I have found that spending time in silence in nature without anything to do, disallowing myself from doing things, no note-taking, no reading, et cetera, and spending, I have spent a number of extended fasts in nature, just like water only, by myself, no talking, no reading, no writing. What's extended?

Seven days, generally. Wow. So you're camping in nature? Sure. With just water? Yep. That's it. By myself. And there are risks associated with that, right? You got to be careful, not stupid about it. But that does a lot for me with some persistent benefits. Are there some favorite places that you've gone into nature?

It doesn't have to be too fast. Like, for instance, I'm a big fan of some of the national parks up in the Pacific Northwest because it's like being transported to a different planet. Yosemite is obviously amazing, but any favorite spots where people won't go looking for you there, don't worry.

Yeah. You live in Austin all the time. That's right. Yeah. So I would say Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, spending time in mountains, around rivers, lakes, I find very therapeutic and just gorgeous. I do think we suffer from awe deficiency disorder, you know, a bit of ADD when we're trapped in the mundane for too long with too much distraction, with too many to-dos, with too many relationships.

And there's no space for awe there. There isn't the room necessary. Awe isn't, from my perspective, generally a quick hit that you get in the 30 seconds between using two apps. There's more breathing room required for a genuine transcendent experience of awe. So I try to, on a yearly basis, as one of my top priorities, block out these weeks of time in nature.

Last year was the first year I did that. I went out to Colorado in August and just took daily hikes. I stayed in a hotel. I'm not as beastie as you doing water fast. I was eating every day, but it was spectacular. One thing I noticed, and I'd like to know your process on, how do you handle going back into life?

Great question. You know, because those days were and are amazing, right? You know, detached and, you know, maybe one text message here or there in between hikes or something, and then you just really clued in. Even the process of watching a show at night, like one felt so rich and like enough.

So I wasn't as aesthetic as you were and like really cleaned all the clutter. But once you return to life, it's almost like getting, being awash in demands. And I can see from a place of more equanimity how one could make better choices. But how do you handle those transitions?

The re-entry. Yeah. So before getting to the re-entry, I think it might make sense for me to talk about what comes before. So let's say it's like pre, during, post. Part of the reason I do these one week or longer periods off the grid is because it forces me to put better systems in place.

So there's the benefit that you derive from, say, that week. And I have three weeks coming up right after this interview where I'm going to be off the grid. To set myself up for three weeks off the grid, I have a team. I have the podcast. I have a lot of things that are in motion at any given point in time.

If you disappear for, say, a two to four week period, generally you cannot let the whole house catch on fire, then come back and put it out effectively, which means you need to put some policies and rules and so on in place in advance. And there's a carryover effect that has a host of benefits and makes things smoother for the re-entry.

So they're related. Like the more you set up the pre, the easier the post is going to be. And then you have this beautiful, expansive experience in nature, whatever it might be, whether you're making it a suffer fest like I do or at a hotel at night, either way, these things can work.

And nature in and of itself is super helpful. I do think that a lot of the time we like to imagine because we're driven, smart, accomplished people that our problems are very complex. And at the end of the day, it's like you just need some time in nature and a cold shower and some fucking macadamia nuts and you'll be fine.

You don't need to solve like all the existential dilemmas of humankind actually or fancy pharmaceuticals. So you have this experience over this week and what I will do then is set at least a, let's call it integration period of two to three days where I will slowly edge back in to my previous routine.

I will not within 12 hours of getting back to so-called civilization have a day full of calls or meetings. I will not do that. It's too much of a shock to the system. And I think it robs you of a tail end of benefits, which would also be the case with say fast or ketogenic diet or any number of interventions.

You can squeeze out a long tail of benefits if you make a handful of changes. For instance, after an extended fast, what if you started with a subcaloric ketogenic diet for a few days? You get to extend some of the benefits as opposed to going straight back to say a diet that includes a lot of carbohydrates.

Similarly, when you create more of a vacuum, more space for awe, insight, reflection, recovery, I think you're doing yourself a disservice if you jump from park into sixth gear. And so I plan for that. And it's a function of scheduling. I also have a predictable weekly schedule. So I tend to schedule podcast recordings on Mondays and Fridays.

In preparation for an extended trip, I will batch a lot of similar activities that we have, say, a bunch of episodes in the bank that are pre-scheduled. Everything is figured out in advance. And over time, the more you take these breaks, the better your system has become and the more liberated you are from the day-to-day, which means when you get back, you also don't need to rush as much into hyperactivity.

And if you do, you know that that is more from a compulsivity than from a necessity. While you're on these nature retreats, are you writing on a daily basis? Are you just thinking and allowing thoughts to enter and leave your system? Depends on the retreat. So sometimes I'm writing, but writing, I think, can underscore for me a desire to be compulsively productive.

And I think that is inversely correlated to my happiness or sense of well-being a lot of the time. So there are many areas in my life now. So if you were to ask me, what has changed significantly since the time that you wrote the word for our body, I would say that rather than looking for areas to optimize, I am looking where I can very deliberately de-optimize certain areas to increase sense of well-being.

Where can I de-optimize? Where can I stop measuring? Where can I stop reading books? Which areas can I ignore completely? What types of information can I just excise from my life altogether for a period of time? Delete Twitter. Stop reading about books in X related to, say, AI or whatever it might be.

Like, where can I de-optimize selectively to sort of optimize the whole? Does that make sense? Makes good sense. Yeah. And before we started recording, I gave you a book, which is a short collection of poetry by Halaliza Gafuri, which is called Gold. It's a collection of Rumi poetry. Reading poetry is an activity almost by definition, which is the antithesis of optimization.

So I've tried to also integrate more of those activities into my life. And this relates to your question, because there are times when I will force myself to sit on my goddamn hands and not write, not read. Just do the thing that is so uncomfortable sometimes, which is just sitting there with yourself.

It can be incredibly uncomfortable in part because of the fear that it could be comfortable, especially for proactive people with a strong, to use Paul Conti's words, generative drive. No, you're going to, that's, you know, which is a good thing, I believe. It's a good thing. And it can be a good thing.

It can indicate really incredible adaptations. It can also sometimes, I think, indicate maladaptations, right? And so I think it's helpful to take a break from that generative drive, or at least just put it in park position to see if that generative drive is, is perhaps indicative of you leaning towards something in a healthy, proactive way versus running from something in a long-term destructive way.

Yeah. Well, and I think Paul would say that part of the generative drive process is peace, you know, not as necessarily even as a still state, but as a, you know, being able to experience peace even in the transitions. And there's a lot more to say about that. And he would say it far better than I ever would.

So I'll leave it at that. And I mean, for people who have the option, getting in nature, it doesn't have to be all day, every day on a water fast. I just take certain things to an extreme because that's who I am. Sorry, when you say water fast, that means fasting with water, right?

Fasting, but yes, drinking water. It just means you're allowed to have water and nothing else. For, for a long time, I thought it meant that you're not drinking water. Oh yeah, no, don't do that. Some people do that, right? They do these crazy food, water fasts as a way.

I think they believe it clears senescent cells or something, but probably clears a lot more than just senescent cells. Yeah, there might be something to it. I mean, look, there are people who recycle by drinking their own urine, not my jam. But I would say it's like three hours without shelter, three days without water, three weeks without food, general rule of thumb.

So be careful with dehydration. You can go a long time without food. I don't care how ripped you are. You got 8% body fat, man, you got plenty of time. You can go a couple of weeks, no problem. Yeah, you got calories. 9,000 calories per pound stored body fat.

You got plenty. Don't worry. So for people who have the option to be in nature and just exercise several hours a day to exhaustion, see how many of your problems seem to just go away. Just try that. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.