Most people have probably heard the hypothetical question, what would you do if you knew you couldn't fail? What would you do if you couldn't fail? And Seth turns that around. I think that's a good question. But he turns around and said, what would you do if you knew you were going to fail?

In terms of identifying what you would do for the process, what would you do if you knew it was going to fail? Okay, you're considering these five different projects. Let's say they're all going to fail, but you still have to choose one of the five. Which would you choose?

Yeah, that's a great question. Much harder to answer. And at the same time, I'm called back to when I was a graduate student and still now with the podcast, I have this litmus test, which is, is the experiment that I'm working on the one that I want to be working on most?

Is the podcast that I'm working on the one that I want to be working on most? I mean, there's truly no other podcast I'd rather be having today than this one. And the moment I'm starting to think, oh, I wish I was doing that thing over there, I realize I'm off target.

I'm off target. And I think that asking really good questions is something clearly that you're very good at. And getting a little bit deeper into your process around that, do you write those things down? Like, is there a notebook someplace in the kingdom of Tim Ferriss in Austin or elsewhere that says, you know, those questions that, that essentially those questions are written?

Are they? Yeah. I collect, I literally have a document with questions that I've gathered from Seth printed out and at the Airbnb where I'm staying here. You brought it with you. I printed it out here and then I went through and I read it last night and I was highlighting questions from past interviews I've had with him on my podcast to revisit his questions.

So I was literally doing that last night over dinner and I collect questions. I collect questions. If I am reading a magazine and I come across a good question, I take, I take a photo or I capture it somehow in notes or in Evernote, which I know is kind of old fashioned these days, but I've used it for everything.

So the critical mass is beyond enormous and I do collect and revisit these things. I capture them in journals as well, but I absolutely capture good questions when I find them. Questions are so powerful for the brain. I don't want to go into this in too much detail cause I have a lot more questions for you, but we just wrapped a series on mental health that will come out later this year with Paul Conti and he is brilliant as we both know and does truly important work.

And he pointed to the value of asking really good questions about oneself and because of the way that questions that are really directed at self inquiry queue up the subconscious. So you ask the question and unlike a statement or a meme, the brain works with that in the days and hours after asking the question in ways that simple declarative statements probably don't ping the system the same way, which is probably why we can see so many points of wisdom and truth everywhere and it doesn't necessarily transform us, but asking really good questions really does seem to transform us.

Yeah, there's, I think judging people by their questions is also a shortcut to assessing and learning a lot about how someone functions and what makes them tick. I think it was Voltaire who said, you know, judge a man by his questions, not by his answers. Something along those lines.

But when in doubt, attribute to Voltaire. It sounds good. It does sound good. And I think about this a lot. I do think about the questions and I refine the questions that I ask myself, especially while journaling because it's easier to cross examine and stress test your own certainty and beliefs when they are captured on paper or digitally on a laptop, for instance.

So I do routinely revisit certain questions that I've found helpful over time. I mean, one that people can play with is with whatever is really causing you consternation or stress at the moment, some kind of decision or relationship, business, could be anything. Just what might this look like if it were easy?

What might this look like if it were easy, if it had to be easy, if that were possible, what might it look like? And that could apply to anything. It could apply to anything, you know, could apply to could apply to fitness. It's like, look, if you do really intense kettlebell swings twice a week with proper weight and load and time under tension, and you do pushups a few times a week and handle a couple of other elements, you can get in pretty good shape.

It's so simple, but it hits a lot. I mean, it hits your entire posterior chain. Okay, fine. Do some pushups and some core work, but if you're not exercising at all because you've made the assumption that it's four hours, five hours a week, rather than completely remove that objective and call it just impractical, can you ratchet down the scale?

How far can you ratchet down the scale until you have no excuses? That would just be one example, language learning, tech investing, it applies to everything. Making life easier is something that definitely gets my vote. Yeah. Making it easier and making it more elegant, right? The more pieces in your life you have floating around, the more contacts, the more extraneous loose connections, the harder your life is going to be.

The cognitive overload or overhead is really high. So I'm always looking for maybe like Japanese flower arranger. It's like, okay, how many pieces can I remove while still like maintaining the essence of what I'm trying to achieve? You and Rick Rubin, man, I'm telling you, two people I am fortunate enough to know personally and that I have tremendous respect for and the work is self-evident.

It's really remarkable. So rewind that and listen to that segment right there, folks. I'm telling you, I've worked hard to apply it because it's not my default and boy, does it make a significant improvement to simplify, simplify, simplify.