Mentally Great
host: Fouad Boustani
musical creativity, exploring life philosophies, parenting
listen: (download)
watch: (download)
Transcript:
Fouad
I usually start this with a direct question, but I want to actually start with the theme song for this podcast, which I’ve been wanting to do. So this will be the first episode where I actually do it, so you’ll let me know if my if my singing sucks or not. So yeah, we’ll find, yeah we’ll find, yeah. We’ll find the truth. The truth, the truth, the truth. So this is a new episode of the Rich Insight Podcast. Today I have the pleasure of welcoming one of my favorite thinkers ever, Derek Sivers. Welcome to the podcast.
Derek Sivers
Thanks, Fouad. I’m so honored that you did the song for the first time here. That’s so cool. Now, I’ve got a question for you. When you sing that, are you hearing an arrangement in your head? Are you hearing other instruments in your head while you’re singing?
Fouad
I was just in the car and I started getting this whistling and it started just forming. And then I heard the word truth, and it made so much sense. Because this is the goal of this podcast, is to discover the truth of what makes you happy and the meaning of life in general.
Derek Sivers
All right. Like I’m curious when you hear music in your head, maybe even not songs you’re inventing, but your favorite songs you already know. Do you hear the whole thing in your head like a recording, or do you just hear your voice singing the melody?
Fouad
I just hear a melody without lyrics first. Just a melody that comes natural. I don’t do music, so I don’t know why. It comes just randomly. But I realized that when I’m the most present and when I am detached from my phone and just a free of stimulation, they start coming.
Derek Sivers
Okay cool. Do you know the Beatles song Strawberry Fields Forever? Okay. It’s one of my favorite songs because of all of the different instruments in it. And I was walking in Thailand and suddenly we were walking through strawberry farms. And there were, you know, lots of them. And we had been walking through strawberry farms for a couple hours, and suddenly my brain went, “Strawberry Fields Forever.” And suddenly the whole song came back to me. I mean, like the cellos, the drums, the backwards guitar recording and little harp. And I was like, wow, I’m just hearing the whole song in my head at one time. And it made me wonder about how different people experience music in their head. Like, is it just the melody, or do we hear the whole song? And maybe is the reason that I hear the whole song is because I was a musician for so many years that I think about all those different ingredients, or was I just like that anyway. I don’t know.
Fouad
It’s so interesting because music, it relates a lot to what we’re going to talk about. And there’s actually the story of Tversky and how this little child sneaked into to listen to his preparation of music and how he talks about, can we go through that story? I’m super excited through it.
Derek Sivers
Sure. Lead the way. What do you want to talk about? Let’s do it.
Fouad
I want to talk about how she asked the famous artist, “Which instrument is your favorite?” And he said, “I don’t have a favorite instrument. It depends on the time. And that’s when I pick the instrument or philosophy that’s needed for that specific time.” So can you go through that story?
Derek Sivers
The whole idea is that a girl watching an orchestra is trying to figure out what’s the best instrument. Is the violin the best, is the clarinet the best? Is it the trumpet? And so she goes to the conductor and asks him, and he makes the comparison of life philosophies to say, “There is no one best you can combine them so you don’t have to pick one. You can combine them or you use different instruments at different times. Like right now the trumpet is playing for a while and that’s beautiful. And then the trumpet will stop, and then the cellos and the violas and the violins will come in. But now a clarinet will join them, and then they will stop and the clarinet will continue.” And this is the same as life philosophies, that you don’t have to pick just one to say, “Now I’m going to put my head down and focus on making money. And this is the way we should all be focused on making money.” No,that’s just a way that’s good for you for now. And maybe that’s what you need now, but it doesn’t mean it’s the right answer forever or for everyone. It’s just for you for now and then at a different time in your life, maybe you need to just go exploring and go be nomadic and go be a hedonist. And maybe now you need to try on different philosophies. So it’s using that metaphor of the instruments in an orchestra, like the philosophies that we could live our life by. Oh, and then you mentioned time. And so at the end she says, “Yes. Well, what is your favorite?” And he says, “My favorite is time.” Because he likes to use time to combine or use time, like I said, to kind of bring things in and out over time and treating time as the instrument itself.
Fouad
I love this story so, so, so much. And “Useful Not True” your new book, which I loved, the audiobook. I don’t know how you did that in one take, which is crazy. And I loved how you talked about applying different philosophies to different periods in your life so that sometimes you might need stoicism, another time detachment, another time essentialism. So it really depends, but it’s a toolbox that you can pick from at any point in time. So let’s go through-- what are your main philosophies in life? I know minimalism is one of them, so I would love to know.
Derek Sivers
No, sorry to disagree, but I think part of living a full life is to try on different philosophies and to not pick one as the one. So yes, I have a tendency to like minimalism as an aesthetic. I own very few things. I like having very few things, but that’s because for ten years of my life, I had too many things. I had a recording studio with just so many instruments around and cables and microphones and I was a self-promoting musician. And so I had hundreds of CDs and photos and tapes and I was a maximalist. I was filling my life with connections and gigs and opportunities and events and people. And it was only after many years of doing things that way that I said, “I think I need the opposite now.” And I moved up to Woodstock, New York, to the forest, and I went, “Ah, okay, I’ve just said no to everything. My life is very simple now.” And I think this is part of a full life that anybody listening to this, if you’ve been doing something one way for a long time, you would be well suited to try the opposite for a while and embrace the opposite philosophy.
Fouad
What I loved about your book “How to Live”, is that it made me even more curious about you. Because every single chapter was contradicting the other, but was still true. So some of the philosophies that really impacted me were. Before we jump into how to internalize a philosophy and to have an arrangement of tools in your toolbox. I want to talk about the fact that in “How to Live”, you talked about to really learn, you have to get surprised in the process. So can you expand on that?
Derek Sivers
Yeah. Think of the times when you’ve felt like you learned the most are the times when you were the most surprised. When you thought something was a certain way, and then you learned something new that made you realize that, no, in fact, it’s a very different way than you expected. And you went, “Whoa! Wow. I really learned something today. That was amazing.” If you’re just learning more information, you might be adding information to what you already know, but to me that’s not really learning. That’s just adding a few more details. It’s those moments of surprise that really teach you the most. So therefore, if you want to keep learning and growing in your whole life, a great technique is to follow the surprise, follow whatever will surprise you the most. Which may be the thing that we were just talking about. May be the reason you asked right now, living according to a different set of beliefs than you’re used to. Doing things in a very different way than you’re used to. If you’re usually very serious, go be hedonistic for a while. Go party in a way that you detest, but learn to enjoy it. And vice versa. If you’ve been too hedonistic for too long go get a job and sign a two year lease and commit to one place and do one thing and spend your spare time in a library instead of out with friends just to experience it. Even if you don’t like it, find something you like about it. It’s just a way of seeing life from different perspectives, to live a full life and be surprised and learn and grow.
Fouad
I’m adding to that point. The thing that really struck me from “Useful Not True”, was the fact that we got so caught up in one certain frame, and we believe that it’s the truth, that it limits our potential in our life. So what is the first step to letting go of a frame that’s not serving us?
Derek Sivers
Forcing yourself to see a contradictory point of view and realize that it’s not wrong. So if you’ve been doing something this way for a long time. You don’t need to just prove that that’s wrong. You just need to find a very contradictory way of thinking or doing things and see the benefit of it. And just by seeing the benefit of that, you’ll realize that this is not the only right answer. Let’s say, democracy. A friend of mine was just yesterday saying that he thinks that the decline of democracy worldwide is the world’s biggest problem. But I spent a lot of time in United Arab Emirates last year, and that’s not a democracy. And I just got back from China last week and that’s not a democracy. And both of these places are amazing and quite well run. And thriving without democracy. So it’s not that democracy is the only way to be. It’s a good way. It doesn’t mean that this is wrong. Just because I’m saying that this conflicting viewpoint is also correct. It’s just nice to acknowledge that there’s no one right answer, that there are multiple ways of doing things, and they can each have their pros and cons.
Fouad
Is that why you’re so fascinating with traveling and experiencing different cultures and people?
Derek Sivers
Yes, totally. That’s why I travel. I do not travel for the food or the beaches. I travel because I want to inhabit philosophies.
Fouad
And so which philosophy-- it’s a tricky question for you because I know you. You like a lot of countries and you see the strength in every philosophy. But which one has been the most useful to you?
Derek Sivers
Well, the most useful one is the one that’s most surprising, because that’s the one that expands my mind. And once I get used to it, then the most useful one would be the next most surprising one. So Singapore was a great experience for me because I was just a California American boy before I moved to Singapore. And I loved Singapore so much. I mean, I became a legal permanent resident. My son was born there. I even applied for citizenship there, but I had permanent residency. I thought I was going to live there for 20 years. The only reason I left is after two and a half years, my wife at the time said that she didn’t like it there, and so we decided to raise our son in New Zealand. But I thought I was going to stay there much longer. I really, really love Singapore, and Singapore is about as opposite as can be from California. The worldview, the kind of Confucian mindset, this idea of doing what’s best for your community, never mind you personally, you personally are not as important as the community, whether that’s your family or your country. But you got to do what’s best for the greater good. That mindset was so foreign to me that when I first arrived in Singapore, I thought everybody was wrong. I thought, “No, what are you talking about? That’s wrong. That’s stupid. That’s crazy. No. Here’s how you should be living.” And I was telling them my California way, and it took a year or two for me to finally meet enough Singaporean people that explained their outlook to me enough. That made me realise that their way is not wrong, and I started to see the benefits of it.
Derek Sivers
So that was the most useful experience for me. Maybe because I spent a whole two and a half years there, and I really internalized it and thought I was going to spend much longer there. So it’s like I really said, “Okay, this is my home. This is not a place I’m visiting. This is home.” And I needed to internalize that more. So I would love to keep doing that with India and different parts of India. Oh my God. Just by the way, anybody if you haven’t been to India, you need to know that when you hear the word India, you need to think about it like when you hear the word Europe, that within India that is not one culture. That is a big collection of vastly different cultures. The fact that it’s one country is just a circumstance of history. It could have been 27 different countries like Europe is. But anyway, I would love to go live for many years in Europe and live for many years in China and live for many years somewhere in the GCC. You know, UAE or Oman or maybe even Saudi Arabia. I would just love to inhabit these different philosophies and internalize them.
Fouad
I love that, I love that so much. That changed my perspective on traveling. I always saw it as an entertainment thing. Like you travel, you test the food, you know? But now I see it more like an experience where you embody a different philosophy. And so it’s so interesting to adopt that viewpoint.
Derek Sivers
Well, so can I just pause to ask you. So you grew up in Lebanon?
Fouad
Yeah. Yeah.
Derek Sivers
So from what I’ve heard, Lebanon itself is a very pluralistic place. It’s not a monoculture. There are like different cultures going on inside Lebanon. Can you tell me anything about that? Does that shape your worldview growing up there?
Fouad
So Lebanon is basically made up of two main religions. There’s Islam and Christianism. Yeah, Christianism?
Derek Sivers
Christianity. Yeah.
Fouad
Christianity. Sorry. Yeah. And here the culture is basically a culture. So if you realize when I sent you the follow up email, I told you, yeah, you can come over, you have everything settled, you have the food. It’s because this is the culture we are in. If you thought I was a creep, I’m not, I’m not.
Derek Sivers
Not at all, I thought it’s wonderful.
Fouad
But it’s the culture. To to host lovingly. Everyone’s kind of family here. If you fall on the ground, they’re going to pick you up. They’re going to treat you like their children, their son. And it’s a very bonded, tied culture. Yes, there is the the highs and lows and there’s the conflicts between religions and all this. But if you go deeper, it’s a very loving place.
Derek Sivers
It’s really cool. Yeah. I would love to come get to know Lebanon.
Fouad
You should, man. You should. Some of the best food.
Derek Sivers
Oh, of course, that I already know, I already know. See, we have we all have personal preferences. So even though I’m fascinated with the Chinese culture, I do not like Chinese food. I’ve tried over and over again, but oh man, do I love Middle Eastern food. I could eat hummus for every meal every day. I love it. Yeah, I’m not that much of a food person, but I love Middle Eastern food.
Fouad
If you come here just shoot me a text or email or whatever and I’ll take you to the best Middle Eastern places here. The best Lebanese food.
Derek Sivers
I’d love that.
Fouad
It’s a beautiful thing that the connection can go beyond cultures. And that you can meet a stranger that was once someone you never knew and connect through--. You talked about it in the in the audio book “Useful Not True”. You said through social and emotional reasons, but then it becomes more natural when you’re connected with yourself. You naturally, naturally connect and love others without any ulterior motives. I know you meditate, right? Do you meditate?
Derek Sivers
I walk in the forest by myself for an hour every day.
Fouad
And what does that make you feel internally?
Derek Sivers
Grounded. Connected, the opposite of frazzled. I guess that would be centered. I usually don’t even bring anything. I don’t bring headphones. I don’t listen to anything. Sometimes I do, but usually I don’t. I just enjoy that hour of walking through the forest. No other people around. And I live in a very hilly place, so it’s good exercise. You walk up, up, up, up, up up up up up, up, up. It’s like walking up 30 flights of stairs a few times. And so I have to put on a different shirt every time I do it because the shirt gets wet. I throw it in the laundry, you know, so it’s good exercise, but I follow the same trail every time because it means that I can let my mind wander. I don’t have to decide at every point, where am I? Where am I going? I just follow the same trail. And I know it’s a one hour walk, and it’s good exercise, and it’s through the forest in a way that I won’t see a lot of other people. So it’s where I let my mind wander. Or I think about one thing, or I process things that I’ve taken in. Yeah, I think the best learning happens not at the moment you take in the information, but when you’ve had time to reflect on it yourself and internalize it. So yeah. I don’t know if you’d call that meditation or not. But I think it’s better for me. It’s better for me because I sit still so much writing all day. I think it’s better for me to be walking during these moments instead of more sitting.
Fouad
I want to cover the point of wondering, because I heard Jeff Bezos also talk about this and the importance to your creativity and to your innovation, and to having great ideas. Before that, there’s something that intrigued me about you. I got to know you through Tim Ferriss and I love Tim Ferriss and you through him, I started loving you. I realized the radiant joy you emanate through your eyes beyond words. Before listening to any word you had to say, I saw a radiant joy that genuinely that a lot of people crave to have. And so I want to first ask you, was it always like that or how did it develop?
Derek Sivers
Yeah, it’s always like that. Sorry. I don’t know what else to say about that. It’s a strange thing to hear about yourself. Because we know our self through others, right. So if lots of people tell you that you have nice ears. Or lots of people say that, “Wow, you’re tall or you’re skinny” or something like that. You have to think, “Well, I guess I’m tall and skinny with nice ears because people keep telling me tha.” But objectively, you don’t think of yourself that way. You think I’m just me. But it’s only when other people tell you things about yourself. So yeah, other people tell me that I seem to be a very happy person. But to me, it just seems like the default human nature. I don’t understand how people are not.
Fouad
Do you feel like your frame plays a role or your way of thinking in your happiness?
Derek Sivers
Yeah, entirely. But we choose how we think. It’s always a choice. It’s like, we choose our emotions too. Maybe not the first one. You have an emotional reaction to something. But then how you choose to think or how you think about anything is your choice. You are able to respond. That’s the definition of the word responsible response able. You are able to respond however you want. So if I drop a plate on the floor and it breaks. I could choose to be angry about that, or I could choose to laugh about that. And I think early on, maybe in my teenage years, I realized these things were a choice. And so I just chose the point of view that feels better. And maybe that’s why I seem so happy is I just choose that perspective. Deciding for yourself how you would like to be in the world, how you would like to respond to no matter what happens. How you would like to wake up feeling, and then realize that that’s under your control, that you can choose to be excited every day, even if your situation is that you are shoveling horseshit for a living for a dollar a month and that’s your life. And you are taking care of your 17 handicapped siblings. Then even in the worst of situations, you can find a way to see it that is empowering.
Derek Sivers
You can choose a point of view that works for you, even if you have to sift through thousands of ways to see it before you find one that works for you. There is a way to work that. They can empower you to either do something to change it or accept it the way it is and feel okay about it and so this energy that you’re seeing, I think, maybe just comes from the fact that I’ve been doing this my whole life. Well, since my teenage years, I should say, since I was a teenager I just decided to do this. I decided that I was going to find a way to see any situation in a positive light. But I have to add something to that. it would be easy right now to say, well, easy for you, millionaire. You sold your company. You’re living in gorgeous New Zealand. Yeah. Easy for you to tell me. Life is good, but it’s a situation. I’ll just give one little tiny example. I was talking with a friend. You know, we always have, like, best friends that you talk to all the time, and then you have good friends that you maybe talk to twice a year. And so I was talking to one of my good friends that I talk to twice a year, and I said something about cancer and how I had cancer.
Derek Sivers
And she goes, “Wait, what?” I said, “Oh, I didn’t tell you that.” She goes, “No, you didn’t tell me that.” I said, “Yeah, I’ve had cancer four times.” She’s like, “Derek, this is really serious. I can’t believe you didn’t tell me this.” It’s like, “Well, it wasn’t a big deal to me. Like, you know, four times I went to the doctor and four times they had to, like, cut a chunk out of me. And, you know, they stitched me up and told me it was gone for now. And I’m fine now. And, yeah, I just didn’t think that was a big deal.” She’s like, “Oh my God, Derek, how could you not tell me this? You had cancer four times. How are you smiling telling me this?” I said, “Because if I die, I die. It’s no big deal, like, I’m okay with that.” I think I was maybe a little sad and scared the first time they told me, but I just decided to choose a point of view on this that works for me, that empowers me instead of makes me feel, “Oh my God, my life is over.” So, yeah, we always choose our response to anything. And this is my response. Like, okay, I’ve had cancer four times in two years. So what?
Fouad
The first word that came to mind when I saw the interview was liberating. And so I want the viewer to have the philosophies, the tools and everything else. So basically, to get to the substance of this interview and things they could take away from this. I really love the fact that you talk about doing fulfilling work and how you bring play into work and make it an enjoyable thing. I think this is where this child like energy, which is so beneficial in a world as a creative. I would love to ask you, how do you turn work into play?
Derek Sivers
By finding what’s interesting in it. By making the environment fun if you can’t make the work fun. I’ll tell you, I’m signing my name 15,000 times to prepare for the next printing of my next book in order to have the autographed copies. Yeah, I’ve got a stack of papers that I’m signing with, you know, a stack of Sharpie markers 15,000 times on signing my name. There’s no other way to make that work fun except to make the environment fun. So I’ve watched some movies. I started putting on Spanish lessons because I’m going to South America soon and I’m like, all right. I just decided to enjoy the process. All right, I’m signing my name 15,000 times. I’m going to see some movies that I’ve been meaning to see, or going to learn some Spanish. But there’s also a way of looking at work, that you can get more out of it. Like if I was working at a shit job where I was just a tiny piece inside of a big company. And if that’s the best job I could get for now, I would use that opportunity to learn more about the systems of the big company.
Derek Sivers
I’d see myself as a little cog inside the machine that is learning how the machine works by being inside of it and I’m saying this from experience. When I was 20 years old, I moved to New York City and got a job inside the music industry at the lowest possible level. I was the tape room guy. It was a minimum wage job where my job was to file incoming music tapes and send out music tapes that were requested. But I was thrilled to be there because, oh, my God, I’m inside the music industry. I get to learn how it works. I’m here, I get to talk to my managers and and watch the systems and observe. And I get to go to meetings and even sit in the back of the meetings and offer to do dictation. Or, you know, I can take notes on the meeting. So I would just offer anytime they were having a meeting like, “Hey, if you need anybody to take notes, let me know.” And there was this legendary songwriter that came in and I said, “Hey, if you need anything, let me know. If you need soup, if you need whatever.” And he’s like, “Go down to the drugstore and get me some ointment for my neck. It’s killing me.”
Derek Sivers
So I went down to the drugstore and I got him some ointment for his neck, and he had me rub whatever into his neck. But by doing this, I was sitting here with one of the world’s legendary songwriters, and we started talking about how he writes songs, and there’s a way of taking any shit work and finding something great about it and turning it to your advantage, turning it into a learning experience. So I was surprised one day when I got an email from somebody who said that he hates his job and hates his life because all he’s doing is packing boxes inside Fedex, Federal Express, the shipping company in the US. And I was like, “Oh my God, you work at Fedex? That is so exciting. It’s as if I were you. I would be learning so much about the systems. That’s like a revolutionary place to work. And man, you could be learning your manager’s job and like working there. And just like the people you could meet just from working on the inside there and learn about those systems, that’s so exciting.” And he never replied to that email. I don’t know what became of him, but I think about him sometimes and like, man, that guy was so lucky he was working inside Fedex. So anyway, I don’t know. Is this helpful?
Fouad
Yeah it is, it is. I think the main thing that came to mind, I saw one of your videos where you had the animations, which I love, by the way. You said, “If it excites you, do it. If it drains you, don’t do it.” Can you explain for someone who hasn’t heard this.
Derek Sivers
We have a compass in our gut that points two directions. Either something is generally exciting you or it’s draining you. If you feel something is sucking your energy away, and if it’s just making you tired, then that’s a sign that you’re doing something wrong. You’re heading the wrong direction that the compass is pointing this way, you’re going that way. Because whatever’s exciting you, whether it’s a sense of fun, obviously, but even fear. Fear is a form of excitement. When you are scared of something, your nerves are like this, your muscles are tight. You’re excited. We think of it as a negative excitement, but it’s still excitement, which is better than feeling drained where you feel the life being sucked out of you. So I just think that you should keep following whatever excites you, even if it’s what scares you. That’s a form of excitement. So that’s the direction we should keep heading. And I guess what I’m saying with this other stuff is that if you notice something draining you, you can do something to change your situation by changing your focus in some other way. Changing your environment, changing something. Changing your attitude so that you stay excited in some way.
Fouad
That was a thing that really resonated with me when you said follow your excitement. It really felt intuitively correct. And the things where I followed my excitement were the things where I gave it my heart and I just dedicated myself to it. You talk a lot about mastery, and there’s a kind of a dilemma here, because if you follow your excitement does that take you away from mastering something or?
Derek Sivers
Okay, deep happy versus shallow happy. That’s my way of putting it. That shallow happy is chasing every little distraction. It might satisfy you for a minute, but on a deeper level you will feel unsatisfied, whereas deep happiness usually comes from experience of having felt a shallow happy minus the deep happy. But the deeper happiness is more like the word fulfillment, which is just a deeper level, and it’s a deeper joy. So say it’s also the difference between like picking one person and having a long relationship, or a marriage that goes on for decades, versus just having sex and flirtation with every new person you meet. You could say that would be fun to keep flirting and making out with every new person you’re attracted to. But then you would miss the deeper happiness of a long, fulfilling relationship. So same thing with mastery versus distraction is if you keep following. Every little distraction that comes across your screen, you’ll only be shallow, happy. You’ll be missing this deeper joy that could come from getting great at something. And the people you would meet from becoming great at something if you become a great guitar player and you get really good at what you do, suddenly you’ll be playing with other musicians that are the best drummers and the best singers and the best bassists, because you spent all that time on one single thing.
Derek Sivers
Whereas if you just play 30 instruments a little bit, you might not get to play with any great musicians because nobody wants to play with somebody that’s not at their level. It’s just a metaphor for life, that picking any one thing and diving into it deeper means avoiding the lure of distractions that are trying to pull you away from it. But you just have to have some foresight and future thinking to know that this will this will be a deeper happiness, that, no, I’m not going to go to Ibiza and party. No, I’m not going to check out the newest social media that launched this week. All of those things will just pass me by. But I’m going to get really great at this one thing.
Fouad
I love the point where you say time is the best filter. It leaves at the end. The most time tested, useful and valuable skills. So what are those valuable skills you see now that people could benefit from?
Derek Sivers
So I got this idea from your fellow Lebanese, Nicholas Nassim Taleb. He wrote in the book “Antifragile” about-- I forget what he called it. The the rule, Lindy’s law, I think he calls it that whatever has been around the longest is most likely to be around the longest still. That if something has stood the test of time already. It’s the strongest indicator that it will continue to stand the test of time. So he pointed at Broadway musicals that the Broadway show that just opened this year is the least likely to last. But the one that’s been playing for 20 years is the most likely to last. I think of this with technologies, programming languages, software. Just like technologies in general that have been around longer and stood the test of time, even if that just means maybe eight years versus eight months. A lot of people jump on the newest thing that’s been around a few months, and they get all excited about it. I often ignore every brand new thing that comes out, and I just wait until it’s been around a year. And if people are still excited about it after a year, I’ll look into it. Because it just seems to be a better filter for my time. I don’t want to hear this week’s news. Tell me in a year what I should know about last year. That would be a better filter for my time, I think. Same with technology. So yeah, does that help? That’s using time as a filter. That avoiding the daily news, even avoiding the weekly news. Looking only at things that are still important after a few months can be a good filter for even your daily information that you take in.
Fouad
I love this so much. I want to I want to continue and cover later on the effect of ChatGPT on on your creativity or your life in general. But before that, something that really, really interests me is on the path to mastery to avoid making the work unfulfilling. You talked about Satisficing and Maximizing by Barry Schwartz. And by the way, I bought the book because of you and started reading it.
Derek Sivers
Oh, cool.
Fouad
Yeah.
Derek Sivers
Was that The Paradox of Choice”?
Fouad
Yeah, The Paradox of Choice.
Derek Sivers
Yeah. Good one.
Fouad
And so I want to jump into that point with you asking a specific question, which is the system-- I wrote it down here. So what’s your system for satisficing or maximizing. How do you choose which?
Derek Sivers
Ooh ooh good question. Okay, so first let’s just tell the audience that the word satisficing, in short, means saying good enough, whereas maximizing means seeking the absolute best or trying to make something the best. And so what the book called “The Paradox of Choice” says is that we should satisfice more often, because when we try to maximize to get the absolute best, we may technically make a better choice, but emotionally we’re going to feel worse about it because we’ve spent too much time looking into all these other options. We’re too aware of all of the other choices we could have made, and so we’re going to feel worse about any choice we do make. So when I learned that, I really took it to heart. I read that book and I went, wow, this feels like a profound life lesson. So I’m going to follow this now. I’ve decided that for everything that is not say the most important thing in my life. I’m going to just satisfice. I’m just going to say good enough. I’m going to quickly make choices if I need to buy a bicycle because I have no bicycle. Well, then I will just go spend 20 minutes reading reviews of bicycles. Pick one that’s available. That’s good enough. And I will never again think about having a different bicycle or a better bicycle, that’s good enough. But for the few things in my life that really matter, which right now are really just say maybe just 2 or 3 things. It’s my writing and being the best possible dad with my son. Because I only have one kid. This is it. This is all I got. It’s my only chance to be a parent. Those things I definitely maximize. Every time I see my boy, every time he comes home from school, I try as hard as I can to be the best dad I can be.
Derek Sivers
I don’t just say good enough about that. And same with my writing, I really sweat every word. I sit there, I do it like a songwriter or maybe even like a poet, where it’s just like every syllable, I say it out loud. I want to make sure it has the right sound, that it has the right rhythm and I stack up my sentences in just the right way, where each one leads to the next. And I really sweat those things, but it makes me happy to do it. It makes me really happy to be the best dad I can be. It makes me really happy to be the best writer I can be, and to look back at something I’ve written going,D”amn, I did like that’s the best I could have possibly done. I gave it everything I had.” And then it also makes me really happy to say, even look at my house around me and go like, it’s fine, it’s good enough. Like, see, even my house to me is something I don’t care that much about right now I’m talking to you from a house that is not great and I don’t care, it’s kind of shitty, but it keeps me out of the rain and the cold. It’s fine. It’s ugly, but I don’t care. It’s good enough. So maybe everybody just has to decide for themselves, what are the few things you’re going to maximize because you care that much. And then for everything else, you’d be better off just satisficing by saying good enough, man.
Fouad
When I heard that in the interview with him. It’s the first time I was like, “Yeah, I don’t have to do everything perfect.” It’s not like how you do one thing is how you do everything. No. I can focus on maximizing and every time I make my bed now, you pop to mind, like, okay, that’s good enough.
Derek Sivers
That’s nice. All right. Glad I could help you have a messy bed. Actually, it is a funny example. Yeah, I have a messy bed right now, too. I got up this morning and just tossed my covers aside and stepped out. I’m sure if you were to look at my bedroom right now, it’s a mess. I don’t care, nobody cares. I’m not being judged for that. I think I probably did say this in the interview with Tim, because I remember this moment, this idea that nobody cares what you’re bad at. That, like, right now, Fouad, you’re probably more known for your podcast worldwide than anything else you do. What you do, how you keep your bed or how your house is like, really worldwide nobody cares. There’s maybe two people in your life that are going to care. And it’s like, oh, well, you know, I can’t be everything to everybody. So it’s really nice to know that we don’t have to be great at everything that really most of your value to the world is going to come from just a couple things that you do and everything else just doesn’t matter as much.
Fouad
I do have a question you talked about maximizing in your writing, and there’s something that I really struggle with, which is coming to the essence. So the thing that really interested me is when you wrote “How to Live”. You wrote 1300 pages. You wrote for 16 hours a day for four years, approximately, and you condensed it to 112 pages. So that means you left 8%. So my question for you is what what do you do to decide if that’s useful or not? And to leave just the essential?
Derek Sivers
No, I did that for me. There are some people who have asked if I would please send them my 1300 page rough draft, and I say, “No, I don’t want that in the world. That was never meant for the public.” Just like you dress the way you want to dress because of how you want to be in the world. There’s some people that wear a suit, and there’s some people that wear orange saffron robes with beads and some people that wear whatever shitty t-shirt somebody gave them for free at a conference. You choose how you want to be in the world. A musician chooses the kind of music they want to put out in the world. Most musicians have the ability to play many kinds of music, but they choose the one that they feel represents them, like this is what they want to put out into the world to represent themselves. And so, yeah, the the writing I do, I really like succinct writing. I’m so thankful when somebody writes in a beautiful, rich way that respects my time versus say somebody that takes an idea that could have been 20 pages, but they make it 300 pages to please their publisher. I feel like that was an inconsiderate waste of my time. Well, like, good for you, author. I’m sure you made your publisher happy and I hope you got a bigger advance out of it. But now thousands of people are wasting tens of thousands of hours on your book because you puffed it up to make it bigger than it needed to be, just because your publisher asked you to, you know, do you really not respect any of us out here wasting our time with this long version of something that could have been short? So no, I feel like it’s my duty to the world to make my words as short as can be. But first, it’s just me creating something I think is beautiful, and I do that for myself first.
Fouad
So what is the the your train of thoughts when you’re looking at the thousand 300 page draft to decide what to leave out and what to keep in?
Derek Sivers
Okay. Fun subject. Okay, let’s actually talk about “Useful Not True”. Well, actually, no, I guess this applies to either one. Both times, it’s realizing that I’m not going to say everything there is to say. If I try to say everything there is to say, I will never be happy because. If I learn more tomorrow, the day after the book is published, I’m going to want to go back and revise it to add more. Since I want this book to have all of the information. So instead it’s this letting go idea of saying that if I just say this thing, that will be enough. That will communicate the idea. It’s more aesthetically beautiful. It’s easier for people to share with their friends. It’s easier to give your friend and kinder, to give your friend a short book than a long book. You can give your friend a 100 page book and say, “You should read this. It’s only going to take an hour. You really should read this.” Versus if you give your friend a 900 page book and say, “You should read this, it’s going to take you 35 hours. But trust me.” It’s a much more considerate gift, it’s easier to share.
Derek Sivers
It’s easier to share a small idea than a big idea. Have you ever had that experience of you have a big idea, and you’re trying to tell your friends, and your friends start getting bored that you’re going on for too long because you’re going, “No, wait, there’s more to it.” And you’re going on and on and on and on about this idea that you’re excited about, and you see your friends their eyelids get tired. It’s easier to communicate a small idea that makes your friends go, “Oh, oh, that’s interesting.” Because what they do next, if you communicate a small idea, the person hearing it goes, “Oh, I can use that.” Or oh that’s interesting. They start to think how they could apply this little idea. And so the thought process is I’m not the final word. This is not the complete answer. This is not all of the information. It’s just a little spark so that the reader will take this and make it their own, they will provide the rest of their context for their situation. I’m just giving a little spark, like the bit of sand that gets into an oyster so that they can turn it into a pearl.
Fouad
I love this, I love this philosophy. I want to jump. So I promised the listeners we would jump to ChatGPT. But I also want to jump into at the end. I promise to do the game at the start, but we’re going to do it at the end. This is how it flowed. And I have a question about your son also that could be interesting for you. So, let me see. There’s something really interesting that I realize about your point of view that is so liberating is-- by the way, it’s crazy that you spent 20,000 hours with your son. I barely spend an hour a week with my dad, so it’s something that really woke me up. Um, yeah.
Derek Sivers
I mean, same here. It was. It was only. It’s situational too. If he would have been born while I was in the midst of running my company, I probably would not have been a very good dad. But luckily, he was born right after I sold my company, so I was able to make him my top priority in life. Yeah.
Fouad
He’s a lucky, lucky kid. So I do have a question about reinventing yourself. So that’s something you talk a lot about. And it’s scary for an artist to let go of something that once worked. And so, for example, I used to make videos on social media and it was two people talking. I could send you one after by mail. And it worked really well. And the the community grew from 8000 to 1 million to 2 million. And it just grew. And I got to a point where I was like, this is not me anymore. It’s just an act. I’m not being myself. It’s not genuine. It’s not authentic. And when I heard your interview with Tim, I was like, “Man, I would love to be friends with Derek. He’s so authentic.” And this is what I strive to be like. And I took it to the extent of saying, okay, if I want to start off content again, reinventing myself, which I want to come to the point and ask you how to do it, I want my audience to be a bunch of Derek Sivers.
Derek Sivers
Hah.
Fouad
Yeah, that is the people I would love to have as friends, as thinkers, as people that I genuinely would love to, to share my art with.
Derek Sivers
So growing up as a musician, I read a lot of interviews and biographies and stories about famous musicians, and the idea of reinvention comes up a lot. But to me it was like an artistic necessity that Miles Davis, Bob Dylan, Madonna, Paul Simon, David Bowie, these musicians kept reinventing themselves. I mean, you know, even the classical composers. Stravinsky, if you look at his career, he had vastly different musical styles in his long career. To me, growing up with this story around me taught me that this is a necessity that every artist must change their style as they go. This is part of growing and learning and expanding and keeping yourself interested in what you’re doing. Don’t do it if you’re still fascinated with the art form that you’re currently on, if you’re really fascinated with it, and it’s truly exciting the hell out of you still, well, then there’s no need to change it yet. But as soon as you feel this feeling of like, “Okay, I’ve done that, I’ve mastered that, I’ve done that completely.” As soon as you feel that feeling, well, then you have to force yourself into a new style to keep yourself fresh and expanding and growing to stay green.
Derek Sivers
You know, to be a little green sprout instead of an old rotting tree so that you can keep growing. To me, this is just necessity. This is what we have to do. But even in life, there were some life decisions I made like selling my company after ten years. I did it because I was feeling that the bigger personal learning, growing experience for me, was to leave this company I had been doing for ten years and do something brand new. Even though I could have made more money sticking with the company. It’s not about that. It was about the personal growth. So I sold the company because that was the scariest, most unfamiliar thing I could do. Or as it would have been nice and easy and I could have made millions of dollars just continuing to do what I was doing. But to me, personal growth was more important.
Fouad
The thing that I find that guides your decisions and correct me if I’m wrong, I’m just seeing it to see if I could adopt this point of view also is you follow what scares you, scares you the most?
Derek Sivers
Yep. Because that’s like I just said, that’s the learning, growing experience. If you care about your personal growth, expanding your abilities, expanding your understanding of the world. Well then the map on how to get there is to always go towards whatever scares you.
Fouad
I love this. I love this so much and I think people would benefit from this so so so much.
Derek Sivers
I think so too. I know it’s, again, you know, somebody might say, “Well, yeah, easy for you to say. I’ve only got $20 in the bank. I’m fucked. I have to just do what I’m doing.” But I’ve had this philosophy always, even when I had no money and no success at all. And I think that approaching life this way is the path to success. By most definitions.
Fouad
I was researching before we jump into the GPT point, the question I have about your kid and the game. I was researching a couple of days ago for a video about ikigai, and I forgot the name of the guy. He did a Ted talk, and he said, “If you don’t have time for your ikigai, use the 5 to 9.” And I thought about it and I was like, okay, what, 5 to 9? He said, “From 5 to 9 a.m. and from 5 p.m. till 9 p.m. You have these two windows to work on your ikigai.” So your reason for being. And that really struck a chord that we have more time than we think to work on our passions.
Derek Sivers
Yeah. I’ve never told this story before, but. I have tinnitus, which is maybe pronounced tinnitus, which is in my ears at all times even right now, as I’m talking, I hear like five loud annoying tones at the same time. It’s from attending a concert when I was 12 years old without earplugs. So ever since I was 12, I’ve had loud ringing in my ears, and it’s the most annoying thing in my life. So when I heard that there was a cure for it, I tried it immediately. And to do this thing you put on headphones and it plays tones at the same time that you have a sensor on your tongue, but the doctor says you have to do this 30 minutes twice a day, so do it 30 minutes in the morning, 30 minutes at night, and you cannot do anything else while you’re doing it. Don’t try to watch videos, don’t try to read. Just sit and focus on the sound. 30 minutes in the morning, 30 minutes at night. And I said, okay, I really want to cure this. So I did it. I did the program 30 minutes every morning, 30 minutes every night, and I did this for months, and unfortunately it didn’t work. But it taught me that I will find an hour every day if I have to. So even when I think I have no free time, I made time. No matter how tired I was or no matter how busy I was, I stopped what I was doing because I wanted to cure my tinnitus so badly that I made the time to do this. So it didn’t work. But it gave me a new perspective on time because I thought, I don’t have time to learn a foreign language. I don’t have time to lift weights. Like a real athlete training program. And then after doing this, I went, “Oh, actually, if I really wanted to, I would.” There is always the time. You can always say no to everything else. And you know what? Like how old are you now?
Fouad
23.
Derek Sivers
23. Wow. All right. I’m 54. Dude, when I was your age the internet wasn’t invented yet. I was still living a full life, reading books, learning without any internet. And so it is completely feasible for me to just turn it off, to just shut off the internet completely, to have no internet for days and know that’s fine, that there’s really nothing I’m missing out there. And I know that for a fact, because I lived 26 years of my life with no internet. I know that reading books is enough stimulation for any of us. And so yeah, we can find the time. I hadn’t heard that 5 to 9. You can make time in that 5 to 9. I think one of the biggest ways to do it is by turning off these other things that you think of as necessities, but really aren’t.
Fouad
That’s so beautiful. That’s so beautiful. I love the point you made about at our age in the 20s and teens. People are more prone to fall into addiction with technology and that has a serious impact on mental health. And I can say that because I’ve been in a phase where I was constantly on the phone and in a phase where I had to focus, so I had to put my phone away. And my last year of uni, because I’m a serial procrastinator, I left all my exams to the end and I was focusing on my passion, which was creating videos about personal development. And I was faced with the final decision. It’s either you stop and you focus on your exams, or you’re going to fail and repeat the entire year. And so here I made a decision. Okay, I’m going to leave my phone in the dorm room. I’m going to walk to the library with no phone, and I’m going to study all day until I finish this thing. And these three months, which were supposed to be the most stressful three months in my life because I had left the eight exams till the end, turned out to be-- because I didn’t use my phone. I was mindful, the most peaceful three months in my entire life. And so. I fully understand your perspective and way of life because it’s more joyful, I think.
Derek Sivers
Yeah, yeah. I mean, there can be joy to be had from being connected with people you like around the world, and I do as much as sometimes I enjoy having my phone off. Then I turn it on and I get WhatsApp voicemails from my best friends in India and New York and Germany. And I’m like, “Oh, this is great.” It does bring a lot of joy too. So it’s like we use the same technology to both bring joy, bring enlightenment, and bring the worst distraction. It’s the exact same device for all of these.
Fouad
100%. So let’s jump to the point of of ChatGPT, which I think is a is a fascinating technology, but yet I face the issue where when I use it, there’s such a load and stimulation of over information that it kind of paralyzes you. Like, what do I do with all this? So what do you think and do you use it even?
Derek Sivers
I started writing this book “Useful Not True” two years ago in 2022. And I think, you know, I have this value system where I think it’s really important to focus on one thing at a time. So in the last two years, of course, AI LLMS have made huge advancements. And to me, they’ve just been distractions as I’ve been wanting to finish this book. So really, if you were to look at my time, I’m mostly just a full time dad because I spend, yeah, 30 to 40 hours a week. Just one on one with my kid. When I’m not with him, then in my spare time, like when he’s at school for six hours, those are the hours I use for working. And then my top priority is to make a great book. And then what other hours do I have to to dive into AI and LLMS? Well, not much, because any hours that I could be spending on that are hours that I really should be spending finishing my book, so I haven’t spent that much time on it. I look that way occasionally, and I catch myself and I say, “Okay, I’ll check that out later after I finish the book.” And that’s how I am with a lot of things. There’s so many things. I mean, oh my God, I want to learn Chinese right now. I want to learn a new programming language. I want to go traveling. There’s so many books I want to read.
Derek Sivers
And I’m like, “All right, after I finish my book first, let me finish my book. Then I will do these other things.” But until then, every available hour I have I spend trying to make the best possible book I can make. And that, like I said, nobody cares what you’re bad at. Most of us are only going to be known for 1 or 2 things. So right now I just feel like my only two things I really care about are being a great dad to this one kid and writing great books. That’s enough. If that’s all I do in the world, that’s enough. Everything else? Oh well, if I never check out AI. Oh well, my life will still be good if I only did these two things. So that said. I have spent a little bit of time, just very little. I paid ChatGPT for the $20 a month subscription because I wanted to see the difference between ChatGPT 3 and 4, so I used GPT4. I keep it open in a tab sometimes while I’m writing something that I’m not sure about, where I kind of wish there was another person in the room that I could ask questions of, and I could say, what do you think of this? Or what is a word that means someone whose work is never done? What is a word that means that’s like the opposite of something I’ve been putting off?
Derek Sivers
And so GPT is great for helping me find a word. I never use it to generate text for me, like, nothing you read that I put out into the world was ever generated by an LLM. I do all my own words. And in fact, even if you look at my home page sive.rs, there’s an AI section on there now. So actually the URL is sive.rs/ai is like my public statement, almost like people have like a privacy statement. Mine is a statement saying, “Here’s how I use AI.” And it’s in order to say, no email you ever received from me will ever be written by an AI. Nothing I’ve ever published on my blog has been written by an AI. If this changes, I will update this page, but this is my public statement. You can always check to see how I’m using it. If you’re ever wondering like “Hey, that that email from Derek sounded a little off.” Or “That article of his, I’m not sure. Did he really write that?” It’s like, well, here’s my public statement and I stand to it. So honestly, that’s all I’ve done so far. I’ve not used it for anything very interesting. I’ve only used it as like a writing research assistant that I ask questions of while I’m writing. I’ll probably cancel my subscription soon because I’m not using it for that much now that I’m finishing the book.
Fouad
I love your authenticity. I admire your values, and I hope to have such strong values that give me this anchor.
Derek Sivers
Sorry. Do you mean what I said about, like, these are the only two things that matter? You mean like that?
Fouad
I mean it in terms of, like, your authenticity and the fact that you know, it’s important to you, but you have it in such a anchored inside everything you do and your entire philosophy. So I before I jump to the end of this episode or segment, just to not take more of your time, how did how did you build such strong values that you adhere to religiously?
Derek Sivers
I think it’s from necessity that, like we talked earlier about the shallow happy versus deep happy, I have felt the pain of letting myself get distracted. And this deeper pain from not living up to my own expectations, not making anything great because I was wasting my time doing little things instead of one big thing. I’ve felt the pain of years of that. Years of my life have gone by when I’ve done nothing great because I let myself be distracted. And after years of that pain, now I can say, I’m just going to say no to all this stuff. I mean, things come up in the news, of course, every day, every week, “Oh, my God, look at these new inventions. Oh my God, you need to check this out. Oh my God, there’s a new social network. Oh my God, there’s a new device. Oh my God, you have to check it out.” Or shit dude, I mean, you know, your neighbors to the south, “Oh my God, did you see what’s going on in the world right now? Oh, my God, you need to react to this.” And I’m like, no, everybody else is reacting. They don’t need one more person to react. I’m just going to do this one thing or two things. I’m going to be a great dad and I’m going to write great books. That’s enough. That comes from having felt the pain of an empty life, just responding to other people’s distractions.
Fouad
That’s so interesting. To jump to the the question about your kid, the highly anticipated question I wanted to ask you. So you spend 30 hours a week with your kid. Now it’s been 20,000 hours, which means you mastered at that twice.
Derek Sivers
Yeah, I mastered the being a dad to him. Yes.
Fouad
I want to ask you, what has he taught you about yourself?
Derek Sivers
The importance of doing the right thing, whether you feel like it or not. There have been many times where I’m tired. Or I’ve really got something else on my mind. OrI’m in pain because I’ve hurt my knee or something like that. And he’ll say, “Dad, let’s play hide and seek.” And my first impulse is like, I don’t want to. But then I think this is it. This is my only chance to be a dad. He’s only going to be a kid once. I’m only going to be a dad once. This is it. And so I’ll go, like. I’ll say “30, 29, 28.” And he’ll get excited. He’ll go run and hide and I’ll just sit there going, “All right, I did the right thing. That was the right thing to do, whether I felt like it or not.” So I think that’s the biggest lesson I’ve got from parenting with him for 12 years now. He’s 12 years old. Is this idea of like doing the right thing, whether you feel like it or not.
Fouad
That’s interesting. That’s interesting.
Derek Sivers
Most of us know what the right thing is to do, right? So when somebody emails you to ask for advice. I think most people have heard enough information. They don’t need more information. They know what is the right thing to do. If they just stop for a second. Just turn off your inputs, turn off your phone, sit by yourself, whether staring at the stars or writing in a notebook and you know, already inside. You have all the information, you know what you should do. It’s just a matter of actually doing it.
Fouad
I just remember the point that we had before we finish up with the game because, we said we would come back to it. Is the word wandering. So how does that add to your creativity and how do you actively wonder?
Derek Sivers
Okay, for me, I don’t know how others do it. Metaphorically it’s exploration. So. Instead of just going one direction and saying, well, I’ve started heading this way, so this is the way I’m going to go. Instead, you say, “Okay, well, that’s one way. What’s another way?” And you make yourself try the opposite. Now I’m going to try this way. And you try this for a bit and you say okay that’s another way. What’s another opposite way? Let me try this. What if I did nothing? What if I, you know, disappeared? It’s it’s brainstorming. You know that term, right?
Fouad
Yeah.
Derek Sivers
Okay. It’s good old fashioned brainstorming. Go ahead. Yeah.
Fouad
I’m sorry to interrupt you. It just pops to mind my impulsive thoughts. I just thought, can we do a wandering exercise for 20s so we could go through the process of what?
Derek Sivers
Sure.
Fouad
So how does it go?
Derek Sivers
Oh, pick a topic.
Fouad
Okay. Mindfulness.
Derek Sivers
All right. If it were me and I was right now and this is not for public, but if you’re asking if it was just me. Okay. Like mindfulness. Okay. First, what the fuck is mindfulness? Full of mind. Mind is full. My mind is full of something. What does that even mean? Mindfulness often means to have an empty head. So do they mean, like, full of awareness or self-awareness? What is self-awareness? Or is it lack of self-awareness? Is it being aware of everything else? Is it being mindful of my surroundings? Why is it important to be mindful of our surroundings? Oh, maybe because there’s something to learn from our surroundings, but then we just listening to the water drip on the roof. Is that learning from it? Would I have to analyze or I have to ask myself what I like about the sound of the water dripping on the roof. What is that? Why do we like that? What is the purpose of mindfulness anyway? Am I just doing this because people tell me that mindfulness is important? Am I trying to impress other people? Am I trying to act like somebody who is mindful in order to get little social points and little rewards from people that say, “Oh, look at you, you’re so mindful.”
Derek Sivers
What if I was the last person on earth, like, literally there was not a single human on earth. I was the only person here. Would I still think that mindfulness is important? For what end does having mindfulness help me achieve what I want to achieve? In another way that not being mindful would not. What is the opposite of being mindful? Is it being distracted? If I’m completely focused on my work, or let’s say I’m reading a book that I’m loving so much so that I don’t even notice that it’s dark outside or that it got dark, or that there’s a fire next door. Is that being mindful or not mindful? Therefore, is mindfu. Paying attention to every distraction. Is it just letting yourself give into distraction? Okay, you said 20s. I went longer than that. That’s how I think. If you give me any topic, this is how I think about it. I like to flip it all around, hold it upside down, spin it around, ask it from different points of view. I try to argue against it, I try to disprove it. Give in to it. Everything.
Fouad
Yeah, it’s really useful. I feel like this is a way people could use to internalize concepts and come up with new ideas from it, and to understand it on a deeper, deeper level.
Derek Sivers
I mean, you know, I do the same with everything. That’s why I seem to have a weird approach to people think I’m weird for my approach to money. Because to me, I do the same thing with money. Like, all right, you know, if you would have said money, I would have said a whole bunch of those kinds of questions around that. Like, what is it for? What’s the whole point of that? Like what? So I could buy a thing or are there some things I really need, or do I actually need those or do I just want? So what is the difference between want and need? How can I feel the difference between want and need. So therefore what is the purpose of money then? Well, it’s a transfer of value. Who could use this money more than me? Are there people that are dying? Because I want a shiny thing. Do I really want the shiny thing that much? Whose life matters? Does my life matter more than other people’s? Is it my job to look out for my life? Or my job to look out for other people’s lives? If money’s a transfer of value, how could I transfer that value to other people more? Can I help them make more money? Like so I make weird decisions around money that people think I’m strange for how much I do not follow the usual paths that other people make of trying to, like, make as much money as they can or whatever, but I think it’s because I have questioned it too much.
Fouad
I loved when you said if I was the only person on earth would that matter?
Derek Sivers
It’s a big one.
Fouad
Because that cuts through a lot of the bullshit.
Derek Sivers
Yeah. Somebody emailed me once saying that he and his girlfriend were planning to travel the whole world together. And did I have any advice? And I said, “Yeah, don’t bring a phone, take no pictures.” And he said, “What? Why?” And I said, “Because there’s a big chance you might be doing this to impress other people.” And if you-- oh no, sorry. I said, “Don’t tell anyone that you’re doing it and don’t bring a phone and take no pictures. And do you still want to do it now? If you could literally not tell anybody on earth that you were doing it. Maybe you just tell your parents where you’re going to be and that’s it. Because there’s a big chance that you might just be wanting to do this just so you can brag on social media. Look at me, look at us. Look what a great life I’m having, aren’t I cool? Aren’t I important? Please love me. Please, please love me.” So that’s not a good reason to be traveling. So yeah, ask yourself if you’d be doing it if you couldn’t tell anybody. Yeah, I think about that one a lot. I think that’s it’s a frequently used tool in the toolbox is asking myself would I still be doing this if nobody knew about it, if I was never going to tell anybody, if I was the last person on earth. It’s a good test to see how much you’re doing to impress others.
Fouad
I love this because it really aligns with, I saw your page or your website, and it really aligns with everything you talk about, which is the fact that what you’re doing is from a place of internal satisfaction. More than just external goals, and which I think is beautiful because it’s authentic. Okay. So to finalize with the game, it’s an improv game. Okay. I just had it randomly in the episode you watch with Bijan, and I said, I want to do it. I just like it. It excites me. So I want to try it. So it’s either you could throw the ping pong and so the game goes like this, it’s like we’re playing a game of ping pong. And at every statement that I say, you say and you continue it. And then I say, and I continue it. So, okay. Do you want, do you want to serve or do I serve.
Derek Sivers
You do the first statement, please.
Fouad
Okay. I reframe my mind to change my perspective.
Derek Sivers
And it has helped me live a fuller life. By trying to understand conflicting points of view.
Fouad
And conflicting points of view have enabled me to understand deeper parts of myself.
Derek Sivers
And other people I feel so much more connected to people in parts of the world that I used to think were completely foreign, and I have nothing in common with. But by trying to see the world from their point of view, it’s helped me feel so much more connected to people I previously felt disconnected from.
Fouad
And then that opened up my heart to love everyone.
Derek Sivers
And I was going to make a bad sex joke there, but I will not.
Derek Sivers
There’s my end.
Fouad
That’s it. That’s how it usually ends. Derek, this was a very value filled episode that I feel contained a lot of aha moments for me and hopefully for others. And it was a pleasure. Pleasure meeting you.
Derek Sivers
Thank you. It’s really weird to do something like this where I’m trying to be helpful to your listeners. But it feels so indulgent when you ask me a question about me saying, why are you like this? And so I have to be kind of selfish in order to be generous, I think. I hope it was useful. So yeah anybody listening to this, if you still have questions or if this made things more confusing in the way that I rambled about myself. Yeah please send me an email. Go to my website sive.rs. I’m not really on social media. I just put everything of value on my website because fuck the corporations.
Derek Sivers
So yeah, go to my website, send me an email, introduce yourself, say hello. That’s how I met Fouad. He just reached out a few months ago and said hello. And then I looked into what he was doing. I went, “Oh my God, you’re great.” So yes, I would love to talk with you.
Derek Sivers
So originally we talked about like, “Hey, you could wait till next time. I mean, you’re part of the world. We could meet up in person or we could just record this now.” So here we are recording this now. And I also do hope to meet up someday when I come to Lebanon.
Fouad
Of course, of course. If you want, I’ll send you my WhatsApp. And if you think of coming here, then there’s a couple of of restaurants that you would love that have the best hummus.
Derek Sivers
Definitely let you know. I would love to meet. So thanks for having me on the show.
Fouad
It’s my pleasure. It’s genuinely my pleasure. And you genuinely make people’s life not only easier, but happier.
Derek Sivers
Thank you.