Andrew Huberman: Relationships, Drama, Betrayal, Sex, and Love

00:00:00.000 | Listen, when it comes to romantic relationships,

00:00:02.080 | if it's not 100% in you, it ain't happening.

00:00:07.080 | And I've never seen a violation of that statement

00:00:12.260 | where it's like, yeah, it's mostly good,

00:00:14.340 | and there's this, and there's like the negotiations.

00:00:16.800 | Well, already it's doomed.

00:00:19.400 | And that doesn't mean someone has to be perfect,

00:00:20.800 | the relationship has to be perfect,

00:00:22.020 | but it's got to feel 100% inside,

00:00:24.800 | like yes, yes, and yes.

00:00:29.720 | The following is a conversation with my dear friend,

00:00:32.480 | Andrew Huberman, his fourth time on this podcast.

00:00:35.920 | It's my birthday,

00:00:37.100 | so this is a special birthday episode of sorts.

00:00:40.040 | Andrew flew down to Austin just to wish me a happy birthday,

00:00:43.200 | and we decided to do a podcast last second.

00:00:45.880 | We literally talked for hours beforehand,

00:00:48.160 | and a long time after, late into the night,

00:00:51.400 | he's one of my favorite human beings,

00:00:53.440 | brilliant scientist, incredible teacher, and a loyal friend.

00:00:58.160 | I'm grateful for Andrew, I'm grateful for good friends,

00:01:02.240 | for all the support and love I've gotten

00:01:04.120 | over the past few years.

00:01:06.440 | I'm truly grateful for this life,

00:01:09.000 | for the years, the days, the minutes, the seconds

00:01:11.320 | I've gotten to live on this beautiful earth of ours.

00:01:14.800 | I really don't want to leave just yet.

00:01:16.800 | I think I'd really like to stick around.

00:01:20.300 | I love you all.

00:01:22.760 | This is the Lex Friedman Podcast,

00:01:26.120 | and now, dear friends, here's Andrew Huberman.

00:01:30.300 | - Trying to run a little bit more.

00:01:34.560 | - Are you losing weight?

00:01:35.600 | - I'm not trying to lose weight,

00:01:36.540 | but I always do the same fitness routine.

00:01:39.200 | I have for like 30 years, basically,

00:01:41.400 | lift three days a week, run three days a week.

00:01:43.760 | But one of the runs is a long run,

00:01:46.760 | one of them's medium, one of them's a sprint type thing.

00:01:48.920 | So what I've decided to do this year

00:01:51.180 | was just extend the duration of the long run,

00:01:55.600 | and I like being mobile.

00:01:58.600 | I never want to be so heavy that I can't move.

00:02:02.680 | Like I want to be able to go out

00:02:04.400 | and run 10 miles if I have to, so sometimes I do.

00:02:07.640 | And I want to be able to sprint if I have to,

00:02:09.600 | so sometimes I do.

00:02:10.720 | And lifting in objects feels good.

00:02:14.760 | It feels good to train like a lazy bear

00:02:16.960 | and just lift heavy objects,

00:02:17.920 | but I've also started training

00:02:19.040 | with lighter weights and higher repetitions

00:02:21.240 | for three-month cycles,

00:02:24.840 | and it gives your joints a rest.

00:02:26.600 | And yeah, so I probably, you know,

00:02:29.240 | I think it also is interesting to see

00:02:30.600 | how training differently changes your cognition.

00:02:33.620 | That's probably hormone related,

00:02:34.920 | you know, hormones downstream of training heavy

00:02:37.100 | versus hormones downstream of training a little bit lighter.

00:02:40.760 | I think my cognition is better when I'm doing more cardio

00:02:44.880 | and when the repetition ranges are a little bit higher,

00:02:49.080 | which is not to say that people who lift heavy are dumb,

00:02:52.280 | but there is a,

00:02:53.440 | 'cause there's real value in lifting heavy.

00:02:55.200 | - There's a lot of angry people listening to this right now.

00:02:57.240 | - No, no, no, but lifting heavy

00:02:59.280 | and then taking three to five minutes rest

00:03:01.300 | is far and away a different challenge

00:03:04.360 | than running hard for 90 minutes.

00:03:08.640 | That's a tough thing.

00:03:09.560 | Just like getting in an ice bath,

00:03:10.640 | people say, "Oh, well, how is that any different

00:03:12.240 | "than working out?"

00:03:14.040 | Well, there are a lot of differences,

00:03:15.040 | but one of them is that it's very acute stress.

00:03:18.680 | Within one second, you're stressed.

00:03:21.000 | So I think subjecting the body to a bunch of different types

00:03:24.880 | of stressors in space and time is really valuable.

00:03:28.020 | So yeah, I've been playing with the variables

00:03:29.600 | in a pretty systematic way.

00:03:30.880 | - Well, I like long and slow for, like you said,

00:03:35.880 | the impact it has on my cognition.

00:03:37.760 | - Yeah, the wordlessness of it,

00:03:41.440 | the way it puts you in a,

00:03:43.760 | the way it seems to clean out the clutter,

00:03:46.640 | it can take away that hyper-focus

00:03:49.480 | and put you more in a relaxed focus for sure.

00:03:53.800 | - Well, for me, it brings the clutter

00:03:55.000 | to the surface at first.

00:03:56.680 | Like all these thoughts come in there

00:03:58.520 | and then they dissipate.

00:03:59.880 | You know, I've been, 'cause I got knee barred pretty hard.

00:04:02.520 | That's when somebody tries to break your knee.

00:04:04.120 | - That was just, what's a knee bar?

00:04:05.240 | They try and break your knee?

00:04:06.480 | - Yeah. - Oh, so you tap.

00:04:07.520 | So they-- - Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:04:08.800 | So it's, you know, hyper-extending you that direction.

00:04:11.800 | I got knee barred pretty hard.

00:04:13.240 | So in ways I don't understand, it kind of hurts to run.

00:04:17.760 | I don't understand what's happening behind there.

00:04:19.680 | I need to investigate this.

00:04:21.040 | It basically, the hamstring flex,

00:04:24.840 | like curling your leg hurts a little bit.

00:04:27.320 | And that results in this weird, dull,

00:04:30.840 | but sometimes extremely sharp pain in the back of the knee.

00:04:34.400 | So I'm working through this.

00:04:36.440 | Anyway, but walking doesn't hurt.

00:04:38.240 | So I've been playing around with walking recently,

00:04:42.240 | like for two hours and thinking.

00:04:44.320 | 'Cause I know a lot of smart people throughout history

00:04:48.320 | have walked and thought.

00:04:50.800 | And you have to play with things

00:04:53.000 | that have worked for others, not just to exercise,

00:04:56.040 | but to integrate this very light kind of prolonged exercise

00:05:01.040 | into a productive life.

00:05:02.960 | So they do all their thinking while they walk.

00:05:04.920 | It's like a meditative type of walking.

00:05:07.160 | And it's really interesting.

00:05:08.560 | It really works.

00:05:09.920 | - Yeah, the practice I've been doing a lot more of lately

00:05:13.640 | is I walk while reading a book.

00:05:15.400 | In the yard, I'll just pace back and forth

00:05:17.000 | or walk in a circle.

00:05:18.160 | - Audiobook or you talking about-

00:05:19.000 | - No, hard copy.

00:05:20.680 | - Where you just holding-

00:05:21.520 | - I'm holding the book and I'm walking and I'm reading.

00:05:23.280 | Yeah, and I usually have a pen and I'm underlining.

00:05:25.080 | I have this whole system like underlining stars,

00:05:27.480 | exclamation points, goes back to university

00:05:29.120 | of what things I will go back to,

00:05:31.160 | which things I export to notes and that kind of thing.

00:05:34.060 | But from the beginning, when I opened my lab

00:05:37.280 | at that time in San Diego, before I moved back to Stanford,

00:05:40.280 | I would have meetings with my students or postdocs

00:05:43.480 | by just walking in the field behind the lab.

00:05:46.160 | And I'd bring my bulldog Costello,

00:05:51.800 | bulldog mastiff at the time.

00:05:52.960 | And he was a slow walker.

00:05:54.600 | So these were slow walks,

00:05:56.520 | but I can think much more clearly that way.

00:05:58.680 | There's a Nobel prize winning professor

00:06:01.400 | at Columbia University School of Medicine, Richard Axel,

00:06:04.120 | won the Nobel prize, co-won Nobel prize with Linda Buck

00:06:07.400 | for the discovery of the molecular basis of olfaction.

00:06:09.480 | And he walks in voice dictates his papers.

00:06:13.240 | And now with Rev or these other,

00:06:15.000 | maybe there are better ones than Rev

00:06:17.120 | where you can convert audio files into text very quickly

00:06:20.200 | and then edit from there.

00:06:21.300 | So I will often voice dictate first drafts

00:06:24.960 | and things like that.

00:06:26.180 | And I totally agree on the long runs, the walks,

00:06:29.480 | the integrating that with cognitive work,

00:06:31.240 | harder to do a sprints.

00:06:32.520 | And then the gym, you know, are you weight train?

00:06:36.520 | You just seem naturally strong and like thicker jointed.

00:06:40.160 | It's true.

00:06:41.000 | I mean, we did the one very beginner

00:06:43.560 | 'cause I'm a very beginner of jujitsu class together.

00:06:46.720 | And yeah, as I mentioned then, what if people missed it?

00:06:50.280 | Lex is freakishly strong.

00:06:52.360 | - I think I was born genetically to hug people.

00:06:55.080 | - Oh, like Costello.

00:06:56.640 | - Exactly.

00:06:57.480 | - You guys have a certain similarity.

00:06:58.920 | He had wrists like, you know,

00:07:00.440 | it's like you and Jocko and Costello

00:07:02.160 | have these like wrists and elbows that are super thick,

00:07:05.120 | you know, and then you look around

00:07:06.480 | and you see tremendous variation.

00:07:07.800 | Some people will have like the wrist width of a Whippet

00:07:12.440 | or Woody Allen, and then other people like you or Jocko,

00:07:14.800 | or, you know, there's this one Jocko video

00:07:17.960 | or thing on GQ or something.

00:07:19.320 | Have you seen the comments on Jocko?

00:07:20.680 | These are the best.

00:07:21.800 | - No.

00:07:22.760 | - The comments, I love the comments on YouTube

00:07:25.040 | 'cause occasionally they're funny.

00:07:27.160 | The best is when Jocko was born,

00:07:28.960 | the doctor looked at his parents and said, "It's a man."

00:07:33.520 | [laughing]

00:07:35.400 | - It's like Chuck Norris type comments.

00:07:36.720 | - Oh yeah, those are great.

00:07:38.160 | That's what I miss about Rogan being on YouTube

00:07:40.240 | with the full length episodes, is all that comment.

00:07:42.680 | - So this is technically a birthday podcast.

00:07:45.680 | What do you love most about getting older?

00:07:47.800 | - It's like the confirmation that comes from getting more

00:07:55.780 | and more data, which basically says,

00:07:59.960 | yeah, the first time you thought that thing,

00:08:01.800 | it was actually right

00:08:02.640 | because the second, third, and fourth, and fifth time,

00:08:05.600 | it turned out the exact same way.

00:08:06.880 | In other words, there've been a few times in my life

00:08:10.340 | where I did not feel easy about something.

00:08:15.340 | I felt a signal from my body, this is not good.

00:08:20.180 | And I didn't trust it early on, but I knew it was there.

00:08:25.280 | And then two or three bad experiences later,

00:08:30.280 | I'm able to say, ah, every single time,

00:08:33.040 | there was a signal from the body informing my mind,

00:08:36.140 | this is not good.

00:08:38.600 | Now, the reverse has also been true

00:08:40.200 | that there've been a number of instances

00:08:41.880 | in which I feel sort of immediate delight.

00:08:44.160 | And there's this kind of almost astonishingly

00:08:47.480 | simple experience of feeling comfortable with somebody

00:08:51.400 | or at peace with something or delighted at an experience.

00:08:55.400 | And it turns out all, literally all of those experiences

00:08:59.700 | and people turned out to be experiences

00:09:01.800 | and people that are still in my life

00:09:03.720 | and that I still delight in every day.

00:09:06.440 | In other words, what's great about getting older

00:09:09.380 | is that you stop questioning the signals

00:09:14.380 | that come from the, I think, deeper recesses

00:09:17.080 | of your nervous system to say, hey, this is not good,

00:09:20.120 | or hey, this is great, more of this.

00:09:23.280 | Whereas I think in my teens, my 20s, my 30s,

00:09:28.640 | I'm almost 48, I'll be 48 next month.

00:09:31.380 | I didn't trust, I didn't listen.

00:09:35.880 | I actually put a lot of work into overriding those signals

00:09:39.720 | and learning to fight through them,

00:09:40.800 | thinking that somehow that was making me tougher

00:09:42.840 | or somehow that was making me smarter,

00:09:46.960 | when in fact, in the end, those people that you meet

00:09:49.600 | that are difficult or there are other names for it,

00:09:53.280 | it's like, in the end, you're like,

00:09:54.800 | yeah, that person's a piece of shit.

00:09:56.440 | Or this person is amazing and they're really wonderful,

00:10:01.440 | and I felt that from go.

00:10:03.720 | - So you've learned to trust your gut

00:10:05.960 | versus the influences of other people's opinions.

00:10:09.040 | - I've learned to trust my gut

00:10:10.000 | versus the forebrain overanalysis, overriding the gut.

00:10:15.000 | Other people often in my life have had great optics.

00:10:20.980 | I've benefited tremendously from an early age

00:10:24.080 | of being in a large community

00:10:25.560 | of what has been mostly guys,

00:10:26.640 | but I have some close female friends

00:10:27.780 | and always have as well,

00:10:30.020 | who will tell me that that's a bad decision

00:10:32.360 | or this person not so good or be careful

00:10:34.960 | or they're great or that's great.

00:10:37.400 | So oftentimes my community and the people around me

00:10:39.640 | have been more aligned with the correct choice than not.

00:10:44.480 | - Really? - Yes.

00:10:45.600 | - Really, when you were younger,

00:10:46.840 | like with like trans parents and so on?

00:10:50.280 | - I don't recall ever really listening

00:10:51.800 | to my parents that much.

00:10:53.200 | I grew up in a, you know,

00:10:54.400 | we don't have to go back to my childhood thing,

00:10:56.120 | but my sense was that- - It's not your fault, Andrew.

00:10:58.120 | - Thank you.

00:10:58.940 | I learned that recently in a psilocybin journey.

00:11:02.300 | My first high dose psilocybin journey, which was-

00:11:06.040 | - Welcome back.

00:11:06.880 | - Done with a clinician, thank you very much.

00:11:08.360 | Thank you.

00:11:09.200 | I was worried there for a second at one point,

00:11:11.280 | am I not coming back?

00:11:12.740 | But in any event, yeah, I grew up with some wild kids.

00:11:17.320 | You know, I would say about a third of my friends

00:11:19.000 | from childhood are dead or in jail.

00:11:21.960 | About a third have gone on

00:11:23.360 | to do tremendously impressive things,

00:11:25.520 | start companies, excellent athletes,

00:11:28.420 | academics, scientists, and clinicians.

00:11:32.400 | And then about a third are living their lives

00:11:34.180 | as kind of more typical.

00:11:35.600 | I just mean that they are happy family people

00:11:39.840 | with jobs that they mainly serve the function to make money.

00:11:44.400 | They're not sort of career,

00:11:45.480 | into their career for career's sake.

00:11:46.960 | But, so some of my friends early on

00:11:50.960 | gave me some bad ideas.

00:11:52.520 | But most of the time my bad ideas came from

00:11:57.120 | overriding the signals that I knew that my body,

00:12:02.880 | and I would say my body and brain were telling me to obey.

00:12:07.880 | And when I say body and brain is that

00:12:09.920 | there's this brain region, the insula,

00:12:11.840 | which does many things,

00:12:14.460 | but it represents our sense of internal sensation

00:12:18.040 | and interoception.

00:12:19.240 | And I was talking to Paul Conti about this,

00:12:21.600 | as who, as you know, I respect tremendously.

00:12:24.960 | I think he's one of the smartest people I've ever met.

00:12:27.560 | I think for different reasons,

00:12:28.620 | he and Mark Andreessen are some of the like

00:12:30.840 | smartest people I've ever met.

00:12:32.560 | But Paul's level of insight into the human psyche

00:12:34.920 | is absolutely astounding.

00:12:36.480 | And he says the opposite of what most people say

00:12:42.640 | about the brain, which is most people say,

00:12:46.520 | oh, the supercomputer of the brain is the forebrain.

00:12:48.760 | It's like a monkey brain with a extra real estate

00:12:51.000 | put on there.

00:12:51.840 | And the forebrain is what makes us human

00:12:53.600 | and gives us our superpowers.

00:12:57.360 | Paul has said, and he's done a whole series

00:13:01.600 | on mental health that's coming out

00:13:02.800 | from our podcast in September.

00:13:04.960 | So this is not an attempt to plug that,

00:13:06.300 | but he'll elaborate on what I'm about to say.

00:13:08.160 | - Wait, you're doing a thing with Paul?

00:13:09.360 | - We already did.

00:13:10.200 | - Oh, nice.

00:13:11.440 | - Yeah, so Paul Conti shot up,

00:13:13.000 | we did, he and I sat down,

00:13:14.040 | he did a four episode series on mental health.

00:13:16.560 | It's not mental illness, mental health,

00:13:18.760 | about how to explore one's own subconscious,

00:13:20.920 | explore the self, build and cultivate the generative drive.

00:13:26.900 | You'll learn more about what that is from him.

00:13:28.880 | He's far more eloquent and clear than I am.

00:13:31.740 | And he provides essentially a set of steps

00:13:36.080 | to explore the self that does not require

00:13:38.680 | that you work with a therapist.

00:13:39.720 | This is self-exploration that is rooted in psychiatry.

00:13:44.160 | It's rooted in neuroscience.

00:13:45.420 | And I don't think this information exists anywhere else.

00:13:48.280 | I'm not aware that it exists anywhere else.

00:13:50.240 | And he essentially distills it all down

00:13:52.600 | to one eight and a half by 11 sheet,

00:13:56.640 | which we provide for people.

00:13:58.400 | And he says there, I don't want to give too much away

00:14:03.160 | because I would detract from what he does so beautifully,

00:14:05.840 | but if I tried and I wouldn't accomplish it in any way,

00:14:08.640 | but he said, and I believe that the subconscious

00:14:13.660 | is the supercomputer of the brain.

00:14:16.000 | All the stuff working underneath our conscious awareness

00:14:18.580 | that's driving our feelings and what we think

00:14:21.400 | are the decisions that we've thought through so carefully.

00:14:24.520 | And that only by exploring the subconscious

00:14:27.520 | and understanding it a little bit,

00:14:29.820 | can we actually improve ourselves over time.

00:14:34.240 | And I agree.

00:14:35.240 | I think that so that the mistake is to think

00:14:38.440 | that thinking can override it all.

00:14:40.440 | It's a certain style of introspection and thinking

00:14:43.740 | that allows us to read the signals from our body,

00:14:47.260 | read the signals from our brain,

00:14:48.300 | integrate the knowledge that we're collecting

00:14:50.900 | about ourselves and to use all that in ways

00:14:53.500 | that are really adaptive and generative for us.

00:14:56.420 | - What do you think is there in that subconscious?

00:14:58.800 | What do you think of the Jungian shadow?

00:15:01.580 | What's there?

00:15:03.060 | - You know, there's this idea as you're familiar with too,

00:15:05.380 | I'm sure that this Jungian idea

00:15:06.900 | that we all have all things inside of us,

00:15:09.820 | that all of us have the capacity to be evil,

00:15:11.880 | to be good, et cetera,

00:15:12.840 | but that some people express one or the other

00:15:15.160 | to greater extent.

00:15:16.520 | But he also mentioned that there's a unique category

00:15:19.940 | of people, maybe two to 5% of people

00:15:22.480 | that don't just have all things inside of them,

00:15:24.800 | but they actually spend a lot of time exploring

00:15:27.080 | a lot of those things, the darker recesses,

00:15:29.520 | the shadows, their own shadows.

00:15:31.340 | You know, I'm somebody who's drawn to goodness

00:15:36.660 | and to light and to joy and all those things

00:15:38.720 | like anybody else, but no, I think maybe it was part

00:15:42.080 | of how I grew up, maybe it was the crowd I was with,

00:15:44.720 | maybe, but then again, you know,

00:15:47.720 | even when I started spending more time

00:15:49.580 | with academics and scientists, I mean,

00:15:52.200 | you see shadows in other ways, right?

00:15:54.120 | You see pure ambition with no passion.

00:15:56.680 | I recall a colleague in San Diego who,

00:16:00.920 | it was very clear to me, did not actually care

00:16:03.740 | about understanding the brain,

00:16:05.100 | but understanding the brain was just his avenue

00:16:07.640 | to exercise ambition.

00:16:10.220 | And if you gave him something else to work on,

00:16:11.800 | he'd work on that.

00:16:12.640 | In fact, he did, he left and he worked on something else.

00:16:14.360 | I realized he has no passion for understanding the brain

00:16:16.600 | like all the, I assumed all scientists do,

00:16:19.400 | certainly why I went into it,

00:16:21.060 | but some people it's just raw ambition.

00:16:23.160 | It's about winning.

00:16:24.440 | It doesn't even matter what they win,

00:16:26.520 | to which to me is crazy, but I think that's a shadow

00:16:29.140 | that some people explore, not one I've explored.

00:16:32.080 | I think the shadow parts of us are very important

00:16:34.960 | to come to understand and look better to understand them

00:16:37.920 | and know that they're there and work with them

00:16:41.400 | than to not acknowledge their presence

00:16:44.880 | and have them surface in the form of addictions

00:16:47.240 | or behaviors that damage us and other people.

00:16:52.080 | - So one of the processes for achieving mental health

00:16:54.960 | is to bring those things to the surface.

00:16:56.640 | So fish the subconscious mind.

00:16:58.820 | - Yes, and Paul describes 10 cupboards

00:17:03.880 | that one can look into for exploring the self.

00:17:06.400 | There's the structure of self and the function of self.

00:17:08.880 | Again, this will all be spelled out in the series

00:17:10.840 | in a lot of detail, also in terms of its relational aspect

00:17:13.780 | between people, how to pick good partners

00:17:16.340 | and good relationship.

00:17:17.180 | He gets really into this from a very different perspective.

00:17:20.500 | Yeah, fascinating stuff.

00:17:21.880 | I was just sitting there, just, I will say this,

00:17:24.720 | that that four episode series with Paul

00:17:28.200 | is at least to date the most important work

00:17:31.180 | I've ever been involved in.

00:17:33.180 | In all of my career, because it's very clear

00:17:37.280 | that we are not taught how to explore our subconscious

00:17:40.160 | and that very few people actually understand how to do that.

00:17:42.760 | Even most psychiatrists,

00:17:44.160 | he mentioned something about psychiatrists.

00:17:46.440 | You know, if you're a cardiothoracic surgeon

00:17:48.520 | or something like that, and 50% of your patients die,

00:17:51.320 | you're considered a bad cardiothoracic surgeon.

00:17:53.880 | But with no disrespect to psychiatrists,

00:17:56.520 | there are some excellent psychiatrists out there.

00:17:58.840 | There are also a lot of terrible psychiatrists out there

00:18:01.160 | because unless all of those,

00:18:03.780 | all of their patients commit suicide or half commit suicide,

00:18:06.620 | they can treat for a long time without it becoming visible

00:18:09.460 | that they're not so good at their craft.

00:18:11.180 | Now he's superb at his craft.

00:18:13.460 | And I think he would say that, yes, exploring some shadows,

00:18:17.180 | but also just understanding the self.

00:18:19.620 | Like what, you know, really understand,

00:18:23.260 | like who am I and what's important?

00:18:25.980 | What are my ambitions?

00:18:27.060 | What are my strivings?

00:18:28.260 | Again, I'm lifting from some of the things

00:18:29.780 | that he'll describe exactly how to do this.

00:18:32.660 | People do not spend enough time addressing those questions.

00:18:37.660 | And as a consequence,

00:18:39.540 | they discover what resides in their subconscious

00:18:43.340 | through the sometimes bad, hopefully also good,

00:18:47.360 | but manifestations of their actions.

00:18:50.320 | We are driven by this huge 90% of our real estate

00:18:55.320 | that is not visible to our conscious awareness.

00:18:58.860 | And we need to understand that.

00:19:00.980 | You know, I've talked about this before.

00:19:02.380 | I've done therapy twice a week since I was a kid.

00:19:04.660 | I had to as a condition of being let back in school.

00:19:07.940 | I continue, I found a way to either through insurance

00:19:10.980 | or even when I didn't have insurance,

00:19:12.020 | I took an extra job writing for Thrasher Magazine

00:19:14.220 | when I was a postdoc so I could pay for therapy

00:19:16.780 | at a discount 'cause I didn't make much money as a postdoc.

00:19:20.000 | I mean, I think for me,

00:19:21.540 | it's as important as going to the gym.

00:19:23.460 | And people think it's just, you know,

00:19:25.220 | ruminating on problems or getting, no, no, no.

00:19:27.940 | If you work with somebody really good,

00:19:29.980 | they're forcing you to ask questions about

00:19:32.100 | who you really are, what you really want.

00:19:34.600 | It's not just about support, but there should be support.

00:19:38.380 | There should be rapport, but then it's also,

00:19:41.100 | there should be insight, right?

00:19:43.020 | Most people who get therapy, they're getting support.

00:19:45.280 | There's rapport, but insight is not easy to arrive at.

00:19:49.540 | And a really good psychologist or psychiatrist

00:19:52.060 | can help you arrive at deep insights

00:19:53.840 | that transform your entire life.

00:19:56.620 | - Well, sometimes when I look inside and I do this often,

00:20:00.140 | you know, exploring who you truly are,

00:20:02.300 | you come to this question, do I accept,

00:20:06.140 | once you see parts, do I accept this or do I fix this?

00:20:11.140 | Is this who you are fundamentally

00:20:15.420 | and it will always be this way

00:20:17.500 | or is this a problem to be fixed?

00:20:19.620 | Like, for example, one of the things,

00:20:23.080 | especially recently, but in general,

00:20:24.620 | over time I've discovered about myself,

00:20:27.180 | probably has roots in childhood,

00:20:29.700 | probably has roots in a lot of things,

00:20:32.620 | is I deeply value loyalty,

00:20:34.560 | maybe more than the average person.

00:20:39.300 | And so when there's disloyalty, it can be painful to me.

00:20:43.380 | And so this is who I am.

00:20:44.620 | And so do I have to relax a bit?

00:20:48.300 | Do I have to fix this part or is this who you are?

00:20:51.060 | And there's a million, that's one like little--

00:20:53.480 | - I think loyalty is a good thing to cling to,

00:20:55.180 | provided that when loyalty is broken,

00:20:58.160 | that it doesn't disrupt too many other areas of your life.

00:21:02.620 | But it depends also on who's disrupting that loyalty.

00:21:05.140 | If it's a coworker versus a romantic partner

00:21:08.460 | versus your exclusive romantic partner,

00:21:10.460 | depending on the structure of your romantic partner life.

00:21:12.460 | You know, I mean, I have always experienced extreme

00:21:20.500 | joy and feelings of safety and trust in my friendships.

00:21:25.500 | Again, mostly male friendships, but female friendships too,

00:21:29.920 | which is only to say that they were mostly male friendships.

00:21:32.200 | The female friendships have also been very loyal.

00:21:34.640 | So getting backstabbed is not something I'm familiar with.

00:21:40.780 | And yeah, I love being crewed up, you know?

00:21:44.200 | - Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure.

00:21:45.760 | And I'm with you and you and I

00:21:48.280 | very much have the same values on this.

00:21:50.120 | But you know, that's one little thing.

00:21:51.900 | And then there's many other things.

00:21:53.140 | Like I'm extremely self-critical.

00:21:55.340 | And you look at my, you know, I look at myself

00:21:58.100 | as I'm regularly very self-critical.

00:21:59.780 | There's a self-critical engine in my brain.

00:22:01.860 | And I talked to actually Paul about this,

00:22:03.700 | I think on the podcast quite a bit.

00:22:06.060 | And he's saying, this is a really bad thing.

00:22:08.680 | Like you need to fix this.

00:22:10.300 | You need to be able to be regularly

00:22:12.540 | very positive about yourself.

00:22:15.140 | And I kept disagreeing with him.

00:22:16.180 | No, this is like who I am.

00:22:18.380 | Like you, and it seems to work.

00:22:20.640 | Don't mess with the thing that seems to be working.

00:22:22.680 | It's fine.

00:22:23.600 | Like I oscillate between being really grateful

00:22:25.880 | and really self-critical.

00:22:27.300 | But then you have to like figure out what is it?

00:22:29.520 | Maybe there's a deeper root thing.

00:22:30.960 | There's an, maybe there's an insecurity in there somewhere

00:22:33.920 | that has to do with childhood.

00:22:35.360 | And then you're trying to prove something

00:22:36.720 | to somebody from your childhood, this kind of thing.

00:22:39.200 | - Well, a couple of things that I think are

00:22:41.920 | hopefully valuable for people here.

00:22:43.460 | One is, one way to destroy your life is to spend time

00:22:48.460 | trying to control your or somebody else's past.

00:22:52.980 | So much of our destructive behavior and thinking

00:22:58.200 | comes from wanting something that we saw or did

00:23:02.240 | or heard to not be true.

00:23:04.540 | Rather than really working with that

00:23:07.240 | and getting close to what it really was.

00:23:09.040 | And, you know, sometimes those things are even traumatic

00:23:11.760 | and we need to really get close to them

00:23:13.780 | and for them to move through us.

00:23:15.800 | And that, you know, there are a bunch of different ways

00:23:17.700 | to do that with support from others and hopefully,

00:23:20.900 | but sometimes on our own as well.

00:23:23.240 | I don't think we can rewire our deep preferences

00:23:26.700 | and what we find despicable or joyful.

00:23:30.300 | I do think that it's really a question

00:23:33.300 | of what allows us peace.

00:23:35.260 | Like, can you be at peace with the fact

00:23:36.780 | that you're very self-critical and enjoy that,

00:23:39.140 | get some distance from it, have a sense of humor about it,

00:23:41.620 | or is it driving you in a way that's keeping you awake

00:23:44.080 | at night and forcing you back to the table to do work

00:23:47.640 | in a way that feels self-flagellating and doesn't feel good?

00:23:51.320 | You know, can you get that humility and awareness

00:23:55.040 | of how you're, you know, of your one's flaws?

00:23:57.660 | And I think that that can create, you know,

00:24:00.420 | this word space sounds very new agey,

00:24:02.240 | like get space from it.

00:24:03.080 | So, you know, you can have a sense of humor

00:24:04.880 | about how neurotic we can all be.

00:24:07.400 | I mean, you know, neurotic isn't actually a bad term

00:24:10.800 | in the classic sense of the psychologists and psychiatrists,

00:24:13.640 | the Freudians said that, you know,

00:24:15.160 | the best case is to be neurotic,

00:24:17.280 | to actually see one's own issues and work with them,

00:24:19.620 | whereas psychotic is the other way to be,

00:24:22.960 | which is obviously not good.

00:24:24.480 | So I think the question of whether or not

00:24:26.960 | to work on something or to just accept it

00:24:30.640 | as part of ourselves, I think, really depends

00:24:33.600 | if we feel like it's holding us back or not.

00:24:36.040 | And I think you're asking perhaps the most profound question

00:24:39.920 | about being a human, which is, you know,

00:24:43.040 | what do you do with your body?

00:24:44.880 | What do you do with your mind?

00:24:45.720 | I mean, if you, it's also a question

00:24:47.880 | we started off talking about fitness a little bit,

00:24:50.320 | which is for whatever reason, you know,

00:24:53.600 | do I need to run an ultra marathon?

00:24:58.040 | No, I don't feel like I need to.

00:24:59.640 | David Goggins does, and does a whole lot more than that.

00:25:04.820 | So that for him, that's important.

00:25:06.380 | For me, it's not important to do that.

00:25:08.120 | I don't think he does it just so he can run the ultras.

00:25:11.140 | There's clearly something else in there for him

00:25:13.440 | and guys like Cam Haines and a tremendous respect

00:25:17.000 | for what they do and how they do it.

00:25:19.580 | Does one need to make their body more muscular,

00:25:24.120 | stronger, more endurance, more flexibility?

00:25:27.640 | Do you need to read harder books?

00:25:29.280 | Do you need to, I think doing hard things feels good.

00:25:33.040 | I think it, I know it feels good.

00:25:35.240 | I know that the worst I feel, the worst way to feel

00:25:40.240 | is when I'm procrastinating and I don't do something.

00:25:42.960 | And then whenever I do something and I complete it

00:25:44.720 | and I break through that point where it was hard

00:25:46.440 | and then I'm doing it, at the end,

00:25:48.060 | I actually feel like I was infused

00:25:50.080 | with some sort of super chemical.

00:25:52.660 | And who knows if it's probably a cocktail

00:25:55.360 | of endogenously made chemicals,

00:25:57.200 | but I think it is good to do hard things,

00:25:59.640 | but you have to be careful not to destroy your body,

00:26:02.520 | your mind in the process.

00:26:03.640 | And I think it's about whether or not you can achieve peace.

00:26:07.840 | Can you sleep well at night?

00:26:09.320 | Stress isn't bad if you can sleep well at night.

00:26:11.960 | You can be stressed all day, go, go, go, go, go, go, go.

00:26:14.680 | And it'll optimize your focus, but can you fall asleep

00:26:17.440 | and stay deeply asleep at night?

00:26:19.620 | Being in a hard relationship, some people say,

00:26:22.440 | you know, that's not good.

00:26:24.680 | Other people like it.

00:26:25.840 | Can you be at peace in that?

00:26:27.680 | And I think we all, you know, I have different RPM

00:26:32.680 | that, you know, we all kind of idle at different RPM.

00:26:34.920 | And some people are big, mellow Costellos

00:26:38.400 | and others are kind of like, you know,

00:26:39.880 | need more friction in order to feel at peace.

00:26:43.440 | But I think ultimately what we want is to feel at peace.

00:26:47.440 | - Yeah, I've been through some really low points

00:26:50.280 | over the past couple of years.

00:26:51.600 | And I think the reason could be boiled down

00:26:55.360 | to the fact that I haven't been able

00:26:57.760 | to find a place of peace,

00:26:59.760 | a place or people or moments that give deep inner peace.

00:27:04.760 | Yeah, I, you know,

00:27:09.200 | I think you put it really beautifully.

00:27:13.240 | It's, you have to figure out, given who you are,

00:27:17.320 | the various characteristics of your mind,

00:27:20.280 | all the things, all the contents of the cupboards,

00:27:23.360 | how to get space from it.

00:27:25.440 | And ultimately one good representation of that

00:27:27.720 | is to be able to laugh at all of it.

00:27:29.480 | Whatever's going on inside your mind,

00:27:31.960 | to be able to step back and just kind of chuckle

00:27:33.960 | at the beauty and the absurdity of the whole thing.

00:27:36.840 | - Yeah, and keep going.

00:27:37.960 | There's this beautiful, as I mentioned,

00:27:40.680 | seems like every podcast lately,

00:27:42.520 | I'm a huge Rancid fan,

00:27:44.480 | mostly 'cause I just think Tim Armstrong's writing

00:27:46.360 | is pure poetry and whether or not you like the music or not,

00:27:49.720 | you know, and he's written music

00:27:51.880 | for a lot of other people too.

00:27:53.080 | He's not, doesn't advertise that much 'cause he's humble.

00:27:56.280 | But I-- - And by the way,

00:27:57.760 | I went to a show of theirs like 20 years ago.

00:27:59.480 | - Oh yeah, I'm going to see them in Boston, September 18th.

00:28:01.800 | I'm literally flying there for,

00:28:03.320 | or I'll take the train from New York.

00:28:06.880 | I'm gonna meet a friend of mine named Jim Thiebaud,

00:28:08.600 | who's a guy who owns a lot of companies

00:28:10.840 | in skateboard industry.

00:28:12.280 | We're meeting there, like a couple of little kids

00:28:13.880 | to go see them play.

00:28:14.960 | Amazing, amazing people, amazing music.

00:28:18.640 | - Very intense. - Very intense.

00:28:20.240 | But embodies all the different emotions.

00:28:22.520 | That's why I love it, right?

00:28:23.440 | They have some love songs, they have some hate songs,

00:28:25.240 | they have some, and, but you know, there's,

00:28:27.960 | going back to what you said, I think there's a song,

00:28:31.120 | the first song on the "Indestructible" album,

00:28:33.720 | I think it, there's a, it's sort of,

00:28:36.240 | he's just talking about like shock and disbelief

00:28:38.120 | of discovering things about people that were close to you.

00:28:41.160 | And you know, it's, I won't sing it,

00:28:44.280 | but you know, nor I wouldn't dare.

00:28:46.520 | But there's this one lyric where,

00:28:50.060 | that's really stuck in my mind for,

00:28:52.240 | ever since that album came out in 2003,

00:28:54.720 | which is, you know, that nothing's what it seems.

00:28:59.720 | So I just sit here laughing, I'm going to keep going on.

00:29:02.580 | I can't get distracted.

00:29:04.200 | There is this piece of like,

00:29:05.300 | you got to learn how to push out

00:29:06.640 | the disturbing stuff sometimes and go forward.

00:29:10.220 | And I mean, I remember hearing that lyric

00:29:12.920 | and then writing it down.

00:29:14.440 | And you know, that was a time where my undergraduate advisor

00:29:17.120 | who was like a mentor and a father to me, you know,

00:29:20.640 | blew his head off in the bathtub, like three weeks before.

00:29:25.640 | And then my graduate advisor who I was working for

00:29:28.560 | at that time, who I loved and adored,

00:29:29.880 | was really like a mother to me.

00:29:31.240 | I knew her when she was pregnant with her two kids,

00:29:33.400 | died at 50, breast cancer.

00:29:35.480 | And then my postdoc advisor, you know,

00:29:37.880 | first day of work at Stanford as a faculty member,

00:29:40.720 | sitting across the table like this from him,

00:29:42.240 | had a heart attack right in front of me,

00:29:43.520 | died of pancreatic cancer at the end of 2017.

00:29:45.720 | And I remember just thinking like, you know,

00:29:47.280 | going back to that song there over and over, like,

00:29:50.080 | and where people would, you know,

00:29:52.280 | I haven't had many betrayals in life.

00:29:53.720 | I've had a few, but just thinking like,

00:29:55.480 | or seeing something or learning something about something,

00:29:57.440 | you just like, you can't believe it.

00:29:59.400 | And I mentioned that lyric off that first song,

00:30:04.400 | Indestructible, on that album,

00:30:06.400 | because it's this, like just the raw emotion of like,

00:30:09.960 | I can't believe this, what I just saw is so disturbing,

00:30:14.060 | but I have to just keep going forward.

00:30:17.720 | There are certain things that we really do need

00:30:19.560 | to push not just into our periphery,

00:30:21.960 | but often to the gutter and keep going.

00:30:23.800 | And that's a hard thing to learn how to do.

00:30:26.320 | But if you're going to be functional in life, you have to.

00:30:29.320 | And actually just to get at this issue of do I change

00:30:32.120 | or do I embrace this aspect of self,

00:30:34.480 | about six months, it was April of this last year,

00:30:40.520 | I did some intense work around some things

00:30:44.560 | that were really challenging to me.

00:30:46.200 | And I did it alone,

00:30:47.780 | and it may have involved some medicine.

00:30:50.320 | And I expected to get peace through this.

00:30:53.780 | I was like, I'm going to let go of it.

00:30:55.000 | And I spent 11 hours just getting more and more frustrated

00:31:00.000 | and angry about this thing that I was trying to resolve.

00:31:02.520 | And I was so unbelievably disappointed

00:31:06.120 | that I couldn't get that relief.

00:31:07.320 | And I was like, what is this?

00:31:08.440 | Like, this is not how this is supposed to work.

00:31:11.360 | I'm supposed to feel peace, the clouds are supposed to lift.

00:31:15.240 | And so a week went by, and then another half week went by.

00:31:20.120 | And then someone whose opinion I trust very much,

00:31:22.980 | I explained this to them

00:31:25.300 | because I was getting a little concerned,

00:31:26.860 | like what's going on, this is worse, not better.

00:31:29.540 | And they said, this is very simple.

00:31:31.540 | You have a giant blind spot,

00:31:34.020 | which is your sense of justice, Andrew,

00:31:37.540 | and your sense of anger are linked like an iron rod,

00:31:41.720 | and you need to relax it.

00:31:45.060 | And as they said that, I felt the anger dissipate.

00:31:48.580 | And so there was something that I think is, it is true.

00:31:50.580 | I have a very strong sense of justice

00:31:53.060 | and my sense of anger, then at least,

00:31:57.120 | was very strongly linked to it.

00:31:58.260 | So it's great to have a sense of justice, right?

00:32:00.300 | I hate to see people wronged, I absolutely do.

00:32:02.660 | And I'm human, I'm sure I've wronged people in my life.

00:32:04.780 | I know I have, they've told me,

00:32:05.780 | I've tried to apologize and reconcile where possible.

00:32:08.220 | Still have a lot of work to do.

00:32:10.620 | But where I see injustice,

00:32:13.600 | it draws in my sense of anger in a way

00:32:15.680 | that I think is just eating me up.

00:32:18.100 | And, but it was only in hearing that link

00:32:20.660 | that I wasn't aware of before,

00:32:22.640 | it was in my subconscious, obviously,

00:32:24.820 | did I feel the relaxation.

00:32:27.700 | It wasn't, there's no amount of plant medicine or MDMA

00:32:31.860 | or any kind of chemical you can take

00:32:35.460 | that's naturally just going to dissipate

00:32:37.380 | what's hard for oneself.

00:32:39.020 | It needs, if one embraces that,

00:32:41.100 | or if one chooses to do it through just talk therapy

00:32:43.460 | or journaling or friends or introspection

00:32:45.340 | or all of the above,

00:32:46.420 | there needs to be an awareness

00:32:49.180 | of the things that we're just not aware of.

00:32:51.260 | So I think the answer to your question,

00:32:52.700 | do you embrace or do you fight these aspects of self is,

00:32:56.540 | I think you get in your subconscious

00:32:58.380 | through good work with somebody skilled,

00:33:00.620 | or sometimes that involves the tools I just mentioned

00:33:03.320 | in various combinations, and you figure it out.

00:33:06.900 | You figure out if it's serving you.

00:33:08.460 | Obviously it was not bringing me peace.

00:33:10.900 | It was undermining, my sense of justice

00:33:13.180 | was undermining my sense of peace.

00:33:15.620 | And so in understanding this link,

00:33:17.660 | now I would say that in understanding this link

00:33:20.140 | between justice and anger,

00:33:21.780 | now I think it's a little bit more of like,

00:33:24.620 | you know, it's not like a Twizzler stick bendy,

00:33:26.540 | but it's at least it's not like an iron rod.

00:33:28.780 | Like, you know, when I see somebody wronged,

00:33:30.580 | I mean, it used to just like, like immediately.

00:33:33.380 | - But you're able to step back.

00:33:34.740 | Now that's like, to me,

00:33:36.540 | the ultimate place to reach is laughter.

00:33:41.420 | - I just sit here laughing.

00:33:43.900 | Exactly, that's the lyric.

00:33:45.740 | I like, I can't believe it.

00:33:47.020 | So I just sit here laughing, like can't get distracted.

00:33:50.900 | Just at some point, but the problem, I think,

00:33:53.980 | in just laughing at something, like that gives you distance.

00:33:57.500 | But the question is,

00:33:58.660 | do you stop engaging with it at that point?

00:34:02.500 | Like I experienced this, I mean,

00:34:05.380 | recently I got to see how sometimes I'll see something

00:34:08.220 | that's just like, what?

00:34:09.540 | Like, this is crazy.

00:34:10.380 | So I just laugh, but then I continue to engage in it

00:34:13.300 | and it's taking me off course.

00:34:15.940 | And so there is a place where, you know, I mean,

00:34:18.460 | I get realized this is probably a kid's show too.

00:34:20.580 | So I want to keep it, you know, G rated,

00:34:22.060 | but at some point for certain things,

00:34:24.420 | it makes sense to go, fuck that.

00:34:27.860 | - But also laugh at yourself for saying, fuck that.

00:34:31.140 | - Yeah, and then move on.

00:34:32.460 | So the question is, do you get stuck or do you move on?

00:34:35.380 | - Sure, sure.

00:34:36.660 | But like, there's a lightness of being

00:34:38.260 | that comes with laughter.

00:34:39.220 | I mean, I've gotten, like, as you know,

00:34:41.020 | I spent the day with Elon today.

00:34:43.140 | He just gave me this burnt hair.

00:34:45.220 | Do you know what this is?

00:34:46.060 | - I have no idea.

00:34:46.940 | - I'm sure there's actually,

00:34:48.220 | it should be a "Human Lab" episode on this.

00:34:50.660 | It's a cologne that's burnt hair.

00:34:53.380 | And it's like supposedly a really intense smell.

00:34:55.380 | And it is.

00:34:56.220 | - Give me a smell.

00:34:57.060 | - Please, it's not going to leave your nose.

00:34:58.260 | - That's okay.

00:34:59.100 | Well, that's okay.

00:34:59.940 | I'll take a gentle, I'll whiff it as if I were whiffing

00:35:01.940 | a chemical in the lab. - You have to actually

00:35:02.780 | spray it on yourself, 'cause I don't know if you can.

00:35:04.580 | - So I'm reading an amazing book

00:35:07.380 | called "An Immense World" by Ed Young.

00:35:09.260 | He won a Pulitzer for "We Contain Multitudes"

00:35:11.900 | or something like that,

00:35:12.900 | I think is the title of the other book.

00:35:14.900 | And the first chapter is all about olfaction

00:35:16.900 | and the incredible power that olfaction has.

00:35:20.220 | That smells terrible.

00:35:21.900 | I don't even- - I mean, it doesn't leave you.

00:35:23.140 | Ah, for those listening,

00:35:25.300 | it doesn't quite smell terrible.

00:35:27.580 | It's just intense and it stays with you.

00:35:30.500 | - This to me represents just laughing

00:35:34.260 | at the absurdity of it all.

00:35:35.660 | - So I have to ask, so you were rolling jiu-jitsu?

00:35:38.780 | - Yeah, we're training jiu-jitsu, yeah.

00:35:40.180 | - So is that fight between Elon and Azok

00:35:43.780 | actually going to happen?

00:35:45.060 | - I think Elon is a huge believer of this idea

00:35:47.460 | of the most entertaining outcome is the most likely.

00:35:51.580 | And he almost, there is almost the sense

00:35:56.460 | that there's not a free will

00:35:58.660 | and the universe has a kind of deterministic,

00:36:02.020 | gravitational field pulling towards the most fun.

00:36:06.420 | And he's just the player in that game.

00:36:08.980 | So from that perspective, I think it seems like

00:36:11.900 | something like that is inevitable.

00:36:14.300 | - Like a little scrap in the parking lot

00:36:16.420 | of a Facebook or something like that?

00:36:17.860 | - Exactly. - Sorry, meta.

00:36:19.260 | - Yeah. - But it looks like

00:36:20.340 | they're training for real and Azok has competed, right?

00:36:22.620 | In jiu-jitsu.

00:36:23.460 | - So I think he is approaching it as a sport.

00:36:27.220 | Elon is approaching it as a spectacle.

00:36:31.980 | And I mean, the way he talks about it,

00:36:33.900 | he's a huge fan of history.

00:36:34.980 | He talks about all the warriors

00:36:36.420 | that have fought throughout history.

00:36:37.980 | If you look, he wants to really do it at the Coliseum.

00:36:41.020 | And the Coliseum is for 400 years,

00:36:44.820 | there's so much great writing about this.

00:36:47.320 | I think over 400,000 people have died

00:36:50.540 | in the Coliseum, gladiators.

00:36:52.580 | So this is this historic place that sheds so much blood,

00:36:56.940 | so much fear, so much anticipation of battle, all of this.

00:37:01.620 | So he loves this kind of spectacle.

00:37:04.180 | And also the meme of it, the hilarious absurdity of it,

00:37:08.860 | that two tech CEOs are battling it out on sand

00:37:12.900 | in a place where gladiators fought to the death

00:37:16.140 | and then bears and lions ate prisoners

00:37:19.360 | as part of the execution process.

00:37:21.300 | - Well, it's also gonna be an instance

00:37:23.140 | where Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk

00:37:25.380 | has changed bodily fluids.

00:37:27.660 | They bleed, this one, things about fighting.

00:37:30.260 | I think it was in that book, it's a great book,

00:37:32.780 | "Fighter's Heart," where he talks about

00:37:34.860 | sort of the intimacy of sparring.

00:37:37.180 | I only rolled Jiu-Jitsu with you once,

00:37:38.620 | but there was a period of time where I boxed,

00:37:40.860 | and which I don't recommend.

00:37:43.080 | I got hit, I hit some guys, and I definitely got hit back.

00:37:46.020 | I'd spar on Wednesday nights when I lived on San Diego.

00:37:50.740 | And when you spar with somebody,

00:37:54.540 | even if they hurt you, especially if they hurt you,

00:37:56.820 | you see that person afterwards,

00:37:59.060 | and there's an intimacy, right?

00:38:01.060 | It was in that book, "Fighter's Heart,"

00:38:02.820 | where he explains, you're exchanging bodily fluids

00:38:05.180 | with a stranger, right?

00:38:06.660 | And you're in your primitive mind,

00:38:11.120 | and so there's an intimacy there that persists.

00:38:13.860 | - You go together through a process of fear, anxiety.

00:38:18.380 | - Yeah, when they get you, you nod 'em,

00:38:19.780 | you watch somebody catch somebody,

00:38:21.580 | not so much in professional fighting,

00:38:23.540 | but if people are sparring and they catch you,

00:38:25.820 | you acknowledge that they caught you.

00:38:27.780 | Like, "He got me there."

00:38:29.780 | - And on the flip side of that, so we trained,

00:38:31.980 | and then after that, we played "Diablo IV."

00:38:34.740 | - I don't know what that is.

00:38:36.180 | I don't play video games, sorry.

00:38:37.700 | - But it's a video game, so it's a pretty intense combat.

00:38:42.700 | You're fighting demons and dragons.

00:38:46.140 | - Last video game I played was Mike Tyson's "Punch Out."

00:38:48.340 | - There you go, that's pretty cool.

00:38:49.180 | - I met him recently, it went on his podcast.

00:38:51.060 | - You went, wait.

00:38:52.260 | - It hasn't come out yet.

00:38:53.100 | - It hasn't come out yet, okay.

00:38:53.940 | - Yeah, I asked Mike, his kids are great.

00:38:57.580 | They came in there, they're super smart kids.

00:38:59.780 | Goodness gracious, they ask great questions.

00:39:02.320 | Asked Mike what he did with the piece of Evander's ear

00:39:06.500 | that he bit off.

00:39:08.340 | - Do you remember?

00:39:09.180 | - Yeah, he's like, "Get back to him."

00:39:10.700 | (laughing)

00:39:11.620 | - Here you go, sorry about that.

00:39:14.060 | - He sells edibles that are in the shape of ears

00:39:16.660 | with a little bite out of it.

00:39:18.100 | Yeah, his life has been incredible.

00:39:21.540 | He's, and I met, yeah, his family,

00:39:25.900 | you get the sense that they're really a great family.

00:39:29.060 | They're really--

00:39:30.260 | - Mike Tyson?

00:39:31.340 | That's a heck of a journey right there of a man.

00:39:33.500 | - Yeah, my now friend, Tim Armstrong,

00:39:35.980 | like I said, lead singer from Ranci, he put it best.

00:39:38.060 | He said that Mike Tyson's life is Shakespearean

00:39:42.380 | and down, up, down, up,

00:39:45.980 | and just the arcs of his life are just like

00:39:49.300 | sort of an only in America kind of tale too, right?

00:39:52.260 | - So speaking of Shakespeare,

00:39:53.380 | I recently gotten to know Neri Oxman,

00:39:55.380 | who's this incredible scientist

00:39:58.260 | that works at the intersection of nature and engineering,

00:40:01.460 | and she reminded me of this Anna Akhmatova line.

00:40:06.460 | This is this great Soviet poet that I really love

00:40:11.460 | from over a century ago,

00:40:13.380 | that each of our lives is a Shakespearean drama

00:40:16.140 | raised to the thousand degree.

00:40:17.920 | So I have to ask, why do you think humans are attracted

00:40:21.540 | to this kind of Shakespearean drama?

00:40:24.900 | Is there some aspect, we've been talking about,

00:40:29.420 | the subconscious mind that pulls us towards the drama,

00:40:33.860 | even though the place of mental health is peace?

00:40:36.740 | - Yes and yes.

00:40:39.740 | - Do you have some of that?

00:40:40.980 | - A draw towards drama?

00:40:42.860 | Yeah.

00:40:45.500 | - If you look at the empirical data.

00:40:46.900 | - Yes, I mean, right.

00:40:48.160 | If I look at the empirical data,

00:40:49.300 | I mean, I think about who I chose to work for

00:40:51.660 | as an undergraduate, right?

00:40:52.620 | I was a barely finished high school,

00:40:54.820 | finally get to college, barely,

00:40:57.580 | I think this is really embarrassing

00:40:59.860 | and not something to aspire to.

00:41:01.340 | You know, I was thrown out of the dorms for fighting,

00:41:05.380 | barely passed my classes.

00:41:07.540 | The girlfriend and I split up.

00:41:09.340 | I mean, I was living in a squat,

00:41:10.700 | got into a big fight,

00:41:11.980 | I was getting in trouble with the law.

00:41:13.820 | Then she got my act together, go back to school,

00:41:15.540 | start working for somebody.

00:41:16.580 | Who do I choose to work for?

00:41:18.340 | A guy who's an ex Navy guy

00:41:20.660 | who smoked cigarettes in the fume hood,

00:41:22.820 | drinks coffee and we're injecting rats with MDMA.

00:41:26.380 | And, you know, I was drawn to like the personality,

00:41:29.660 | his energy, but I also, he was a great,

00:41:31.500 | he was great scientist,

00:41:32.620 | worked out a lot on a thermal regulation in the brain

00:41:35.300 | and more.

00:41:37.400 | You know, go to graduate school,

00:41:39.540 | I'm working for somebody and decide that,

00:41:43.340 | yeah, doing, working in her laboratory

00:41:45.100 | wasn't quite right for me.

00:41:45.980 | So I'm literally sneaking into the laboratory next door

00:41:48.220 | and working for the woman next door

00:41:49.780 | because I liked the relationships that she had

00:41:51.700 | to a certain set of questions.

00:41:53.140 | And she was a kind of a quirky person, you know,

00:41:55.980 | so drawn to drama, but drawn to, I like characters.

00:41:59.620 | I like people that have texture

00:42:01.700 | and I'm not drawn to raw ambition.

00:42:03.780 | I'm drawn to people that seem to have a real passion

00:42:05.980 | for what they do and a uniqueness to them

00:42:08.460 | that I, you know, you can kind of, not kind of,

00:42:12.540 | I'll just say how it is.

00:42:13.460 | I can feel their heart for what they do.

00:42:15.760 | And I'm drawn to that, like, and that can be good.

00:42:19.340 | The same reason I went to work for Ben Barris as a postdoc.

00:42:23.540 | It wasn't because he was the first transgender member

00:42:26.220 | of the National Academy of Sciences.

00:42:27.380 | That was just a feature of who he was.

00:42:28.580 | I loved how he loved glia.

00:42:31.420 | He would talk about these cells,

00:42:32.920 | like they were the most enchanting things

00:42:34.700 | that he'd ever seen in his life.

00:42:35.960 | And I was like, this is like the biggest nerd

00:42:37.700 | I've ever met and I love him.

00:42:39.740 | I think I'm drawn to that.

00:42:41.680 | This is another thing that Conti makes,

00:42:44.900 | elaborates on quite a bit more

00:42:46.580 | in the series on mental health coming out,

00:42:48.420 | but there are different drives within us.

00:42:50.700 | There's this, there are aggressive drives,

00:42:53.920 | not always for fighting, but for intense interaction.

00:42:57.580 | I mean, look at Twitter, look at some of the,

00:42:59.260 | look at people clearly have an aggressive drive.

00:43:02.820 | There's also a pleasure drive.

00:43:04.680 | Some people also have a strong pleasure drive.

00:43:07.480 | They want to experience pleasure through food,

00:43:09.440 | through sex, through friendship, through adventure,

00:43:12.520 | you know, but I think the Shakespearean drama

00:43:16.080 | is the drama of the different drives

00:43:18.680 | in different ratios in different people.

00:43:21.580 | I know somebody and she's incredibly kind,

00:43:24.760 | has an extremely high pleasure drive,

00:43:27.400 | loves taking great care of herself and people around her

00:43:30.640 | through food and through retreats

00:43:32.720 | and through all these things and makes spaces beautiful

00:43:36.080 | everywhere she goes and is gifts these things

00:43:39.120 | that are just so unbelievably feminine

00:43:42.160 | and incredible, these gifts to people

00:43:44.320 | and the kind and thoughtful about what they like.

00:43:46.320 | And then, but I would say very little aggressive drive

00:43:50.880 | from my read.

00:43:53.080 | And then I know other people who are,

00:43:54.520 | just have a ton of aggressive drive

00:43:56.200 | and very little pleasure drive.

00:43:57.540 | And I think, so there's this alchemy that exists

00:44:00.480 | where people have these things in different ratios

00:44:02.640 | and then you blend in, you know,

00:44:04.840 | the differences in the chromosomes

00:44:07.080 | and differences in hormones

00:44:08.280 | and differences in personal history.

00:44:09.600 | And what you end up with is a species

00:44:12.120 | that creates incredible recipes of drama,

00:44:17.120 | but also peace, also relief from drama, contentment.

00:44:21.300 | I mean, I realize this isn't the exact topic

00:44:23.840 | of the question, but someone I know very dearly,

00:44:28.020 | actually an ex-girlfriend of mine,

00:44:29.840 | long-term partner of mine sent me something recently.

00:44:33.320 | I think it hit the nail on the head,

00:44:34.400 | which is that ideally for a man,

00:44:37.760 | they eventually settle where they find and feel peace.

00:44:41.960 | Where they feel peaceful,

00:44:43.260 | where they can be themselves and feel peaceful.

00:44:45.480 | Now, I'm sure there's a equivalent

00:44:47.680 | or mirror image of that for women,

00:44:50.160 | but this particular post that she sent was about men.

00:44:53.000 | And I totally agree.

00:44:54.320 | And so it isn't always that we're seeking friction,

00:44:58.480 | but for periods of our life, we seek friction,

00:45:01.280 | drama, adventure, excitement, fights, you know,

00:45:06.280 | and doing hard, hard things.

00:45:09.120 | And then I think at some point,

00:45:11.320 | I'm certainly coming to this point now where it's like,

00:45:13.560 | yeah, that's all great.

00:45:15.120 | And checked a lot of boxes,

00:45:17.520 | but had a lot of close calls,

00:45:18.640 | flew really close to the sun on a lot of things

00:45:20.640 | with life and limb and heart and spirit.

00:45:23.640 | And some of, you know, people close to us didn't make it.

00:45:28.120 | And sometimes not making it means

00:45:29.960 | the career they wanted went off a cliff

00:45:31.640 | or their health went off a cliff

00:45:33.960 | or their life went off a cliff.

00:45:35.460 | But I think that there's also the Shakespearean drama

00:45:39.640 | of the characters that exit the play

00:45:42.520 | and are living their lives happily in the backdrop.

00:45:44.960 | It just doesn't make for as much entertainment.

00:45:47.320 | - That's one other thing that's a benefit.

00:45:52.640 | You could say it's a benefit of getting older

00:45:54.640 | is finding the Shakespearean drama less appealing

00:45:58.800 | or finding the joy in the piece.

00:46:01.740 | - Yeah, definitely.

00:46:02.660 | I mean, I think that, I think there's real peace with age.

00:46:05.720 | I think the other thing is this notion

00:46:07.560 | of checking boxes is a real thing, for me anyway.

00:46:11.000 | I have a morning meditation that I do.

00:46:13.340 | Well, I wake up now and get my sunlight, I hydrate,

00:46:17.200 | I use the bathroom, I do all the things that I talk about.

00:46:20.760 | I've started to practice a prayer in the last year,

00:46:23.440 | which is new-ish for me,

00:46:25.640 | which is, we could talk about it if you want.

00:46:27.040 | - In the morning? - Yeah.

00:46:28.080 | - Can you talk about it a little bit?

00:46:29.240 | - Sure, yeah.

00:46:30.400 | And then I have a meditation that I do

00:46:33.520 | that actually is where I think through

00:46:35.360 | what the different roles that I play.

00:46:37.200 | So I start very basic.

00:46:39.340 | I say, okay, I'm an animal.

00:46:42.000 | Like we are biologically animals, right?

00:46:45.960 | Human, you know?

00:46:48.200 | I'm a man, I'm a scientist, I'm a teacher,

00:46:51.520 | I'm a friend, I'm a brother, I'm a son.

00:46:53.280 | You know, I go through this, I have this list

00:46:54.640 | and I think about the different roles that I have

00:46:56.920 | and the roles that I still want in my life going forward

00:47:00.160 | that I haven't yet fulfilled.

00:47:02.200 | It just takes me, it's sort of an inventory

00:47:04.520 | of where I've been, where I'm at,

00:47:06.400 | and where I'm going, as they say.

00:47:08.060 | And I don't know why I do it,

00:47:10.360 | but I started doing it this last year,

00:47:12.400 | I think because it helps me understand

00:47:16.240 | just how many different contexts I have to exist in

00:47:19.440 | and remind myself that there's still more

00:47:22.080 | that I haven't done, that I'm excited about.

00:47:24.440 | - So within each of those contexts,

00:47:25.900 | there's like things that you want to kind of accomplish

00:47:28.880 | to define that.

00:47:30.120 | - Yeah, and I'm ambitious.

00:47:31.320 | So I think, you know, I'm a brother.

00:47:32.840 | I have an older sister and I love her tremendously.

00:47:35.920 | And I think like, I want to be the best brother

00:47:38.120 | I can be to her, which means maybe a call,

00:47:40.480 | maybe just, you know, we do an annual trip together

00:47:43.680 | for our birthdays, our birthdays are close together.

00:47:45.200 | We always go to New York for our birthdays

00:47:46.520 | if we've gone for the last three, four years.

00:47:47.920 | Like really like reminding myself of that role,

00:47:49.880 | not because I'll forget,

00:47:50.880 | but because I have all these other roles

00:47:52.040 | I'll get pulled into.

00:47:53.200 | I say the first one, I'm an animal

00:47:55.800 | because I have to remember that I have a body

00:47:57.600 | that needs care, like any of us.

00:47:59.900 | I need sleep, I need food, I need hydration.

00:48:01.880 | I need that I'm human,

00:48:03.480 | that the brain of a human is marvelously complex,

00:48:07.600 | but also marvelously self-defeating at times.

00:48:12.200 | And so I've been thinking about these things

00:48:13.800 | in the context of the different roles.

00:48:15.160 | And the whole thing takes about four or five minutes.

00:48:17.120 | And I just find it brings me a certain amount of clarity

00:48:19.900 | that then allows me to ratchet into the day.

00:48:22.200 | The prayer piece, yeah, I think I've been reluctant

00:48:25.960 | to talk about until now

00:48:30.160 | because I don't believe in pushing religion on people.

00:48:33.920 | And I think that, and I'm not,

00:48:38.620 | it's a highly individual thing.

00:48:41.000 | And I do believe that one can be an atheist and still pray

00:48:44.640 | or agnostic and still pray.

00:48:45.920 | But for me, it really came about through understanding

00:48:50.760 | that there are certain aspects of myself

00:48:55.520 | that I just couldn't resolve on my own.

00:49:00.120 | And no matter how much therapy, no matter how much,

00:49:03.760 | and I haven't done a lot of it,

00:49:04.800 | but no matter how much plant medicine

00:49:07.000 | or other forms of medicine or exercise or podcasting

00:49:12.000 | or science or friendship or any of that,

00:49:14.940 | I was just not going to resolve.

00:49:17.740 | And so I started this because someone close to me said,

00:49:26.560 | a male friend said, "Prayer is powerful."

00:49:31.100 | And I said, "Well, how?"

00:49:32.300 | And he said, "I don't know how,

00:49:33.260 | but if you can get,

00:49:35.640 | it can allow you to get outside yourself,

00:49:38.560 | let you give up control and at the same time take control."

00:49:41.920 | I don't even like saying take control,

00:49:43.040 | but the whole notion is that, again, forgive me,

00:49:46.520 | but there's no other way to say it.

00:49:48.020 | The whole notion is that, you know,

00:49:49.360 | like God works through us, whatever God is to you,

00:49:52.440 | he, him, her, whatever, life force, nature,

00:49:56.520 | whatever it is to you, right?

00:49:57.880 | That it works through us.

00:49:59.480 | And so I do a prayer, I'll just describe it,

00:50:01.320 | where I ask, I make an ask to help remove my defects,

00:50:06.320 | my character defects.

00:50:09.540 | I pray to God to help remove my character defects

00:50:12.680 | so that I can show up better in all the roles of my life

00:50:16.880 | and do good work, like to,

00:50:18.960 | which for me is learning and teaching,

00:50:21.480 | learning and teaching.

00:50:22.800 | And so you might say,

00:50:24.280 | "Well, how is that different than a meditation?"

00:50:25.880 | Well, I'm acknowledging that there is something

00:50:28.720 | that bigger than me, bigger than nature, as I understand it,

00:50:32.800 | that I cannot understand or control, nor do I want to,

00:50:35.720 | and I'm just giving over to that.

00:50:37.680 | And does that make me less of a scientist?

00:50:40.160 | I sure as hell hope not.

00:50:41.840 | I certainly know, there's the head of our neurosciences

00:50:45.260 | at Stanford until recently.

00:50:46.880 | You should talk to him directly about it.

00:50:49.400 | Bill Newsom has talked about his religious life.

00:50:52.380 | For me, it's really a way of getting outside myself

00:50:56.440 | and then understanding how I fit into this bigger picture.

00:50:59.680 | And the character defects part is real, right?

00:51:02.600 | I'm a human, I have defects,

00:51:03.900 | like I got a lot of flaws in me, like anybody,

00:51:08.340 | but, and trying to acknowledge them

00:51:13.340 | and asking for help in removing them,

00:51:16.700 | not magically, but through right action,

00:51:19.620 | through my right action.

00:51:21.600 | So I do that every morning.

00:51:23.140 | And I have to say that it's helped.

00:51:26.100 | It's helped a lot.

00:51:26.920 | It's helped me be better to myself,

00:51:28.540 | be better at other people.

00:51:30.520 | I still make mistakes,

00:51:31.780 | but it's becoming a bigger and bigger part of my life.

00:51:36.780 | And I never thought I'd talk like this,

00:51:38.740 | but I think it's clear to me that

00:51:44.660 | if we don't believe in something,

00:51:50.860 | again, doesn't have to be traditional standardized religion,

00:51:53.780 | but if we don't believe in something bigger than ourselves,

00:51:56.980 | we at some level will self-destruct.

00:52:01.140 | I really think so.

00:52:03.680 | And it's powerful in a way that all the other stuff,

00:52:07.240 | meditation and all the tools is not

00:52:09.840 | because it's really operating at a much deeper

00:52:13.440 | and bigger level.

00:52:14.920 | And, you know, yeah, I think that's all I can talk about.

00:52:20.920 | It mostly because I'm still working out,

00:52:24.720 | you know, the scientists in me wants to understand

00:52:26.200 | how it works and I want to understand.

00:52:27.880 | And the point is to just go, you know,

00:52:30.600 | there's, you know, for lack of a better language for it,

00:52:33.920 | there's higher power than me and what I can control.

00:52:37.200 | I'm giving up control on certain things.

00:52:39.400 | And somehow that restores a sense of agency

00:52:42.600 | for right action, better action.

00:52:46.040 | - I think perhaps a part of that is just the humility

00:52:49.180 | that comes with acknowledging there's something bigger

00:52:52.040 | and more powerful than you.

00:52:53.280 | - And then you can't control everything.

00:52:55.400 | It's, I mean, you go through life as a hard driving person,

00:52:58.640 | you know, forward center of mass.

00:52:59.960 | I remember being that way since I was little.

00:53:02.080 | It's like a new Legos, I'm like, I'm gonna make all the Legos.

00:53:04.280 | I was like on the weekends, you know,

00:53:06.000 | learning about medieval weapons

00:53:07.560 | and then giving lectures about it in class

00:53:09.200 | when I was five or six years old.

00:53:10.880 | We're learning about tropical fish and, you know,

00:53:12.720 | cataloging all of them at the store and then organizing it

00:53:15.000 | and make my, you know, my dad drive me

00:53:17.680 | or my mom drive me to some fish store

00:53:19.120 | and then spending all my time there

00:53:20.180 | until they throw me out, you know, all of that.

00:53:22.400 | But I also remember my entire life, I would secretly pray

00:53:26.840 | when things were good and things weren't good,

00:53:29.800 | but mostly when things weren't good,

00:53:31.160 | 'cause it's important to pray for me,

00:53:33.420 | it's important to pray each morning regardless.

00:53:35.320 | But when things weren't right, I couldn't make sense of them,

00:53:39.800 | I would secretly pray, but I felt kind of ashamed of that

00:53:42.640 | for whatever reason.

00:53:43.720 | And then it was once in college, I distinctly remember

00:53:46.240 | I was having a hard time with a number of things

00:53:49.440 | and I took a run down to Sands Beach, it was UC San Barbara.

00:53:54.820 | And I remember I just, I was like,

00:53:56.720 | I don't know if I even have the right to do this,

00:54:00.260 | but I'm just praying.

00:54:01.320 | I just prayed for the ability to be as brutally honest

00:54:06.320 | with myself and with other people as I possibly could be

00:54:11.400 | about a particular situation I was in at that time.

00:54:14.420 | I mean, I think now it's probably safe to say

00:54:16.220 | I'd gone off to college

00:54:17.440 | 'cause of a high school girlfriend.

00:54:18.520 | We'd, essentially she was my family,

00:54:21.640 | frankly more than my biological family was

00:54:23.920 | at a certain stage of life.

00:54:25.160 | And we'd reached a point where we were diverging

00:54:27.200 | and it was incredibly painful.

00:54:29.400 | It was like losing everything I had.

00:54:31.800 | And it's like, what do I do?

00:54:33.000 | How do I manage this?

00:54:34.000 | Do I, you know, I was ready to quit

00:54:35.720 | and join the fire service just to support us

00:54:38.360 | so that we could move forward.

00:54:39.400 | And, you know, it was just, but praying,

00:54:43.560 | just saying, I can't figure this out on my own.

00:54:45.880 | It's sort of like, I can't figure this out on my own.

00:54:48.060 | And how frustrating that is,

00:54:49.020 | no number of friends could tell me,

00:54:51.180 | and inner wisdom couldn't tell me,

00:54:53.300 | and eventually it led me to the right answers.

00:54:55.180 | And she and I are friendly friends to this day.

00:54:57.880 | She's happily married with a child and we're on good terms.

00:55:01.420 | But I think, you know, it's a scary thing,

00:55:06.420 | but it's the best thing when you,

00:55:10.780 | I can't control all this.

00:55:11.860 | And asking for help, I think is also the piece.

00:55:14.880 | You're not asking for some magic hand

00:55:16.300 | to come down and take care of it.

00:55:17.140 | You're asking for the help to come through you, right?

00:55:20.580 | So that your body is used to do these right works,

00:55:23.540 | right action.

00:55:24.500 | - Isn't it interesting that this secret thing

00:55:27.560 | that you're almost embarrassed by,

00:55:28.700 | that you did it as a child, is something you,

00:55:31.020 | it's another thing you do as you get older,

00:55:32.820 | is you realize like those things are part of you,

00:55:35.100 | and it's actually a beautiful thing.

00:55:37.020 | - A lot of the content of the podcast

00:55:38.380 | is deep academic content.

00:55:40.820 | And we talk about everything from, you know,

00:55:43.180 | eating disorders to bipolar disorder to depression,

00:55:45.720 | you know, a lot of different topics,

00:55:47.000 | but the tools are the protocols, as we say, right?

00:55:49.720 | The sunlight viewing and all the rest.

00:55:51.680 | You know, a lot of that stuff is just stuff

00:55:54.120 | I wish I had known when I was in graduate school.

00:55:56.440 | If I had known to go outside every once in a while

00:55:58.240 | and get some sunlight, not just stay in the lab,

00:56:01.740 | I would have, you know, I might not have hit

00:56:03.820 | like a really tough round of depression

00:56:06.480 | when I was a postdoc and working twice as hard.

00:56:09.140 | And, you know, when my body would break down

00:56:11.320 | or I'd get sick a lot,

00:56:12.200 | I don't get sick much anymore occasionally,

00:56:13.760 | about once every 18 months to two years,

00:56:15.320 | I get, you know, I'll get something.

00:56:16.720 | But, you know, I used to break my foot

00:56:20.440 | skateboarding all the time.

00:56:21.280 | I couldn't understand what's wrong with my body.

00:56:22.720 | I'm getting injured.

00:56:23.540 | I can't do what everyone else can.

00:56:24.460 | Now I developed more slowly at a long arc of puberty,

00:56:27.120 | but I, so that was part of it.

00:56:30.920 | I was still developing, but you know,

00:56:32.280 | how to get your body stronger, how to build endurance.

00:56:34.240 | Like no one told me, the information wasn't there.

00:56:36.660 | So a lot of what I put out there is the information

00:56:38.480 | that I wish I had had, because once I had it,

00:56:41.780 | I was like, wow, like A, this stuff really works.

00:56:44.300 | B, it's grounded in something real.

00:56:46.500 | You know, sometimes certain protocols are a combination of,

00:56:50.080 | you know, animal, human and animal and human studies,

00:56:53.040 | sometimes clinical trials.

00:56:53.980 | Sometimes there's some mechanistic conjecture for some,

00:56:57.860 | not all, I always make clear which,

00:56:59.640 | but in the end, like figuring out how things work

00:57:04.640 | so that we can be happier, healthier, more productive,

00:57:08.040 | suffer less, like reduce the suffering of the world.

00:57:11.860 | And I think that, well, I'll just say thank you

00:57:16.860 | for asking about the prayer piece.

00:57:22.060 | Again, I'm not pushing or even encouraging it on anyone.

00:57:27.040 | I've just found it to be tremendously useful for me.

00:57:29.780 | - You know, I mean, about prayer in general,

00:57:34.860 | you said information and figuring out how to get stronger,

00:57:38.160 | healthier, smarter, all those kinds of things.

00:57:41.240 | A part of me believes that deeply, you know,

00:57:45.080 | you can gain a lot of knowledge and wisdom through learning,

00:57:49.340 | but a part of me believes that all the wisdom I need

00:57:53.240 | was there when I was 11 and 12 years old.

00:57:57.900 | - And then it got cluttered over.

00:58:00.040 | Well, listen, I can't wait for you and Conti to talk again,

00:58:03.400 | because when he gets going about the subconscious

00:58:06.500 | and the amount of this that sits below the surface,

00:58:08.540 | like an iceberg, and the fact that when we're kids,

00:58:13.260 | we're not obscuring a lot of that subconscious as much.

00:58:18.260 | And sometimes that can look a little more primitive.

00:58:21.240 | I mean, a kid that's disappointed will let you know.

00:58:26.240 | A kid that's excited will let you know.

00:58:28.720 | And you feel that raw exuberance or that raw dismay.

00:58:32.840 | And I think that as we grow older,

00:58:35.460 | we learn to cover that stuff up.

00:58:36.700 | We wear masks and we have to, to be functional.

00:58:39.540 | And I don't think we all want to go around

00:58:40.860 | just being completely raw.

00:58:43.980 | But as you said, as you get older,

00:58:46.040 | you also get to this point where you kind of go,

00:58:48.500 | eh, you know, what are we really trying to protect anyway?

00:58:53.020 | I mean, I have this theory that, you know,

00:58:55.340 | certainly my experience has taught me that a lot of people,

00:59:01.900 | but I'll talk about men 'cause that's what I know best,

00:59:06.220 | whether or not they show up strong or not,

00:59:10.920 | that they're really afraid of being weak.

00:59:15.840 | Like they're just afraid,

00:59:17.000 | like sometimes the strength is even a way

00:59:18.520 | to try and not be weak, right?

00:59:20.680 | Which is different than being strong for its own sake.

00:59:23.360 | I'm not just talking about physical strength.

00:59:24.640 | I'm talking about intellectual strength.

00:59:25.760 | I'm talking about money.

00:59:26.600 | I'm talking about expressing drive.

00:59:30.040 | I've been watching this series a little bit of Chimp Empire.

00:59:34.060 | - Oh yeah.

00:59:35.220 | - So Chimp Empire is amazing, right?

00:59:37.420 | They have the head chimp, he's not the head chimp,

00:59:39.780 | but the alpha in the group and he's getting older.

00:59:44.660 | And so what does he do?

00:59:46.060 | Every once in a while, he goes on these vigor displays.

00:59:49.580 | He goes and he grabs branch, he starts breaking them,

00:59:51.660 | he starts thrashing them and he's incredibly strong.

00:59:53.500 | And they're all kind of like watching.

00:59:54.960 | I mean, yeah, I immediately think of people

00:59:56.780 | like they're dead lifting on Instagram.

00:59:58.940 | And I just think, displays of vigor.

01:00:01.360 | This is just the primate showing that displays the vigor.

01:00:04.360 | Now what's interesting is that he's doing that specifically

01:00:08.000 | to say, hey, I still have what it takes to lead this troop.

01:00:11.400 | Okay, then there are the ones that are subordinate to him,

01:00:14.960 | but not so far behind.

01:00:18.020 | - It seems to be that there's a very clear

01:00:19.960 | like numerical ranking.

01:00:21.360 | - There is.

01:00:22.200 | - Like it's clear who's the number two, number three.

01:00:24.560 | - Oh yeah.

01:00:25.400 | - I mean, probably-

01:00:26.240 | - Who gets to mate first, who gets to eat first.

01:00:27.160 | This exists in other animal societies too,

01:00:28.980 | but Bob Sapolsky would be a great person

01:00:30.860 | to talk about this with,

01:00:31.980 | 'cause he knows obviously tremendous amount about it.

01:00:34.220 | And I know just the top contour, but yeah.

01:00:37.600 | So number two, three and four males are aware

01:00:42.320 | that he's doing these vigor displays,

01:00:43.600 | but they're also aware because in primate evolution,

01:00:46.440 | they got some extra forebrain too, not as much as us,

01:00:49.020 | but they got some.

01:00:50.140 | And they're aware that the vigor displays are displays

01:00:53.900 | that because they've done them as well

01:00:56.280 | in a different context,

01:00:57.680 | might not just be displays of vigor,

01:00:59.560 | but might also be an insurance policy

01:01:01.480 | against people seeing weakness.

01:01:03.700 | Okay, so now they start using that prefrontal cortex

01:01:08.480 | to do some interesting things.

01:01:09.640 | So in primate world,

01:01:12.480 | if a male is friendly with another male,

01:01:14.640 | wants to affiliate with him and say,

01:01:17.080 | "Hey, I'm backing you."

01:01:18.920 | They'll go over and they'll pick off

01:01:21.000 | the little parasites and eat them.

01:01:23.320 | And so the grooming is extremely important.

01:01:25.060 | In fact, if they want to ostracize

01:01:27.600 | or kill one of the members of their troop,

01:01:31.100 | they will just leave it alone.

01:01:32.380 | No one will groom it.

01:01:33.300 | And then there's actually a really disturbing sequence

01:01:35.900 | in that show of then the parasites start to eat away

01:01:38.100 | on their skin, they get infections, they have issues.

01:01:40.180 | No one will mate with them.

01:01:41.380 | No one, they have other issues as well

01:01:43.780 | and can potentially die.

01:01:44.760 | So the interesting thing is, is number two and three

01:01:48.020 | start to line up a strategy to groom this guy,

01:01:51.600 | but they are actually thinking about overtaking

01:01:56.380 | the entire troop, setting in a new alpha.

01:01:58.980 | But the current alpha did that to get where he is.

01:02:03.120 | So he knows that they're doing this grooming thing,

01:02:06.860 | but they're not, might not be sincere about the grooming.

01:02:09.180 | So what does he do?

01:02:10.020 | He takes the whole troop on a raid to another troop

01:02:12.120 | and sees who will fight for him and who won't.

01:02:14.140 | This is advanced contracting of behavior

01:02:19.580 | for species that normally we don't think of

01:02:22.560 | as sophisticated as us.

01:02:24.160 | So it's very interesting and it gets to something

01:02:26.200 | that I hope we'll have an opportunity to talk about

01:02:28.040 | 'cause it's something that I'm obsessed with lately

01:02:29.760 | is this notion of overt versus covert contracts, right?

01:02:33.020 | There are overt contracts where you exchange work for money

01:02:35.760 | or you exchange any number of things in an overt way,

01:02:39.520 | but then there are covert contracts

01:02:42.080 | and those take on a very different form

01:02:43.840 | and always lead to, in my belief, bad things.

01:02:47.640 | - Well, how much of human and chimp relationships

01:02:51.180 | are overt versus covert?

01:02:53.060 | - Well, here's one thing that we know is true.

01:02:55.640 | Dogs and humans, the dog to human relationship

01:03:00.020 | is 100% overt.

01:03:01.940 | They don't manipulate you.

01:03:04.120 | Now you could say they do in the sense that they learn

01:03:06.740 | that if they look a certain way or roll on their back,

01:03:08.540 | they get food, but there's no banking of that behavior

01:03:13.540 | for a future date where then they are going

01:03:16.780 | to undermine you and take your position, okay?

01:03:19.720 | So in that sense, dogs can be a little bit manipulative

01:03:22.380 | in some sense, but now, okay, so overt contract would be,

01:03:27.380 | we both wanna do some work together,

01:03:31.100 | we're gonna make some money, you get X percentage,

01:03:33.720 | I get X percentage, overt.

01:03:35.820 | Covert contract, which is, in my opinion, always bad,

01:03:41.700 | would be we're gonna do some work together,

01:03:44.160 | you're gonna get a percentage of money,

01:03:45.280 | I'm gonna get a percentage of money.

01:03:47.500 | Could look just like the overt contract,

01:03:49.480 | but secretly, I'm resentful that I got the percentage I got,

01:03:54.240 | so what I start doing is covertly taking something else.

01:03:59.240 | What do I take?

01:04:00.800 | Maybe I take the opportunity to jab you verbally

01:04:03.740 | every once in a while.

01:04:05.020 | Maybe I take the opportunity to show up late.

01:04:07.840 | Maybe I take the opportunity to get to know

01:04:09.820 | one of your coworkers so that I might start a business

01:04:11.920 | with them, that's covert contracting.

01:04:14.040 | And you see this sometimes in romantic relationships.

01:04:17.080 | One person, we won't set the male or female

01:04:19.060 | in any direction here and just say,

01:04:21.200 | it's I'll make you feel powerful

01:04:23.460 | if you make me feel desired.

01:04:25.560 | Okay, great, there's nothing explicitly wrong

01:04:28.340 | about that contract if they both know and they both agree,

01:04:31.320 | but what if it's, I'll do that,

01:04:33.820 | but I'll have kids with you so you feel powerful,

01:04:37.280 | you'll have kids with me so I feel desired,

01:04:39.260 | but secretly, I don't wanna do that.

01:04:41.920 | Or one person says, I don't wanna do that, or both don't,

01:04:44.800 | so what they end up doing is saying,

01:04:46.780 | okay, so I expect something else.

01:04:48.940 | I expect you to do certain things for me,

01:04:51.040 | or I expect you to pay for certain things for me.

01:04:53.200 | Covert contracts are the signature of everything bad.

01:04:58.040 | Overt contracts are the signature of all things good.

01:05:02.080 | And I think about this a lot because I've seen a lot

01:05:05.100 | of examples of this.

01:05:06.200 | Like anyone, we participate in these things,

01:05:10.360 | whether or not we want to or not,

01:05:11.480 | and the thing that gets transacted the most is,

01:05:16.480 | well, I should say the things that get transacted the most

01:05:20.360 | are the overt things.

01:05:21.420 | You'll see money, time, sex,

01:05:25.480 | property, whatever it happens to be, information,

01:05:33.120 | but what ends up happening is that when people,

01:05:37.680 | I believe, don't feel safe,

01:05:40.080 | they feel threatened in some way.

01:05:41.440 | Like they don't feel safe in a certain interaction.

01:05:43.720 | What they do is they start taking something else

01:05:46.760 | while still engaging in the exchange.

01:05:49.320 | And I'll tell you, if there's one thing

01:05:52.600 | about human nature that's bad, it's that feature.

01:05:56.960 | Why that feature?

01:05:58.640 | Or is it a bugger feature, as you engineers like to say?

01:06:02.080 | I think it's because we were allocated a certain extra

01:06:04.760 | amount of prefrontal cortex that makes us more sophisticated

01:06:07.840 | than a dog, more sophisticated than a chimpanzee,

01:06:12.260 | but they do it too.

01:06:13.720 | And it's because it's often harder to deal with,

01:06:18.720 | in the short term, to deal with the real sense

01:06:24.060 | of this is scary, this feels threatening,

01:06:27.840 | than it is to play out all the iterations.

01:06:29.840 | It takes a lot of brain work.

01:06:32.240 | You're playing chess and go simultaneously,

01:06:34.560 | trying to figure out where things are going to end up,

01:06:35.880 | and we just don't know.

01:06:37.000 | So it's a way I think of creating a false sense

01:06:39.560 | of certainty, but I'll tell you, covert contracts,

01:06:42.800 | the only certainty is that it's going to end badly.

01:06:44.800 | The question is how badly.

01:06:46.440 | Conversely, overt contracts always end well, always.

01:06:51.440 | The problem with overt contracts is that you can't be

01:06:54.800 | certain that the other person is not engaging

01:06:57.600 | in the covert contract.

01:06:58.480 | You can only take responsibility for your own contracting.

01:07:01.320 | - Well, one of the challenges of being human

01:07:03.920 | is looking at another human being

01:07:06.440 | and figuring out their way of being, their behavior,

01:07:11.440 | which of the two types of contracts it represents,

01:07:14.480 | because they look awfully the same on the surface.

01:07:18.320 | And one of the challenges of being human,

01:07:20.960 | is the decision we all make, is are you somebody

01:07:23.720 | that takes a leap of trust and trusts other humans

01:07:26.320 | that are willing to take the hurt,

01:07:27.840 | or are you going to be cynical and skeptical

01:07:31.280 | and avoid most interactions until they,

01:07:35.080 | over a long period of time, prove your trust?

01:07:37.840 | - Yeah, I never liked the phrase history repeats itself

01:07:40.520 | when it comes to humans, because it doesn't apply

01:07:45.160 | if the people or the person is actively working

01:07:50.160 | to resolve their own flaws.

01:07:52.680 | I do think that if people are willing to do dedicated,

01:07:55.720 | introspective work, go into their subconscious,

01:07:58.980 | do the hard work, have hard conversations,

01:08:01.960 | and get better at hard conversations,

01:08:03.440 | something that I'm constantly trying to get better at,

01:08:06.040 | I think people can change, but they have to want to change.

01:08:09.720 | - It does seem like deep down,

01:08:13.280 | we all can kind of tell the difference

01:08:14.920 | between overt and covert.

01:08:16.520 | Like we have a good sense.

01:08:17.920 | I think one of the benefits of having this characteristic

01:08:21.120 | of mine where I value loyalty,

01:08:23.480 | I've been extremely fortunate to spend most of my life

01:08:26.360 | in overt relationships.

01:08:28.440 | And I think that creates a really fulfilling life.

01:08:31.880 | - But there's also this thing,

01:08:32.840 | and maybe we're in this portion of the podcast now,

01:08:35.440 | but I've experienced this.

01:08:36.280 | - I should say that this is late at night we're talking.

01:08:38.720 | - That's right, certainly late for me, but I'm two hours.

01:08:41.160 | I came in today on, I'm still in California.

01:08:43.640 | - And we should also say that you came here

01:08:45.080 | to wish me a happy birthday.

01:08:46.240 | - I did, I did.

01:08:48.080 | - And the podcast is just like a fun

01:08:50.320 | last minute thing I suggested.

01:08:51.760 | - Yeah, some close friends of yours have arranged a dinner

01:08:55.000 | that I'm really looking forward to.

01:08:57.080 | I won't say which night, but it's the next couple of nights.

01:09:01.520 | Your circadian clock is one of the most robust features

01:09:05.720 | of your biology.

01:09:06.920 | I know you can be nocturnal or you can be diurnal.

01:09:09.780 | We know you're mostly nocturnal

01:09:11.680 | at certain times of the year, Lex,

01:09:12.960 | but very, very few people can get away with no sleep.

01:09:17.480 | Very few people can get away

01:09:18.480 | with a chaotic sleep-wake schedule.

01:09:20.200 | So you have to obey a 24 hour, aka circadian rhythm

01:09:24.960 | if you want to remain healthy of mind and body.

01:09:27.280 | We also have to acknowledge that aging isn't linear, right?

01:09:32.280 | So- - What do you mean?

01:09:34.400 | - Well, I mean, the degree of change between years 35 and 40

01:09:39.400 | is not going to be the degree of change between 40 and 45.

01:09:43.680 | But I will say this, I'm 48 and I feel better

01:09:47.240 | in every aspect of my psychology and biology now

01:09:52.000 | than I did when I was in my 20s.

01:09:54.860 | Yeah, sort of quality of thought, time spent.

01:09:59.860 | Physically, I can do what I did then,

01:10:04.860 | which probably says more about what I could do then

01:10:06.860 | than what I can do now.

01:10:08.100 | But if you keep training, you can continue to get better.

01:10:11.060 | The key is to not get injured.

01:10:12.220 | And I've never trained super hard.

01:10:15.160 | I've trained hard, but I've been cautious to not,

01:10:17.660 | for instance, weight train more than two days in a row.

01:10:19.500 | I do a split, which is basically three days a week,

01:10:21.380 | and the other day is a run, take one full day off,

01:10:23.700 | take a week off every 12 to 16 weeks.

01:10:25.660 | I've not been the guy hurling the heaviest weights

01:10:28.080 | or running the furthest distance,

01:10:29.540 | but I have been the guy who's continuing to do it

01:10:31.620 | when a lot of my friends are talking about knee injuries.

01:10:34.620 | - Hey, hey, hey.

01:10:35.460 | - I'm talking about, I'm just.

01:10:37.020 | (laughing)

01:10:38.740 | But of course, with sport, you can't account for everything

01:10:41.500 | the same way you can with fitness.

01:10:42.840 | And I have to acknowledge that.

01:10:44.380 | Unless one is powerlifting, weightlifting and running,

01:10:50.400 | you can get hurt, but it's not like skateboarding

01:10:52.640 | where if you're going for it, you're gonna get hurt.

01:10:55.660 | That's just, you're landing on concrete.

01:10:57.200 | And with jiu-jitsu, people are trying to hurt you

01:11:01.400 | so that you say, "Stop."

01:11:03.820 | So with a sport, it's different.

01:11:06.220 | And these days, I don't really do a sport any longer.

01:11:10.040 | I work out to stay fit.

01:11:13.380 | I used to continue to do sports, but I kept getting hurt.

01:11:18.380 | And frankly, now, a rolled ankle,

01:11:20.860 | I may put out a little small skateboard part in 2024

01:11:25.860 | because people have been saying,

01:11:26.900 | "We wanna see the kickflip."

01:11:28.280 | I would say, "Well, I'll do a heel flip instead."

01:11:29.940 | But okay, I might put out a little part

01:11:32.540 | 'cause some of the guys that work on our podcast

01:11:33.940 | are from DC.

01:11:34.780 | I think by now, I should at least do it

01:11:37.940 | just to show like I'm not making it up.

01:11:40.120 | And I probably will.

01:11:42.220 | But I think doing a sport is different.

01:11:44.100 | That's how you get hurt, overuse and doing an actual sport.

01:11:48.400 | And so, hat tip to those who do an actual sport.

01:11:52.060 | - And that's a difficult decision.

01:11:54.660 | Like a lot of people have to make.

01:11:56.620 | I have to make with jiu-jitsu, for example.

01:11:58.740 | Like if you just look empirically,

01:12:00.520 | I've trained really hard for all my life

01:12:02.620 | in grappling sports and fighting sports

01:12:04.180 | and all this kind of stuff.

01:12:05.700 | And I've avoided injury for the most part.

01:12:08.340 | And I would say, I would attribute that to training a lot.

01:12:13.340 | Sounds counterintuitive, but training well and safely

01:12:18.120 | and correctly, keeping good form, saying no

01:12:20.900 | when I need to say no, but training a lot

01:12:23.540 | and taking it seriously.

01:12:25.020 | Now, when this training is kind of a side,

01:12:28.140 | really a side thing, I find that the injury

01:12:31.620 | becomes a higher and higher probability.

01:12:34.380 | - But when you're just doing it every once in a while.

01:12:35.980 | - Every once in a while.

01:12:36.820 | - Yeah, I think you said something really important,

01:12:39.860 | the saying no.

01:12:41.380 | I mean, the times I have gotten hurt training

01:12:43.700 | is when someone's like,

01:12:44.620 | "Hey, let's hop on this workout together."

01:12:46.140 | And it becomes a, let's challenge each other

01:12:48.040 | to do something outrageous.

01:12:49.440 | Sometimes that can be fun though.

01:12:51.720 | I went up to Cam Haines' gym

01:12:53.480 | and he does these very high repetition weight workouts

01:12:55.860 | that are in circuit form.

01:12:58.080 | I was sore for two weeks, but I learned a lot

01:13:01.480 | and didn't get injured.

01:13:02.740 | And yes, we ate bow hunted elk afterwards.

01:13:05.480 | - Nice.

01:13:06.560 | But the injury has been a really difficult

01:13:08.920 | psychological thing for me 'cause,

01:13:10.620 | so I've injured my finger, pinky finger,

01:13:15.400 | I've injured my knee.

01:13:16.240 | - Yeah, your kitchen is filled with splints.

01:13:18.240 | - Splints, I'm trying to figure out.

01:13:20.680 | - It's like, if you look in Lex's kitchen,

01:13:26.040 | there's some really good snacks.

01:13:27.680 | I had some right before.

01:13:28.880 | He's very good about keeping cold drinks in the fridge

01:13:33.160 | and all the water has element in it, which is great.

01:13:35.320 | I love that.

01:13:36.160 | But then there's a whole hospital's worth of splints.

01:13:41.320 | - Yeah, I'm trying, I'm trying to figure out.

01:13:42.600 | So here's the thing.

01:13:43.600 | You, the finger like pop out like this, right?

01:13:46.620 | Pinky finger.

01:13:47.600 | I'm trying to figure out how do I splint in such a way

01:13:50.100 | that I can still program, still play guitar,

01:13:53.560 | but protect this kind of torque motion

01:13:55.960 | that creates a huge amount of pain.

01:13:58.200 | - It's not so you have a jujitsu injury.

01:13:59.600 | - Jujitsu, but it's not the kind of,

01:14:02.260 | it's probably more like a skateboarding style injury,

01:14:04.560 | which is, it's unexpected and a silly thing.

01:14:09.560 | - It's a thing that happens in a second.

01:14:11.320 | I didn't break my foot doing anything important.

01:14:13.360 | - Yeah.

01:14:14.200 | - I broke my fifth-minute tarp

01:14:16.560 | while stepping off a curb.

01:14:18.560 | - Yep.

01:14:19.400 | - That's why they're called accidents.

01:14:23.240 | If you get hurt doing something awesome,

01:14:25.880 | that's a trophy that you have to work through.

01:14:28.120 | It's part of your payment to the universe.

01:14:30.640 | If you get hurt stepping off a curb

01:14:34.040 | or doing something stupid, it's called a stupid accident.

01:14:38.360 | - Since we brought up "Chimp Empire,"

01:14:40.600 | let me ask you about relationships.

01:14:43.320 | I think we've talked about relationships.

01:14:44.720 | - Yeah, I only date homo sapiens.

01:14:46.440 | It's the morning meditation.

01:14:49.320 | - The night is still young.

01:14:50.240 | You are human.

01:14:51.560 | No, but you are also animal.

01:14:53.920 | Don't sell yourself short.

01:14:55.040 | - No, I always say, listen,

01:14:55.960 | any discussion on the "Human Lab" podcast

01:14:58.160 | about sexual health or anything,

01:14:59.840 | I always, the critical four is consensual,

01:15:03.680 | age-appropriate, context-appropriate, species-appropriate.

01:15:06.800 | - Species-appropriate, well,

01:15:08.600 | can I just tell you about sexual selection?

01:15:11.720 | I've been watching "Life in Color" with David Attenborough.

01:15:14.520 | I've been watching a lot of nature documentaries.

01:15:16.160 | Talking about inner peace,

01:15:18.160 | it brings me so much peace to watch nature.

01:15:20.440 | At its worst and at its best.

01:15:22.080 | So "Life in Color" is a series on Netflix

01:15:24.320 | where it presents some of the most colorful animals

01:15:28.560 | on earth and kind of tells their story

01:15:30.400 | of how they got there through natural selection.

01:15:34.680 | So you have the peacock with the feathers

01:15:36.400 | and it's just such incredible colors.

01:15:38.400 | Like the peacock has these tail feathers, the male,

01:15:43.400 | that are like gigantic and they're super colorful

01:15:46.280 | and there are these eyes on it.

01:15:48.960 | It's not eyes, it's like eye-like areas.

01:15:52.120 | And they wiggle their ass to show the tail.

01:15:54.560 | They wiggle the tails.

01:15:55.520 | - The eye spots.

01:15:56.360 | - The eye spots, yes, thank you.

01:15:57.480 | You know this probably way better than me.

01:15:59.360 | I'm just quoting it.

01:16:00.280 | - No, no, no, please continue.

01:16:01.480 | - But it was, it's just, I'm watching this

01:16:03.360 | and then the female is as boring looking as,

01:16:06.120 | like she has no colors or nothing,

01:16:08.240 | but she's standing there bored,

01:16:10.560 | just seeing this entire display.

01:16:13.760 | And I'm just wondering, like the entirety of life on earth,

01:16:18.440 | or not the entirety, post-bacteria,

01:16:20.880 | is like, at least in part, maybe in large part,

01:16:25.400 | can be described through this process

01:16:26.880 | of natural selection, of sexual selection.

01:16:29.200 | So dudes fighting and then women selecting.

01:16:35.900 | It seems like, the entirety of that series

01:16:39.380 | shows some incredible birds and insects and shrimp.

01:16:44.140 | They're all beautiful and colorful.

01:16:45.980 | - Mantis shrimp.

01:16:46.820 | - Mantis shrimp.

01:16:47.700 | They're just, they're incredible.

01:16:50.260 | And it's all about getting laid.

01:16:53.060 | It's fascinating.

01:16:54.020 | There's nothing like watching that

01:16:58.140 | and "Champ Empire" to make you realize,

01:17:00.260 | we humans, that's the same thing.

01:17:03.100 | That's all we're doing.

01:17:04.460 | And all the beautiful variety,

01:17:05.740 | all the bridges and the buildings and the rockets

01:17:07.940 | and the internet, all of that is this kind,

01:17:10.220 | is at least in part, this kind of,

01:17:13.540 | a product of this kind of showing off for each other.

01:17:17.500 | And all the wars and all of this.

01:17:19.900 | Anyway, I'm not sure what I'm asking.

01:17:22.620 | Oh, relationships, yes.

01:17:23.900 | - Right, before you ask about relationships,

01:17:26.180 | I think what's clear is that every species, it seems,

01:17:32.740 | every animal species wants to make more of itself

01:17:36.380 | and protect its young.

01:17:38.420 | - Well, to protect its young is non-obvious.

01:17:41.900 | - So not destroy enough of itself

01:17:45.020 | that it can't get more to reproductive competent age.

01:17:49.820 | I mean, I think that, you know, we have a natural,

01:17:53.540 | I mean, healthy people have a natural reflex

01:17:56.980 | to protect children.

01:17:59.060 | - Well, I don't know that.

01:18:00.780 | - And those that can't--

01:18:01.600 | - Wait a minute, wait, wait, wait, wait a minute.

01:18:03.100 | I've seen enough animals that are murdering the children

01:18:05.620 | of some other--

01:18:06.700 | - Sure, there's even siblicide.

01:18:08.260 | First of all, I just wanna say that I was delighted

01:18:13.180 | in your delight around animal kingdom stuff

01:18:15.260 | 'cause this is a favorite theme of mine as well.

01:18:18.100 | But there's, for instance, some fascinating data on,

01:18:22.260 | for instance, for those that grew up on farms,

01:18:25.060 | they'll be familiar with free martins.

01:18:26.780 | You know about free martins?

01:18:28.360 | They're cows that have multiple calves inside them.

01:18:33.360 | And there's a situation in which the calves will secrete,

01:18:38.080 | if there's more than one inside,

01:18:39.760 | will secrete chemicals that will hormonally castrate

01:18:44.400 | the calf next to them so they can't reproduce.

01:18:46.680 | So already in the womb,

01:18:47.680 | they are fighting for future resources.

01:18:50.400 | That's how early this stuff can start.

01:18:52.320 | So it's chemical warfare in the womb against the siblings.

01:18:55.520 | Sometimes there's outright siblicide.

01:18:57.900 | Siblings are born, they kill one another.

01:19:00.740 | This also becomes biblical stories, right?

01:19:03.160 | There are instances of cuttlefish, beautiful cephalopods,

01:19:09.000 | like octopuses, and that is the plural as we--

01:19:12.420 | - Yeah, that's a meme on the internet.

01:19:15.420 | - Oh yeah, that became a meme or a little discussion?

01:19:17.780 | - Yeah, it spread pretty quick.

01:19:19.300 | And now we just resurfaced it.

01:19:21.000 | [laughing]

01:19:22.540 | - The dismay in your voice is so amusing.

01:19:25.800 | In any event, the male cuttlefish will disguise themselves

01:19:29.820 | as female cuttlefish, infiltrate the female cuttlefish group

01:19:34.460 | and then mate with them.

01:19:35.660 | All sorts of types of covert operations.

01:19:41.860 | So I think that--

01:19:44.620 | [laughing]

01:19:46.740 | It's like a drinking game where every time we say covert

01:19:49.340 | contract in this episode,

01:19:51.100 | you have to take a shot of espresso.

01:19:53.900 | Please don't do that, you'd be dead by the end.

01:19:56.220 | - So actually just a small tangent,

01:19:58.220 | it does make me wonder how much intelligence

01:20:00.180 | covert contracts require.

01:20:01.980 | It seems like not much.

01:20:02.980 | If you can do it in the animal kingdom,

01:20:05.780 | there's some kind of instinctual,

01:20:07.540 | it is based perhaps in fear.

01:20:10.300 | - Yeah, it could be simple algorithm.

01:20:12.440 | If there's some ambiguity about numbers

01:20:16.700 | and I'm not with these guys,

01:20:18.540 | and then flip to the alternate strategy.

01:20:21.340 | I actually have a story about this that I think is relevant.

01:20:23.180 | I used to have cuttlefish in my lab in San Diego.

01:20:25.940 | We went and got them from a guy out in the desert.

01:20:28.060 | We put them in the lab, it was amazing.

01:20:30.020 | And they had a postdoc who was studying

01:20:33.100 | prey capture and cuttlefish.

01:20:34.180 | They have a very ballistic,

01:20:35.860 | extremely rapid strike and grab of the shrimp.

01:20:38.820 | And we were using high speed cameras

01:20:42.740 | to characterize all this.

01:20:44.360 | Looking at binocular,

01:20:45.220 | they normally have their eyes on the side of their head.

01:20:47.240 | When they see something they want to eat,

01:20:49.100 | the eyes translocate to the front,

01:20:50.580 | which allows them stereopsis,

01:20:51.820 | depth perception allows them to strike.

01:20:53.480 | We were doing some unilateral eye removals,

01:20:55.180 | they would miss, et cetera.

01:20:56.300 | Okay, this has to do with eye spots.

01:20:59.500 | This was during a government shutdown period

01:21:02.280 | where the ghost shrimp that they normally feed on,

01:21:07.280 | that we would ship in from the Gulf down here,

01:21:10.460 | weren't available to us.

01:21:11.460 | So we had to get different shrimp.

01:21:13.020 | And what we noticed was the cuttlefish normally

01:21:15.980 | would just sneak up on the shrimp.

01:21:18.460 | We learned this by data collection.

01:21:20.780 | And if the shrimp was facing them,

01:21:22.820 | they would do this thing with their tentacles

01:21:24.420 | of kind of enchanting the shrimp.

01:21:27.740 | And if the shrimp wasn't facing them, they wouldn't do it.

01:21:30.300 | And they would ballistically grab it and eat them.

01:21:33.420 | Well, when we got these new shrimp,

01:21:35.300 | the new shrimp had eye spots on their tails.

01:21:38.460 | And then the cuttlefish would do this kind of attempt

01:21:40.900 | to enchant regardless of the position of the ghost shrimp.

01:21:43.660 | So what does that mean?

01:21:44.500 | Okay, well, it means that there's some sort of algorithm

01:21:46.500 | in the cuttlefish's mind that says,

01:21:49.500 | okay, if you see two spots, move your tentacles.

01:21:52.980 | So it can be, as you pointed out,

01:21:54.340 | it can be a fairly simple operation,

01:21:56.660 | but it looks diabolical.

01:21:58.500 | It looks cunning, but all it is is strategy B.

01:22:02.020 | - Yeah, but it's still somehow emerged.

01:22:08.420 | I mean, I don't think that calling it an algorithm doesn't,

01:22:12.940 | I feel like- - Well, there's a circuit there

01:22:14.820 | that gets implemented in a certain context,

01:22:17.180 | but that circuit had to evolve.

01:22:19.140 | You do realize super intelligent AI will look at us humans

01:22:22.460 | and will say the exact thing.

01:22:24.340 | There's a circuit in there that evolved

01:22:27.660 | to do this algorithm A and algorithm B,

01:22:31.060 | and it's trivial.

01:22:32.340 | And to us humans, it's fancy and beautiful

01:22:34.340 | and we write poetry about it, but it's just trivial.

01:22:36.620 | - We don't understand the subconscious

01:22:38.980 | because that AI algorithm cannot see into what it can't see.

01:22:42.860 | It doesn't understand the under workings

01:22:45.100 | of what allows all of this conversation stuff to manifest.

01:22:48.660 | And we can't even see it.

01:22:49.780 | How could AI see it?

01:22:50.780 | Maybe it will.

01:22:51.820 | Maybe AI will solve and give us access to our subconscious.

01:22:55.620 | Maybe your AI friend or coach,

01:22:59.420 | like I think Andreessen and others are arguing

01:23:02.140 | is going to happen at some point, is going to say,

01:23:03.780 | "Hey, you know, Lex, you're making decisions lately

01:23:07.140 | that are not good for you,

01:23:08.460 | but it's because of this algorithm

01:23:11.300 | that you picked up in childhood

01:23:13.020 | that if you don't state your explicit needs upfront,

01:23:17.220 | you're not going to get what you want, so why do it?"

01:23:19.980 | From now on, you need to actually make a list

01:23:22.260 | of every absolutely outrageous thing that you want,

01:23:25.340 | no matter how outrageous,

01:23:27.260 | and communicate that immediately, and that will work.

01:23:31.220 | - We're talking about cuttlefish and sexual selection,

01:23:33.820 | and then we went into some, where do we go?

01:23:36.660 | And you said you were excited.

01:23:38.300 | - Well, I was excited.

01:23:40.020 | Well, you were just saying,

01:23:41.260 | what about these covert contracts and animals do them?

01:23:43.660 | I think it's simple contextual engagement

01:23:45.540 | of a neural circuit, which is not just nerd speak

01:23:47.900 | for saying they do a different strategy,

01:23:49.180 | it's saying that there has to be a circuit there,

01:23:52.300 | hardwired circuit, maybe learned, but probably hardwired,

01:23:55.500 | that can be engaged, right?

01:23:57.540 | You can't build neural machinery out of, in a moment,

01:24:01.740 | you need to build that circuit over time.

01:24:04.220 | What is building it over time?

01:24:05.360 | You select for it.

01:24:06.200 | The cuttlefish that did not have

01:24:08.220 | that alternate context-driven circuit

01:24:10.980 | didn't survive when there was a,

01:24:14.620 | when all the shrimp that they normally eat disappear,

01:24:17.260 | and the eye-spotted shrimp showed up.

01:24:19.820 | And there were a couple that had some mis-wiring.

01:24:22.500 | This is why mutation, right, X-Men stuff is real.

01:24:25.620 | They had a mutation that had some alternate wiring,

01:24:28.860 | and that wiring got selected for,

01:24:30.500 | it became a mutation that was adaptive

01:24:32.660 | as opposed to maladaptive.

01:24:33.940 | This is something people don't often understand

01:24:35.560 | about genetics, is that it only takes a few generations

01:24:39.300 | to devolve a trait, make it worse,

01:24:42.220 | but it takes a long time to evolve an adaptive trait.

01:24:46.500 | There are exceptions to that, but most often that's true.

01:24:50.140 | So a species needs a lot of generations.

01:24:52.340 | We are hopefully still evolving as a species,

01:24:55.420 | and it takes a long time, but,

01:24:58.260 | to evolve more adaptive traits,

01:25:00.260 | but doesn't take long to devolve adaptive traits

01:25:04.140 | so that you're getting sicker

01:25:05.900 | or you're not functioning as well.

01:25:07.660 | So choose your mate wisely,

01:25:09.380 | and that's perhaps a good segue

01:25:10.680 | into sexual selection in humans.

01:25:12.460 | - I could tell you're good at this.

01:25:13.860 | (Lex laughing)

01:25:15.460 | We said, well, why did I bring up sexual selection?

01:25:17.660 | It's the relationships, so sexual selection in humans.

01:25:20.800 | I don't think you've done an episode on relationships.

01:25:24.940 | - No, I did an episode on attachment,

01:25:28.340 | but not on relationships.

01:25:30.940 | The series with Conti includes one episode of the four

01:25:35.780 | that's all about relational understanding

01:25:38.340 | and how to select a mate based on matching of drives.

01:25:43.340 | - Oh, the demons inside the subconscious,

01:25:47.220 | how to match demons, that they dance well together, or what?

01:25:49.780 | - And how generative two people are.

01:25:52.060 | - What does that mean?

01:25:52.900 | - Means how, the way he explains it is,

01:25:56.020 | how devoted to creating growth within the context

01:26:00.020 | of the family, the relationship with work.

01:26:02.480 | - Well, let me ask you about mating rituals

01:26:04.140 | and how to find such a relationship.

01:26:07.200 | I mean, you're really big on friendships,

01:26:09.340 | on the value of friendships.

01:26:10.500 | - I am.

01:26:11.340 | - And that, I think, extends itself

01:26:15.180 | into one of the deepest kinds of friendships you can have,

01:26:18.980 | which is a romantic relationship.

01:26:21.300 | What mistakes, successes, and wisdom can you impart?

01:26:26.300 | - Well, I've certainly made some mistakes.

01:26:32.380 | I've also made some good choices in this realm.

01:26:34.820 | First of all, we have to define

01:26:39.800 | what sort of relationship we're talking about.

01:26:41.620 | If one is looking for a life partner,

01:26:43.620 | potentially somebody to establish family with,

01:26:46.260 | with or without kids, with or without pets, right?

01:26:48.300 | Families can take different forms.

01:26:50.760 | I mean, I certainly experienced being a family

01:26:53.380 | in a prior relationship where it was the two of us

01:26:55.620 | and our two dogs, and then it was like, it was family.

01:26:58.080 | Like we had our little family.

01:26:59.760 | Um,

01:27:00.600 | I think based on my experience

01:27:07.920 | and based on input from friends

01:27:11.460 | who themselves have very successful relationships,

01:27:15.220 | I must say I've got friends who are in long-term,

01:27:20.220 | monogamous, very happy relationships

01:27:25.660 | where there seems to be a lot of love,

01:27:30.100 | a lot of laughter, a lot of challenge, and a lot of growth.

01:27:35.000 | And both people, it seems, really want to be there

01:27:39.580 | and enjoy being there.

01:27:41.300 | Just to pause on that, one thing to do, I think,

01:27:46.300 | by way of advice, is listen to people

01:27:48.060 | who are in long-term successful relationships.

01:27:50.580 | That's like, it seems dumb, but like,

01:27:53.900 | like, oh, we both know and are friends with Joe Rogan,

01:27:56.540 | who's been in a long-term, really great relationship,

01:27:59.580 | and he's been an inspiration to me.

01:28:01.460 | So you take advice from that guy.

01:28:03.140 | - Definitely.

01:28:04.300 | And several members of my podcast team

01:28:06.580 | are in excellent relationships.

01:28:08.780 | I think one of the things that rings true

01:28:13.620 | over and over again in the advice and in my experience

01:28:17.740 | is, you know, find someone who's really a great friend.

01:28:22.900 | Like, build a really great friendship with that person.

01:28:25.780 | Now, obviously not just a friend

01:28:26.940 | if we're talking romantic relationship,

01:28:28.460 | but, and of course, sex is super important,

01:28:32.420 | but it should be a part of that particular relationship

01:28:37.140 | alongside or meshed with the friendship.

01:28:39.840 | Can it be a majority of the positive exchange?

01:28:45.320 | I suppose it could,

01:28:46.620 | but I think the friendship piece is extremely important

01:28:48.620 | because what's required in a successful relationship,

01:28:51.440 | clearly, is joy in being together,

01:28:54.940 | trust,

01:28:57.360 | a desire to share experience,

01:29:03.140 | both, you know, mundane and more adventurous,

01:29:07.680 | support each other,

01:29:08.940 | acceptance,

01:29:11.120 | a real,

01:29:13.220 | maybe even admiration,

01:29:15.860 | but certainly delight in being with the person.

01:29:18.520 | You know, earlier we were talking about peace,

01:29:20.300 | and I think that that sense of peace comes from knowing

01:29:22.940 | that the person you're in friendship with

01:29:24.540 | or that you're in romantic relationship or ideally both,

01:29:27.580 | 'cause let's assume healthy relation,

01:29:28.860 | the best romantic relationship

01:29:30.140 | includes a friendship component with that person.

01:29:32.140 | It's like you just really delight in their presence,

01:29:35.380 | even if it's a quiet presence,

01:29:36.940 | and you delight in seeing them delight in things, right?

01:29:43.740 | That's clear.

01:29:44.860 | The trust piece is huge, you know,

01:29:48.940 | and that's where people start,

01:29:51.260 | you know, we don't want to focus on what works,

01:29:52.660 | not what doesn't work,

01:29:53.500 | but that's where I think people

01:29:56.020 | start engaging these covert contracts.

01:29:58.020 | They're afraid of being betrayed, so they betray.

01:30:00.920 | They're afraid of giving up too much vulnerability,

01:30:05.260 | so they hide their vulnerability,

01:30:08.020 | or in the worst cases, they feign vulnerability.

01:30:11.240 | Again, that's a covert contract

01:30:14.540 | that just simply undermines everything.

01:30:16.100 | It becomes one plus one equals two minus one to infinity.

01:30:18.940 | Conversely, I think if people

01:30:22.060 | can have really hard conversations,

01:30:24.580 | this is something I've had to work really hard on

01:30:26.220 | in recent years that I'm still working hard on,

01:30:28.500 | but the friendship piece seems to be the thing

01:30:31.380 | that rises to the top when I talk to friends

01:30:34.740 | who are in these great relationships.

01:30:37.180 | It's like they have so much respect and love

01:30:40.260 | and joy in being with their friend.

01:30:43.740 | It's the person that they want to spend

01:30:45.180 | as much of their non-working,

01:30:46.420 | non-platonic friendship time with,

01:30:50.140 | and the person that they want to experience things with

01:30:51.980 | and share things with.

01:30:53.820 | And it sounds so kind of canned and cliche nowadays,

01:30:57.240 | but I think if you step back and examine

01:30:59.620 | how most people go about finding a relationship,

01:31:01.960 | sort of like, "Oh, am I attracted?"

01:31:03.620 | Of course, physical attraction is important

01:31:05.620 | and other forms of attraction too.

01:31:07.580 | And they sort of enter through that portal,

01:31:10.280 | which makes sense.

01:31:11.420 | That's the mating dance, right?

01:31:13.260 | That's the peacock situation.

01:31:15.080 | That's hopefully not the cuttlefish situation.

01:31:17.860 | But I think that there seems to be a history

01:31:24.500 | of people close to me getting into great relationships

01:31:28.480 | where they were friends for a while first,

01:31:30.620 | or maybe didn't sleep together right away,

01:31:33.600 | that they actually intentionally deferred on that.

01:31:36.220 | This has not been my habit or my experience.

01:31:41.100 | I've gone the more, I think, typical,

01:31:43.820 | like, "Oh, there's an attraction, like this person,

01:31:46.300 | there's an interest."

01:31:47.140 | You kind of explore all dimensions

01:31:48.280 | of relationship really quickly,

01:31:49.560 | except perhaps the moving in part

01:31:50.980 | and the having kids part, which ideally,

01:31:53.520 | because it's a bigger step,

01:31:54.380 | harder to undo without more severe consequences.

01:31:58.360 | But I think the whole take it slow thing,

01:32:02.520 | I don't think is about getting to know someone slowly.

01:32:04.960 | I think it's about that physical peace,

01:32:07.420 | because that does change the nature of the relationship.

01:32:10.220 | And I think it's because it gets right

01:32:12.440 | into the more hardwired primitive circuitry

01:32:15.820 | around our feelings of safety, vulnerability.

01:32:19.440 | There's something about romantic and sexual interactions

01:32:26.260 | where it's almost like, it's like assets and liabilities,

01:32:30.940 | right, where people are trying to figure out

01:32:32.820 | how much to engage their time and their energy

01:32:36.440 | and multiple, I'm talking about from both sides,

01:32:38.580 | male, female, or whatever sides,

01:32:41.440 | but where it's like assets and liabilities.

01:32:43.500 | And that's where it starts getting

01:32:45.220 | into those complicated contracts early on, I think.

01:32:50.460 | And so maybe that's why,

01:32:51.720 | if a really great friendship and admiration

01:32:54.140 | is established first,

01:32:56.540 | even if people are romantically and sexually attracted

01:32:58.820 | to one another, then that piece can be added in

01:33:00.760 | a little bit later in a way that really kind of just seals

01:33:04.900 | up the whole thing.

01:33:05.720 | And then who knows,

01:33:06.560 | maybe they spend 90% of their time having sex.

01:33:08.260 | I don't know, that's not for me to say or decide, obviously,

01:33:13.260 | but there's something there about staying out

01:33:17.740 | of a certain amount of risk

01:33:19.860 | of having to engage covert contract

01:33:26.660 | in order to protect oneself.

01:33:29.060 | - But I do think like,

01:33:30.680 | love at first sight, this kind of idea is in part

01:33:37.540 | realizing very quickly that you are great friends.

01:33:41.940 | Like I've had that experience of friendship recently.

01:33:45.580 | It's not really friendship, but like,

01:33:48.040 | oh, you get each other with humans,

01:33:50.100 | not in a romantic setting.

01:33:51.980 | - Right, friendship.

01:33:52.820 | - Yeah, just friendship.

01:33:53.660 | - Well, dare I say, I felt that way about you

01:33:55.860 | when we met, right?

01:33:56.700 | I was like, this dude's cool and he's smart and he's funny

01:34:00.860 | and he's driven and he's giving and he's got an edge

01:34:05.440 | and I wanna learn from him, wanna hang out with him.

01:34:10.440 | I mean, that was the beginning of our friendship

01:34:12.580 | was essentially that set of internal realization.

01:34:17.020 | - Just keep going, just keep going.

01:34:17.860 | - And a sharp dresser.

01:34:19.460 | - Yeah, yeah, just looks great shirtless on a horseback.

01:34:22.140 | - No, no, no, listen, I mean,

01:34:24.420 | despite what some people might say on the internet,

01:34:26.020 | it's a purely platonic friendship.

01:34:28.300 | - Somebody asked if Andrew Kuperman has a girlfriend

01:34:31.820 | and somebody says, "I think so."

01:34:33.460 | And the third comment was, "This really breaks my heart

01:34:38.460 | "that Alex and Andrew are not an item."

01:34:42.600 | - We are great friends, but we are not an item.

01:34:45.200 | - Yeah, well. - It's true, it's official.

01:34:47.200 | I hear over and over again from friends

01:34:52.440 | that have made great choices and awesome partners

01:34:55.760 | and have these fantastic relationships

01:34:58.200 | for long periods of time that seem to continue to thrive.

01:35:01.480 | At least that's what they tell me

01:35:02.320 | and that's what I observe.

01:35:03.720 | Establish the friendship first

01:35:06.720 | and give it a bit of time before sex.

01:35:11.160 | And so, I think that's the feeling, that's the feeling.

01:35:16.160 | And we're talking micro features and macro features.

01:35:21.920 | We're talking, and this isn't about perfection,

01:35:24.280 | it's actually about the imperfections,

01:35:25.600 | which is kind of cool.

01:35:26.520 | I like quirky people, I like characters.

01:35:28.960 | I'll tell you where I've gone badly wrong

01:35:30.520 | and where I see other people going badly wrong.

01:35:32.780 | If there is no rule that says that you have to be attracted

01:35:38.120 | to all attractive people, by any means.

01:35:42.180 | It's very important to develop a sense of taste

01:35:44.600 | in romantic attractions, I believe.

01:35:47.480 | What you really like in terms of a certain style,

01:35:51.000 | a certain way of being.

01:35:53.840 | And of course that includes sexuality

01:35:58.020 | and sex itself, the verb.

01:36:00.080 | But I think it also includes

01:36:03.120 | their just general way of being.

01:36:05.240 | And when you really adore somebody,

01:36:07.680 | you like the way they answer the phone.

01:36:09.640 | And when they don't answer the phone that way,

01:36:11.040 | you know something's off and you want to know.

01:36:13.080 | And so I think that the more you can tune up

01:36:18.080 | your powers of observation,

01:36:20.600 | not looking for things that you like,

01:36:22.400 | and the more that stuff just kind of washes over you,

01:36:26.080 | the more likely you are to quote unquote fall in love.

01:36:28.880 | As a mutual friend of ours said to me,

01:36:31.640 | listen, when it comes to romantic relationships,

01:36:33.640 | if it's not 100% in you, it ain't happening.

01:36:38.640 | And I've never seen a violation of that statement

01:36:43.840 | where it's like, yeah, it's mostly good.

01:36:45.920 | And there's this, there's like the negotiations.

01:36:48.360 | Well, already it's doomed.

01:36:50.960 | And that doesn't mean someone has to be perfect.

01:36:52.380 | The relationship has to be perfect,

01:36:53.600 | but it's got to feel 100% inside.

01:36:56.360 | It's like, yes, yes, and yes.

01:36:59.400 | I think Dyseroth when he was on here,

01:37:02.360 | your podcast mentioned something that,

01:37:05.520 | I think the words were,

01:37:06.840 | or maybe it was in his book, I don't recall,

01:37:08.240 | but that love is one of these things

01:37:10.340 | that we story into with somebody.

01:37:12.400 | We create this idea of ourselves in the future

01:37:15.320 | and we look at our past time together

01:37:18.280 | and then you story into it.

01:37:20.220 | I mean, there are very few things like that.

01:37:21.680 | I can't story into building flying cars.

01:37:25.960 | I have to actually go do something.

01:37:27.520 | I mean, yeah, and love is also retroactively constructed.

01:37:32.520 | I mean, anyone who's gone through a breakup

01:37:35.060 | understands the grief of knowing,

01:37:36.680 | ah, like this is something I really shouldn't be in

01:37:39.020 | for whatever reason, 'cause it only takes one.

01:37:40.840 | If the other person doesn't want to be in it,

01:37:42.200 | then you shouldn't be in it.

01:37:43.280 | But then missing so many things,

01:37:45.800 | and that's just the attachment machinery really at work.

01:37:49.100 | - I have to ask you a question that somebody

01:37:51.920 | on our amazing team wanted to ask.

01:37:54.080 | He's happily married.

01:37:56.600 | Another, like you mentioned, incredible relationship.

01:37:58.920 | - Are they good friends?

01:37:59.960 | - Are they amazing friends?

01:38:01.200 | - There you go.

01:38:02.040 | - But I'm not saying who it is, so I can say some stuff,

01:38:06.040 | which is it started out as a great sexual connection.

01:38:10.840 | - Oh, well, there you go.

01:38:11.680 | - But then became very close friends after that.

01:38:14.320 | - Listen. - There you go.

01:38:15.720 | So speaking of sex. - Many paths to roam.

01:38:18.240 | - He has a wonderful son and he's wanting

01:38:20.920 | to have a second kid, and he wanted to ask

01:38:22.640 | the great Andrew Huberman, is there sexual positions

01:38:27.640 | or any kind of thing that can help maximize the chance

01:38:32.200 | that they have a girl versus a boy?

01:38:34.440 | 'Cause they had a wonderful boy, they want a girl.

01:38:36.880 | Is there a way to control the gender?

01:38:39.240 | - Well, this has been debated for a long time,

01:38:41.800 | and I did a four and a half hour episode on fertility.

01:38:45.120 | And the reason I did a four and a half hour episode

01:38:46.920 | on fertility is that, first of all,

01:38:48.600 | I find that reproductive biology fascinating,

01:38:52.240 | and I wanted a resource for people that were thinking about

01:38:57.200 | or struggling with having kids for whatever reason.

01:39:01.280 | And it felt important to me to combine the male

01:39:03.340 | and female components in the same episode.

01:39:05.300 | It's all timestamped, so you don't have to listen

01:39:06.960 | to the whole thing.

01:39:07.800 | We talk about IVF and mutual fertilization,

01:39:10.080 | and we talk about natural pregnancy.

01:39:11.400 | Okay, the data on position is very interesting,

01:39:16.000 | but let me just say a few things.

01:39:17.200 | There are a few clinics now, in particular,

01:39:19.200 | some out of the United States that are spinning down sperm

01:39:24.200 | and finding that they can separate out fractions,

01:39:26.540 | as they're called, that can spin the sperm down

01:39:28.680 | at a given speed, and they'll separate out

01:39:30.420 | at different sort of depths within the test tube

01:39:34.400 | that allow them to pull out the sperm on top or below

01:39:39.120 | and bias the probability towards male or female births.

01:39:42.440 | It's not perfect, it's not 100%,

01:39:44.440 | it's a very costly procedure,

01:39:45.840 | but it's still very controversial.

01:39:47.760 | Now, with in vitro fertilization, you can extract eggs,

01:39:51.000 | you can introduce a sperm directly by pipette,

01:39:55.200 | it's a process called ICSI,

01:39:56.520 | or you can set up a sperm race in a dish.

01:39:58.840 | And if you get a number of different embryos,

01:40:01.080 | meaning the eggs get fertilized,

01:40:05.160 | duplicate and start formoblasticis,

01:40:07.280 | which is a ball of cells, early embryo,

01:40:09.400 | then you can do karyotyping.

01:40:11.160 | So you can look for XX or XY, select the XY,

01:40:14.040 | which then would give rise to a male offspring

01:40:16.320 | and implant that one.

01:40:17.240 | So there is that kind of sex selection.

01:40:19.880 | With respect to position, there's a lot of lore

01:40:25.000 | that if the woman is on top or the woman's on the bottom,

01:40:29.920 | or whether or not the penetration is from behind,

01:40:32.720 | whether or not it's gonna be male or female offspring,

01:40:34.680 | and frankly, the data are not great, as you can imagine,

01:40:38.200 | 'cause those would be interesting studies to run, perhaps.

01:40:43.760 | - There is study, there is paper.

01:40:45.160 | - There are some-- - But they're not, I guess,

01:40:48.000 | there's more lore than science.

01:40:49.520 | - And there are a lot of other variables

01:40:51.520 | that are hard to control.

01:40:52.720 | So for instance, if it's ejaculation during intramission,

01:40:57.080 | during sex penetration, et cetera,

01:40:59.600 | then you can't measure, for instance, sperm volume,

01:41:04.000 | as opposed to when it's IVF,

01:41:05.920 | and they can actually measure how many milliliters,

01:41:07.520 | how many forward motile sperm.

01:41:08.880 | It's hard to control for certain things.

01:41:11.120 | And it just can vary between individuals

01:41:13.480 | and even from one ejaculation to the next.

01:41:15.520 | And okay, so there's too many variables.

01:41:17.480 | However, the position thing is interesting

01:41:20.400 | in the following way, and then I'll answer

01:41:23.960 | whether or not you can bias towards a female.

01:41:26.680 | But as long as we're talking about sexual--

01:41:27.520 | - I have other questions about sex.

01:41:29.160 | - But as long as we're talking about sexual position,

01:41:30.980 | there are data that support the idea

01:41:35.560 | that in order to increase the probability

01:41:38.560 | of successful fertilization,

01:41:42.640 | that indeed the woman should not stand up right after sex,

01:41:47.640 | and should right after the man has ejaculated inside her,

01:41:52.120 | and should adjust her pelvis, say, 15 degrees upwards.

01:41:56.000 | I mean, some of the fertility experts, MDs,

01:42:00.360 | will say that's crazy, but others that I sought out,

01:42:05.360 | and not specifically for this answer,

01:42:08.800 | but for researching that episode,

01:42:10.760 | said that, yeah, what you're talking about

01:42:12.240 | is trying to get the maximum number of sperm,

01:42:14.320 | and it's contained in semen,

01:42:15.800 | and yes, the semen can leak out.

01:42:17.400 | And so keeping the pelvis tilted for about 15 degrees

01:42:21.200 | for about 15 minutes, obviously tilted in the direction

01:42:24.120 | that would have things running upstream, not downstream,

01:42:26.880 | so to speak.

01:42:28.000 | - Gravity. - Gravity, it's real.

01:42:30.300 | So for maximizing fertilization,

01:42:36.360 | the doctors I spoke to just said,

01:42:38.600 | look, given that if people are trying to get pregnant,

01:42:42.040 | what is spending 15 minutes on their back,

01:42:44.500 | this sort of thing?

01:42:46.680 | Okay, so then with respect to female,

01:42:50.900 | getting a female offspring, or XX female offspring,

01:42:55.900 | selectively, there is the idea that as fathers get older,

01:43:01.560 | they're more likely to have daughters as opposed to sons.

01:43:04.440 | That's a, from the papers I've read,

01:43:07.280 | is a significant, but still mildly significant result.

01:43:11.560 | So with each passing year,

01:43:13.920 | this person increases the probability

01:43:16.400 | they're gonna have a daughter, not a son.

01:43:18.960 | So that's interesting.

01:43:19.800 | - But the probability differences are probably tiny.

01:43:22.040 | - I mean, it's not, you know, it's a significant,

01:43:25.480 | it's not trivial, it's not a trivial difference.

01:43:28.260 | But if they want to ensure having a daughter,

01:43:33.200 | then they should do IVF and select an XX embryo.

01:43:37.520 | And when you go through IVF,

01:43:39.320 | they genetically screen them for karyotype, which is XXXY.

01:43:42.800 | And they look at mutations, genotypic mutations,

01:43:47.920 | for things like, you know, trisomies and aneuploidies,

01:43:52.200 | all the stuff you don't want.

01:43:54.000 | - But there is a lot of lore, if you look on the internet.

01:43:55.920 | - Sure, different foods.

01:43:57.520 | - So there are a lot of variables.

01:43:58.560 | - There's a lot of variables,

01:43:59.400 | but there haven't been systematic studies.

01:44:00.760 | So I think probably the best thing to do,

01:44:04.880 | unless they're gonna do IVF, is just, you know,

01:44:07.040 | roll the dice.

01:44:08.000 | And, you know, I think with each passing year,

01:44:11.440 | they increase the probability of getting a female offspring.

01:44:14.640 | But of course, with each passing year,

01:44:17.680 | the egg and sperm quality degrade.

01:44:20.440 | So, you know, get after it soon.

01:44:23.020 | - So I went down a rabbit hole.

01:44:25.520 | There's like sexology, there's journals.

01:44:28.680 | - Oh yeah. - On sex.

01:44:29.680 | - Sure.

01:44:30.680 | - Okay, so I--

01:44:31.520 | - And some of them, not all, quite reputable.

01:44:34.620 | - Yeah.

01:44:36.480 | - Some of them really pioneering in the sense that

01:44:39.720 | they've taken on topics that are, you know,

01:44:43.040 | considered, you know, outside the main frame

01:44:46.240 | of what people talk about, but they're very important.

01:44:49.600 | We have episodes coming out soon with, for instance,

01:44:51.780 | the head of male urology, sexual health,

01:44:55.000 | and reproductive health at Stanford, Michael Eisenberg,

01:44:57.120 | but also, you know, one with a female urologist,

01:45:00.720 | sexual health, reproductive health, Dr. Rina Malik,

01:45:05.080 | who has a quite active YouTube presence.

01:45:07.900 | She does these really dry, like scientific presentation,

01:45:12.900 | but very nice.

01:45:14.640 | She has a lovely voice, but she'll be talking about,

01:45:17.840 | you know, erections or squirting or like all this.

01:45:20.200 | She does very kind of internet type content,

01:45:23.260 | but she's a legitimate urologist,

01:45:25.440 | reproductive health expert.

01:45:27.040 | And in the podcast, we did talk about

01:45:30.160 | both male and female orgasm.

01:45:33.060 | We talked a lot about sexual function, dysfunction.

01:45:35.180 | We talked a lot about pelvic floor.

01:45:37.640 | One interesting factoid is that only three,

01:45:42.640 | only 3% of sexual dysfunction is hormonal,

01:45:47.240 | endocrine in nature.

01:45:50.780 | It's more often related to some pelvic floor

01:45:53.320 | or vasculature, blood flow related or other issue.

01:45:58.040 | And then when Eisenberg came on the podcast,

01:46:00.480 | he said that far less sexual dysfunction

01:46:04.220 | is psychogenic in origin than people believe,

01:46:07.600 | that far more of it is pelvic floor, neuro and vascular.

01:46:11.120 | So, you know, there are the myths of,

01:46:13.740 | I mean, it's not saying that it's,

01:46:14.980 | that psychogenic dysfunction doesn't exist,

01:46:17.080 | but that a lot of the sexual dysfunction

01:46:19.820 | that people assume is related to hormones

01:46:21.720 | or that is related to psychogenic issues

01:46:24.320 | are related to vascular or neural issues.

01:46:27.560 | And the good news is that there are great remedies

01:46:30.400 | for those.

01:46:31.280 | And so those, both those episodes detail

01:46:33.880 | some of the more salient points

01:46:36.560 | about what those remedies are and could be.

01:46:38.840 | I mean, one of the kind of, again, factoids,

01:46:42.480 | but it was interesting that, you know,

01:46:43.680 | a lot of people have pelvic floor issues

01:46:45.040 | and they think that their pelvic floors

01:46:46.960 | are quote unquote messed up.

01:46:49.640 | So they go on the internet,

01:46:50.480 | they learn about Kegels, Kegels, you know,

01:46:52.640 | and it turns out that some people need Kegels.

01:46:55.240 | They need to strengthen their pelvic floor.

01:46:56.760 | Guess what?

01:46:58.280 | A huge number of people with sexual

01:47:00.160 | and urologic dysfunction have pelvic floors

01:47:05.160 | that are too tight and Kegels are going to make them

01:47:07.040 | far worse and they actually need to learn

01:47:08.960 | to relax their pelvic floor.

01:47:10.200 | And so seeing a pelvic floor specialist is important.

01:47:12.320 | I think in the next five, 10 years,

01:47:14.000 | we're going to see a dramatic shift

01:47:16.080 | towards more discussion about sexual

01:47:17.800 | and reproductive health in a way that acknowledges

01:47:20.520 | that yeah, the clitoris comes from the same origin tissue

01:47:23.200 | as the penis.

01:47:24.580 | And in many ways, the neural innervation of the two,

01:47:27.920 | while clearly different, has some overlapping features

01:47:31.360 | that there's going to be discussion around kind of anatomy

01:47:36.360 | and hormones and pelvic floors

01:47:38.720 | and in a way that's going to erode some of the kind

01:47:43.720 | of like cloaking of these topics

01:47:46.400 | 'cause they've been cloaked for a long time.

01:47:48.040 | And there's a lot of like, well, let's just call it what is.

01:47:51.200 | There's a lot of bullshit out there about what's what.

01:47:54.120 | And now the hormonal issues, by the way,

01:47:56.760 | just to clarify, can impact desire.

01:48:00.160 | So a lot of people who have lack of desire

01:48:02.800 | as opposed to lack of anatomical function,

01:48:05.980 | this could be male or female,

01:48:07.140 | that that can originate with either things like SSRIs

01:48:10.880 | or hormonal issues.

01:48:12.100 | And so we talk about that as well.

01:48:13.400 | So it's a pretty vast topic.

01:48:15.080 | - Okay, you're one of the most productive people I know.

01:48:18.560 | What's the secret to your productivity?

01:48:22.280 | How do you maximize the number of productive hours

01:48:24.960 | in a day?

01:48:25.780 | You're a scientist, you're a teacher,

01:48:27.440 | you're a very prolific educator.

01:48:30.160 | - Well, thanks for the kind words.

01:48:32.500 | I struggle like everybody else,

01:48:34.640 | but I am pretty relentless about meeting deadlines.

01:48:39.640 | I miss them sometimes, but sometimes that means cramming,

01:48:45.720 | sometimes that means starting early.

01:48:47.840 | But--

01:48:48.680 | - Has that been hard, sorry to interrupt with the podcast?

01:48:51.200 | There's certain episodes,

01:48:53.840 | I mean, you're like taking just incredibly difficult topics

01:48:58.080 | and you know there's going to be a lot

01:49:00.820 | of really good scientists listening to those

01:49:03.320 | with a very skeptical and careful eye.

01:49:05.320 | Do you struggle meeting that deadline sometimes?

01:49:09.460 | - Yes, we've pushed out episodes

01:49:11.700 | because I want more time with them.

01:49:13.340 | I also, I haven't advertised this,

01:49:15.420 | but I have another fully tenured professor

01:49:19.780 | that started checking my podcasts

01:49:24.440 | and helping me find papers.

01:49:27.000 | He's a close friend of mine,

01:49:27.920 | he's an incredible expert in neuroplasticity

01:49:30.680 | and that's been helpful.

01:49:31.980 | But I do all the primary research for the episodes myself.

01:49:35.420 | Although my niece has been doing a summer internship

01:49:38.960 | with me and finding amazing papers.

01:49:40.800 | She did last summer as well.

01:49:42.040 | She's really good at it.

01:49:44.100 | Just sick that kid on the internet

01:49:45.680 | and she gets great stuff.

01:49:47.840 | - Can I ask you, just going on tangents here,

01:49:50.820 | what's the hardest, finding the papers

01:49:53.720 | or understanding what a paper is saying?

01:49:56.440 | - Finding the best papers.

01:49:59.240 | Yeah, 'cause you have to read a bunch of reviews,

01:50:02.320 | figure out who's getting cited,

01:50:04.080 | call people in a field, make sure that this is the stuff.

01:50:06.480 | I mean, I did this episode recently on ketamine,

01:50:09.160 | about ketamine, I wasn't on ketamine.

01:50:11.120 | And there's this whole debate about S versus R ketamine,

01:50:15.000 | SR ketamine, and I called two clinical experts

01:50:17.560 | at Stanford, I had a researcher at UCLA help me.

01:50:20.320 | Even then, a few people had gripes about it.

01:50:23.080 | I don't think they understood a section

01:50:24.680 | that I was perhaps could have been clearer about.

01:50:27.080 | But yeah, you're always concerned that people

01:50:31.680 | won't either won't get it or I won't be clear.

01:50:34.160 | So the researching is mainly about finding the best papers.

01:50:36.960 | And then I'm looking for papers that establish

01:50:39.920 | a thoroughness of understanding

01:50:42.000 | that are interesting, obviously.

01:50:45.580 | It's fun to get occasionally look at some of the odder

01:50:48.820 | or more progressive papers that are,

01:50:50.700 | what's new in a field, and then where there are

01:50:52.740 | actionable takeaways to really export those

01:50:55.700 | with a lot of thoughtfulness.

01:50:57.420 | I mean, I think that going back to the productivity thing,

01:51:01.240 | I do, I get up, I look at the sun,

01:51:04.700 | I don't stare at the sun, but I get my sunshine.

01:51:07.780 | It all starts with a really good night's sleep.

01:51:09.260 | I think that's really important to understand.

01:51:11.300 | So much so that if I wake up and I don't feel rested enough,

01:51:13.740 | I'll often do a non-sleep deep rest yoga nidra

01:51:16.380 | or go back to sleep for a little bit, get up,

01:51:18.580 | really prioritize one, the big block of work

01:51:22.220 | for the thing that I'm researching.

01:51:23.780 | I think a little bit of anxiety

01:51:25.180 | and a little bit of concern about deadline helps.

01:51:27.780 | Turning the phone off helps.

01:51:30.720 | Realizing that those peak hours, whenever they are for you,

01:51:35.940 | you do not allow those hours to be invaded

01:51:38.860 | unless there's a nuclear bomb goes off.

01:51:42.420 | And a nuclear bomb is just a phraseology for,

01:51:47.420 | it could be family crisis would be a good justification.

01:51:52.660 | There's an emergency obviously, but it's all about focus.

01:51:56.680 | It's all about focus in the moment.

01:51:58.520 | It's not even so much about how many hours you log,

01:52:01.620 | it's really about focus in the moment.

01:52:02.820 | How much total focus can you give to something?

01:52:05.420 | And then I like to take walks and think about things

01:52:08.660 | and sometimes talk about them in my voice recorder.

01:52:11.300 | So I'm just always churning on it all the time.

01:52:14.260 | And then of course, learning to turn it off

01:52:19.380 | and engage with people socially

01:52:20.620 | and not be podcasting 24 hours a day in your head is key.

01:52:24.900 | But I think I love learning and researching

01:52:27.300 | and finding those papers and the information

01:52:29.860 | and I love teaching it.

01:52:30.820 | And these days I use a whiteboard.

01:52:33.160 | Before I start, I don't have any notes, no teleprompter.

01:52:36.480 | Then the whiteboard that I use beforehand

01:52:38.540 | is to really sculpt out the different elements

01:52:40.820 | and the flow, get the flow right and move things around.

01:52:44.580 | The whiteboard is such a valuable tool.

01:52:46.140 | Then take a couple of pictures of that

01:52:48.380 | when I'm happy with it, put it down on the desk.

01:52:50.380 | And these are just bullet points

01:52:51.780 | and then just churn through and just churn through

01:52:54.140 | and nothing feels better than researching

01:52:57.500 | and sharing information.

01:52:58.700 | And as you did, you grew up writing papers

01:53:02.420 | and it's hard and I like the friction of like,

01:53:05.380 | "Ugh, I want to get up, I want to use the bathroom."

01:53:08.300 | When I was in college, I was trying to make up deficiencies

01:53:12.020 | from my lack of attendance in high school

01:53:14.980 | so much so that I would set a timer

01:53:17.500 | I wouldn't let myself get up to use the bathroom even.

01:53:20.340 | Never had an accident, but I was, you know,

01:53:22.500 | I mean, it was like, I listened to music,

01:53:24.580 | classical music, rancid, a few other things,

01:53:27.540 | some Bob Dylan maybe thrown in there

01:53:29.980 | and just study and it felt,

01:53:34.740 | and then you hit the two hour mark and you're in pain

01:53:37.220 | and then you get up and you're like,

01:53:38.380 | "Use the bathroom," like that felt so good.

01:53:40.660 | There's something about the human brain

01:53:42.100 | that likes these kinds of friction points

01:53:44.460 | and working through them

01:53:45.740 | and you just have to work through them.

01:53:46.780 | So yeah, I'm productive and my life is arranged around it.

01:53:51.060 | And, you know, that's been a bit of a barrier

01:53:53.400 | to personal life at times,

01:53:55.440 | but my life's been arranged around it.

01:53:57.380 | I've set up everything so that I can learn more,

01:54:00.180 | teach more, including, you know, some of my home life.

01:54:07.140 | But I do, you know, still watch "Chimp Empire."

01:54:09.700 | I still got time to watch "Chimp Empire."

01:54:11.240 | Look, the great Joe Strummer, right?

01:54:14.100 | Clash, they were my favorite Mescaleros.

01:54:15.980 | He said, you know, the famous Strummer quote,

01:54:17.900 | "No input, no output."

01:54:20.340 | So you need experience, you need outside things

01:54:24.340 | in order to foster the process.

01:54:27.820 | But yeah, just nose to the grindstone, man.

01:54:32.300 | I don't know.

01:54:33.140 | And that's what I'm happy to do with my life.

01:54:35.780 | I don't think anyone should do that just because,

01:54:38.100 | but this is how I'm showing up.

01:54:40.660 | And, you know, if you don't like me, then scroll.

01:54:43.460 | Why do they say swipe left, swipe right?

01:54:45.140 | I don't know.

01:54:45.980 | I'm not on the apps, the dating apps.

01:54:47.580 | So that's the other thing.

01:54:48.940 | I keep waiting for when,

01:54:50.260 | listens to Lex Freeman podcasts as a checkbox

01:54:54.260 | on like Hinge or Bumble or whatever it is.

01:54:56.380 | But I don't even know, are those that are field?

01:54:58.100 | 'Cause I don't know what are the apps now.

01:55:00.300 | - I've never used an app.

01:55:01.580 | And I always found it troublesome

01:55:04.980 | how little information is provided on apps.

01:55:07.460 | - Well, they're the ones that are like a stock lake,

01:55:09.460 | like Raya, you know?

01:55:11.300 | It's like they sort of like,

01:55:13.420 | companies will actually fill them with, you know,

01:55:16.980 | people that look a certain way.

01:55:18.740 | - Well, soon it'll be filled with AI.

01:55:20.820 | - Oh, yeah.

01:55:22.300 | - That's what you said, oh.

01:55:23.940 | There's a heartbreak within that.

01:55:25.940 | - Well, I, you know, I'm guilty

01:55:27.340 | of liking real human interaction.

01:55:29.360 | - Have you tried AI interaction?

01:55:34.140 | - No, but I have a feeling you're gonna convince me to.

01:55:36.860 | - One day.

01:55:38.660 | Yeah, I've also struggled finishing projects that are new,

01:55:43.900 | that are something new.

01:55:46.380 | Like for example, one of the things

01:55:48.020 | I really struggled finishing is something that's in Russian

01:55:51.260 | that requires translation and overdub

01:55:53.300 | and all that kind of stuff.

01:55:54.620 | The other project I've been working on for like over,

01:55:57.220 | at least a year,

01:55:59.460 | off and on, but trying to finish

01:56:03.140 | is something we've talked about in the past

01:56:04.620 | is I'm still on it, a project on Hitler in World War II.

01:56:08.340 | I've written so much about it.

01:56:10.180 | And I just don't know why I can't finish it.

01:56:11.860 | I have trouble like really,

01:56:14.360 | I think I'm terrified being in front of the camera.

01:56:18.340 | - Like this? - Like this.

01:56:19.660 | - Or solo? - Well, actually, no, no, no.

01:56:21.780 | Solo.

01:56:22.860 | - Well, if ever you wanna do solo,

01:56:24.740 | seriously, 'cause we've done this before, right?

01:56:26.560 | Our clandestine study missions.

01:56:29.700 | I'm happy to sit in the corner and work on my book

01:56:31.620 | or do something if you wanna,

01:56:32.860 | if it feels good to just have someone in the room.

01:56:33.700 | - Just for the feeling of somebody else?

01:56:35.420 | - Definitely. - Well, what do you,

01:56:36.420 | I mean, how do you, you don't seem to,

01:56:38.800 | you seem to have been fearless

01:56:42.540 | to just sit in front of the camera

01:56:44.580 | by yourself to do the episode.

01:56:48.020 | - Yeah, it was weird.

01:56:48.900 | I mean, the first year of the podcast,

01:56:50.620 | it just spilled out of me.

01:56:51.820 | It was just, I had all that stuff I was so excited about.

01:56:54.260 | I've been talking to everyone who would listen

01:56:56.660 | and anyone, even when they'd run away, I'd keep talking.

01:57:02.060 | Before there was ever a camera, wasn't on social media.

01:57:04.740 | 2019, I posted a little bit, 2020, as you know,

01:57:06.700 | I started going on podcasts.

01:57:07.740 | But yeah, I had so, I just,

01:57:09.740 | I just, the zest and delight in this stuff.

01:57:14.380 | It's like circadian rhythms,

01:57:15.460 | I'm gonna tell you about this stuff.

01:57:16.420 | I just felt like here was the opportunity

01:57:18.300 | and just let it burst.

01:57:19.860 | And then as we've gotten into topics

01:57:21.700 | that are a little bit further away from my home knowledge,

01:57:25.500 | I still get super excited about it.

01:57:30.980 | It's music in the brain episode

01:57:33.180 | I've been researching for a while now.

01:57:34.500 | I'm just so hyped about it.

01:57:36.340 | It's so, so interesting.

01:57:37.900 | There's so many facets,

01:57:39.020 | singing versus improvisational music,

01:57:43.180 | versus I'm listening to music,

01:57:44.900 | versus learning music.

01:57:47.180 | I mean, it just goes on and on.

01:57:48.740 | There's just so much that's so interesting.

01:57:51.460 | I just can't get enough.

01:57:52.900 | And I think, I don't know, you put a camera in front of me,

01:57:56.140 | I sort of forget about it.

01:57:58.620 | And I'm just trying to just teach.

01:58:01.020 | - Yeah, so that's the difference, that's interesting.

01:58:02.580 | I mean, I-- - Forget the camera.

01:58:03.660 | - Maybe I need to find that joy as well.

01:58:05.340 | But like for me, a lot of the joy is in the writing.

01:58:09.100 | And the camera, there's something--

01:58:11.940 | - Well, the best lecturers, as you know,

01:58:13.740 | and you're a phenomenal lecturer,

01:58:15.460 | so you embody this as well.

01:58:17.100 | But when I teach at Stanford,

01:58:18.900 | I was directing this course in neuroanatomy and neuroscience

01:58:21.340 | and for medical students,

01:58:22.500 | and I noticed that the best lecturers would come in

01:58:25.160 | and they're teaching the material

01:58:26.500 | from a place of deep understanding,

01:58:28.980 | but they're also experiencing it as a first-time learner

01:58:33.060 | as at the same time.

01:58:34.380 | So it's just sort of embodying the delight of it,

01:58:36.500 | but also the authority over the, not authority,

01:58:38.940 | but the sort of mastery of the material.

01:58:41.460 | And it's really the delight in it

01:58:43.740 | that the students are linking onto.

01:58:45.460 | And of course, they need and deserve

01:58:47.100 | the best accurate material.

01:58:48.740 | So they have to know what they're talking about.

01:58:50.140 | But yeah, just tap into that energy of learning

01:58:53.260 | and loving it and people are along for the ride.

01:58:56.260 | Or, you know, I get accused of being long-winded,

01:58:58.140 | but you know, things get taken out of context,

01:59:01.300 | that leads to greater misunderstanding.

01:59:03.040 | And also I look at, listen,

01:59:04.420 | I come from a lineage of three dead advisors,

01:59:07.020 | three, all three.

01:59:09.620 | So I don't know when the reaper's coming for me.

01:59:12.740 | I'm doing my best to stay alive a long time,

01:59:14.640 | but whether or not it's a bullet or a bus

01:59:16.420 | or cancer or whatever, or just old age,

01:59:20.260 | I mean, I'm trying to get it all out there as best I can.

01:59:24.820 | And if it means you have to hit pause

01:59:26.380 | and come back a day or two later,

01:59:27.620 | like that seems like a reasonable compromise to me.

01:59:30.260 | I'm not going to go longer than I need to.

01:59:33.960 | And I'm trying to shorten them up.

01:59:35.620 | But again, that's kind of how I show up.

01:59:39.700 | It's like Tim Armstrong would say about writing songs.

01:59:42.020 | I asked him, do you write, how often do you write?

01:59:43.420 | Every day, every day.

01:59:45.300 | Was Rick ever stopped creating?

01:59:46.700 | No.

01:59:47.540 | Has Joe ever stopped preparing for comedy?

01:59:48.780 | Are you ever stopping to think about world issues

01:59:51.940 | and technology and who you can talk to?

01:59:54.340 | I mean, it seems to me you've always got a plan inside.

01:59:58.300 | The thing I love about your podcast the most,

02:00:01.620 | to be honest, these days, is the surprise of like,

02:00:04.660 | I don't know who the hell's going to be there.

02:00:06.420 | It's almost like I get a little nervously excited

02:00:10.180 | about when a new episode comes out,

02:00:12.060 | 'cause I have no idea, no idea.

02:00:14.780 | And I mean, I have some guesses

02:00:16.560 | based on what you told me during the break.

02:00:17.800 | I mean, you've got some people where it's just like,

02:00:20.420 | whoa, Lex has went there?

02:00:23.740 | Awesome, can't wait, click.

02:00:25.900 | I think that's really cool.

02:00:28.460 | Like you're constantly surprising people.

02:00:30.300 | So you're doing it so well.

02:00:33.100 | Like it's such a high level.

02:00:34.780 | And I think it's also important for people to understand

02:00:38.140 | that what you're doing, Lex, there's no precedent for it.

02:00:42.260 | Sure, there've been interviews before,

02:00:43.620 | there've been podcasts before, there're discussions before,

02:00:46.120 | but it's not like, how many of your peers can you look to

02:00:48.660 | to find out how best to do the content like yours?

02:00:51.580 | Zero.

02:00:52.540 | There's one peer, you.

02:00:54.660 | And so, that should give you great peace

02:00:59.100 | and great excitement because you're a pioneer.

02:01:02.700 | You're literally the tip of the spear.

02:01:04.580 | I don't want to take an unnecessary tangent,

02:01:06.680 | but I think this might thread together

02:01:08.300 | two of the things that we've been talking about,

02:01:09.620 | which are, I think, of pretty key importance.

02:01:12.160 | One is romantic relationships,

02:01:13.960 | and the other is creative process and work.

02:01:16.380 | And this, again, is something I learned from Rick,

02:01:18.560 | but that he and I have gone back and forth on,

02:01:20.420 | and that I think is worth elaborating on,

02:01:23.500 | which is, earlier we were saying,

02:01:25.780 | the best relationship is gonna be one

02:01:27.780 | where it brings you peace.

02:01:29.900 | I think peace also can be translated to,

02:01:32.700 | among other things, lack of distraction.

02:01:36.240 | So, when you're with your partner,

02:01:38.080 | can you really focus on them and the relationship?

02:01:42.140 | Can you not be distracted by things that you're upset about

02:01:48.220 | from their past or from your past with them?

02:01:51.820 | And, of course, the same is true for them, right?

02:01:54.540 | They ideally will feel that way towards you, too.

02:01:56.580 | They can really focus.

02:01:58.120 | Also, when you're not with them, can you focus on your work?

02:02:02.540 | Can you not be worried about whether or not they're okay

02:02:05.900 | 'cause you trust that they're an adult

02:02:07.260 | and they can handle things

02:02:08.140 | or they will reach out if they need things?

02:02:11.020 | They're gonna communicate their needs like an adult,

02:02:13.720 | not creating messes just to get attention

02:02:16.220 | and things like that.

02:02:17.620 | Or disappearing, for that matter.

02:02:21.020 | So, peace and focus are intimately related

02:02:26.020 | and distraction is the enemy of peace and focus.

02:02:31.360 | So, there's something there, I believe,

02:02:34.700 | because with people that have the strong generative drive

02:02:38.140 | and want to be productive in their home life,

02:02:41.700 | in the sense of have a rich family life

02:02:43.740 | or partner life, whatever that is,

02:02:45.420 | and in their work life,

02:02:47.580 | the ability to really drop into the work

02:02:49.220 | and like, okay, you might have that sense,

02:02:51.660 | like I hope they're okay

02:02:52.540 | or need to check my phone or something,

02:02:54.940 | but just know we're good.

02:02:56.860 | So, peace and focus, I think,

02:02:59.020 | and being present are so key.

02:03:01.580 | And it's key at every level of romantic relationship

02:03:03.740 | from certainly presence and focus,

02:03:07.240 | everything from sex to listening to raising a family,

02:03:12.240 | to tending to the house.

02:03:15.240 | And in work, it's absolutely critical.

02:03:17.820 | So, I think that those things are kind of mirror images

02:03:21.300 | of the same thing

02:03:22.460 | and they're both important reflections of the other.

02:03:25.180 | And when you start to just,

02:03:26.300 | you know, when work is not going well,

02:03:28.680 | then the focus on relationship can suffer and vice versa.

02:03:33.680 | - And it's crazy how important that is.

02:03:35.700 | How incredibly wonderful it could be

02:03:41.260 | to have a person in your life

02:03:42.860 | that kind of enables that creative focus.

02:03:47.220 | - Yeah, and you supply the peace and focus

02:03:50.640 | for their endeavors, whatever those might be.

02:03:53.180 | I mean, that symmetry there,

02:03:55.900 | because clearly people have different needs

02:03:57.980 | and the need to just really trust,

02:03:59.820 | you know, like when Lex is working,

02:04:01.540 | he's in his generative mode and I know he's good.

02:04:06.540 | And so, then they feel sure they've contributed to that,

02:04:11.020 | but then also what you're doing is supporting them

02:04:13.740 | in whatever way it happens to be.

02:04:15.540 | And I think that sometimes you'll see that,

02:04:17.180 | people will pair up along creative creative

02:04:19.140 | or musical musical or computer scientists.

02:04:22.380 | But I think, again, going back to this Conte episode

02:04:25.780 | on relationships is that the superficial labels

02:04:29.640 | are less important, it seems,

02:04:31.020 | than just the desire to create that kind of home life

02:04:34.120 | and relationship together.

02:04:36.000 | And as a consequence, the work mode,

02:04:40.460 | and for some people, both people aren't working

02:04:43.020 | and sometimes they are,

02:04:43.900 | but I think that's the good stuff, you know?

02:04:47.020 | And I think that's the big learning in all of it

02:04:49.260 | is that the further along I go with each birthday,

02:04:52.660 | I guarantee you're gonna be like,

02:04:54.180 | "What I want is simpler and simpler

02:04:56.260 | "and harder and harder to create, but oh, so worth it."

02:05:01.260 | - The inner and the outer peace.

02:05:04.460 | It's been over two years, I think,

02:05:08.700 | since Costello passed away.

02:05:10.280 | - Still tears me up.

02:05:12.540 | I cried about him today.

02:05:15.500 | Cried about him today.

02:05:16.700 | It's proportional to the love,

02:05:21.060 | but yeah, I'll cry about it right now if I think about it.

02:05:22.900 | It wasn't putting him down,

02:05:23.980 | it wasn't the act of him dying, any of that.

02:05:26.140 | Actually, that was a beautiful experience.

02:05:28.740 | I didn't expect it to be,

02:05:30.300 | but it was in my place when I was living in Topanga

02:05:32.300 | during the pandemic where we launched the podcast

02:05:34.340 | and I did it at home and he hated the vets,

02:05:38.380 | I did it at home and he gave out this huge,

02:05:41.420 | (sighs)

02:05:43.820 | right at the end.

02:05:45.140 | And I could just tell he had been in just

02:05:47.300 | not a lot of pain, fortunately,

02:05:48.620 | but he had just been working so hard just to move it all.

02:05:52.300 | And the craziest thing happened,

02:05:54.100 | like it was unbelievable.

02:05:55.260 | I've never had an experience like this.

02:05:56.980 | I expected my heart to break

02:05:59.180 | and I've felt a broken heart before.

02:06:00.740 | I felt it, frankly, when my parents split.

02:06:04.060 | I felt it when Harry shot himself.

02:06:07.140 | I felt it when Barbara died.

02:06:09.260 | I felt it when Ben went.

02:06:11.980 | So as well, and so many friends, like way too many friends.

02:06:16.980 | I mean, end of 2017, my friend Aaron King,

02:06:20.680 | Johnny Fair, John Eichelberry,

02:06:24.840 | stomach cancer, suicide, fentanyl.

02:06:27.740 | It's like, whoa, all in a freaking week.

02:06:30.340 | And I just remember thinking like, what the,

02:06:32.840 | but when it just heartbreak and you just carry that

02:06:35.980 | and it's like, ah, but, and that's just a short list.

02:06:40.060 | And I don't say that for sob stories,

02:06:42.220 | just for a guy that wasn't in the military

02:06:43.660 | or didn't grow up in the inner city.

02:06:44.860 | Like it's an unusual number of like deaths,

02:06:47.300 | like close people.

02:06:48.440 | When Costello went, the craziest thing happened.

02:06:54.260 | My heart warmed up, like heated up.

02:06:56.940 | And I wasn't on MDMA and I wasn't,

02:06:59.220 | I was just, just the moment he went, he just went, whoosh.

02:07:03.420 | And I was like, what the hell is this?

02:07:05.780 | And it was just, it was like a supernatural experience

02:07:08.460 | to me, I just never had that.

02:07:09.660 | I put my grandfather in the ground.

02:07:11.060 | I was a pallbearer at the funeral.

02:07:12.380 | I've like done that more times than I'd like to,

02:07:14.740 | to have ever done it.

02:07:17.140 | And it just heated up with Costello.

02:07:20.220 | And I thought, what the fuck is this?

02:07:22.140 | And it was almost like, and you can make up these,

02:07:24.080 | we make up these stories about what it is,

02:07:25.720 | but it was almost like, he was like, all right,

02:07:28.500 | I have to be careful 'cause I will cry here.

02:07:31.100 | And I don't want to.

02:07:34.180 | It was almost like he was like, all that effort,

02:07:37.300 | 'cause I put in putting so much effort into him.

02:07:39.180 | I was like, all right, you get that back.

02:07:41.180 | It was like the giant frigging thank you.

02:07:44.300 | And it was incredible, you know,

02:07:46.340 | and I'm not embarrassed to shed a tear or two about it

02:07:48.260 | if I have to, like, I was like, holy shit.

02:07:50.740 | Like, that's how close I was to that animal.

02:07:53.380 | - Where do you think, where do you think you can find

02:07:55.940 | that kind of love again?

02:07:57.060 | - Man, I don't know.

02:07:58.420 | I mean, when, and excuse me for welling up,

02:08:01.480 | but it was just, I mean, it's a frigging dog, right?

02:08:03.680 | I get it.

02:08:04.620 | But for me, it was the first real home I ever had.

02:08:09.160 | But when Costello went, it was like,

02:08:13.380 | we'd had this home in Topanga, we'd set it up,

02:08:15.860 | and we're like, and he was just so happy there.

02:08:17.900 | And I think it just, I don't know,

02:08:21.460 | it was like this weird, like victory slash massive loss.

02:08:25.900 | Like, we did it, 11 years.

02:08:28.260 | We can did everything, everything to make him

02:08:32.420 | as comfortable as possible.

02:08:33.380 | And he was super loyal, beautiful animal,

02:08:35.140 | but also just funny and fun.

02:08:37.860 | And I was like, I did it.

02:08:39.980 | Like, I gave as much of myself to this being

02:08:43.540 | as a human, I felt I could without making it,

02:08:47.380 | like detracting from the rest of my life.

02:08:51.180 | And he loved, and so I don't know.

02:08:52.840 | When I think about Barbara, especially,

02:08:55.760 | I well up and it's hard for me, but I mean,

02:08:59.900 | I talked to her before she died

02:09:01.260 | and that was a brutal conversation,

02:09:02.760 | saying goodbye to someone, especially with kids.

02:09:06.160 | And that was hard.

02:09:08.980 | I think that really flipped a switch in me

02:09:15.600 | where I'm like, I always knew I wanted kids.

02:09:17.540 | I say, I want kids, I want a lot of kids.

02:09:19.140 | That flipped a switch in me.

02:09:20.500 | I was like, I want kids, I want my own kids.

02:09:22.820 | - You might be able to find that kind of love.

02:09:24.460 | - Yeah, I think, 'cause it was the caretaking.

02:09:26.740 | It wasn't about what he gave me all that time.

02:09:29.600 | And the more I could take care of him

02:09:31.020 | and see him happy, the better I felt.

02:09:33.060 | It was crazy.

02:09:34.220 | And I don't know.

02:09:36.260 | So I miss him every day, every day.

02:09:40.540 | I miss him every day.

02:09:42.140 | - You got a heart that's so full of love.

02:09:45.940 | I can't wait for you to have kids.

02:09:48.180 | - Thanks, man.

02:09:49.020 | - For you to be a father.

02:09:50.140 | - Yeah, well-- - I can't wait to--

02:09:50.980 | - When I'm ready for it, when God decides I'm ready,

02:09:55.980 | I'll have 'em.

02:09:58.700 | And then I will still beat you to it,

02:10:01.340 | as I told you many times before.

02:10:03.140 | - I think you should absolutely have kids.

02:10:07.900 | I mean, look at the people in our life.

02:10:10.020 | 'Cause we're kind of the,

02:10:11.820 | in case you haven't realized it already,

02:10:13.100 | like we're the younger of the podcasters.

02:10:17.040 | But you know, like Joe and Peter and Sagura

02:10:22.040 | and the rest, right?

02:10:26.100 | They're like the tribal elders, right?

02:10:29.140 | And we're not the youngest in the crew,

02:10:32.660 | but if you look at all those guys,

02:10:36.660 | they all have kids.

02:10:38.500 | They all adore their kids.

02:10:41.140 | And their kids bring tremendous meaning to their life.

02:10:43.860 | Like we'd be morons if you didn't go off and start a family.

02:10:48.860 | I didn't start a family.

02:10:52.080 | And yeah, I think that's the goal.

02:10:55.540 | I mean, I think of the goals, that's one of them.

02:10:58.620 | - Kids not only make their life more joyful

02:11:01.900 | and brings love to their life,

02:11:03.220 | it also makes them more productive,

02:11:04.520 | makes them better people, all that.

02:11:05.900 | It's kind of obvious.

02:11:09.220 | - Yeah, I think that's what Costello wanted.

02:11:11.340 | I think I have this story in my head

02:11:12.740 | that he was just like, "Okay, take this."

02:11:15.060 | - Yeah.

02:11:15.900 | - Yeah.

02:11:16.720 | - And don't fuck this up. - It was a good test.

02:11:19.120 | - Lord knows, don't fuck this up.

02:11:21.580 | - Andrew, I love you, brother.

02:11:23.020 | This was an incredible conversation.

02:11:23.860 | - Love you too.

02:11:24.700 | - I appreciate you.

02:11:26.860 | - We will talk often on each other's podcast

02:11:29.220 | for many years to come.

02:11:30.380 | - Yes.

02:11:31.220 | - Many, many years to come.

02:11:32.060 | - Thank you.

02:11:32.880 | Thanks for having me on here.

02:11:34.140 | And there are no words for how much I appreciate

02:11:37.460 | your example and your friendship.

02:11:38.860 | So love you, brother.

02:11:40.140 | - Love you too.

02:11:40.980 | Thanks for listening to this conversation

02:11:43.740 | with Andrew Huberman.

02:11:44.980 | To support this podcast,

02:11:46.060 | please check out our sponsors in the description.

02:11:48.620 | And now let me leave you with some words from Albert Camus.

02:11:52.700 | In the midst of winter,

02:11:54.260 | I found there was within me an invincible summer.

02:11:58.140 | And that makes me happy,

02:11:59.580 | for it says that no matter how hard

02:12:01.540 | the world pushes against me,

02:12:03.340 | within me, there's something stronger,

02:12:06.060 | something better, pushing right back.

02:12:10.220 | Thank you for listening and hope to see you next time.

02:12:13.180 | (upbeat music)

02:12:15.760 | (upbeat music)

02:12:18.340 | [BLANK_AUDIO]

Andrew Huberman: Relationships, Drama, Betrayal, Sex, and Love | Lex Fridman Podcast #393

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