Order of Man - Everything is F＊cked

00:00:00.000 Hope is something most of us believe is a necessity in order to progress in our lives. I mean,

00:00:04.600 without it, would you be driven to do anything meaningful? It's hope that convinces you of

00:00:09.400 potential reward on the other side of your efforts. But what if the way that you've been

00:00:13.660 looking at hope isn't helping you, but actually hindering? And if that's the case, is there a more

00:00:18.280 practical, pragmatic way for you to approach hopefulness in a way that's going to serve you

00:00:23.240 best? And that's what today's conversation is all about. I'm joined by New York times,

00:00:28.080 best-selling author of The Subtle Art of Not Giving an F and Everything is F'd, Mr. Mark Manson.

00:00:33.780 We talk about the uncomfortable truth that few people are willing to admit to themselves,

00:00:39.180 the difference between master morality and slave morality, how everyone is driven by what he calls

00:00:44.840 the God value, how pain is the universal constant, and why in the midst of everything being horrible,

00:00:51.780 you can still have hope. You're a man of action. You live life to the fullest. Embrace your fears

00:00:56.640 and boldly chart your own path. When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time. Every time,

00:01:03.120 you are not easily deterred or defeated. Rugged, resilient, strong. This is your life. This is who

00:01:09.900 you are. This is who you will become. At the end of the day, and after all is said and done,

00:01:15.480 you can call yourself a man. Gentlemen, what is going on today? My name is Ryan Michler. I am the host

00:01:21.300 and the founder of the Order of Man podcast and movement. Guys, this is a movement to reclaim and

00:01:26.240 restore masculinity to its proper place. What is its proper place? It's a place of honor and integrity

00:01:33.260 and respect and strength and capability. And to that end, we've got this podcast. We've got

00:01:38.980 our social media channels. We've got YouTube. We've got our exclusive brotherhood. We've got courses.

00:01:44.980 We've got so much available to you. But since you're listening to this podcast, whether you're

00:01:48.740 new to the podcast or have been listening for any amount of time, what you need to know is that we

00:01:54.820 are interviewing some of the most incredible, successful men on the planet. Today, I've got

00:01:58.900 Mark Manson, a highly, highly successful author and writer and thinker. I'm going to introduce him

00:02:04.800 to you in a minute as if he needs an introduction. But we've also had other guys like Jocko Willink and

00:02:09.860 Andy Frisilla and Tim Kennedy and Matt Best and Dakota Meyer and Grant Cardone and Brian Rose and

00:02:17.880 the lineup. I say this every week of men who have joined and band with us in some way is

00:02:24.100 absolutely incredible and a testament to the fact that these guys want to be involved in what it is

00:02:29.620 we're doing. And it's my job to take all of the information they're sharing and all of their

00:02:34.740 experience and distill it down into something that each and every one of us can use in our own

00:02:38.960 personal lives. So I'm going to get to the conversation with Mark here in just a minute.

00:02:42.740 I do want to make a mention of my friends over at Origin. If you've been listening for any amount

00:02:48.460 of time, you've heard me talk about these guys. Guys, I talk with them about them, I should say,

00:02:52.880 because they're friends of mine and they're doing incredible work, especially when it comes to

00:02:58.480 manufacturing in America without compromise. It's clear that we've got some supply issues,

00:03:05.900 that we've got some supply chain problems globally. And these guys have been for a very long time now

00:03:12.980 working on shoring up those supply chains with everything made and distributed and manufactured

00:03:19.560 in America. They're making geese and rash guards, denim and boots. They've got a lineup of exercise

00:03:26.240 equipment and also a nutritional supplemental lineup partnered up with Jocko Willink. So if you're

00:03:32.120 interested in any of that and their story, which is incredible, again, a hundred percent made in

00:03:36.480 America without compromise, which is something that is becoming more and more evident that we need to

00:03:41.840 look into and take a serious consideration with go check out origin at origin, main.com. And if you

00:03:48.800 pick up any of their products or merchandise, use the code order or D E R at checkout, that will let

00:03:54.480 them know that you came from this podcast. And then also you'll get a discount as well. Again,

00:03:59.400 origin, main.com and use the code order at checkout. All right, guys, let me introduce my guest. Most of

00:04:06.520 you don't need an introduction, but for those of you who do, let me introduce you anyways. His name is

00:04:11.400 Mark Manson. Again, it's very likely that you're already familiar with him, or at least his two books

00:04:16.440 that are his last two books, I should say, because he has, has more than just these two. But the last two

00:04:21.860 are the subtle art of not giving an F and everything is F'd. He's again, a New York times bestselling

00:04:27.460 author. He's a self-described thinker and life enthusiast. Part of the reason for his unbelievable

00:04:34.260 success, I believe is his no BS approach to self-development. In fact, that's the reason why

00:04:39.300 I follow him and the words that he shares very closely. We live, and this is no surprise to you

00:04:44.860 guys in an environment and popular culture designed to make everyone feel good about themselves.

00:04:50.100 Uh, but Mark would rather bring to light the uncomfortable truths that few people are willing

00:04:56.500 to deal with, but need to be dealt with. So guys, I think you're going to like this one

00:05:00.840 as much as I enjoyed the conversation. So sit back, uh, take some notes and listen to the

00:05:05.480 way that it really is. Mark, what's going on, man. Thanks for joining me on the podcast.

00:05:10.660 Hey, it's good to be here. I thought, I thought I lost your audio again, but, uh, I think we're,

00:05:16.680 I think we're okay. It was, it was cutting out a little bit there, right? When you hit record.

00:05:21.280 Of course. Like when you need it is when it doesn't work, right? That's how it goes.

00:05:25.020 Exactly. Exactly. I've been looking forward to this conversation for a long time. I've been

00:05:29.140 following you for a couple of years now since, uh, uh, since the subtle art of not giving an F came out

00:05:35.040 and, uh, glad we could be talking about this book, which I've been going through again. I went

00:05:39.760 through it earlier, but going through it again over the past couple of weeks. Nice. Yeah, man.

00:05:44.360 Uh, I think it's a breath of fresh air, uh, in an environment where it seems like everybody's

00:05:48.840 trying to give hope and optimism and fluffy unicorn dreams. And like this to me represents reality,

00:05:56.940 which is, I think why so many men will resonate with your work and what you're talking about.

00:06:01.920 Yeah. Yeah. I, I, um, it's a, it's a weird time for sure. And it was funny because it was weird

00:06:08.500 even before this, the whole Corona virus thing started. And, uh, well, you know, I wrote the

00:06:13.760 book in that, in that pre Corona environment of everybody kind of hyperventilating about

00:06:19.860 everything. Um, and so now that we are actually amid, uh, a real crisis, it's, it's been interesting.

00:06:29.720 There's kind of that the book has gotten a resurgence and a lot more attention the last few

00:06:33.740 weeks. Yeah. I mean, I imagine now is where, uh, people cling to look for grasp for any,

00:06:41.460 any hope they can, any optimism they can possibly find, uh, to overcome some of the issues they've

00:06:48.660 been dealing with. So I imagine when it is difficult, uh, things like that are more prevalent

00:06:52.960 for people. Yeah, for sure. For sure. So how do you think people generally in the light of like

00:07:01.040 Corona virus fallout and maybe furloughed or loss of a job and staying at home and all the other

00:07:05.500 changes, how do you feel generally the people who've reached out to you are responding based

00:07:10.300 on the work you've done and your approach to hope, which we'll delve more into throughout the

00:07:14.160 conversation, obviously. Uh, it's been a pretty good, you know, I, I always feel bad talking about

00:07:22.020 this because so many people are struggling and, you know, have lost jobs, lost income, lost businesses.

00:07:29.560 Um, you know, my, my, my brand and my message apparently does great in a recession and in a

00:07:36.540 crisis, you know, which, which makes sense because everything I write about is about

00:07:40.320 struggle, like dealing with struggles, dealing with problems, how to handle like negative emotions.

00:07:45.860 Um, and it's, uh, so I, I've actually seen a swell of engagement on my website and on my newsletter

00:07:55.140 and a lot of people are reaching out. And so I've actually just been kind of re writing week to week

00:08:01.380 about, um, kind of, I guess just different psychological angles and topics of this moment

00:08:09.380 in our history and like kind of getting through this moment together. Um, the email I sent out,

00:08:15.220 uh, today actually, um, was about, uh, was all about how, you know, we're going to pretty soon

00:08:24.360 FOMO is going to be replaced by FOGO, which is the fear of going out. So it's, you know,

00:08:28.960 even when the economy opens back up and, and everything is kind of starts returning to normal,

00:08:34.280 like we're, we're going to have this, this ambient anxiety in our, in our lives of like,

00:08:39.320 Oh, do I really want to go to the basketball game? Is it worth it? I don't know. Like grandma's

00:08:43.300 coming next week. Um, and so it's, it's just going to be a weird new normal. And, um, and so it's,

00:08:50.680 it's a process that I'm living through week to week and, and my, my readers are kind of living

00:08:55.500 through it with me week to week. Yeah, that, that makes sense. It's, it's, um, I think during times

00:09:02.000 like this, anytime there's a variable, people are just trying to find their footing. It seems like,

00:09:06.340 like, how do I, how do I get to some level of comfort? Like it doesn't need to be ultimate comfort,

00:09:11.940 but some level of comfort where I can go on. Maybe I can find some routines and rhythm in my life

00:09:17.240 and find some semblance of normalcy in this chaotic and hectic time filled with a lot of

00:09:23.680 unknown variables. Yeah. I mean, we need, and this is one of the things I talk about in the book is

00:09:29.860 that like, it's just a basic psychological need for certainty or like some sense of certainty or control

00:09:35.400 in our lives. And, um, you know, in, in normal times we, you know, we develop, we develop these

00:09:41.960 large social routines, you know, we get up, we go to work the same time every day, we work the same

00:09:46.260 people, we do the same thing, we come home to the same house. And, uh, you know, part of the scariest

00:09:52.140 thing about these times is, is that a lot of those routines get jumbled up and suddenly our lives

00:09:58.780 become extremely uncertain. And I think we're, we're all kind of living with this uncertainty of like,

00:10:03.760 we have no idea how things are going to be in three or six months from now. And that just people

00:10:11.800 respond to that differently, but they respond to that with, um, they respond to it emotionally and

00:10:18.060 negatively. Yeah. Yeah. Some people get angry. Some people get sad. Some people get apathetic. Um,

00:10:25.860 but we all kind of retreat and try to cope with it in our own ways. Do you think it's best to

00:10:32.700 try to find some level of routine and practices that you can create some normalcy in your life?

00:10:38.820 Is it best to roll with it and be open to variables? I imagine it's probably somewhere

00:10:42.860 in between. Like, how do you strike that balance between, yeah, what happens happens. So I'm just

00:10:47.780 going to deal with it as it comes. But in the meantime, I'm going to be doing X, Y, and Z to set

00:10:51.600 myself up. Yeah. I, you know, during this time, it's funny because I, I actually found, you know,

00:10:58.440 and I've worked from home for like 10 years and I've, I actually found myself struggling to get

00:11:03.420 out of bed, like missing work calls and missing things like that. I'm like, and this stuff used

00:11:09.380 to never happen. And I was like, okay, I need, I need to kind of dive into this. So, um, a few weeks

00:11:16.260 ago, I actually, I talked to a number of mental health professionals. Um, I did a bunch of, you know,

00:11:21.280 research, looking through studies and stuff online. And, um, basically it's, it's people

00:11:27.700 kind of the number one piece of advice, uh, in any sort of circumstance like this, people who are

00:11:33.900 like socially isolated or, um, quarantined or, or just physically isolated is, is always to create

00:11:40.080 some sort of daily structure for yourself. So, you know, get up at the same time, create some sort

00:11:46.040 of morning ritual. You know, if you, if you're lucky enough to work from home, you know, set your

00:11:51.820 hours and kind of stick to them as if it's a regular work day. If you're not, uh, working at the moment,

00:11:57.520 like find something productive and useful to do each day, spend a few hours doing it. Um, cause it's

00:12:04.380 just, our mind needs that framework and that structure to, for everything else to kind of function

00:12:11.220 efficiently. Um, and so if you're just kind of like drifting from day to day with no real urgency or,

00:12:19.580 uh, uh, and lots of uncertainty, then, then you're just kind of going to kind of like get lost in the

00:12:26.300 Netflix binges and, you know, eating chocolate and drinking beer all day. Like it's, it's just going to,

00:12:33.560 it's going to go downhill fast. Which, you know, like when you talk about it like that, I'm like,

00:12:37.080 that actually sounds pretty good. But then, you know, you engage in that, you know,

00:12:40.700 you know, not only do you not, should you not be doing it, but then you just feel guilty for doing

00:12:45.900 it too. Right. And so it just creates this like perpetual snowball of bad behavior, guilt for the

00:12:51.160 bad behavior, and then bad behavior to subdue the guilt that I was experiencing because I engaged in

00:12:56.760 bad behavior. Yeah. And, and it's like, you know, and under normal circumstances, it feels good to

00:13:03.720 indulge those things because there's kind of a backstop, right? So it's, you know, you got to go back to

00:13:08.760 work on Monday morning. So, all right, yeah, let's go on a bender on Saturday and recover Sunday and

00:13:14.320 then things will be fine. The problem with times like this is there's no backstop. Like you don't

00:13:18.160 have to be anywhere. You don't have to see anybody. So fuck it. Let's get drunk on a Wednesday afternoon.

00:13:25.380 You know, like I've been, I've been talking to my friends and we've been saying like, it feels like

00:13:29.540 we're in college again, you know, where it's just like, you know what, let's skip class today. Let's,

00:13:33.700 let's drink a bunch of beer and like, you know, watch TV and yeah, nothing's stopping you.

00:13:39.960 That's fine. Is this like, I took a couple of notes here, but is this akin to the moral gap

00:13:45.860 that you talk about where, you know, we have this, this reaction or the way that we respond. And then,

00:13:50.680 you know, maybe it's lack of responsibility, for example, and then we justify it because, well,

00:13:56.480 Monday through Friday, I'm completely responsible. So it's okay that I do it now.

00:14:00.280 Yeah. I mean, one of the things I talk about in chapter two of, of everything is fuck that I,

00:14:07.540 that definitely comes into play here is, is that our, our own brains aren't really trustworthy.

00:14:14.100 Like most of us assume that we're very rational people and that we like sit down and make very

00:14:20.040 rational decisions. But the truth is, is, is, you know, psychology has shown for decades that actually

00:14:26.200 we're, we're, we're very emotional and impulsive and really what our rational mind or, or what I call

00:14:31.960 the thinking brain does is it just makes up reasons for what we did later, you know? So, uh,

00:14:39.920 a really simple and bad example is, is like, you know, all right, Wednesday, Wednesday evening,

00:14:46.840 I'm feeling crappy to get today. I'm going to drink some whiskey. Cause you know, why the hell not?

00:14:53.220 I have nothing to do. Right. You know, I haven't left the house in three weeks. You know, what's the

00:14:56.820 point? Um, and that's, that's an, that's a decision made on impulse made on, on, on emotional feeling,

00:15:04.540 but then our, our logical mind will, you know, we, we can't really, we need to feel like we're,

00:15:10.640 we're doing, we're being a reasonable person. And so the logical mind sets the work, finding reasons

00:15:15.320 why that's a good idea. It's like, well, you know, you, you work so hard, uh, you know,

00:15:20.580 the first quarter of this year, like you deserve to have an extended break and not just treat it

00:15:25.440 like a sabbatical. You know, you've never really taken an extended amount of time off,

00:15:29.240 so don't beat yourself up about it. You know, it's like, we slowly like talk our way into it.

00:15:33.920 And, uh, and the problem is, is our mind is always doing that. Like it's, it's, there's no,

00:15:38.900 and the thing that kind of keeps, that keeps us sane is accountability with each other.

00:15:42.940 You know, it's like, I honestly, like the, the, one of the only things that like made me do any

00:15:50.400 work today whatsoever is the fact that I was getting on a call with you at 4 p.m. because,

00:15:55.820 because I'm like, I know if I don't do it before the call, that it's definitely not going to happen

00:16:00.780 after. And if I, and if I, and if I don't do it, you know, at all, then like, I'm just going to feel

00:16:07.800 like I wasted an entire day. And so it's, it's, it's having these points of accountability with

00:16:13.420 other people where it's the pain of, it's like the embarrassment of, of like, oh, I don't want

00:16:18.280 to look like an asshole to Ryan. Uh, so I'm going to do X, Y, and Z on Monday afternoon. Uh, you know,

00:16:25.040 like that's what keeps us sane. That's what keeps us like productive because when we're left to our

00:16:30.260 own devices, we can just talk ourselves into anything. Yeah. And that, that is one of the things

00:16:35.360 that I really liked about what you talked about in the book, I think you called it or talked about

00:16:39.200 it as being integrated, right? The feeling, the feeling brain versus the thinking brain,

00:16:43.780 and you're trying to integrate them, right? Cause I see what a lot of people do is they'll be,

00:16:49.560 and I'm sure we'll get into this more, but they'll be overly emotional and they'll allow

00:16:54.540 their emotions solely to dictate entirely how they live their life. And then you see those individuals

00:17:01.020 who try as hard as they can to ensure that it's only logical, it's only rational, it's only thinking

00:17:07.940 brain, and they don't integrate the way they feel about things into the equation at all. And, and,

00:17:12.940 and I really liked that idea of the integrated brain between both of them.

00:17:17.180 Yeah. Cause both one without the other is unhealthy, you know, it's the person who's all thinking brain

00:17:23.880 all the time. They become very detached from their own emotional wellbeing and, and the emotional

00:17:30.800 wellbeing of others. Um, and they also, they become very unaware of their own biases and prejudices.

00:17:36.620 They, because they think they're being rational, but most of the time we're not being rational.

00:17:41.580 Exactly. Yeah. I say they, but we is probably the better term there for sure.

00:17:45.020 All of us. Right. Yeah. And, um, you know, and then the feeling brain is just,

00:17:50.760 it's like our, it's like our inner, inner monkey. Like it was just, we will, we just want to eat,

00:17:56.940 eat tasty stuff and poop and fuck each other. And like, you know, like that's all we're right.

00:18:03.560 That part of the brain is just on that, like eat, sleep, fuck like 24 seven. And so you need to,

00:18:10.540 you know, you, you need to find some sort of happy balance between the two because the, the,

00:18:17.500 the animalistic side of us or the feeling side of us, like that's where our, our motivation comes

00:18:22.400 from. It's where our inspiration comes from. It's where our drive comes from. And so we want,

00:18:26.280 we want to keep that. We don't want to suppress it. But at the same time, if we don't check

00:18:31.140 ourselves by questioning ourselves logically, by being skeptical of ourselves and other people,

00:18:37.020 um, by setting out plans and accountability for ourselves, uh, you know, then we, we just become

00:18:43.640 kind of this, this, uh, this raging lunatic. Um, and so I, I kind of described the, you know,

00:18:50.980 the process of maturity is essentially getting your two brains to speak to each other and listen

00:18:55.940 to each other. Like finding that, that balance between the emotional side of yourself and the

00:19:01.860 impulsive side, and then the, the more logical and, and the, the higher, um, you know, the higher

00:19:09.340 side of, of human nature. Right. Yeah. It seems to me, I mean, the term I've looked at in the past

00:19:14.880 or thought of it as like reprogramming, or I've even thought about it in the context of working

00:19:19.840 out, like how do you disguise working out so you can trick yourself into doing it? And for me,

00:19:25.020 it was always sports. Like if I was playing football or playing basketball, or I was doing

00:19:30.860 something that was competitive with other men and we were trying to beat each other, like obviously

00:19:37.360 there's exercise and training and physicality built into it, but that was the by-product of the

00:19:42.740 fact that we're just trying to win and have fun. Right. And so I disguised it. Is that what you

00:19:46.860 would suggest? Like reprogramming the way that you view tedious, monotonous, even things that you

00:19:53.560 don't want to do, like eating the right diet and engaging in physical activity and exertion when

00:19:58.700 maybe you haven't for the past decade. Yeah. I think a lot of it is just becoming aware of

00:20:05.740 I always see it as like becoming aware of how our mind actually works, because once you become aware

00:20:12.860 of it, you can start taking advantage of it, or you can start, there's a term called nudging. You

00:20:17.960 can start nudging yourself towards the right behaviors. And so, you know, social accountability

00:20:24.020 is like the top thing. You know, we are a social emotional species. And so what you were saying

00:20:31.080 with sports, like I, people rip on CrossFit a lot. Like I tried CrossFit a few years ago and I did it

00:20:37.740 for a few months and it was, it was so interesting because, uh, you know, I could be by myself or even

00:20:45.140 like with a friend, like I could have a friend who'd be like, do 20 pushups and then sprint around the

00:20:50.800 block. And I'd be like, fuck you, dude. I'm not doing that. That sounds horrible. But then you,

00:20:55.400 you walk into a CrossFit gym and they're like, okay, you and you and you, you're on a team,

00:20:59.980 you, you, you, and are on a team. Everybody do 20 pushups and run around the block. First team to

00:21:04.320 win, you know, like is the winner. And like people go fucking nuts. Like I, like I would work out harder

00:21:10.640 than I've ever worked out in my life at these places. And you see why so many people get injured

00:21:15.760 just because it's like, you're emotional, right? Yeah. You're, you're like, you're on it. It's,

00:21:20.900 there's a very instinctive part of ourselves that like, we look to be on a team and we look to

00:21:26.200 compete with others. And, and CrossFit is just like nailed, take it, like finding that instinctual

00:21:33.080 side of ourselves and then leveraging it to get us to work out like crazy people. Right. And, uh,

00:21:38.620 it's, it's a lot like to me, you know, I think about my children, like if I want my kids to do

00:21:43.160 something and they won't do it, I just get out my phone. I'm like, I'll time you. And like 50 to 70%

00:21:49.680 of the time, they're like, okay, yeah, I'll do it. You know, the other 30, they still won't do it,

00:21:54.040 but it doesn't work sometimes. Yeah. It's, it's, there's like little, you know,

00:21:59.920 they're like little like mind hacks like that. Um, you know, one, one thing that's super simple,

00:22:05.360 uh, that, that, that research has shown is like, if you really want to get yourself to do something

00:22:10.320 that you don't want to do, um, you simply create repercussions, repercussions that are more painful.

00:22:15.580 So, um, you know, one thing that I've done before and, and a lot of my, my writing friends do is if

00:22:23.540 we're on deadline or if like, we are like, we really need to get a book done or a draft done

00:22:27.820 or something. And we're not like months are going by and we're just, it's not happening. Um, I'll go

00:22:34.540 like, I'll go to somebody in my family and I'll be like, look, you know, I'll hand them a check for a

00:22:39.080 couple thousand bucks. And I'm like, look, if I don't have a draft done in three months,

00:22:44.380 go cash this check. And yeah. And it's, it's terrifying. Yeah, for sure. For sure. You know,

00:22:51.320 you, and you, you like write, you write in the amount of money that would be very painful. And,

00:22:56.660 uh, and, and it, it, it completely changes things. Uh, you know, one thing I'm doing during this time

00:23:02.840 to kind of help with that accountability, that day-to-day routine and accountability is,

00:23:06.700 is, um, I texted one of my author buddies and I'm like, dude, are you having trouble? Like

00:23:11.620 getting started in the morning, like laying around in bed till 10 or 11. And, and he was like, yeah,

00:23:16.580 dude. I'm like, all right, let's do this. Like every morning, 8 a.m. Uh, zoom call for like 10

00:23:24.140 minutes. And we're just going to say like what we want to get done that morning. And that's it. Like,

00:23:29.040 you know, just check in with each other. And then if one of us like blows it repeatedly,

00:23:33.660 then, you know, we'll punish each other somehow. We'll come up with something, but it's just like,

00:23:39.120 just the social shame of, man, I don't want my buddy to get up at 8 a.m. And for me, like,

00:23:45.880 like I would feel like such a dick if I was sleeping in and my, my friend is like,

00:23:50.900 waiting for you. Yeah. Just like that, that is so much scarier than, than anything else I could come

00:23:59.440 up with on my own that, that it's like, yeah, I just get up. Yeah. Yeah. What are your thoughts

00:24:04.500 about wrapping up your identity in your, in your, in your performance or your actions? You know,

00:24:10.340 like I think about, for example, there there's things that I've tried to try to quit or change

00:24:14.840 about my life, even exercise. And just thinking to myself, you know, healthy people do X, Y, and Z.

00:24:21.660 And it seems to me just that thought alone has helped me push towards doing the thing that I have a

00:24:26.760 desire to do, even though I don't always feel like doing it. Yeah. I think whenever, whenever you're

00:24:34.040 talking about like implementing habits into your life, you know, I think, I think that the process

00:24:41.880 kind of happens in a few different phases. And one of them is one of the kind of the last pieces to fall

00:24:49.140 into place is that identity of component. And I think part of what prevents people from, you know, say,

00:24:55.560 getting like exercising for the first time in 10 years or changing up their diet or taking on a

00:25:03.100 new hobby or something is, is that they've adopted this, an identity for themselves of like, oh, I'm

00:25:08.020 not the type of person who does that. Right. You know, maybe, maybe they're always the chubby friend.

00:25:12.880 And it was kind of like the joke, their group of friends. And they've just, it's so internalized

00:25:17.740 that they've just assumed without even thinking about it for years and years and years. Like,

00:25:23.400 I'm not the type of guy that works out. I'm not the type of guy that, uh, learns how to,

00:25:29.420 to paint or like learns how to, you know, fix a car or whatever. Um, we tell us, we, we tell

00:25:37.500 ourselves these stories throughout our lives so much that we forget that we're telling them. And so

00:25:41.960 when it, when the time comes where you actually do want to adopt some new behavior, um, you're already,

00:25:49.220 you're starting out working against yourself. And so ideally when you're adopting a new habit or

00:25:55.140 whatever, you know, the first few weeks, it's just, it's kind of pure willpower. Um, but slowly you

00:26:02.180 should start to find the things about that new behavior, that new habit that are enjoyable,

00:26:06.300 some of the benefits that are enjoyable. And, uh, and then kind of the last piece to fall into place

00:26:11.860 is like, wait, maybe I am the type of guy who does X. Maybe I am a healthy person. Maybe this

00:26:17.920 is the new me. Right. Um, and so it's, um, the identity thing is it's, uh, it's a, it's a deep

00:26:26.500 level of questioning that has very practical ramifications. Yeah. I can see where you're

00:26:33.620 saying it, where it would come in last and what you were talking about where, you know, we've,

00:26:37.660 we've wrote this programming for so long and we've bought into it that it's very hard to believe that

00:26:43.600 it's even programming. Like we just think it is what it is. Right. And it's like, yeah, you know,

00:26:48.340 it wasn't always that way somewhere along the way we believed something initially, or we heard

00:26:53.620 something or we read something and then we adopted it even just like to this degree. And then we spent a

00:26:59.460 bunch of time reinforcing that thought. And now we don't think it's a script. We just believe

00:27:04.060 that it is objectively reality. This is the way it is. There's no ifs, ands, or buts about it.

00:27:10.660 Yeah. It just seems obvious, you know, it's, I tell people all the time that I didn't even,

00:27:17.160 I didn't even know I was good at writing until I was like 28, you know? And, and it's, it's,

00:27:24.900 it's crazy. You know, like my, I never got good grades in English class. I never got good grades

00:27:33.000 on my essays or my papers. Looking back, it's because I didn't follow the fucking assignment,

00:27:38.040 but it's at the time I didn't realize that. I thought that was a bad thing. I thought I was

00:27:42.640 just like bad at English. Right. You couldn't do it. Right. Yeah. I was just a bad writer. And so,

00:27:48.180 you know, at the beginning and early in my career, I start, I kept trying to start all these internet

00:27:52.720 businesses and the internet businesses kept failing, but the blogs, like I, I would create a blog as a way

00:28:00.660 to like get traffic to the internet business. Right. And the business, like nobody would buy

00:28:04.640 anything and wouldn't make any money, but the blogs were really popular. And it finally, like,

00:28:09.760 it took like two years for it to dawn on me. I'm like, wait, maybe I'm actually good at this writing

00:28:14.800 thing. Yeah. That's funny. Cause you just bought into that script that you weren't for so long.

00:28:20.440 And it had to take some sort of a jolt or something. Cause I imagine like it isn't going to

00:28:24.700 change. That script isn't going to change. In fact, I think you wrote it in the book

00:28:27.480 that in order for you to change that thing, I'm just obviously paraphrasing here.

00:28:32.600 You have to be introduced to some contrary thought or idea. Otherwise, like, how are you

00:28:38.360 going to grow? How are you going to change the perspective that you're on right now?

00:28:42.060 Yeah. It's you, you, there has to be some sort of like contrary experience for you to start shifting,

00:28:47.160 um, your, your perception of yourself. I used to run into this a lot, you know, back early in my

00:28:54.780 career, I used to do one-on-one coaching and, and most, most of my clients were actually young

00:29:00.480 men. And I, it was super interesting to me how a lot of the guys that I worked with, they were

00:29:07.420 basically, they were kind of like your, your zero to hero story. They're like, they're nerds in high

00:29:14.940 school, got picked on, got bullied. None of the girls liked them. And then by the time they got to

00:29:21.120 like their earlier mid twenties, they, they came into their own and they were actually like really

00:29:26.300 cool, really cool guys, but they had never had those social experiences and those sexual

00:29:32.940 experiences. So they were, they were kind of like starting way behind. And I remember working with

00:29:40.160 guys. Like, I remember I, I worked with this guy once, like he looked like a fucking male model.

00:29:45.320 Like he was the type of guy, like literally we would walk down the street and girls would like

00:29:50.020 stop and stare at him. And, and in his mind, he, he had never had a girlfriend. And in his mind,

00:29:55.740 he was like, he was a loser, right? Like he's still like, nobody wanted to talk to him or hang

00:30:00.460 out with him. And I'm like, dude, you are doing, I'm like, can I just hang out with you? Maybe they

00:30:06.840 were looking at you, Mark. I don't know. It could have been that, right? Yeah. Maybe I was,

00:30:11.320 maybe I was, I was completely up, but it's, um, it was incredible because people's perception of

00:30:18.860 themselves off would lag reality a number of years. Um, you see this too with people who lose tons

00:30:28.700 of weight. Like they still think that they're overweight, like even though that they're like

00:30:33.400 fit and right. Um, they still feel out of shape or they still feel like they're a person out of

00:30:40.420 shape and like that they don't, they don't have that comfort with their body that people who,

00:30:44.860 who've been in shape for a long time have. Um, so yeah, the identity piece is always kind of,

00:30:52.580 it's a little bit off. Um, and, and the reason, one of the reasons for that, that I talk about in

00:31:00.280 the book is that it's just because our identity is just completely made up. It's just, it's a bunch

00:31:04.540 of stories that we've told ourselves, uh, from our experiences throughout our life. And some of those

00:31:12.460 experiences can be true and important. Um, and some of those experiences can just be total

00:31:18.400 bullshit. You know, it's like some random thing happens when you're a kid and next thing, you know,

00:31:25.340 you, you spend half of your life, you know, believing you're stupid when you're not.

00:31:29.600 Right. And, and what you talk a lot about too, is this is like kind of that uncomfortable truth is

00:31:35.340 that none of it really matters. Like we attach so much meaning to things that are insignificant in the

00:31:41.540 grand scheme of things. I had made a post on Instagram. This was a couple of weeks ago,

00:31:45.120 or maybe a couple of months ago. And I said something to the effect that like, if I died,

00:31:49.940 like this podcast would be forgotten in like a week, if that, you know, like tomorrow people would

00:31:56.420 find a new podcast. Like, Oh, I guess Ryan's not doing podcasts anymore. And I was actually,

00:32:01.320 they'd be like, they'd be like, man, Ryan's such a lazy dick. Exactly.

00:32:05.640 Yeah. That's probably more accurate. So I, so I was thinking, you know,

00:32:10.760 I was thinking about it from the context of like, I wasn't beating myself up. I was like,

00:32:15.400 Oh, this is interesting. Like I can let some of the pressure off on myself. Cause really it doesn't

00:32:20.460 actually matter. And I was coming from the position of like what you described, which is

00:32:24.700 hopeful. And like, this is, this is actually a little bit liberating. And it was funny. Cause I

00:32:29.080 had a lot of people message me back and like, Oh, that's a really grim way to look at it. I hope

00:32:33.720 you're okay. And I hope things are okay. And you're, you're doing all right. I'm like,

00:32:37.180 I'm actually, I'm good. Like I'm okay with the fact that, you know, the podcast will be forgotten

00:32:42.420 fairly shortly, but in the meantime, like I'm going to make the most of it. Cause I enjoy doing

00:32:46.700 it. I want to do it. It seems to help people. And that's about where it ends for me. And that's

00:32:51.120 actually been a very liberating thought. It's totally liberating. And it's, it's,

00:32:56.960 and I agree. Like most people's first reaction is like, wow, dude, that's dark. Yeah. It's like,

00:33:01.940 no, it's, we're all going to die. And the vast majority of the things that we say and do

00:33:06.700 aren't really going to matter. And it's not only does that free us to experiment, to experience

00:33:14.200 failure, to experience rejection, but it, it frees us to, um, I guess to just to, to more honestly

00:33:21.780 pursue what feels right to ourselves. Um, and it's, it is a very freeing thing. You know,

00:33:30.240 one of my favorite quotes, uh, comes from David Foster Wallace. And he said, uh, he said,

00:33:36.060 you'll stop worrying how much people fit or he said, you'll stop worrying what people think about

00:33:40.500 you when you realize how seldom they do. Yes. And it's, I remember reading that in my mid twenties

00:33:48.300 and just like stopping and like shutting the book because, because I had a lot of social anxiety when

00:33:54.100 I was younger and I was like, Oh my God. I'm like, that's right. Like, I don't like when I go into

00:33:59.880 a party. I don't fucking care about 90% of the people there. I'm not looking at their shoes or

00:34:05.360 like what they're drinking. Right. I don't fucking care. Right. I'm like, wow. Nobody,

00:34:11.120 but you think they're caring like that about you. Exactly. Yeah, exactly. It's funny. Cause we do,

00:34:17.620 we do make up stories like every once in a while, for example, if I reach out, like, let's say early

00:34:24.180 on in this podcasting thing, which was like five years ago, I reached out to you and I said, Hey man,

00:34:28.400 I'd love to have you on the podcast. And you didn't respond or answer back. My knee jerk reaction was

00:34:32.680 like, Oh, he doesn't like what we're doing or he doesn't get it. Or he doesn't like the way that we

00:34:38.260 do it. I'm like, that is entirely just, that's a lie that's made up. I have no idea. Maybe you just

00:34:44.580 didn't see the damn email. Like it could have just been that. Right. So I've learned to, if I'm going to

00:34:51.720 make up stories, which is mostly what we're doing when we're responding to other people, like I'm going to

00:34:55.920 make up a story that doesn't make me feel like crap. Like, like, like instead of, Oh, Mark doesn't

00:35:02.900 like what we're doing. He's not into this. He doesn't want to join us on the show. It's no,

00:35:06.280 he just didn't see the email. And when he sees it, if he sees it at some point, he'll get around and

00:35:09.780 we'll make it happen. Like if the, if it's going to be a lie, I'm going to make that lie instead.

00:35:13.580 And that's actually been really helpful for me. Yeah. Yeah. And it's, and I come back to,

00:35:20.240 I just have a very fundamental belief that most people, most people are good. Like most people

00:35:27.060 are good. Most people are, have very good intentions. Yeah. Uh, I, I just think that

00:35:32.460 we're all like a bunch of fucking monkeys and have no idea what we're doing, you know? So it's,

00:35:37.380 there's a, there's a thing called Hanlon's razor, which says that never attribute to malice,

00:35:41.880 what can be explained by ignorance. And it's just, I've noticed that very similar to what you said.

00:35:48.940 I've noticed that over the years in my career, it's, you keep expecting. I remember when I first

00:35:54.860 got it, got my first book deal, I kind of had this expectation of like, Oh man, publishing industry,

00:35:59.160 like all these like big wigs in the, in their skyscrapers and Manhattan are like choosing

00:36:05.800 which books are going to be the next hits and all this stuff. Right. You go in these meetings and like,

00:36:11.220 they, like most people have no fucking clue what they're talking about. And it's, you know,

00:36:17.080 everybody's just taking their best guess and it's, it's, um, so it's, it, that's another,

00:36:25.780 it, it helps to not take things personally, you know, like it's, it's not about you. And it's almost,

00:36:33.400 it's almost crazy to explain those things as being about you. It's, it's, you know, it's like if every

00:36:40.580 email you send that doesn't get responded to you, you decide it's cause they hate you. Like that's,

00:36:45.020 that's like, that's like a form of narcissism. Oh yeah. How arrogant do you need to be to believe

00:36:50.660 that? Right. Yeah. Yeah. It's like, no, no, it's just people are fucking busy, man. Right.

00:36:56.120 Have you seen my inbox? Which by the way, I got to say, when I reached out for this, I,

00:37:01.580 I had went through your contact form and then I talked to some, some mutual friends of ours as well.

00:37:06.320 Uh, your contact form is brilliant. Like the things like, here's what I do. Here's what I don't do.

00:37:12.360 I know I sound like a dick, but this is the way it has to be. And I'm like, man, that is so nice

00:37:17.620 to see that. Cause usually, you know, people beat around the bush and we try to be friendly and

00:37:22.180 courteous and we don't want to hurt people's feelings. I'm like, just come out with it so I

00:37:25.860 can get a yes or a no. And then we can drive on with our day. Yeah. It's, it's, I mean, and I,

00:37:32.400 I love that. I love the contact form too, because it, it sets it, it alleviates me of the guilt of

00:37:39.900 saying no to people or ignoring people, you know? So it used to be, I used to get tons and

00:37:43.860 tons of emails from people who like started their podcast and they wanted me to be episode one.

00:37:48.400 And I'm like, I'm like, all right, dude, like you're, I'm sure you're a nice guy, but I mean,

00:37:54.620 I, I have a bookstore, right? Like I don't have time to like get on podcast with every fucking kid

00:38:00.880 that wants to start a podcast. Um, and so now I, you know, I put, just put that contact form there

00:38:06.240 and now I don't feel bad about saying no to it. Um, but it also, it just, I like it cause it sets

00:38:13.100 the precedent of how I want, like what kind of communication I want. Cause sometimes you get

00:38:18.600 people come to you, you know, with these long flowery emails with their life story. And I'm

00:38:24.940 like, no, dude, just, just tell me how big your audience is and tell me the concept of the show.

00:38:29.920 And it's like, and if both are good, then like, sure. And we'll make it work. Yeah. Yeah. I was

00:38:36.420 like, I don't need to know about, you know, your hero's journey or whatever. I think this comes down

00:38:42.640 to, you know, your other work as well as like not caring so much about what other people think,

00:38:48.440 you know, it's that, that's a really big sticking point for a lot of guys. And it, frankly,

00:38:54.060 it causes us to do stupid things like things that are completely out of alignment with what we want to

00:38:59.560 do. Uh, they detract and deter from what it is that we want to accomplish. Cause we're so worried

00:39:05.240 about gaining the approval or accolades of other people. And man, you wake up one day and realize

00:39:11.100 like I'm living somebody else's life. Like I'm so worried about what Mark thinks of me that I can't

00:39:16.540 have a serious discussion about something that's important to me, you know, something that might

00:39:20.800 actually impact somebody else in a positive way. Yeah. Yeah. And it's, um, I talk about this and,

00:39:28.700 and, uh, subtle art. And I, I also talk about it in my men's dating book, um, which is to stop

00:39:36.700 caring what people think about you, you need to find something more important than people's opinions

00:39:42.700 about you. You know, it's, I think in my experience, what people who are crippled by, uh, people approving

00:39:51.740 of them or validating them or not, um, it's generally because they, they have no like kind of higher

00:39:57.260 mission for themselves. They don't have anything that they care about. That's more important than

00:40:01.120 what other people think. Um, and so it's a lot of what I, I, I do is, is just trying to snap people

00:40:08.620 out of that. Gents, let me interrupt the conversation for just a brief moment. Uh, our digital brotherhood,

00:40:15.220 the iron council, it continues to grow in these very uncertain times. And I think that's because

00:40:19.780 it's times like these that really cause us to reflect on the type of men that we are and how we're

00:40:25.300 showing up for our communities and our family members and the people that we love. Uh, for a

00:40:29.300 long time, I knew that I personally was capable of so much more, but it was frustrating to me knowing

00:40:34.840 that there was a huge gap between what I knew I was capable of. And then what I was actually doing,

00:40:40.740 uh, I started hiring mentors. I started to surround myself with good and capable men.

00:40:45.660 And that's when things really started to take off and turn for the better for me. Uh, the problem

00:40:51.040 is that most men, uh, don't really know where to connect with the type of men that I'm talking

00:40:55.480 about. And that's what the iron council is. Uh, and without beating a dead horse about it,

00:41:00.660 if you want to thrive in all aspects of your life, then you need to band with other men and

00:41:05.500 banding with other men who are successful, highly motivated, driven, have their own ambitions and are

00:41:11.440 willing to hold your feet to the fire is really, uh, that powerful. It's that powerful that'll,

00:41:16.180 that will help you transform your life. So if you're interested, you want to learn more about

00:41:21.100 what we're doing inside the iron council, then head to order of man.com slash iron council.

00:41:26.340 Again, that's order of man.com slash iron council. You can watch a quick intro video,

00:41:32.020 which is brand new. So you might want to check that out anyways. Uh, and then you can lock in

00:41:35.740 your spot again, order of man.com slash iron council. Uh, you can do that after the conversation,

00:41:41.400 but for now we'll finish it up with Mark. How do you, how do you strike the balance?

00:41:47.160 Cause one of the things as I was reading the book, and this ties into what you had just said of,

00:41:50.900 of finding something that's important to you is, you know, realizing that most of what you do

00:41:57.560 is not going to matter. People aren't going to remember it. You probably won't be remembered all

00:42:03.380 that much when you're gone, except for those in your immediate circle, right? Your kids and your

00:42:06.700 wife are going to remember the fact that you're gone, but outside of that, not really anybody. Okay.

00:42:10.480 Yeah. How do you strike the balance between coming to that realization, but then not being

00:42:15.980 nihilistic about it. And then just kind of throwing your hands up in the air and like

00:42:19.780 spinning into this, like doom and gloom mindset that nothing matters in life.

00:42:25.420 Yeah. I think I look at it very practically, right? Like it's so on an objective level,

00:42:33.880 either nothing met like objectively speaking, there's, there's no meaning of life. Like it's just

00:42:40.460 a bunch of stuff that's happening. And if there is any, if there is any meaning, it's so beyond our

00:42:45.080 comprehension. It's like, doesn't even matter that we talk about it. So that, that's kind of like on

00:42:49.520 an objective level, but on a subjective level, like an individual level, our mind is always creating

00:42:56.800 meaning for ourselves and our mind needs meaning. It needs some, something to look forward to something

00:43:02.360 to find important. Like that's just a, it's, it's as fundamental to our health as food is, or, uh, or

00:43:11.620 sleep, you know, like it's, if, if not, if we are unable to process and create meaning, we just like

00:43:19.440 lay down on the couch and never get up. Right. Um, so since we are in a situation where our, our,

00:43:27.540 our psychological hardware is kind of built to find and create meaning, we might as well find and

00:43:36.900 create the, the most useful and, and healthy forms of meaning that we can come across. And, um,

00:43:44.760 and so I, that's kind of what I see as, um, growth or purpose in our, in our lives is to find,

00:43:54.420 you know, and we're all individuals. We all have different histories and backstories and

00:43:58.120 personalities. So the things that we ended up finding important are going to be different,

00:44:03.480 but that process of finding what's important, that process of to use the language of the first book

00:44:09.400 is the process of finding what to give a fuck about, um, is the most kind of fundamental process

00:44:15.880 of being a grown mature person. And, uh, and it's a process that we all have to go through at some point.

00:44:23.500 Yeah. I like the example, or one of the examples that you used in the book, you talked about Jocko

00:44:28.400 and he's a friend. He's been on the podcast three times now. And, and you said something to the

00:44:33.060 effect of, he talks about, for example, getting up at 4.00 AM to get up before the enemy. And you're

00:44:38.440 like, what enemy, like maybe in combat, there was an enemy. And now like, what is he talking about?

00:44:43.620 But you also, you weren't doing it to beat that up. You were doing it as a way that this is the

00:44:48.020 script or the meaning that he had given it so that he can do something that practically

00:44:52.060 and pragmatically helps him improve his life. And that's the story he's using in order to

00:44:57.960 accomplish what he wants to accomplish. Yeah. And it's, it's, um, and it's a story that's

00:45:04.380 probably laden with a lot of emotional meaning, historical meaning. I mean, you know, he, he is

00:45:10.020 a combat veteran, no doubt, right. You know, he's got years and years of experiences that feed

00:45:16.000 into that story for him. So even if it's not objectively true, it's emotionally a very powerful

00:45:22.020 thing for him. And I think that's true. Uh, it's true for all of us to a certain extent.

00:45:27.800 You know, we all have, um, these stories that we, we tell ourselves that we've kind of bought

00:45:34.460 into that are, uh, that are hopefully useful for ourselves. Sometimes they're destructive,

00:45:40.440 but most of them tend to be useful for ourselves. And, and those stories that they're laden with

00:45:46.200 a bunch of historical significance, emotional significance, um, you know, relationships,

00:45:52.380 things like that. It's, you know, it's like your, your dad used to take you hunting your entire

00:45:57.440 child and that was the way you bonded with him. And so it's like, now that means something to you.

00:46:01.780 Does that mean it hunting is an important thing and it needs like everybody needs to hunt? No,

00:46:07.980 it's just the, it's just another random thing you can go do. It's funny you say that. Cause I had a

00:46:14.040 guy, he just, I was talking about hunting cause cause I do enjoy hunting and I talked about it

00:46:20.100 on Instagram and he came back and he was, he was responding back to me negatively, but he seems so

00:46:25.840 emotionally tied up in his response. And I'm like, what's this guy's deal? Like, did he have a bad

00:46:30.700 experience or what? And cause it wasn't like, it wasn't a normal response. Like you can tell he

00:46:36.760 was really emotionally worked up. And then I went through the comments and he had commented on

00:46:40.240 somebody else's and his dad was an asshole and was, and when they, and he forced him to go hunting.

00:46:47.580 And when they went hunting, like he was just verbally and emotionally abusive to him when he

00:46:52.580 went hunting and now he hates hunting. I'm like, yeah, okay, now I get it. I understand now.

00:46:57.820 And he thinks he's being logical. Like you don't have to hunt and maybe you don't. He thinks he's

00:47:03.120 being completely, completely reasonable and logical. He's not, he's being emotional and he

00:47:08.540 can't even see it. And I'm not pointing fingers cause you and I, everybody else does the same exact

00:47:13.320 thing. Yeah. I feel like we're closing a lot of circles here. Um, it's, it's, uh, it's funny too,

00:47:20.220 because people, you know, people in you and I shoes, you know, we have big online following. So we get a

00:47:26.460 lot of emails, we get a lot of comments and you see this a lot. Like I, I, I get pretty much

00:47:31.460 everything I write. I will get at least two or three emails from people who are somehow like

00:47:37.300 emotionally triggered by something. And it's, and it's, it's something exactly like what you're

00:47:42.480 describing, you know? So it's, I'll get an email and it's, it'll be like, I got one recently from

00:47:48.740 a woman. And she's like, she's like, I'm a woman. I'm from Canada. I've been a truck driver for 27

00:47:54.100 years. And she starts explaining like all these experiences that happened in the nineties and how

00:48:00.240 some joke I made in an article about something completely different is, is ignorant about the

00:48:08.520 experience that she went through and other women in her profession go so insensitive.

00:48:13.540 I'm like, what? It's like, okay. At that point, I'm just, you know, it's, and I think that's kind

00:48:21.400 of the internet in a nutshell, you know, like it's, we've all got, we've all got a couple sensitive

00:48:27.820 areas in our, in, in, in ourselves emotionally. You know, we've all got things that we're a little

00:48:34.560 bit sensitive to and that we get emotionally triggered by. And in the normal day-to-day world,

00:48:40.700 if you're just walking around, hanging out, seeing your coworkers, seeing your friends,

00:48:45.340 it never comes up because you've kind of organized your life around your values and the things you

00:48:50.800 care about and the people you enjoy talking to. But then you get on the internet and it's just a

00:48:55.380 free for all. And you're exposed to hundreds and hundreds of people that you, you've never met,

00:48:59.520 you're never going to meet. And sure enough, at some point, somebody pops up with that one thing

00:49:05.400 that just pisses you off more than anything else.

00:49:08.620 They are so good at figuring out what it is too. They know, they've got to know.

00:49:13.860 And it's, and you just lose it. Next thing you know, it's like two in the morning and you're

00:49:18.940 fucking tweeting at this person for the 33rd time. And it's just, it happens to all of us.

00:49:25.680 And, uh, it's, yeah, it's just, it's the worst, man.

00:49:30.240 How do you, uh, it is, it is the worst. Cause there could be a thousand positive comments of like,

00:49:35.240 thank you. This helped. I really appreciate it. Wow. New perspective. I haven't heard about

00:49:40.020 you're an asshole. And then you're like, boom, like laser beam on that one comment. Like forget

00:49:45.220 about the thousand people that said you helped them and you served them. It's that one guy who,

00:49:49.480 who that you don't have his approval, right. To go back to what we were talking about earlier.

00:49:53.400 And you're like, I got to win this guy over by, I don't know, like doing the same thing to him,

00:49:58.040 what he's doing to you as if that's going to work. It's very, very strange.

00:50:01.300 Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's just human nature. It's, uh, it's like, if you can look at like the most

00:50:07.560 beautiful painting, but if there's a tiny scratch on it, all you see is the fucking scratch. Oh yeah.

00:50:12.580 It's all the only thing you could pay attention to. How do you, uh, how do you check your stories

00:50:18.620 though? Like, like you said, if it's all stories, if we're trying to assign meaning to everything and

00:50:23.240 every experience that we have and go through, you said most of it serves us. And I, I agree. I think

00:50:28.860 just naturally we create stories that serve us. Maybe it's taken to the extreme at times,

00:50:32.780 but there are things that, that don't serve us. And how do you check that emotional response? How

00:50:38.740 do you ensure that the stories you've concocted are actually serving and helping you? Like,

00:50:43.540 how do you get out of your own way when this stuff comes into play?

00:50:47.140 I, the only way you can really check your own stories against reality is by opening up to other

00:50:56.420 people and, and basically sharing your story and then seeing their reaction, seeing if they like

00:51:02.180 wince and be like, what the fuck are you smoking? You know, or if they're like, yeah, I told her,

00:51:07.700 yeah, you're right on, you know? Um, you know, that's one way. And then the other way I think

00:51:11.980 is just to engage in the world in general, you know, to read books, um, understand the world,

00:51:19.300 understand science, understand psychology, like learn the basics of a lot of just how

00:51:24.660 human mind and, and the world works. And, and because that, that, the less, the less you

00:51:34.040 understand about the world from kind of a scientific point of view, the, the larger the gap is for you

00:51:40.600 to just project whatever you want in onto the world, you know? So it's, this is why the people

00:51:46.300 who are least informed have like the most ridiculous stories about why things happen. It's because

00:51:52.400 they can just project whatever they feel is true and what they feel is true is usually absolutely

00:51:59.420 crazy. Um, so it's, it's basically just getting out and engaging as much as possible with people and,

00:52:09.880 and perceptions outside of yourself. Yeah. I like that you're talking about those outside experiences

00:52:15.920 because you talk about in the book, the importance or, or at least our emphasis on community,

00:52:21.540 right? Finding other people to support us and how we feel. And then you talk about creating your

00:52:26.740 own religion in there. And I'm like, Mark is like, he's got my playbook right now. And I'm like,

00:52:31.840 oh, maybe what I'm doing is wrong. Like you started to make me question about like what I'm doing and

00:52:36.920 how I'm talking to people. And I think we all do it right. Like you, you probably have a degree of

00:52:41.880 that yourself as you're building your audience and sharing. And so I'm like, man, Mark's going

00:52:46.180 to hate what I'm doing. I'm like, oh wait, he's doing the same. Oh wait, we're all doing the same

00:52:49.820 thing, building these communities and building these religions. So it is important to get out

00:52:54.320 of that religion every once in a while. Yeah. You want to, you don't want to become a cult member

00:53:00.800 basically, you know, it's, it's, and it's funny that chat, that chapter in the book, I mean,

00:53:06.700 for obvious reasons, cause it talks about religion, but it, it, it was very controversial

00:53:12.420 with readers. And I think a lot of people misunderstood because what you said is exactly

00:53:18.840 right. Like what I'm saying is we it's, it's impossible for us to not buy into these narratives,

00:53:27.240 right. As if, you know, in some, in a quasi religious way, like we, we have to create these

00:53:32.500 narratives, find a community of people who, who share similar narratives and then form like a

00:53:37.420 little tribe around it. Like that's just human nature. And whether it's, uh, whether you're forming

00:53:43.060 your, your tribe around Jesus or, uh, uh, libertarianism or, uh, you know, gender equality or,

00:53:53.460 you know, veganism, whatever, veganism, anything like that high volume, low, low weight is better

00:54:01.540 than high, high intensity, you know, like all of these things. Like, it's just, this is just how

00:54:07.340 humans self-organize and how we understand our relationship with the world. And so it's, it's

00:54:13.340 not that not to not form these little tribes and communities and many religions. It's that we're

00:54:19.400 doing it already. So a be aware of it so that you don't become a zealot and be, um, be conscious

00:54:27.260 of what you're buying into because I'll, many of these religions, uh, are, and I use the word

00:54:36.200 religion very broadly for just basically any kind of faith-based belief system, right? Many,

00:54:41.280 many religions are, are more destructive than others. And, um, and so it's, it's, it's important

00:54:50.200 to be careful when seeking out a community of like-minded people.

00:54:53.780 Well, and not only that, I mean, that's absolutely true, but even the position that I feel like I'm

00:54:59.220 in is, as I was going through this information, I was like, you know, there's a lot of responsibility

00:55:03.740 because the things that I share, it's weird. It sounds really weird to say, but it's true is that

00:55:09.320 people cling to it and then they make their own decisions and, and act based on things that I say.

00:55:16.720 And so not only is it, I need to be conscious of what religion I'm buying into, but I need to be

00:55:22.940 conscious of what information I'm sharing as the, the leader for lack of a better term, because people

00:55:28.700 are making decisions and acting based on my beliefs and my thoughts and the things that I'm communicating

00:55:33.720 to them. There's a lot of responsibility there.

00:55:36.720 Absolutely. And, and, you know, one of the only things that kind of makes me comfortable about

00:55:40.520 my position is that a big, a fundamental component of my, I guess, my system, my belief system that I

00:55:50.240 share with people is that nobody else can do it for you. You have to, you have to actualize on your

00:55:58.180 own. You have to test out belief systems and find your own way. That comes through, I think, to most of

00:56:04.160 my readers, but not all of them. It's funny, like four or five years ago, I actually, I created like a

00:56:10.400 forum, like a community forum for, on my website. And it was absolutely maddening because people

00:56:20.400 joined and they started discussing topics. And then pretty soon you had certain people saying,

00:56:26.080 well, if you look at this article from 2012 on this paragraph, Mark says this, and you're clearly

00:56:32.020 wrong. Cause if you really under, and then some other guy comes in and he's like, well, if you really

00:56:35.760 understood Mark's work, then you would know that this and this and this, and then somebody else comes

00:56:40.040 in and they're like, oh, well, I've been reading Mark since 2009. And he would say this. And I'm

00:56:44.340 just like, I'm looking at this, like, oh my God, we can't, this can't be happening.

00:56:50.040 And so you become like a prophet or a Messiah in a way. And it's dangerous.

00:56:53.840 I'm like, dude, you guys clearly missed the point. First of all, like you really read closely.

00:57:00.200 You definitely missed the point. And, uh, and then second of all, yeah, it's just, I can't,

00:57:06.040 speaking about like feeling pressure. Um, yeah, I, I shut that shit down pretty quick.

00:57:12.960 I think that's a good check is like, Hey, go out and explore, like, like learn. Like if I tell you

00:57:19.160 that you can learn everything that you need to learn from my book or my podcast or my course or

00:57:23.940 whatever it is, then that's an issue. Like that's probably a pretty good red flag for you. And for me

00:57:29.360 that there's something else to be learned here. If I'm trying to convince you that this is the way.

00:57:34.420 Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's, there's, I think there's a huge important, importance of, uh,

00:57:42.920 fostering a diversity of ideas in your life. You know, I think it's, it's good to seek out

00:57:50.720 kind of disparate schools of thought and trying to like, see how they fit together or they might

00:57:56.280 fit together. Um, you, you don't want to get cornered, uh, in the one way of thinking.

00:58:01.840 Right. Well, I think this ties into what you were talking. We're talking a little bit

00:58:05.880 about religion and value. This ties into what you had dubbed the God value too. Like all

00:58:11.560 of us have even atheists, an element of faith. Like there's something that we place as, as

00:58:18.060 our, our God value, our most important value, whether it's actual God or the NFL or women

00:58:26.180 or whatever, like we all have these things that we value above all else.

00:58:31.120 Yeah. It's, you have to pick something that matters. Right. So it's like, if you're going

00:58:35.620 to be alive and be a functioning human being, you have to pick things that are choose to find

00:58:41.660 meaning in things. And when you choose what to find meaning and you, you have to prioritize

00:58:47.060 them, you know? So it's like family first, work second, play third, whatever. Um, whatever

00:58:53.680 it is though, there's something at the top of that hierarchy, there's something that is

00:58:57.440 kind of your organizing principle for everything else in your life. There's something that is

00:59:02.140 your first priority. You know, if like everything in your life was dangling off a cliff and you

00:59:07.040 could only grab one thing, you would grab that one thing. And everybody has that one thing.

00:59:12.120 And so it's, I call that one thing, the God value, which is because it's, there's nothing,

00:59:17.820 first of all, there's nothing above it. And second of all, there's, it's, it's, there's no way to

00:59:22.480 prove that that's the most important thing in, in life. It's just something that you've chosen to

00:59:27.460 believe in. Um, so again, whether that's your family or alcohol or, uh, making a shitload of money,

00:59:37.340 like we all, we all pick a God value and worship it in our own ways. And I think one of the,

00:59:45.580 and I try to be fair to organize religion in the book because I, I, I don't, I am atheist, but I

00:59:50.760 don't, um, I'm not as critical of religion as a lot of, you know, people like Sam Harris or

00:59:58.320 Christopher Hitchens, you know, cause I think one of the effective things that organized religion does

01:00:03.360 is that it, it, uh, it gives people a God value that ideally teaches very healthy behaviors and,

01:00:12.240 and pro-social things. Um, you know, treat your neighbors well, be charitable, et cetera. Um,

01:00:18.440 because it's for a lot of people, it's like without, without that kind of religious God value,

01:00:25.100 it's, they, they end up with something very destructive instead.

01:00:28.600 Yeah. I, I, so I'm Christian. And as I was reading the book, like, I didn't feel any of it was like,

01:00:35.900 well, that's out of line. Like, obviously I knew that about you anyways, cause I'd been following

01:00:40.320 your work for some time. So obviously you weren't coming at it from the religious perspective, but I

01:00:46.020 did feel like you addressed it in a way that's like, yeah, I don't believe in God, the spiritual

01:00:49.820 component of it, but it's a good thing. And we all partake in some religion, Christians and

01:00:55.460 Christianity, right. And other people, like you said, entrepreneurs making a boatload of money and

01:01:00.080 that's the religion they're participating in. So it's like, we all, we all are in some religion,

01:01:05.640 some organized religion. And it's just a matter of what we, what we cling onto and what's,

01:01:09.740 you know, hopefully will serve us. Yeah. Yeah. Um, the other thing I wanted to talk with you about,

01:01:17.260 and I've, I've got so many notes here, we're going to bump up against time, but, um,

01:01:21.200 you talked about an interesting thing. You talked about master morality versus the slave

01:01:25.780 morality. And I thought that was really interesting. Like the master morality, and I'll

01:01:31.520 explain what I think it means and how it came across. And then you can correct me or add to

01:01:35.720 it. But, um, is this idea that if we've achieved, we deserve, right. And I think, I think that's

01:01:42.660 been pretty apparent. I think people recognize that acknowledge it, although not everybody embraces

01:01:50.160 it. I think a lot of people acknowledge it, but I'm really fascinated with this slave mentality is

01:01:54.120 because I don't have, or I was hindered by a set of circumstances that now I deserve something.

01:02:01.140 And in a way I've seen this, this idea become more and more prevalent with like a victim mentality and

01:02:07.680 believing that it's virtuous in and of itself to be a victim, which I don't believe is the case,

01:02:13.860 but I would love to hear your take on it. Yeah. It's so the master and slave morality,

01:02:19.440 it comes from Nietzsche and he, it's, it's a really simple and elegant way to, to look at history and

01:02:28.640 kind of look at human nature, nature throughout history. So Nietzsche argued that master morality

01:02:33.800 is, is kind of your, it's like the default morality. It's like the, like it's kind of comes from the

01:02:39.520 animal world, which is might makes right. It's like the strongest survive and the meritocracy and

01:02:44.460 everything out. Right. Sure. Yeah. It's, it's like, if, if you, if you want it, you need to fight for it

01:02:51.620 and you need to earn it. Uh, and that, that kind of ruled up through early human civilization. And

01:02:59.860 then, you know, what Nietzsche points out is that right around, uh, a certain period in history, um,

01:03:07.220 or the organized religions all arose around the same time and they all spouted, uh, or, or proselytized

01:03:15.000 like a slave, what he called a slave morality, which is basically that it's, it's, it's not the

01:03:21.680 person who earned everything that is righteous. It's actually the person who has nothing that is

01:03:26.780 righteous because, um, he, he has no attachments. He has not hurt anybody. He is being taken advantage

01:03:33.900 of, and because he or she is, is, uh, is being exploited by other people in society. Um, they

01:03:46.040 actually deserve good things to happen to them. They are actually the morally righteous. And so

01:03:51.560 this is, you see this in teachings of Jesus and Buddha and all these other people. And, um, you

01:03:57.200 know, Nietzsche thought this was a bad thing. Nietzsche thought master morality is what pushes the human

01:04:02.120 race forward. The problem is that master morality is just like, it's very heartless, you know,

01:04:07.040 like it just, it's like if, if you die, well, fuck, it's not my problem. Right. Right. Right.

01:04:13.100 You know, taken to the extreme. Sure. Yeah. Um, but the problem is that slave morality, which

01:04:19.780 emerged kind of in more modern civilization. And I think, you know, you could epitomize with like

01:04:25.080 communism and things like that. Slave morality taken to its logical extreme, um, removes

01:04:31.820 all innovation and differentiation between, between people. It tries to make everybody be

01:04:38.640 exactly the same, have the same things, have the same experiences, say the same things, um, that way,

01:04:44.860 because the only way you can remove inequality from society is to remove agency or freedom.

01:04:52.100 Sure. Um, and so the, the truth is that I think both of these moral impulses are always,

01:04:59.200 they exist in all of us individually, you know, like we all, if we, if we're walking down the

01:05:05.320 street and we see somebody get hit by a car, every single one of us is going to run to that person

01:05:10.580 and make sure they're okay. Like that is, that is our impulse towards slave morality. That is like,

01:05:15.480 oh my God, somebody's hurt. We need to help them. Right. Um, but at the same time, all of us in our

01:05:22.560 careers and our workplaces, if we work really, really hard and our coworker is a jackass and

01:05:29.460 they get a raise and we don't like that, or we get a raise and they don't, you know, it's,

01:05:34.960 that feels either very fair or very unfair. You know, it's like, well, I worked hard and harder

01:05:39.460 than you. I deserve more money. Tough luck. Um, and so that's the master morality part of ourselves.

01:05:46.060 And these two kind of instinctual moralities are, they obviously come into conflict because they're

01:05:52.900 contradictory. Sure. And they come into conflict, not only on us individually, we often feel torn

01:05:59.180 with certain people. You know, maybe we have a family member who is unemployed or an addict or

01:06:05.000 something and they can't get their shit together. And on the one hand, we want to give money and help

01:06:09.240 them. But on the other hand, it's like, well, fuck you do something with yourself, you know? And so it's,

01:06:15.600 we feel that conflict on a personal level, but then obviously on a social level, um, you know,

01:06:21.700 master and slave morality maps pretty well onto right wing and left wing political beliefs. Yeah. And,

01:06:27.740 um, but most of us are somewhere in the middle and it's, it's interesting because, I mean,

01:06:36.940 I personally think, you know, I think throughout history, we kind of swing

01:06:43.240 as a society, one side to the other, some cultures are more on one side or the other.

01:06:49.300 Um, but, but each generation grows up with a different set of circumstances. Therefore,

01:06:53.860 they come to see the world in a, in a different way than previous generations, which generally kind

01:06:59.320 of moves them on that moral spectrum or political spectrum in one direction or another. And so

01:07:05.140 I think, I think when you look at younger generations today, uh, you know, I, I, I defend,

01:07:14.920 you know, for all of their flaws and foibles, I, I am an ardent defender of millennials and

01:07:20.980 Gen Z because I think the older generations take for granted how they grew up. You know,

01:07:26.940 they grew up at the end of the cold war. They grew up with the booms of the eighties and nineties.

01:07:30.420 They grew up with, uh, just massive technological innovation happening very quickly. Um, millennials

01:07:38.100 and Gen Z, we grew up with nine 11. We grew up with the crash of 08. We grew up with the greatest

01:07:43.540 amount of student debt in history. We grew up with the worst job market in, in American history. Um,

01:07:51.580 we grew up with deflated wages, you know, so it's like, it's the millennials are the first generation

01:07:56.360 who are, despite being more educated than their parents are less well off than their parents

01:08:01.400 financially. And, um, and so I, I understand why they're pissed off. Like, I totally get it.

01:08:08.760 I, they should be pissed off. Um, but that I think if you take that and combine it with social media,

01:08:18.080 which social media, what generally spreads on social media are things that get the most attention

01:08:25.080 and the things that get the most attention are things that create moral outrage. And so the

01:08:31.260 things that create moral outrage tend to be stories about victimization, people being exploited,

01:08:36.760 people being taken advantage of. Right. And so I think social media just in and of itself has a

01:08:42.460 little bit of a culture of reward to victim because it's the more you're victimized, the more your

01:08:47.680 shit goes viral, the more attention you get, the more people email you, they get put money on your

01:08:52.560 GoFundMe or whatever. Uh, and when you, but when you combine that with like actual systematic

01:09:00.140 grievances, you know, you actually do, you do have a political system that is corroding and not

01:09:06.260 functioning for a large percentage of the population. When you combine those two things, I think you get

01:09:13.120 this, this victimhood culture that we see with the younger people at this point, which is, um,

01:09:19.320 and, and which now kind of populates the radical left end of the spectrum. Um, so it's a hard part

01:09:27.540 very long. Oh, for sure. No, but it's good. The hard part of it is that it like, it just, it gets

01:09:33.400 taken to the extreme to the, cause there are actual victims. Like let's acknowledge this. Totally.

01:09:38.540 There are actual victims. So a lot of times when I say things about victimhood mentality, people are

01:09:43.220 like, Oh, well, some people are really victims. Yeah. Yes. I know. Like, and I'm not saying that what I'm

01:09:47.740 saying is that when we, when we make ourselves out to be a victim, when in fact, we aren't this gal

01:09:54.440 that emailed you about some comment you made in the nineties and how, you know, like she's making

01:10:00.520 herself out to be a victim and it discounts that there are actually people who have been victimized

01:10:07.820 financially, sexually, physically by other people. And it undermines the reality of somebody's like

01:10:15.300 genuine hardship and real situation. That's very frustrating to me.

01:10:19.960 Totally. It actually drives me absolutely nuts. Um, you know, I, I definitely, I politically,

01:10:28.860 I lean left. Um, I'm, I call myself center left, but it's funny because it's, I, I hear from both

01:10:36.880 fringes all the time. I get, I get the left wing crazies and I get the right wing crazies.

01:10:41.480 And, and, and it's, you know, the right wing crazies, I actually find very easy to deal with

01:10:48.140 because it's usually they're talking about, you know, some conspiracy theory and how Jesus

01:10:53.160 is coming back. God's guns, conspiracy theory. We're good to go, man. Yeah. It's like, whatever,

01:10:58.860 you know, just delete it and move on. It's very easy to write it off. But the left wing crazies,

01:11:04.340 um, they're usually, they're calling me some combination of racist, sexist, homophobic,

01:11:10.280 whatever. And, and it drives me crazy because, and I ended up engaging with them because I feel

01:11:16.560 like it's important enough to do so that, you know, it's like, if you're walking around and

01:11:21.320 you're calling every other person on the street, sexist, what you're actually doing is you're,

01:11:27.000 you're diminishing this, the meaning of that word. Exactly. You know, it's like, if, if,

01:11:31.960 if everybody who feels like upset at some point, you know, it's like, it is now like an assault has

01:11:42.080 been assaulted, sexually assaulted, right? Because they had an experience that was upsetting and not

01:11:47.080 pleasant. You know, the people who actually you're hurting are the actual sexual assault victims,

01:11:52.820 because now they're not going to be taken seriously. The people who have actually been

01:11:56.280 raped and harassed and molested, people are going to listen to them less. It's like a boy who cried

01:12:01.900 wolf type thing. Yeah. You know? So it, it pisses me off to no end. Uh, and I, I usually get into,

01:12:11.120 I usually start arguing with these people and, and so I'm happy to say though, sometimes it's

01:12:18.440 it's unlike, and, and I'll, this is, I'll, I'll kind of give credit to the other side now. So

01:12:24.740 unlike people on the right, the people, the, the crazies on the right, I just, I don't even go there

01:12:29.240 because it's, you can't argue with, right. It's crazy. You can't argue with crazy people. They're

01:12:34.600 not logical or reasonable. Right. Yeah. But I have noticed that, that a lot of the, the, these people,

01:12:41.280 and they're generally very young, but like the people on the left who say these things, I I've noticed

01:12:46.440 probably 40 to 50% of them. I'm, I can actually kind of moderate their views throughout the

01:12:51.960 discussion to the point where a lot of them actually end up apologizing to me. Interesting.

01:12:56.000 Um, so that gives me a little bit of hope. Um, but it's, it's, it's a weird time for a lot of reasons

01:13:05.840 right now, politically. And I think, um, one of them is just that the, and this, this does relate to

01:13:15.600 a master slave morality, but I do think it's, you know, we are polarizing as, as a country. I think

01:13:20.420 most, most countries around the world are politically polarizing right now, but what,

01:13:25.520 what makes it so difficult is that the polarization is, um, it's not a mirror image. So the, the,

01:13:34.820 the issues and the, the consequences of the issues on, of left-wing polarization and right-wing

01:13:42.320 polarization, they're actually very different. Um, and they, they look different. Uh, so it's,

01:13:47.820 it makes it very easy for people on one side to be blind to their own side and only see the other.

01:13:54.540 Um, because it looks different. It's very noticeably different. Sure. Um, yeah. Well,

01:14:00.500 I mean, you, the term that you use that really stuck out right there was conflict, you know, and,

01:14:04.880 and you think about conflict, you think about pain, you think about destruction, you think about

01:14:10.100 collateral damage, you know, you think a lot about suffering and misery, and sometimes this is

01:14:15.140 emotional. Sometimes it's physical, you know, we lose ones in pain and suffering, but also

01:14:20.600 it's necessary. Like there has to be conflict, right? There has to be a yin and a yang. There

01:14:27.960 has to be give, and there has to be take. And I even took that away from your book. And I think we

01:14:31.740 can maybe start winding it down from here is, and, and I want to give you the last word as well

01:14:35.840 that, you know, we can have hope because that's what this book is about. It's about,

01:14:41.020 it's about hope and it's about thinking about hope differently. But in order to have hope,

01:14:44.880 here's what I took away. There has to be times where you feel hopeless.

01:14:48.920 Yeah. Right. Where you feel like, like, and I feel this way with my business and with my own

01:14:54.140 personal goals that I have is like, sometimes I'm like, damn, this isn't going as well as I want it

01:14:58.400 to. And nobody wants to experience that. But if I didn't feel that way, then I don't feel like

01:15:03.080 I'd be driven to produce the type of results that occasionally I do experience the positive

01:15:07.640 results. It's like, you gotta have both. Yeah. Yeah. It's, uh, I talk about that about

01:15:12.800 halfway through the book too, is that the, the, the irony is that we need things to be fucked

01:15:17.980 because it's, you can't have hope otherwise. And, um, you can't, you can't have meaning otherwise.

01:15:25.880 So, you know, unless you can imagine the future being better somehow than the present, um,

01:15:31.480 then none of your actions actually hold any meaning. So we actually need things to be fucked.

01:15:36.940 We need there to be problems psychologically speaking. And, uh, and so I, I, and I think

01:15:42.940 that fundamentally is just why any sort of kind of utopian vision is just, is, is the most destructive

01:15:50.960 thing in human society is because it's, when we have problems, we're always going to have problems.

01:15:58.080 The key is not to get, get rid of our problems. It's to simply upgrade our problems, manage our

01:16:03.460 problems, find more desirable problems for people. Yeah. I feel like even if we did create that utopian

01:16:09.460 society, we just make a bunch of dumb shit to be worried about, you know, like it wouldn't even be

01:16:14.060 like, we've got to have conflict. What can we, what can we complain about? You know? So that's, uh,

01:16:18.900 that's what we figured out a way to do. Well, Hey, this has been an amazing conversation. I knew it

01:16:23.300 would be, um, I want to ask you a couple additional questions. Uh, the first one is what does it mean

01:16:27.940 to be a man? Oh man, we're going to go light on this last question. That's an easy one. That's an

01:16:35.340 easy one. Um, well, I, I will say, I don't think it's as clear, uh, these days as it has been in

01:16:45.000 generations prior. You know, I think ultimately what, what it, what it means to be a man is there's

01:16:52.520 always going to be some, some degree of difference between what the actions and behaviors that men

01:17:01.120 typically do and the actions behaviors that women typically do. And I think, you know, our understanding

01:17:06.040 of manhood and masculinity is always going to reflect generally what men do and what men pursue.

01:17:11.840 And, um, and I think the healthy thing that has happened the last few generations is that the

01:17:20.160 scope of what a man can be is expanded. It's no longer like, you no longer have to like make a

01:17:27.080 shitload of money and crush beer cans on your forehead and, you know, ignore your wife and kids

01:17:31.980 like that. It's, it's, you know, you no longer have to be Don Draper. Like you can, there's a very

01:17:37.160 wide spectrum of what manhood looks like. And I think that's, that's a very emotionally healthy,

01:17:44.460 uh, development for men around the world. Um, and so I guess if I had to simplify it and just

01:17:55.340 answer it with a single sentence, I would say like, what it means to be a man is, is to,

01:18:00.920 is to simply, uh, pursue and take action in the world. You know, I think ultimately generally

01:18:10.700 what's defined men is that we're, we're doers, you know, and we look for challenges and, and that's

01:18:17.220 not to say that women don't do that, but it's, um, I think it's a more defining aspect of, of male

01:18:23.820 identity than it is for women. Right on, man. I agree. I concur. Well, what do, where do we,

01:18:30.480 uh, connect with you? Also, obviously you can pick up a copy of the book, but, uh, where's the

01:18:34.720 best place to connect with you and learn more about what you're doing? Uh, check out markmanson.net.

01:18:40.040 Uh, I've got a weekly newsletter there that I send out every Monday and, uh, uh, and then I've got

01:18:45.740 books, subtle art, not giving a fuck. Everything's fucked book about hope. And then, uh, then my,

01:18:50.440 my men's dating book is called models attract women through honesty. So if there are any single

01:18:54.960 guys out there struggling, um, it's, it's a good one to check out. Right on. We'll sync it all up.

01:19:00.360 So the guys know where to go. Mark, I appreciate you. Like I said, I've been connected in a round

01:19:04.420 about way for the past couple of years. And I just really appreciate your honesty. I appreciate the

01:19:09.400 way that you approach things in a no BS attitude, no fluff. Like this is what it is, whether you like

01:19:14.920 it or not, this is what it is. And that is very refreshing in a world that constantly tries to

01:19:20.420 fluff things up and make it sound more wonderful than maybe sometimes it really is. That's a breath

01:19:24.820 of fresh air. So I do appreciate you. And for you taking some time today. Thanks man. Appreciate it.

01:19:31.180 There you go, gentlemen. I told you you would enjoy that one. Again, I think Mark's message really

01:19:36.400 resonates because it's refreshing. He says things in a way that, uh, few people seem to be willing to say.

01:19:43.580 And for me, it's very refreshing when you have somebody tell you the truth. It's not always

01:19:47.720 comfortable. It's not always easy to hear sometimes it's a slap in the face, but the reality is we need

01:19:53.560 that. If we aren't experiencing the results that we want in our life, then we need to be jolted back

01:19:58.300 into reality. So we can start making some choices and decisions and actions that are going to serve us

01:20:02.520 best and help propel us kicking and screaming, maybe even into the future. So if you haven't checked

01:20:08.900 out his last two books, again, the subtle art of not giving an F and everything is F'd. I would

01:20:13.540 highly, highly, highly encourage that you pick up both, check them out. There is some great

01:20:17.340 information in there. Very practical, uh, very pragmatic. And you'll be able to apply it in your

01:20:21.920 life. Uh, also connect with Mark, do me a favor, just hit up Mark, let them know what you thought

01:20:25.800 about the show. Connect with me. Let me know what you thought about the show. And, uh, yeah, it's a

01:20:30.780 great way to stay connected with both of us. And also on a parting note, I would ask that you please

01:20:35.720 leave us a rating and review goes a very, very long way. It only takes you 60 to 90 seconds of your life.

01:20:41.540 If you've gotten any value out of this, I don't ask a whole lot. I give you some opportunities

01:20:45.340 for the iron council and the store merchandise and things like that. But if you are getting value

01:20:49.940 from this, all I would ask in return is that you leave a very quick rating and review. Even if it's

01:20:55.540 just one sentence, click five stars, let everybody else know what you think about the show and where

01:21:00.540 you're getting your information. That's it. Very simple. Also, if you're interested, you can check

01:21:04.400 out the iron council at order of man.com slash iron council. And then we will be back tomorrow.

01:21:09.060 Kip and I, my cohost will be back for another wonderful round of ask me anything. All right,

01:21:15.760 guys, I'll let you get going until tomorrow. Go out there, take action and become the man you

01:21:20.680 are meant to be. Thank you for listening to the order of man podcast. You're ready to take charge

01:21:25.680 of your life and be more of the man you were meant to be. We invite you to join the order at

01:21:30.440 order of man.com.

Order of Man - May 12, 2020

Everything is F＊cked ｜ MARK MANSON

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