's trying to do the same thing in the U.S.

They were bogged down for years and never got approvals. Have you ever heard of medical tourism? Yeah. always be curious about like how how people have the guts to do this but it makes sense you go to mexico get your teeth fixed or whatever you know have you ever done anything like this no so for those who don't know what this is i learned about this because me and sean's buddy john how are you you're friends with john howard yeah yeah he's great we i shared an office with him at this place called founders dojo and they created a company i forget the name of it but it was basically medical

tourism so basically um i i think a use case is typically like dentists or like benesial ears and teeth stuff. Although then there's other stuff like breast implants and plastic surgery where their premise was basically it's cheaper to get it done in Bali or Mexico or India, somewhere like that where like there, I have no idea of this is true. They're like the doctors are just as good, but it's a fraction of the cost to fly out there, get the surgery done, and chill there for a week and recover and fly it back. The company did not work out. And frankly, in my opinion, it sounds like a fucking pain in the ass. I would. never do that. I'd rather pay $20,000 in America for veneers, but be able to get it done like

three blocks from my house than I would want to go to Mexico. But, well, yeah, it's not for you, right? It's for somebody who can't afford it here. It's, it's not if I could do this or that. It's, I can't do this and my teeth fucking hurt. Or I can't do this and I need this surgery done. Okay, if I can't afford it here, even with insurance, then, okay, I'll go to Mexico and I'll do it because I have no real other option. It's so prohibitively expensive. It would cripple me financially. And I don't want to save my health and cripple my finances.

So I'm going to do this. I think it's $100 billion a year is paid out. No shit. No way. It's $100 billion of medical tourism per year globally. That amazes me. I never would have thought that. I just think it sounds like the biggest pain in the ass.

It seems wild, right? But I think that's the, you know, when people are pushed into a corner, they will find a way. You know, that is sort of the innovation of people. And yeah, I'm actually surprised this thing didn't work. What he was doing was he was selling leads. So he would find customers who were interested in it. He would educate them and he would sell those leads to the medical offices, you know, in Mexico or wherever and say, hey, this person is interested. They want to do a phone call with you.

Would you pay us $100 for that lead? And they were like, yeah, sure. And I honestly think that business should have worked and would have worked had he stuck with it. It was like a pivot and maybe he didn't have enough time to figure it out. I don't know the particulars, but I know that it's when he told me about it, I was like, there's no way this would work, but I say that about a lot of stuff. Yeah, exactly. All right, what else we want to talk about?

I don't know. What do you want to do? Let me look at your list here. Okay, so there's Julian Building of Ranch. I think that's pretty cool. We should talk about that. Let's do Julia Building a Ranch and then let's do that. Okay.

I have a good deep dive, but I'm going to save it for the next episode. That's a good one about the diamond industry. All right. Lay the background of this. So you know Julian better than I do. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So Julian Shapiro. He's just at Julian on Twitter. A lot of people follow him there. I think he's got like, you know, 200,000 or maybe more followers. He's a weirdo. Total weirdo in the best way possible. Yeah. He called me the other day. And I said, I go, hello. And he goes, the love of my life. I was like check my phone Who the fuck is calling me? And then he's like, I have this deal, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then he just goes straight into it.

It doesn't even acknowledge the love of my life part. It was just hilarious. He's just a hilarious character. He sends us like the funniest memes. Like on Twitter, he's like this really thoughtful, intellectual, like, guy who'll teach you how to write and teach you about all this other stuff, teach you how to think frameworks, blah, blah, blah. And then in our group chat, he's sending, you know, the goofiest memes,

which is like that's my favorite type of person who's got both of those sides to him, the silly side and the smart side. So he tweeted out that he's basically, he's been talking about this for a while. So it's not just like a bullshit thing. But he's like, he really, really wants to build a ranch. Actually, by the way, I should share the most interesting thing about him. For the last eight months, all he has eaten is wag you steak and boiled eggs. Which I don't believe.

I believe it because he's crazy. And he kind of needed to. I think he had some like his gut health wasn't right. He just like took control. He's like, I'm going to figure out how to fix this. The doctor's not helping me. I'm going to fix this myself. He had read about the carnivore diet.

I think Jordan Peterson had a very similar, like, kind of like issue. And he famously came out. So I did carnivore. It healed me, basically. And so he started doing it. He started feeling a little better. Then he committed to it. He's like, okay.

So he literally orders Wagyu steak from these like farm, from this one farm, actually, in particular. And he orders like $3,000 a month of steak. And he shows me his freezer. His freezer is just full of bricks of steak. like imagine like you know when you see in a movie piles of cash like just bound up piles of cash it's that but with waggy steaks and so he said he said it was miserable for like six or eight weeks he was like I craved carbs I craved sugar and then he got six eight weeks into it and

he's like I can't even imagine eating sugar carbs again I don't crave them at all it sounds horrible by the way that's a real thing from what I understand that there's basically in your microbiome in your gut, there's all these, you know, basically it's bacteria that live there. And the bacteria feed, the different yeast and bacteria feed off of different, like, substrate, different, different food. And so the more you eat carbs, so imagine if what you're putting in is carbs, the bacteria that thrived off of, let's call it, meat are going to sort of die out. And the bacteria that thrive on carbs are going to like proliferate.

They're going to spread. They're going to multiply and they're going to, they're going to make up the majority of your gut. And then if you decide to switch and go low carb, all of the. a sudden those bacteria are going to say where the hell's are food and the in the craving you feel those carb cravings is not just like your mind being weak it's literally the gut bacteria that are signaling to your body we need our fix we need our shit or we're going to die dude what are you are you reading about body stuff now how do you know all this uh no well i heard this once i was fascinated

by it and somebody had told me this and i looked into it because i was like is that bullshit and like i'll just say half the shit i read five years later turns out to be bullshit so like with health. I feel like nobody knows anything. But in hearing this, I was like, oh, that makes total sense. And that's how you get, you know, just like you get withdrawal pangs if you stop caffeine. The same exact thing happens with carbs. And when you know that that's what's happening, you're like, oh, okay, I just need to ride you motherfuckers out. Like, I just need to keep, I just need to hold you guys, I'll starve you guys out. And in seven days, you'll be dead. And the only bacteria left will be the that feed that like the stuff I want to be eating. So it's a total thing.

Well, okay. So, and back to Julian. And by the. wait, that's always why I wanted to start my startup called hostage, where we just like take you and throw you in this like land and keep you in a cabin for like three weeks and just like monitor exactly what you mean. A guaranteed weight loss program. Would you? Yes. Would you be interested in a 10-day program

that would guarantee results? I will pay you $100,000 if you don't lose weight. Sounds good. We just give you 1,400 calories a day. Welcome to hostage. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, like would you like a glass of water? like that's all we that's all you get one of your top ten ideas so anyway so julian basically yeah he buys

and by the way the ranch thought he was a restaurant because he was ordering so much fucking steak they're like well certainly you're a restaurant here's your like wholesale price break and it just turns out he's just a dude anyway so he really wants to build this ranch in the middle of nowhere because he's thinking about where about want to live and then he tweeted out this thread that I love it's just just search his name julian and i'm building a ranch in the middle of nature And basically he's like, you know, why am I doing this? I want to leave San Francisco. I, you know, I just think it would be amazing.

And he basically tweets out his plans. He's like, here's where I'm looking. Here's the land. Here's how much it costs. I'm going to build this like these like prefabbed homes. I'm going to build this podcast studio. I'm going to have like by blank. You like this.

I know this is like right up your alley. So what did you think about this? Okay. So this is in my opinion, very romanticized, incredibly not. practical and it won't work in most cases. Have you ever been, you know, you live in, you lived in a city for a long time. You now live in the burbs, but it's still populated with people. Have you ever been by yourself for a while, like in rural area? Shoot me. Yeah, no, horrible. It's fun for a minute. It's great. I was just in Hawaii and it was like, this is relaxing.

This is great. I can't. I think that. You basically, you want to do it to the point where you're like, ah, I felt the benefits. And now I want to run back into society and tell everyone how awesome. of my am for doing this retreat from society. Yes. And so, like, I'm reading the Teddy Roosevelt biography, and he did the same thing. So basically, um, his wife and mother died on the same day. And it was tragic. It's horrible.

And while she, the wife died, Allison, while giving birth to his daughter. So like the most complicated day ever. And he was like, the light of my life is gone. I cannot live anymore. Uh, just life is done for me. And so he went and he bailed and he lived. in the badlands, which is in the Dakotas. And he said, I feel replenished. I feel wonderful. But you still got to get, he went eventually back to D.C. or New York and became a politician.

And I think that, I think what a lot of people overestimate is, or rather underestimate is community. So in order to make this work, I think a few people can make this work. But for nine out of ten folks, you need peers, you need family, you need friends. Life is, I don't give a fuck if I live in the most beautiful place on earth. If I don't have people that I can see on a regular basis who I love, it's stupid. I'd rather live poor and in a shack with people I love than in a mansion on a 50, 50 acre, 100 acre, platter land. That's beautiful.

100% agree. I think part of his plan is to basically have a bunch of, basically, guest houses, make it an awesome ranch where he'll just have this rotation of kind of friends and cool people that want to come stay. And I think that will, I think that will happen. but he's I think he's single so I don't like you know if I went out there with my my wife my kids then I think I could last a lot longer than than if I went out there literally by myself even just hoping kind of friends would come to visit so I think that is one thing and I think

this is a great example of you want to have this dream but then I think you need to test it I think you need to go live I think he should stop right now he should go somewhere for one week and just say okay let me go test or two weeks let me go spend two weeks by myself in this Airbnb in the middle of nowhere and let me just see how I feel after two weeks. And then let me try that again. And I know he's got the discipline because if you can eat steak only for, you know, steak and eggs only for eight months, props. But like you don't want it to feel like an endurance contest. If you're trying to choose your lifestyle, you want it to be one that feels effortlessly awesome, not like a test of your mental fortitude, I think. So I think it's amazing.

I would love to go visit, but I would not want to do this myself. So I've actually like done this a bunch of times. So there's a bunch of stuff that I wanted in my life. And I was able to test it on a very small scale. And I'll give you a few examples. So for example, I wanted to retire. And so I had the opportunity a couple years ago. I took six weeks off. Right. And I just took it off completely. And by the fifth week, I was like, I can't retire. I have to be around. I have to have something to do. Another example is buying a fancy car. You can go and test these cars for. Right. It's a lot of money. it's $1,000 a day. But testing a $200,000 car for two days is, you get into it.

You're like, this Ferrari is so small. I cannot drive this up and down like a driveway. It's just going to smack the ground and it's not fun. I'm stressed about this. And the fun of having it versus the stress of having it is actually not a good trade. Now that I feel it, I know it. Another example is having a 5,000 square foot home. For the longest time, I was like, I want a 5,000 square foot house.

So I went and rented a 5,000 square foot house. I spent a lot of money. Maybe I think I did it in New York. I rented a 5,500 square foot house and it was like $13,000 for a month. A lot of money, no doubt about that. But the house was way more expensive than that. And I got in this house and I was like, I cannot imagine having to fix all this crap all the time. This is exhausting.

I can't do this. I don't want this. Or I'm only using the living room, the bedroom and this huge kitchen, which I like. I don't need these six other bedrooms. And anyway, I think that you could actually test a lot. of stuff and more people should do that. They should, you can test stuff. Dude, so I, I'm going to rant for a second.

Think about like in college, right? So I think there's this crazy thing in society, which is like over commitment and over specialization without dabbling. So like you're a freshman in college. I remember at the end of my freshman year in college, I had to commit to a major. Like, dude, I just figured out like where the hell the bathroom is. I don't know what a major is. I don't know what the other majors could be.

I know that if I don't commit, I'm going to be falling behind. behind and off track. You know, I'm not going to have my credits on time and I'm not going to know what courses to take. And I'm basically picking my career without ever even knowing what my career should be. So forget what classes I'm going to like. These, my major sort of dictates what job I'm eligible for at the end. And I think it's crazy.

And then same thing with people's, you know, like first job. They just sort of sort of pick a career track without dabbling and figuring out what they actually might like to do. The, like the idea of dating is amazing. Like my parents were arranged marriage. So they, you know, they literally, my mom. read an ad in the newspaper for my dad, which said, like, you know, six feet tall, which is a slight lie. You know, he's 5'10.

You know, Indian, what else? Engineer, degree and good family. I was basically the ad. And she was like, yeah. Describe like every Indian American ever. Good enough. Good enough to marry. Let's meet.

And then the parents met and they're like, okay, in this one tea we're having together, this one coffee meeting we're having. All right, cool. We're done deal. See you. the next time I see you will be at the wedding. And that's how they got married. And like, you know,

really? Shocker that, you know, these marriages aren't always the best. And so that, are they happy? No. So I would say like Indian marriages have like a very low divorce rate because like

societally it's like like there's like a taboo against getting divorced. So they just like even worse. Stay together. Unhappy is what most people do. And then obviously some get divorced. But like there's arranged marriage idea is not great. Now the counterpoint would be, you know, I think in New York there's a 50,

percent divorce rate also. So, you know, maybe the whole dating thing doesn't work as well. So that's the, that's a fair counterpoint. But I would say, um, this idea of dating of basically try before you buy is, um, is really important in life. And like these, these tests that you've done for yourself are super important. And I'm shocked more people don't do them. I started doing them. And I'm like, wow, that's way better than this, like, I'll just have this idea in my head and it'll get so real in my head. And then when I finally do it, I'm like, oh, shit, that was underwhelming. It's like, couldn't I have just sampled this beforehand and known that and not had this idea? Like, what's an example? Like, okay, I'll give you an example on the plus side.

So the example of the plus side. So I hired a chef. So I have a personal chef. I wanted a personal chef for a really long time. How much does that cost a month? So how much does it cost me a month? It's about $3,400 a month, $3,500 maybe. And that includes food? That does not include the food. No, the food's on top. That's just like the service. The service of having a private chef in my house.

And by the way, worth it. Amazing. Like, you know, fortunate to be able to afford it. But like to me, I don't have a fancy car. I don't even have a fancy home. But I got a housekeeper who comes, you know, three days a week. And I got a private chef. And to me, that's like, that's my version of luxury.

That's like, you know, that's my version of a Lambo. It's like a lifestyle lambo. Does this person, tell me everything. Does this? So I had a chef as well for a minute, but it was a little bit different. It was more like meal prep. Does this person come? And I paid way less, a fraction of that.

Right. Well, I'm in the Bay Area too. So, you know, it's a... Yeah. But my guy came two days a week and they would meal prep for me. And I didn't like it. I ended up just not using them and I made my own food. So when does this person come?

So to do the sample idea. I first even got the idea because I got to sample it. So my previous company, Monkey Inferno, you've been there before, for lunch, I think, probably. The investors behind us, they were kind of like a billionaire family, the Birch family. They had a private chef in their home. But, you know, they were out and about all day working or they'd be at the office. So their chef would just come to the office and cook for all of us.

And so, you know, a company of like 20 people and he would cook this amazing spread. And all of a sudden, healthy food tasted good. So immediately I was like, holy shit, this is kind of amazing. I don't have to like go out, figure out what to eat every day. This guy just decides. So that's one decision I don't make. He cooks healthy food and it tastes like junk food. all right, that's like, you know, wow, that's amazing.

If I just ate this for all my meals, I'd be way healthier than just my lunch. And so I got to sample it. That told me, I want this. And there was other things that I got to try, you know, when I was at their house or fancy parties that they throw or fancy cars that they have that, you know, I got to try. And I was like, I don't care about this. Good. I can scratch that off the list.

It's one less thing I want. It's one less thing I care about. And so that's just hanging out with them got me, got me to try some things. that I thought I was working for and figure out what I like and don't like. So then I tried some meal prep people. What I figured out what I really like is somebody who comes, I don't decide what to eat. They know my, they know my life. They know what food I like and they know what health, what level of healthiness I care about.

And they just come make it fresh on the spot. Just saying fresh food tastes way better than meal prep food. And so she comes and then I also thought, I also realized, oh, this is not just about my health. Like one of the most time consuming parts of being a parent is constantly trying to feed your kid. I'm like, my kid's like a picky eater. And so she, you know, like, I'm making the three dishes for her every meal just trying to get her to eat something that she likes. And that just takes up more time than even cooking for myself did.

So the chef cooks for me, my wife, who's vegan and our baby. And so our baby now eats like way better than when we were just, you know, let's make some mac and cheese. Let's warm something up. And it makes it fun to feed her because I'm not. So it's tired. So right now she's coming three days a week. So she comes every other day, basically.

And then on the weekends, we want to eat out. So we like to go to restaurants or whatever. So we said don't come on the weekends. And we may move it up to five days at some point. But right now it's good. And it's little things like, here's a green smoothie. She makes every, you know. So in between meals, instead of a snack, it's she's like, oh, you want your smoothie?

I'm like, oh, yeah, I do want that smoothie. Thank you. Have you lost weight? I think so. I don't really weigh myself, but in the mirror. You look like you lost weight. I look better. And I don't know if my weight has changed.

I don't use the scale. but I just use the mirror as the scale. And so... How often does your cleaner come? Three days a week also. And how much do you pay for that? 160 bucks per visit, I think. Damn, dude, so you spend a lot of money on these things.

I mean, I spent a lot of money on these things. They may be extremely happy. You should do it, but... The feeling after the cleaners are here is like, you know, that's like a high for me. That's like I did it. I don't know what Molly is, but that's Molly for me. I feel so good in my own home. It's amazing. Having food, having fresh, healthy food made, I think that's a treat. That's an absolute treat for me.

I'm perfectly happy with, we have a cleaner who comes every two weeks. And I think we spend 120 or 100, I don't remember. But I'm also messy as fuck. And I have kids and they're messy as fuck. So like, you know, the house gets destroyed. You know, my sister cleans, I think, four times a day in her house. Just putting, putting toys away every, you know, every four hours, basically. So it's crazy. But I don't know if people care about this. But I guess my, my, my, my, my, my, The point I'm trying to make is, I think sampling... Dude, this episode is already, like, totally random. It's off the rest. I'm just going to go with it.

I think sampling your lifestyle is super important. I'll give you one more story here that helps. So, you know that I did a podcast from Vegas. I said, I was at somebody's home, you know... 15,000 square feet. Yeah, I don't even know how many... It's like 10 to 15,000 square feet. It looks like a hotel, basically.

And unbelievable, they have a... They have a Lambo and a Ferrari and a monster truck and like all this stuff. other cool shit. They have all the toys. There's a batting cage in the backyard. There's a, you know, like, a infinity pool that looks over the city, you know, you can see the strip. There's like everything you would want in the home. They got it. Elevator. All the crazy shit. And, and so anyways, like when I was there, I had this feeling that I don't like, that I've thought I had slayed this feeling, but nope, it came back. And it was like, kind of like jealousy.

It was like, I was like, and the way I knew it was because I was like, kind of poo-poeing, like, oh, I don't need all this. I'm happy without. all this. And I was kind of like in my head trying to like almost say why I didn't want these things because actually I felt bad that I didn't have all these things like this weird psychology thing. But the simple way of explaining it was like I felt these like little hunger pangs of envy of like, oh, I want that. And I was like, oh, that's not a good feeling. And the shift I made was instead of feeling like, oh, you know, these are things that I don't have, but they have, right? Like it's nothing wrong with them, but just I don't have these things and other people have

them. Instead, I looked at it differently. I was like, by the third day there, I was like, I got to shift my mindset. I'm not trying to have this jealousy feeling in my day. It's not a cool feeling for me. So I was like, all right, what am I going to shift it to? And I said, oh, how about I look at this like a, like, I'm getting a sample platter here. So these are things I can have. These are things I can have in the next few years. Things go right in my business. I can afford all these things. So why don't I feel like what it feels like to wake up in a mansion like this? Why don't I feel like what it's like to have a basketball court and a batting cage, you know, built into the home? Why don't I feel what it's like to drive this car?

And now I'm all of a sudden feeling excited. Ooh, what do I get to try today that's like, you know, I get to go try on something that I might have in the future. Did you drive his Ferrari? Yeah, so I get to test drive the stuff and feel like what, like, you know, what does it feel like? Did you like it? No, for me, cars are stressful. Like, I don't like fancy cars. They're very stressful to me.

And they're kind of like uncomfortable. Like I don't really get off on it. There's probably a version of a car that I like, but not the like supercars, basically. Supercars are not something I want. And so I got to figure out what do I not want? And then, ooh, actually, this feels really good. It feels really good to have, you know, this home gym built into my home. So, okay, you know, why don't I do that?

And, you know, why don't I go for that then? So I think that sampling is not only just an effective way to figure out what you want. It's also a cure for jealousy. Because when you're in those situations where you're jealous, switch it to thinking of it like, I'm just getting to try before I buy, before. I have all these things, I get to sample them and figure out what exact flavor of this I'm going to want. And then it becomes yours instead of feeling like it's theirs and you don't have it. I have that feeling with, so we have this guy in the podcast a while ago. We should have him back on

again. His name is Nick Bear, B-A-R-E, Nick Bear. He runs Bear Performance Nutrition or something, B-P-N. At a big YouTube channel, right? And a huge YouTube channel. This guy came out with us, he came out with this, his content production is so freaking good. So he's got this supplement business that does like 20 or 30 million in revenue a lot. But when we had him on, it was like six million in revenue or something like that. It wasn't like it was good, but it wasn't significant. And he created this YouTube channel. He's like good looking like yote.

Like he's a massive dude. But he, so he lifts weights and he's this muscle head. But he's really cool. And now he's into endurance sports. And so on his YouTube channel, which now when we're, We had him on, I think it had like 200,000 subscribers. Now it's getting close to a million, seven, 800,000. He did this thing.

He's got this whole team behind his YouTube channel. He's got like three or four guys working full time on it. He released a 45-minute documentary about him running the Leadville 100. The Leadville 100 is 100-mile race through the mountains of Leadville, Colorado. And you basically, it looked like it was like laps or something of like 15 or 20 miles. And he had these guys at checkpoints to film him. And I was watching this guy. It was the most inspirational shit I've ever seen.

I'm going to go and buy. Like, I don't even know what bear nutrition sells. Because whenever I buy weight protein, I just go to Whole Foods and I just buy like, you know, like, or on Amazon. I'm purposely going to go out of my way to buy his stuff. Have you been paying attention to Nick Bear? I don't. He doesn't show up on my YouTube feed.

I need to subscribe so it starts to show up on my feed. Dude, you got to watch this guy. It is the crazy. So he's ex-military. You're the only fitness influencer I watch. We can talk about that in a second. But he's inspired me to like take it to the way. He is so crazy.

This guy is nuts. Like he has a video of him like deadlifting 550 pounds, which is a shit ton of weight. And then he goes and he runs a marathon in like two hours and 55 minutes, which is very, very fast. And he's the biggest guy doing it. It's very interesting. So I've been watching this guy and I have this like pretty big sense of jealousy where I'm like, I want to be doing that. And so that's why I'm doing this little fitness influence.

or shit now. And it's kind of a joke, but not really a joke. And to be honest, it's so fun. Dude, you totally have to do this. It 100% makes you accountable and makes you exercise harder. Yeah, I love it. So I sampled your gym. So I went to your house, sampled your gym. I was like, wow, amazing. And then I called you the other day. I was like, yo, what are you using for the flooring? What are you doing for this? What are you doing for that? Give me the, give me the, the blueprint because I'm turning my garage into your garage. I'm like, that is a great. That was such an amazing feeling to work out there. I want to have that feeling on a daily basis. Dude, it's way cheaper than you think. I know. I didn't even take a, it's not even a lot

of money, but it's more like, it's more of having the clear vision of what you want. And seeing yours was like, oh, now I know what I like. And I just have some additions, some modifications. So I'm like, oh, my daughter who's two, she loves to come out when I'm working out. And she loves to work out with me side by side, which is just like she just wants to be to, she wants to do little things next to me. So we're creating a little workout playpen where she can go in there with little foam weights and do her thing while I'm doing mine. So I'm like, okay, I don't. I'm going to craft this lifestyle to be what I want. And so, like, you know, there's something to the sampling.

And I really encourage people to find a way to sample it. If you want to know what kind of home you want, go Airbnb something. Before I did this chef thing, I hired a chef for one meal to cook like a kind of a dinner for, like I had some friends in town. I was like, oh, let me hire somebody off Craigslist just to make one meal. Like I don't want to deal. We can go out to eat. But wouldn't it be cool if a chef came to our house and did it?

And like the cost is about the same of, you know, taking my friends out to a restaurant. So let me just do that at home. And it was amazing. And so having that chef at the at the home was like a good way to test these things. And so that's my kind of challenge to anybody who has made it through this random episode, which is like, think about the shit that you have been telling yourself you want and figure out a way to go sample it like in the next week. Go rent the car. Go hang out at someone's house.

Go shadow a CEO. Go, you know, hire the chef for the day. Do do like the sample of it and figure out, does it make you want it 10 times more or 10 times less? because usually that's the reaction I have when I feel it for the first time real is I want it way more or way less. I'm curious if people are going to like this rambling. I like this stuff, but I don't know. I wonder what people will enjoy because I can talk about this shit all day.

I like this fitness crap, this building the life that you want crap. I love this stuff. Ben, chime in here. What do you think, Ben? I can only speak from like my perspective, which is I'm really into the charts. city stuff. So that like, I really liked that. And the prison stuff, I think isn't interesting to anyone. So it worked for me. And Teddy Roosevelt, I mean, come on. You knew that would be up my house. Are you going to do? Dude, Teddy Roosevelt is the most prolific person I have

ever read about. I've read maybe over a hundred biographies. He is likely the most active person I have ever read. He has done so much amazing stuff. This guy's a freak. Teddy Roosevelt's Ben, where is the How to Take Over the World episode on Teddy Roosevelt? I would say of the people that people bring up that they want me to do, Teddy Roosevelt is probably number two. Genghis Khan is probably number one that people mention and Teddy Roosevelt number two. So it'll- Dude, Roosevelt is like he's different than Napoleon did a lot, but Roosevelt is far more eclectic.

He, like, before he was even in politics when he was 21, he wrote a book on the Spanish-American War and it was considered a textbook for decades. And then he wrote a couple more books. He became president, obviously. That's amazing. He was like this avid hunter and this zooal. What is it when you collect animals and like describe like the where they come from and things like that like Darwin shit. He did that type of crap before he was like in his 30s. Very prolific, very interesting person. You got to read about Teddy Roosevelt. Very intriguing. What book are you reading? The Rise of Teddy Roosevelt. I think there's like three of

Because I know there's one that came out fairly recently that's really popular now about his trip to the Amazon later in life. Yeah, yeah, and that was amazing. The guy was ridiculous. He also has this book that I'm thinking about reading. This title is beautiful. It's called A Strenuous Life. And so he had this phrase where he was like,

so Roosevelt would like even when he was president, every morning he would box, like fight box, like spar. He loved and he was like, it's our, like we have to live this strenuous life. where we put in effort, physical effort, and we get hurt sometimes and we struggle. He's like, we have to do that. Otherwise, you're never going to feel like a man or a human being. And so I've been very inspired by Teddy Roosevelt.

Very interesting person. That's funny. You know, I'm listening to the Vladimir Putin episodes that you did on how to take over the world. And I'm only, I'm on part one. And I love that he was like the opposite of what you're describing. Because when Sam describes these people, it's like, holy shit.

these are just like another species. It's like a guy who's done this and this and this all before the age of 30. And the best part of about the Putin thing was you were like up until 30, he basically had a very sort of like average, average life. There's nothing remarkable that would tell you that this guy's about to become what Putin ended up becoming. There was like little hints, little signs, a couple moments. But, you know, by and large, it was like, you know, mediocre student, you know,

kind of like low level, low level, you know, spy, not, you know, put in this like random random office, not in the highest level. And then that was all until 30. And then I'm guessing, because I haven't listed to part two yet, but I'm guessing that obviously it's going to turn up and he's going to end up, you know, becoming the leader leader of the country. But it was so crazy to me that he was unremarkable essentially till 30. Was that surprising to you?

Yeah. And the moment that you're talking about is like he was kind of like a mid-level operative in St. Petersburg. And I think the guy that he worked for lost in election. So he's like out of a job. And he was going to go just like started. judo gym in st petersburg russia yeah because he's like pretty good he sounded like just like he's he's like in scranton he's just a mid-level he's assistant to the regional manager and then somehow

becomes you know it's like if dwight became elan must that's sort of like what happened with putin mid-level officer to like you know president do you think ben that he is actually the richest person in the world um no i don't in so far as like do i actually think he has like you have like whatever, $100 billion in secret accounts, probably not. But it's like, it kind of doesn't matter because he has access to as much money as he wants whenever he wants. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So he doesn't have to. He doesn't have to move all that money to his account.

He scares me, man. So rich, he doesn't need it in his account. He freaks me out, man. Putin scares the shit out of me. Sam, have you listened to this episode, the Putin one? No, I, I, dude, I fear him, and so I've been nervous to listen to it. There's a line at the beginning that I love this. like it's like his little

anecdote. It's like he was kind of like not a great student in school and just like wasn't very interested. He's like he's the teacher's like he's smart but he's not that interested in school. And so the teacher tells his dad like he's not living up to he's not living up to his potential. And the dad like as just like as a Russian dad

would is like most Russian shit ever. He goes, so what? Do I kill him or what do I do? That was the response. So what should I do? kill him? I was like, wow. Oh my God. Those Russian thing ever.

Dude, he freaks me out, man. A lot of the Russians scare me. That's kind of like why I like Khabib and the UFC is because the Russians like freak me out. They're on another level. They're on another level. There's levels to it. Let's just put it this way.

They've never seen a Russian doing a podcast. Russians don't do podcasts, right? They live a harder life than us. They're doing more tough shit than sitting in front of a microphone. Dude, I've never even seen a Russian smile. I think I'm almost positive like smiling in Russia's weakness If you saw a Russian and he winked at you

What would happen to anybody? There's this comedian who like talks about like he's like You know like one time I was going to this bad neighborhood And I was nervous And he was and he was, this guy's a white guy And he was nervous and he goes, Someone came up to me, talk to me and asked me like A question that I thought that they were just like trying to like trick me

Into like you know Testing me to see where you know They're going to rob me or not And he goes, immediately, I just spoke in a Russian accent. And immediately they were afraid of me and walked away. And he's like, this is my defense mechanism. He just says, of course I know. Like, I, and it's like horrible Russian accent.

Like, do I know where I am? Of course. Do you? Like, he like says this like scary thing to this guy. And he like walks away from him entirely. And that's his defense mechanism from now. And it's just speaking a Russian accent. That's amazing.

If I do that in an Indian accent, I just get beat up on the spot. So it doesn't work the same. All right. We should wrap it up. I was just, I was going to say something. I was going to stick up for the Russians a little bit. I visited Russia with, uh, with my wife. She speaks a little bit of Russian.

And, um, my experience was like, they are very much like that. Like, they're kind of gruff and like a little scary, whatever. But there were a couple times where like, um, like my phone wasn't working and like we needed to get to the train station in an hour or else like we were going to miss our flight and everything was going to go wrong. And like, people were more willing to go out of their way and like, like, like, literally walk with us for like five blocks, make sure we found the exact right spot,

then anywhere else I've ever been. So it's like they have this very tough exterior, but once you get past it, they're like very, and obviously we're joking. If you are a Russian, we have love for you. I thought we were complimenting the whole time.

If you're going, don't poison Sam, don't feel sad. I was saying how badass they are. Everything I said, I stand behind as a compliment. You know, even just the cities. Dude, St. Petersburg,

do we have anything on the level of the word Moscow, St. Peters? These just sound tougher. than American cities, right? Like, whenever I hear the word of the Kremlin or Kremlin, I'm like, I freak out. Yeah, exactly. Kremlin?

It's a scary word. Bro, we have like Tampa Bay. This is not comparable what we have. You know, it's just they're on another level of toughness. Like Denver? Can you imagine? Just put it just put Denver up against Moscow. America is just not where it's at.

All right. I got to go. Just before I get canceled for praising the Russians.