The Tim Ferriss Show - #556: The Incredible Kyle Maynard — Fear{less} with Tim Ferriss

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Starting point is 00:01:36 Again, that's tim.blog forward slash Friday. And thanks for checking it out. If the spirit moves you. Optimal minimum. At this altitude, I can run flat out for a half mile before my hands start shaking. Can I ask you a question? and thanks for checking it out. If the spirit moves you. The Tim Ferriss Show. this special episode, which features an interview from my 2017 TV show, Fearless. The less is in parentheses because the objective is to teach you to fear less, not to be fearless. Fearless features in-depth, long-form conversations with top performers focusing on how they've overcome fears and made hard decisions, embracing discomfort and thinking big along the way.

Starting point is 00:02:42 It was produced by Wild West Productions, and I worked with them to make both the video and audio available to you for free, my dear listeners. So thank you, Wild West. You can find the video of this episode, which is gorgeous. I think they did an incredible job on youtube.com slash Tim Ferriss. Remember, two R's, two S's, youtube.com slash Tim Ferriss. And eventually you'll be able to see all of the episodes for free at youtube.com slash Tim Ferriss. And eventually you'll be able to see all of the episodes for free at YouTube.com slash Tim Ferriss. So you can swing over there and see what is currently up. Before we get started, just a little bit more on Wild West. Spearheaded by actor, producer, and past podcast guest Vince Vaughn, Wild West has produced a string of hit movies, including The Internship, Couples Retreat, Four Christmases, and The Breakup. In 2020,

Starting point is 00:03:24 Wild West produced the comedy The Opening Act, starring Jimmymases, and The Breakup. In 2020, Wild West produced the comedy The Opening Act, starring Jimmy O. Yang and Cedric the Entertainer. In addition to Fearless, their television credits include Undeniable with Joe Buck, ESPN's 30 for 30 episode about the 85 bears, and the Netflix animated show F is for Family. Wild West has also produced the documentaries Give Us This Day, Game Changers, subtitle Dreams of BlizzCon, and Wild West Comedy Show. And now, without further ado, please enjoy this wide-ranging conversation from Fearless. I'm Tim Ferriss, author, entrepreneur, angel investor, and now TV host. I've spent my entire adult life asking questions, then scouring the

Starting point is 00:04:06 globe to find the answers. On this show, I'll share the secrets of pioneers who have faced their own fears. We'll dig into the hard times, big mistakes, tough decisions, and how they got through it all. The goal isn't to be fearless. The goal is to learn to fear less. Welcome to Fearless. I'm your host, Tim Ferriss, and on this stage, we'll be deconstructing world-class performers of all types to uncover the specific tactics they've used to overcome doubt, tackle hard decisions, and ultimately succeed on their own terms. My guest tonight is a member of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame, New York Times Best-Selling Author, and has summited Mount Kilimanjaro, among others. He inspires audiences around the world with his message, and he conquers challenges with his own unique style.

Starting point is 00:04:53 Please welcome to the stage, athlete, author, and mountaineer, Kyle Maynard. What's up? A little around the world. What's up, everybody? How's it going? Boom. How's it going? Awesome, man. Thank you. Have right. You guys ready to get the show started? Yes! All right. It's so nice to see you, man.

Starting point is 00:05:36 You too. It's been fun. It's been fun. It's been fun. It's been fun. It's been fun. It's been fun. It's been fun.

Starting point is 00:05:44 It's been fun. It's been fun. It's been fun. It's been fun. It's so nice to see you, man. You too. Nice to see you. It's been five years. We met a while back up in Napa. Had quite the adventure. It was. I don't remember most of it, but... Yeah. But I do remember in the sort of flashes of consciousness

Starting point is 00:06:03 in between too much wine, everyone being really, really impressed and inspired by you there. I mean, it was just, it was such a wonder to behold your effect on people. Like how could that guy be so drunk and still stay in his wheelchair? I was like, how does he remember these one-liners? They're brilliant. But what I thought we could do, since this is fearless,

Starting point is 00:06:28 is that we could start not with necessarily the highlight reel, but start with some of the challenges. So we are going to begin with a video and let's take a look. Every weekend we'd go to the tournament and he would get beat. He would lose.

Starting point is 00:06:44 And we'd go and we'd get up at 6 in the morning and he would get beat, he would lose. And we'd go and we'd get up at six in the morning and drive across the town and go wrestle and he would get beat and then I would drive home with him crying because that emotional side of the sport, that's what was happening that I didn't wanna have happen. All right. Tell us about your first wrestling season. Then we're going to back into all the rest.

Starting point is 00:07:11 But as a former wrestler, I like talking about wrestling. So let's start there. Oh, yeah, we can geek out on that. Yeah, I mean, it's a short story. I was terrible. I mean, it was like basically people were almost saying it was borderline child abuse that my mom and dad were having me do this you know it was um it was just crazy and i think the craziest part of it too is

Starting point is 00:07:31 if if my dad were sitting here with us and he'd been a wrestler and he'd kind of been the one to encourage me to go and do it if he were being honest with us he would say that he didn't think that i would ever have won a match what was your record like the first season i lost every match that first season and halfway through my second season so i hadn't would ever have won a match. What was your record like the first season? I lost every match that first season and halfway through my second season. So I still hadn't won a match. What was your last season like? So senior year of high school, had won 36 varsity matches,

Starting point is 00:07:54 beat the state champ from Alabama, Louisiana, went to the Nationals, and placed one match from being a high school All-American. So... All right. So... Yeah. It So tremendous. And we are going to dig into a lot of the wrinkles of that. So I don't want to jump too far ahead, but can you explain for people what congenital amputation is? Yeah, honestly, I have no idea. Like really doctors don't know. I'm not even joking when I say that, but like when I was born, there was no known cause.

Starting point is 00:08:27 And, you know, my mom and dad, they were young. They were in their early 20s. And, really, they kind of, thankfully, stopped looking for an answer. Maybe there's some genetic link, but they don't know. Where did you grow up? How would you describe your childhood? In the early days. In the early days.

Starting point is 00:08:44 So, I was born at uh walter reed army medical so it's where so many of our like veterans that have gone through an amputation have come back to do the rehabilitation which is crazy that i mean just there was no other reason they had no idea that i was gonna be born an amputee like no idea at all the ultrasounds appeared normal um so it was a big surprise at first and um you know i say my mom and dad kind of pulled the ultimate my mom especially at least like this is jedi mind trick where it was a big surprise at first. And I say my mom and dad kind of pulled the ultimate, my mom especially, this Jedi mind trick where it was like, you're not disabled. And I'm like, cool, I'm not disabled.

Starting point is 00:09:11 It was like this kind of attitude of normalcy. And I think that they saw that if they saw me as normal, then I would see myself that way. Yeah, I mean, it's... I think we'll talk a lot more about this, but, I mean, you definitely, child or adult, you sort of conform to the expectations of the people around you, right? So if your parents are presenting you with that image of yourself,

Starting point is 00:09:35 then it makes sense. Sometimes, too, I mean, this is kind of, this is like a small thing, and it's really not. Like, I hear parents that are like, oh, my kid's bad at math. I'm like, what? Like, he's like, you know, know whatever he might be lazy that might be true but they say that like my kids lazy or my kids bad at math or something like that they don't realize how they're actually like I think in a lot of ways

Starting point is 00:09:54 like they're creating that right how they go and see their kids are gonna be how the kids see themselves totally yeah so yeah then my mom I mean she was the coolest with this where it was like you know she wanted me to have friends in the neighborhood and she knew that the socialization aspects of things were going to be the most critical to my development. And like, so she would be out like, you know, corralling other kids to play like neighborhood street hockey games. And, you know, she was working as like a temp secretary. My dad was in college at the time. They didn't have money, but they would buy like the Super Nintendo.

Starting point is 00:10:21 So like, you know, the newest gaming system so they'd have friends come over and want to play. Cool. How did you, for instance, just things that I think many people in this audience, probably all of us take for granted, like how did you learn to eat, for instance? Yeah, it was, so that was an example of where my mom wanted to help, you know, she wanted to go and do it for me. My dad, he knew that, you know, it was going to come in time to, you know, that I wanted to go and do what I would want to be able to go and do that on my own. Right. So I used to use a prosthetic spoon. And a lot of times we would forget it and leave it at home and I'd be dependent on my mom or my grandma to feed me. And, you know, it was he kind of brought up the point. And I kind of say this like jokingly now, but it's true.

Starting point is 00:11:01 Right. Like if you imagine like senior prom date or something like that, I'm not going gonna want like my mom or grandma hanging out behind me like oh here's a bike kyle like oh you know cool it's kind of like he got the bigger picture of the fact that like you know the world was not tailored for for someone that was born like me so then i'd have to be able to adapt to go and figure it out what What was the process like? I mean, I was two or three years old, right? I barely have any conscious memory or recollection of this, but I'd probably dropped the spoon like thousands of times. And did you ever wear prosthetics or consider prosthetics? I did.

Starting point is 00:11:39 I wore them up until I was in kindergarten. And for like a little bit on and off I hated them they weren't natural they're big bulky and like it just they slowed me down more than they helped it was more of a cosmetic reason that I decided to wear them but it was um actually one day you know I sitting like this in a chair surrounded by you know my like kindergarten classroom and it was my turn to do show and tell. And I had these big prosthetic arms on,

Starting point is 00:12:08 and I brought this toy machine gun to school, which wouldn't really fly nowadays, right? But I'm taking the hooks from the prosthetic and trying to make the sound with the gun. And I fumbled with it and dropped it on the ground, and I couldn't jump out and grab it. And I was so embarrassed. I wanted to come to school without the arms and

Starting point is 00:12:26 legs the next day. And like, and my mom just, she just, she called the teacher and just talked to her. And the teacher's like, yeah, bring Kyle to the second half of school tomorrow. I'll talk to him in the morning, the kids. And apparently, I mean, it's a group of like kindergartners, right? So like, it took like three hours to explain to the class why Kyle had arms and legs yesterday,

Starting point is 00:12:47 but he's not going to today. You know? Kind of like tripped the kids out a little bit, right? Totally. Like, I know we're working on letters, but take a second. But the kids, at the end of the day, they told the teacher, they said, that they liked me better like that.

Starting point is 00:13:08 And because I got to jump around, I got to go and play with them and all that. And that was the last time I ever wore them. When you were growing up, what were you most afraid of? What intimidated you the most or what was harder than you thought it would be? Definitely girls. Girls. Yeah, 100%. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:13:23 That seems pretty common. Yeah, for anybody. But yeah, for anybody. But how did you contend with that? I was, I mean, you know, it was, it was actually, you know, it's a lot of probably at 10 years old and started to become like attracted to girls and stuff. It was like, that was a lot of probably the questioning of like, what is the rest of my life going to go and look like? You know, that was a lot of, probably the questioning of like, what is the rest of my life gonna go and look like? You know, that was a big part of it. I know, you know, it's like with anybody with any type of like physical difference,

Starting point is 00:13:52 you know, it's a big thing. It's like, am I gonna be able to find or seek companionship or all that, right? And, you know, like probably the most fear-filled moment of my entire life to date was, you know, not like Kilimanjaro or like stepping into a cage and fighting MMA. It was like asking my senior prom date out, you know? And because, but at the same time too, it's then, you know, now fast forward to where life is. It's

Starting point is 00:14:18 like, I've had an amazing dating life. I've dated some amazing girls. You know, my mom's ticked off that I haven't like settled down to like find the right one yet and give her grandkids. But, you know, sounds like a lot of moms. Yeah. You know, I remember meeting at the event with you, Neil Strauss was there, right? And I was thinking like, you know, Neil Strauss, he's written eight New York Times bestselling books, including the game. So, yeah. And, you know, it was like, we should totally have like a pickup seminar for guys in wheelchairs. Yeah. You know, well, you know, I wasn't, I was going to wait until a little bit later to ask this, but let's say if you meet a vet who's newly an amputee and they have some of

Starting point is 00:14:56 these concerns, right? What's the rest of my life going to look like? Am I going to have companionship? What do you say or do in that situation? You know, I think it's really tough because being born the way that I was, yes, like in these earlier years, there were a lot of those difficult emotions to process, right? There were a lot of like painful times. I mean, when I was 10 years old, kind of swirling with a lot of the stuff of like, what is the future going to be? I mean, I got to a point where I did not see, like I didn't want to go on living at 10, you know, I was like 10 years old. Obviously now being able to look back, it, it just, you know, it's, I couldn't even imagine what life would be. And I want them, you know, for someone that if they were a veteran or if they went through some type of accident or injury to be able to see that hope in that future. Right. But at the same time, I have to go and realize that right then,

Starting point is 00:15:46 for them in that moment, it's way hard. And it's a thousand times harder, in my opinion, to go through and, you know, if you live 20 or 30 or 40 years with arms and legs and then you lose them, your brain and all of its neurology, right? It's hardwired to like, when, you know, they go to pick up the coffee cup,

Starting point is 00:16:01 they go to pick it up with their hand, right? I've never had that programming. So all of my motor development, all of everything was developed around what I have currently being, since it was congenital. So I think it, you know, and now they're also dealing with all of like the emotional processing side of things too. But I just, I really want them to know that they are capable of living whatever life it is that they set out, that they can still create the life that they want to, right? It's not going to be easy. Not going to be like, they don't have to process some of this stuff and deal with some of this

Starting point is 00:16:33 stuff. But just in like the topic of the show, it's like, right? Like fear is ubiquitous. I mean, it's like everybody experiences it all the time. The difference is the people I think that have a great life versus someone that, that sort of just getting by or struggling is they think at some point, maybe the fear is just going to go away and then they'll be able to start or something like that. And I think you just have to be able to jump in and find a way to be able to live your life now, you know? Yeah. What kept you going? I mean, 10, that's a really, that's a, that's a, not only a sensitive period, but a really early age at which to have a lot of that type of darkness, right? What inspired you to keep going or what, how did you come out of that?

Starting point is 00:17:20 I think if I had to pick like a moment in time, it was making my first tackle in football. Okay. Let's talk about it. Tell us about it. I was convinced I was going to be the quarterback on the team. I was like, no question. They're going to make me the quarterback. And they told me to line up as a nose guard. It's a defensive line. And first day of practice, we weren't even like in full pads, but just wearing helmets and stuff. And the center went to go and snap the ball between his legs. I'm lining up right across from him They told me my job was like follow the ball and he basically just like stood straight up And so I just dove under his legs

Starting point is 00:17:53 Smash my helmet the quarterback's legs knocked him over first play got the sack Came home that night and called my dad. He's out of town on a business trip I was like, I think we're done with youth football. I'm going straight to the NFL And I think we're done with youth football. I'm going straight to the NFL. So there's a good photo. So that was one of the moments. Big time. Because it was like at that moment, it was like this moment of achieving something I never thought that I could before.

Starting point is 00:18:20 And like, you know, being a part of the team and the camaraderie and all that. Right. So it was like, you know, all of these like psychological studies and books on like, you know, engagement and flow and all that, right? You know, when you are in that flow state, then it's like, you aren't thinking about anything else, right? That's why I love like jujitsu or mountain climbing, that kind of stuff now. Cause it's like, when I'm doing that, you know, if I think about like, oh man, I got to go into my taxes and I get choked. Yeah, right. There's an immediate penalty. Yeah, big time. You're not just sitting on a couch meditating, trying to get into the zone.

Starting point is 00:18:47 There's like an immediate repercussion. Immediate repercussion. But like in that moment, it was like, I wasn't worried about, am I going to have to live at home with my mom and dad forever? Am I ever going to have a girlfriend? You know, all of those fears and doubts and those questions started to kind of loosen the grip on that.

Starting point is 00:19:02 And your dad suggested the wrestling? Is that how that started? Yeah, he basically tricked me into coming out. So the rule was, is that if, for me or my sisters, if we sign up for any type of sport or activity, we had to finish it. Like, it really finished a season. You know, we didn't have to sign up and do it again, but you had to like sign up, you know, and finish that season. So I did sixth grade, didn't want to ever do it again. I was like done. And seventh grade sign-ups came up, and my dad was like, yeah, maybe you should try it again, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, no, absolutely not.

Starting point is 00:19:31 And he said, you know, I want to tell you something I never really talked to you about. He said, I didn't win a single match my first year either. I knew that he'd become a really good wrestler in high school and college and stuff later on. I was like, wow, really? And he said, yeah, nobody ever wins a match their first year in wrestling. It's actually really common. He said, but everybody wins a match their second season

Starting point is 00:19:50 because you'll find somebody who's their first season and you'll beat up on them, right? So I was like, awesome, sign me up. And to make a long story short, I was interviewing my dad's dad, my grandpa, for my book when I went through to, when I was writing and I was asking him, I was like, when my dad was dad, my grandpa, for my book when I went through to, when I was writing, and I was asking him, I was like, when my dad was losing all his matches his first year, like, did

Starting point is 00:20:09 he want to quit too? Because I did, I begged to quit all the time, and they would drag me out to these tournaments, and he was like, had no idea what I was talking about, because that whole story had been a complete lie. So, based my entire life off of that lie, right? And so then the first kid that I beat, I see this, like, you know, before the match started, I had him beat him. Like, this kid's like, oh, that kid's a first-year wrestler?

Starting point is 00:20:30 He's pretty scrawny. I was like, you know, he's not even warming up the right way. Like, look at him jumping around. Like, we shook hands. I was like, he's got a weak handshake. Like, took the kid down and landed on top. I was like, whoa, this is awesome.

Starting point is 00:20:41 And I was, like, more shocked than he was. Like, I'm just going to keep doing it, so. So let's pull up a video of one of your wins let's take a look Come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come

Starting point is 00:21:12 on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come Maybe demonstrate one right here if you want. Yeah. Let's do it. Yeah, yeah. Let's do it. All right. I mean, I knew at some point this was going to happen, right?

Starting point is 00:21:29 Please do not break my knee. All right. No, we'll go through it slow. All right. So how do I do this? So, like, you know, normal wrestling match starts. We come out. We go and shake hands, right?

Starting point is 00:21:37 And a lot of times, like, guys would, like, push on my head and kind of, like, stay away, right? So my strategy was to be able to like close the distance down very John Smith very John Smith yeah totally I don't know how many more of those I want to do I think we're old. We need to be careful, right? My heart rate got to it right there. Okay. Two seconds. So what other, this is probably going to apply

Starting point is 00:22:13 to like.001% of you, but I want to ask, what were your go-to moves other than that? So I do a lot of kind of like duck under type positions. Yeah, so I'll show you guys what a duck under is. So if you come in, a lot of guys would go and wrestle me down on their knees, right?

Starting point is 00:22:28 So then if he reaches over the top, I can boom, shoot across here, come around and take him down. Or like. So. Favorite was, one of my favorite take downs to this day is like a jack whizzer.

Starting point is 00:22:45 So, if, we'll go a little slow. But if he's on top of me, we can start here, right? So if he starts, he goes, exactly. So he goes over top here, then I'll just tuck and be able to roll. Alright, I think it's time for water. All right. We definitely, the biggest go-to, I won't, I don't think it's a good idea to demonstrate.

Starting point is 00:23:17 What was this? But my biggest go-to technique was called the jawbreaker. But, you know, basically we take someone's jawline like that and use like kind of a front headlock position and just crank on the jaw until they just turned over on their back. Boom, pin me. So that was... The jawbreaker. Oh, my God. I am really glad we did a little demo.

Starting point is 00:23:40 You don't wrestle with all your guests? Is that... No, this is new. I mean, maybe I should. I'm glad I could be your first. I'm not gonna pick you, yeah. No, of all the people I'm gonna pick. So you were inducted into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame. That's a big deal.

Starting point is 00:23:54 That's a big deal. I mean, my heroes are in that Hall of Fame. Totally, mine too. How did that feel? How did that happen? I mean, in contrast to how bad I was when it started, it was really just a cool moment to be able to kind of reflect and look back and see how far we got in the common it was really was really pretty wild there was a big argument in um when I was competing in wrestling and jiu-jitsu as to whether or not I

Starting point is 00:24:32 was unfairly advantaged you know which is an interesting juxtaposition of like kind of like how bad I was like I talked about when I first started to then you know later people were saying yeah he's unfairly advantaged because I was competing against, you know, in high school. I weighed 103 pounds and, you know, many moons ago. And, you know, I'm going up against these 103 pound kids and weren't huge kids. Right. And I had a bigger upper torso than than the kids I was going up against. And, you know, some of the probably some of the similar people that were saying that, like, oh, man, this is like child abuse. His parents are making him doing this are now saying like, he's got an unfair advantage

Starting point is 00:25:06 over you. He was like, you just pinned my son. Yeah, exactly. I changed my mind. And it happened quick. It was really interesting. It was, you know, but to me, I think in a lot of ways, I think that with the wrestling and all that in particular, it was a cultivated advantage.

Starting point is 00:25:22 And I'm all about, you know, you're all about those like, you know, advantages that you cultivate, give you an edge. What did you, what was the most valuable thing that you took from that whole experience? It wasn't until pretty recently, within the last two or so years of doing some like deeper self-reflection that I realized, I could kind of summarize my biggest fear was being seen as helpless. And you can imagine, as a kid, of course, it was just like, if other kids were laughing or joking or making fun of me,

Starting point is 00:25:54 I would want to prove to them that I wasn't helpless. So, wrestling, mountain climbing, those are sports that have a little bit of a bent of like I'm gonna show you that I'm not helpless right and so but I think that now and acknowledging that I'm so grateful for that too but I don't have to be driven by that doesn't have to be the thing that's running the show and I think that if we have these experiences and these fears that are outside of our awareness, then it can start to go and run the show. You know what? I've met billionaires that, you know,

Starting point is 00:26:36 there's some moment in time, right, that was like running the show for them. And maybe it was from a time when they're six or seven years old. I heard someone ask an ultra runner once, they said, well what are you running from? And it's that switch not everyone makes it, going from running away from something to running towards something. How did you develop that awareness so that you could use it as a tool maybe when you choose but not to have it use you. Like, how did you develop that awareness?

Starting point is 00:27:18 I think that one of the competitive advantages that I have is that, like, the disability from a physical side, it got me to ask some bigger philosophical questions at a younger age. You know, and I know that it just, that kind of started to generate some just questioning, deeper questioning of like, what is this about? You know, what is this experience about? What is this life about? What am I, you know, why did this happen? What is the larger context here? Like all of these sort of things. And then like, what did people thousands of years ago think about this?

Starting point is 00:27:45 You know, and even before that, you know, I mean, like, it just, I think that we're all sort of in this inquiry in some level but then we kind of you know we get stuck in our day-to-day and whatever the physical disability i think sometimes is like a it's a little bit of an access and that kind of forces you to you know maybe for some kids to to kind of look at some of those things at a younger age for me i could summarize it in a in a recurring dream that i had um it wasn't until two years ago that i had an experience of like remembering this dream and when i remembered it like i just started crying and i could see all of my successes and all of my failures and it's just like like it's like these buildings like you know had built just kind of crumbling down and the dream was i was in the back seat of my dad's um car and he had this um e-brake that he would go and pull so

Starting point is 00:28:30 like you push it with your thumb and you'd pull it up or it was like a parking brake right so the parking brake on this hill and um all of a sudden in the dream i'd be in the car by myself and the parking brake would come off and i would try to do whatever I could to like grab it. And I couldn't pull it up. I couldn't stop the car. And then a car would just pick up speed. And eventually it was just like, you know, just like wake up and have this like fear of like kind of falling and feeling right. And it was like just this intense, this intense fear and this intense feeling of like helplessness. That was like from the time is maybe maybe five or six to middle school. I had that dream a couple times a year.

Starting point is 00:29:10 It was pretty intense. And I think now, if I'm in the airport traveling, sometimes I'll pull up the gate in the plane, the gate agent, you know, is like, we'll have different responses. Sometimes they're totally cool. And I'll tell them I'll jump on a mature and I'll go and walk to the plane. Sometimes, sometimes they won't believe me. And sometimes, you know, it's like, you can't do it. And I'm like, can I, you know, it would trigger some of that stuff where it would be like you know um like some of those like helpless feelings and I'd have this thought that'd be there of like man like you know you don't have any idea of like the places that I've been like

Starting point is 00:29:59 you probably couldn't go right you probably couldn't be able to climb Aconcagua or something like that you know and I like, I had that thought, and I'm like, oh man, it's a stupid thought. Because I think if you have awareness of something, you know, it's like pops up into my head, and I'm like, well, that's just my own fear. That's my own insecurity, and then it can go away. But if it's just behind the scenes, running the show,

Starting point is 00:30:18 it's like, you know, I think a lot of us, I mean, human beings, we're wired that for whatever reason we kind of make these decisions up about ourselves. I think also human beings, just evolutionarily speaking, we're wired for survival, not for happiness. It's not what your genes are optimized for necessarily, right? So it's something you have to, at least something I have to work on. It's like I can go dark really fast for whatever reason. It's just, it's been, it's been a trend. Yeah. And, but I love that you share that though, you know, you're real. And I want people

Starting point is 00:30:52 to know for me, I've had periods of time of feeling like a fraud in front of groups of people, you know, where I'm like, man, like I'm really struggling with X, Y, or Z. How do I have any right to go and tell anybody here anything? But then now, and I'm sure you've maybe had similar experiences, but like I've gotten to be around enough people where I can see that it's almost the people that don't share that, that those are the ones that I'm like, you know, I want to stay away from because it's like they don't acknowledge that like, because it's everybody, we all have that stuff, right? We all do. Let's pull up a video of you doing some speaking i would say my purpose in life

Starting point is 00:31:30 at least from my perspective would be to help show other people their purpose that other people and what they think is totally irrelevant that for me inside my heart this is what I'm capable of doing this is what I deserve they're thinking about if I were in your shoes and I were running your business I could not do it that is a lie you decide you decide what you're capable of in believe and deserve. Why do you do your speaking 200 days on the road? That's a lot of days on the road, man. Why the speaking? What drives that? To me, it is like there's there's again, so many different whys that are interconnected with that. It's like a form of artistry for me. I think that like, you know, a speech is, is something that I can bring that creativity to.

Starting point is 00:32:25 And it's also, you know, but it's, it's, I'm, I'm not that one thing. I'm not a speaker. I'm not an author. I'm not any one thing, you know, I'm not even an entrepreneur. I don't care. Like I don't care to have any label, not an, you know, an amputee or a wrestler or whatever. I want to not know what I am. Right. So I can go and like find and be curious and figure it out. Like if I had to pick one defining quote for my life, Emerson said, do not go where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail. Applaud you, man.

Starting point is 00:32:53 We are going to go to some audience questions. If you had to pick the most inspiring religious or spiritual leader, who would it be and why? I would say Emerson, for sure. Like I've read all of his works and i mean it's had a profound impact on me joseph campbell's another one um you know but uh yeah i mean i'm just constantly like i geek out on that stuff hard the thing i'm obsessed with currently is the uh the uponish odds and so um you know it's just like thousands of years old a a lot of these ideas, right?

Starting point is 00:33:25 When it's, we, we kind of like to go and put different wrappers on things and think that we've got, you know, different smart ways to figure stuff out. But it's really just like, it's this knowledge of life. And this inquiry is like so old and it cracks me up now. I love, I'm also a big fan of like Martin Seligman and positive psychology and Albert Bandura, you know, and theura and the research side of things. But it cracks me up.

Starting point is 00:33:47 And I was talking to, I told you, I did an interview with Mark Devine today, Navy SEAL commander. And we were just joking that researchers will be like, new headline, smiling, makes you happier. It's like, wow. Thanks, that's where my tax dollars go. You know, it's like this was probably, you know, it was like 10,000 years ago, right? Somebody had, hey, smile and you'll feel better. Put the two together. So you, I read this, and I was like, of course, just because we spent a little bit of time together. It was like, known for having nice handwriting.

Starting point is 00:34:25 And I was like, okay, yeah, of course. Like, of course, God would have better handwriting than I do, which you do. So I wanted to actually pull up an example of your handwriting as much for the content as the handwriting itself. I know there are many people who, whether they admit it or not, view disabled people as inferior. We are, quote, broken in their eyes, we are of no use, no value, and we are just running out the string on life.

Starting point is 00:34:50 But I believe that we are all disabled in one way or another, including disabilities of character and personality. My disability just happens to be more visual than some. This really, when I read that, it really impacted me because it's true. I mean, that sounds maybe a simplistic way to put it, but it's really profound, right? You have people walking around with, everybody has their own wounds. They're all battling their own demons. And I remember I was really bent out of shape about some personal flaw or weakness. And I think it was like an ant, I think it had too much to drink.

Starting point is 00:35:37 And she said, don't worry, people are like Swiss cheese. And I was like, what? And she said, no, we all have holes. We all have those gaps. So this is from Twitter, no, we all have holes. Like we all have those gaps. So, so this is from Twitter at MastinMD. What specific things do you tell yourself when the thought of quitting enters your mind? I think a lot of it is I try to examine just like, what, what is that coming from? Right? Because sometimes I think that, and this is one of the things that's kind of changed and shift,

Starting point is 00:36:04 I used to talk about like, oh, never, ever give up. Now I'm like, giving up is super important and you should give up a lot of things a lot quicker. A job that you hate, a relationship that sucks, like give it up immediately, right? So, but there's other instances where too, it like that's a gray area and i know something that we'll probably talk about was like the mountain climbing yeah you know sure but you know for a little taster of that a lot of like a lot of my experience with mountain climbing is you know gotten to the point where i'm like how far is too far yeah you know like yeah i can go and have like i can push myself but like will there be irreparable harm?

Starting point is 00:36:46 Yeah. You know, and, like, you know, so, of course, like, probably 95% of any climb that I've ever done, like, I'm, like, wanting to quit. And, you know, the 5% that I'm not, it's like I'm either hanging out with my friends or looking around at how beautiful this is. But it's like a lot of the time I have that thought going through my head. And the most brutal parts of either climbing Aconcagua or Kilimanjaro that I took on were the last day that I could have paid extra for like a helicopter evac. And I realized it was like because I had that option and that choice to get that evac, it made things like the suffering way worse. So I want to pull up a photo of you. I believe it might be in your gym, could be elsewhere, but working out on rings. So it looks like you're having a pretty pleasant afternoon.

Starting point is 00:37:40 Pretty good time. What role has building physical strength played in overcoming mental, emotional, and social challenges for you? I think that easily that the physical is the easiest and first access to, you know, I think just to like gaining some type of like inner awareness. I mean, it's just that like as a baseline is an awesome place to start. But I think it just doesn't stop there. I think sometimes if you have people that they aren't able to really contextualize what they're doing and see how the physical can map into everything, right? It's kind of all the same stuff.

Starting point is 00:38:16 So the same lessons you're going to go and learn there, the things that are going to help you in business, the same things that are going to help you in your relationships or your passions and all that. It's just realizing that it's kind of all the same and nothing happens quick. So it does take a lot of time and frankly, you know, a lot of suffering and a lot of failure and a lot of like stuff that nobody really wants to like do. It's like more of like, I want to take this pill and get this effect. I want to go and have this thing, you know, I mean, I love a lot of like the, the biohacking stuff, but I feel like kind of like the, the thing that we go and do by cheapening the process is like, we skip a lot of steps along the way. I think a lot of people forget that they're supplements for a reason. It's not primary. Uh, and just to underscore something

Starting point is 00:39:01 that you mentioned, uh, or looking at it maybe a slightly different way, but this is how I've thought about it a lot, is when I'm in dark periods, the most fruitless thing that I can do personally, I'm not saying this applies to everybody, but it's to try to think my way out of it. And so people say mind over matter. I think you can also go the other direction. I think you can have matter of mind. And using your kinesthetic body, rather than viewing things through this lens of like, it's like Cartesian duality of mind and body. Like, your brain's an organ. Like, that stuff is completely intertwined. So using the physical as a way to develop mastery

Starting point is 00:39:38 over the mental has always been my default when I'm feeling. It's a good place to go. I mean, it's because it's like that immediate sort of access. Yeah, I mean, go to the pain cave, man. Figure stuff out real quick. But to that point, too, something just popped in my head. I had an amazing meeting a couple weeks ago.

Starting point is 00:39:58 Got to have a meeting with the Secretary of the Army at the Pentagon and talk to him about some of these veteran issues and why is it that 22 veterans a day are committing suicide. And it's staggering. I want to know, like, what are they doing about that? But one of the things that he said really stood out, I think is helpful in this sense.

Starting point is 00:40:19 He said whenever he gets to that place of being really stuck, he knows that one of two things are happening, probably both. One, he's trying to do it all by himself. And the other is he's just not asking for help. What advice would you give to someone who has the tendency, and I do quite frankly, to isolate myself? It's like the worst instinct. So I'm like, let me just sit down and figure this out on my own. And it's just like, whoosh, whoosh. How many times do I have to do this before I learn my lesson?

Starting point is 00:40:48 But what advice would you give to someone who has a tendency to do that? That's me. I totally would agree in the same way. But it's really like, lately I've been like, nah, screw that. It's like I want to, I mean, really, what's running the show there, I think is a big part of it. Is it my own like ego? Is it my own sense of like, I can't go and like have support or help from other people. Like, you know, I need to go and do it on my own or no one's going to go and do it as good as me or whatever those kinds of stories are. It's like, just, it's all BS. And like, it just, if it's made up in my head, that's just like, I can go

Starting point is 00:41:21 and unmake it up. Right. I can go in and surround myself with amazing people that are like way smarter than I am you know some of my like best friends and business partners like have the exact opposite strengths that I have as soon as we partnered together then it was like things just shot up through the roof right and you put the right people in the right places like that's the whole like special forces mentality like that one person in inside of like an environment can go and change the whole landscape. And I think it's so true in business, the whole idea of kind of being like the solopreneur and grinding it on your own. And like the late nights, it's like, yeah, that can be a good place to go and get started when you don't have, you don't have a team and access to people.

Starting point is 00:41:57 But even then it's kind of an excuse because you have a community of people that you could tap into and your friends and family and other people like that that are gonna be willing to champion your cause the one thing that's that's helped me quite a bit you guys can check this out the musician Amanda Palmer has a TED talk on asking for help and I remember watching it and then I read her book and I was like yeah yeah, dummy. Like, if you're suffering, call one of your friends who's already figured it out and ask them for help. It was just like such a, kind of in retrospect,

Starting point is 00:42:32 hilarious epiphany for me. And it's always been really hard for me to do that. But in those deeper moments of suffering, I think it's the moment that's like the least thing, the last thing you want to do. Yeah. So you mentioned Emerson. What books have you gifted the most to other people, if any? Or if you were to gift books to other people? I think it is an article that I know that you've recommended a bunch that

Starting point is 00:42:57 I have gifted to all my entrepreneur friends is 1,000 True Fans. 1,000 True Fans by Kevin Kelly. Yeah. Oh, yeah. And that's made a huge difference for me because I'm like, you know, frankly, it's like, you know, it's my own ego that tells me, like, oh, I need to have an audience the size of Tony Robbins or Tim Ferriss, right? It's like, no, necessarily. Like, I need to really be able to communicate

Starting point is 00:43:20 and tap into, like, who is my tribe. And, you know, in the process right now of like, literally like I'm finally like, like balls out, I'm creating it. And like, you know, the, the rapper that I want to go and use for that brand is the, the mountain movement. But the whole idea is I want people to go and like, get over this idea of, of, of, you know, of knowing that they have all the right answers and that their beliefs are the right way it's like and in any belief right I challenge any belief in that I'm not talking about one thing it's like a mountain it does not care like what race you are what gender you are whether you're in a

Starting point is 00:43:58 wheelchair or not it doesn't give a shit right mountains like zero F's given I mean like 100% right like and it's it's it's kind of and it's in in that it's beautiful and it's indifference i think yeah and at the same time it's like i think i want to go and empower people to go in their own metaphorical mountains like how do they go and climb those things and how they go and build that team to ultimately like leave the world better than they found it like it's because it's right now it's insane you know I mean like just the the polarity and all that stuff that we're experiencing and seeing it's I Know and I mean I'm guilty of it too right we all have our assumptions and beliefs and judgments, and it's just like It's impossible to see somebody else's perspective with that

Starting point is 00:44:38 When people when you look at me or if someone looks at me for the first time if you haven't seen the videos and stuff Like that it doesn't automatically occur to someone like oh that guy's clearly an MMA fighter or a mountain climber it'd be true there's a like a quip that has been profoundly impactful in my life that was called the map is not the territory yeah and basically we all walk around as these mental cartographers as if like you know the maps that we go and create our reality as are the territory and they're not they're just maps the maps that we go and create our reality are the territory and they're not, they're just maps. And any map that you want to create can get outdated. It can get, you know, you need to go and like do that software update, right?

Starting point is 00:45:14 For sure. And update your map. Yeah. And it's, um, strikes me, you know, what I've really tried hard to do in the last couple of years myself in, in part to get a correct this faulty software or like buggy software that needs updating it's really simple i mean i was told at one point this is some advice i got on conflict resolution they just said say less two words say less wow okay yeah it wasn't directed at me but it certainly applied to me and uh i was like yeah like how many problems would be solved in this country and around the world if it was just like before you can state a strong opinion, you have to ask three questions and listen to the answers. And actually listen. Like actually listen.

Starting point is 00:45:54 A lot of things would resolve themselves. What is something you've changed your mind on in the last few years? I think I grew up, I mean, in a sort of, you know, in, not even really something I've talked about at all publicly, but in, you know, I grew up in with, you know, very sort of Baptist views and all that, right? And then, you know, I went for several years privately, like as a period of like full-blown like atheism you know and it was like it's kind of secretly harbored some you know sort of degree of spirituality and really it was after like a trip to Thailand and sort of became interested in like sort of eastern thought

Starting point is 00:46:35 and things like that that I expanded that view to a lot more things but then also to have come back to Christianity and seeing the beauty of like the message that Christ taught. And I think that like now, I think I would still, I mean, I identify myself as a Christian of someone that's just a follower of Christ, but at the same time, I'm, you know, I'm not religious, but it's like this sort of, you know, I think it's more broad, inclusive view of like spirituality. And I think that sometimes too, it's, you know, I think that we think that we're so smart. We've got all the answers for this stuff. And sometimes, you know, especially now, I mean, with interesting things, it's like stuff gets spooky, you know, at certain levels.

Starting point is 00:47:18 And it's like there's some other interesting answers and implications there that like are fascinating. You know, stuff that Buddha talked about, stuff that Lao Tzu and you know all these teachers it's like or Campbell. I mean Campbell was the biggest one. Joseph Campbell talked about this like monomyth and how these different creation stories occurred with very similar structures around the world at different times. And you know but as human beings we get, but as human beings, we get so, again, coming back to this idea, we get so locked into our beliefs that we'll start wars over these things.

Starting point is 00:47:49 And like, we will literally kill millions of people off of like a lot of this stuff that we hold onto. And that's why I wanna, I mean, bring this idea that like, really kind of not knowing, I think, is the better place to come from. The entirety of my life was like not knowing comma, you know, but we're going to figure it out. And, uh, you know, I, when I think to the best doctors I know and how they distinguish themselves, there's an expression. There are a

Starting point is 00:48:19 lot of funny expressions in medicine that doctors have. So one is P equals MD, pass equals MD. So just like any industry, just like any trade, you have people who are at the bottom of the class, people at the top of the class. So the people at the top of the class, I think generally have another expression, which is we know that 50% of what we think we know is wrong. We just don't know which 50 percent. Wow. I think if more people walked around keeping that in mind, it would lead them to ask more questions as opposed to seek to antagonize, seek to prove themselves right, right off the bat.

Starting point is 00:48:59 So I want to talk about mountain climbing. How did, let's say Kilimanjaro, how did that come into the picture? Total ADD. That's the best explanation I have for it. It was like, I did a CrossFit sectional workout. The first workout was a thousand-meter row and then sprint up this like 900 foot stone mountain and tore a skin off on my arms to get up there and I was like, but it got to the top, it's an hour and 46 minutes, it's destroyed, but up there and I was like but it got the tops hour and 46 minutes it's destroyed but got there I was like wow this is beautiful my friend sitting there and we're talking and I told her

Starting point is 00:49:31 I was like I want to do I wanted to Kilimanjaro she was like you're freaking crazy like you just tore the skin off your arms doing 900 foot stone mountain and this Kilimanjaro is like 20 or 21 Stone Mountain stacked on top of each other. Yeah And I was like, I don't know how we're gonna do it. But you know want to figure it out so that was I mean it was just Brutal beatdown from you know, the universe on every level after that to get to that point now. What did you do? All right, so you have this Stone Mountain was it?

Starting point is 00:50:05 Yeah. Took all the skin off of your arms and legs. So what was the gear? So with that, we used leather welding sleeves. And I was like, you know, this will protect my arms until I realized the leather welding sleeve was a lot tougher than my skin. So it was the leather that ripped it up.

Starting point is 00:50:23 Yeah, but it was like, yeah, it wasn't the stone but it was like we tried bath towels and duct tape and like thankfully i've got you know these amazing friends that were sitting and just duct taping stuff on my arms and my feet for hours you know and like we tried um you know like oven mitts you know like cooking oven mitts and like several of them stacked up and we tried um webony pads, all these different things. We finally got smart and took a mountain bike tire and cut that into pieces and then like wrapped it around and give some traction and created this prototype shoe.

Starting point is 00:50:54 So I used that to get up the mountain and we didn't get the final gear set complete until two and a half weeks before we left for the climb. What was driving it? That's a big commitment, right? And you presumably have other stuff going on. That takes a lot of focus. Big time.

Starting point is 00:51:10 What did you hope to get out of it? And the biggest driver there was for me personally. And it's hard to kind of understand unless you've spent a significant portion of your time and your life in a wheelchair. Because you don't necessarily realize how many places you can't your life in a wheelchair. Because you don't necessarily realize how many places you can't get to in the wheelchair.

Starting point is 00:51:27 In America, I think that we have the greatest country that I've experienced in terms of accessibility. Part of it is because I think we're a fairly new country, but it's like, in terms of the world, there are many places that are off limits. And that was, you know, when my friends would go and run off into the woods, I couldn't go and follow them.

Starting point is 00:51:51 And so when I was a kid, I wanted to, and I wanted to go and have a way to go and do it unless I was like riding on a buddy's back and we wouldn't get very far doing that. But it was like, that was my access into the woods for a long time or in the mountains. And I wanted to go to nature. I wanted to experience it. I wanted to go and see these places that I'd read about in some, you know,

Starting point is 00:52:12 like poem or something. You know, I'm like, the snow is a Kilimanjaro. I want to see that. As the ever-present threat of deadly avalanches loomsoms, scree, and dust make movement difficult for Kyle. Spikes are attached so he can navigate the icy slope. And Kyle's will to succeed is clear. Nothing will stop him. As day breaks, Kyle Maynard pushes ahead, a beacon of will and determination, showing the world that, no matterard's mission is complete, and he can pay tribute to the men and women who've inspired him,

Starting point is 00:53:25 who choose to live life to the world, what would you put on that billboard? it's, um, I think this time I'm going to switch it up and go with that Campbell quote where he said, you know, he was asking like the purpose of life and he said, it's, you know, and I think you could have a debate with this, but you know,

Starting point is 00:54:15 really I think there's some beauty of it where he said it's to follow your bliss and that doors will open where there are previously only walls. If I'm attached to this idea of like, Oh, I have to be the speaker guy, then I don't necessarily get it. And that sometimes like maybe that could be the most empowering thing to go and give up everything and go and, you know, and pursue a different path. And I respect people that are willing to go in to do that and completely recreate themselves. Well, I would just want to thank you, Kyle, for honestly showing everyone that they can do

Starting point is 00:54:48 more than they think they're capable of doing. It's a huge gift to the world. Ladies and gentlemen, Kyle Maynard. Hey guys, this is Tim again. Just one more thing before you take off, and that is Five Bullet Friday. Would you enjoy getting a short email from me every Friday that provides a little fun before the weekend? Between one and a half and two million people subscribe to my free newsletter, my super

Starting point is 00:55:14 short newsletter called Five Bullet Friday. Easy to sign up, easy to cancel. It is basically a half page that I send out every Friday to share the coolest things I've found or discovered or have started exploring over that week. It's kind of like my diary of cool things. It often includes articles I'm reading, books I'm reading, albums, perhaps, gadgets, gizmos, all sorts of tech tricks and so on that get sent to me by my friends, including a lot of podcast guests. And these strange esoteric things end up in my field and then I test them and then

Starting point is 00:55:47 I share them with you. So if that sounds fun, again, it's very short, a little tiny bite of goodness before you head off for the weekend, something to think about. If you'd like to try it out, just go to Tim.blog slash Friday, type that into your browser, Tim.blog slash Friday, drop in your email and you'll get the very next one. Thanks for listening.

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The Tim Ferriss Show - #556: The Incredible Kyle Maynard — Fear{less} with Tim Ferriss

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The Tim Ferriss Show - #556: The Incredible Kyle Maynard — Fear{less} with Tim Ferriss

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