The Armen Show
host: Armen Shirvanian
Fun broad conversation about websites, writing, productivity, critical thinking, advice, Useful Not True, women podcast guests, friction in life, blogging, and complexity.
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Transcript:
Armen
Hello and welcome to the Armen Show, podcast science, people, creativity, growing, the bookshelf is in the background, all the spirit of the world here and boy do we have a cool guest on this one. Someone I've known of for a long time, back from my personal development, blog writing days to now through all the podcast years. I've seen his books, I've seen articles, written material of his always has resonated with me because there's certain language types that have resonated with me. And he has communicated with individuals I know of as well. When there's interlinking, those are the people that we are meant to be communicating with at times. He has many books. I am very book-oriented. We'll get into those. My guest today, coming from New Zealand, what? How does that even happen? We have Derek Sivers. Welcome to the program.
Derek Sivers
Thank you. And audience, Armen and I started nerding out about so many things before we hit record. We went, "Oh wait, stop, we need to hit record!" So, here we are, nerding out.
Armen
That is true, and I could re-describe nerding out as being with it as far as things that we connect with. It's great to be that.
Derek Sivers
I like the principles on your website. They're very succinct and vague, but I really like that you put them there.
Armen
Yes, similar. I had a soccer player Cameron Porter, he was on my show and he had a principles page on his website. And when I saw that I was like, we have a talk and we ended up talking. I just like it when it's organized. Like these are my thoughts. These are things I believe in. Here's goals I have. You do that so wonderfully with your website. When I see that it's so clear. It's not. There's a person to me that there's a person there. Okay, there's a person there. Cool.
Derek Sivers
It's a little bit like an /about page that says, "Here's who I am, for context." Instead of just "Look at the piece of content I've created today", it gives a little longer context. "This is where I'm coming from. This is where I'm going to."
Armen
It's like a network of a person versus a couple of tidbits. Not staccato, more like a key. You press and hold the key. So it's like, mm. You can feel the whole thing there. I like that quality.
Derek Sivers
Speaking of, you have a very legato voice.
Armen
What is legato? We're about to learn things, people.
Derek Sivers
Oh it's the opposite of staccato. Dot-dot-dot-dot is staccato, and then legato is where one word just goes right into the other one. You've got an interesting way of speaking like a legato saxophone.
Armen
One day I'm going to speak legato when I'm ordering gelato. It's going to be a reordering of the letters and they're going to say here's your ice cream and also wow what a voice. That's cool. I didn't know that. Legato. I didn't even know that. I've been describing it so many times, but I didn't know there was... Of course, I guess there's a description of it. That's nice. There's a fullness to it. I like full paragraphs. I like journaling more in full these days because anything we do, if we look at it later with AI or analyze it, the more full it is, the more we can look at it, the more it's abrupt. It doesn't have much to work with. We don't have as much to work with. So we're building a base of things. So that goes straight into... I want to go into...
Armen
You have a variety of books. How do books represent a base of your thoughts? Do you use them as a base of what you've done, or do you look at them as a review of what you already have figured out? How would you describe that?
Derek Sivers
If they are a log of something, it's only a log of what I found fascinating at that time.
Derek Sivers
So my first writing, chronologically public writing, was for musicians. So for ten years, the thing that inspired me to write was to share with other musicians what I had learned from being on the inside of the music industry. Because I spent many frustrating years beating my head against locked doors as a musician. And then suddenly I was inside the music industry watching how things really work. And I felt like I was a spy on the inside. So I was super motivated to write, to tell other musicians like, "Hey, I've figured it out. This is how it really works. I'm on the inside and let me tell you, this is how deals happen. This is how careers are made. This is why some succeed and others fail. I'm inside. I can tell you the news from the inside now. That was my initial motivation for writing. And then I started a company to help musicians. It was a music distribution company called CD Baby. And I did that for ten years. So while I was running CD Baby, I was still in this mindset of sharing the inside scoop with musicians. I saw myself as a service for musicians.
Derek Sivers
But as I was finishing my ten years with CD Baby and then I sold the company for a ton of money, suddenly people thought of me as an entrepreneur. And now instead of musicians wanting to hear my scoop from the inside, it was entrepreneurs wanting to hear my scoop from the inside, saying, "Hey, how'd you do it? How'd you make that company a success? How'd you make all that?" And I went, "All right, well, here's what I've learned running a company." So then I started speaking to entrepreneurs. So those are my first two books.
Derek Sivers
Then my middle book was called "Hell Yeah or No," which was just a collection of thoughts around what's worth doing.
Derek Sivers
And I'd say only my last two books, called "Useful, Not True," and "How to Live," really took a new, purpose-filled direction.
Armen
There's a lot of meaning in them. I do like how in your books, you have all the sections. I'm writing a book currently and it makes me think of some of the style. Your book type matches more my style where I would put a section described in detail, a section described in detail, and it doesn't have to be so extensive, but it's a main point. That's kind of how I would think. When I think of Wittgenstein, the philosopher, he had like a paragraph, thought, next paragraph, thought. I like that concept because sometimes a thing doesn't have to be a 14-page item. Maybe it is a page, a paragraph, two pages, and it expresses a point and on we go to the next one. So I do like that concept that you did that. Did you feel free to do that? Was there a base for that kind of separating them like that?
Derek Sivers
There was a motivation from reading so many books where a brilliant idea was buried in page 292 in a chapter about something else that went on for a hundred pages. Sometimes I'd find a brilliant, brilliant idea that was buried in the muck. And I thought, "Man, for my own writing, I want to make sure that each individual idea has its own spotlight." So as I'm writing, I try to be aware of when I've put two ideas together and I don't want them to get lost so I separate them, even if it means that I have to do like part one and part two of a chapter. In my newest book, Useful Not True, there's a fable of the bridge guard and I had more to say about that but I didn't want to combine what I had to say about that with the fable itself. So I came back to it like eight chapters later before I closed out the section to say, "Hey, I want to make sure you got the point... Let's go back to that fable about the bridge guard, because now I have more to say about it, but because it's a separate thing to say about it, I separate it into two separate articles." And I even try to do that down at the sentence level, that if I get the idea that a sentence has two ideas in it, I'll separate it into two sentences. I guess I'm just taking this to some kind of logical extreme to make sure that each idea has its own spotlight.
Armen
I think it says something very valuable because I notice let's say on YouTube or sections of TikTok or other places the person that focuses on one or two main points and makes a thousand videos on that is doing way better with the public. People are happy to see the next day a similar but altered form of this exact same thing a thousand times more than a a thousand different things because a thousand different things after the third one they're like, oh that wasn't I don't want to learn about fishing. This is a dating thing. I'm trying to learn about it's not connected but if the person really focuses on like You are trying to go to travel in places that are tropical at this time of the year to do writing. Super specific somehow, but let's say that then there'll be people okay writing there/ Okay, that kind of writing could be journal writing. You're so specific now They're like this is a nice home to be in so that's what you're doing with that which is a very cool, you can connect with it as a person, if you're looking for that.
Derek Sivers
Thanks. It's writing for short attention spans.
Derek Sivers
It's not just that, but it's being considerate to understand that you are not a big deal to most people. For most people, you are one of many things flashing in front of their eyes for just a few seconds. You're not going to get them to stop give you 30 undivided minutes of their time. You have to just assume that you've got maybe 10 seconds. And so your idea has to get to the point and be simple and easy to spread.
Derek Sivers
I like the metaphor of the nutshell, where we say, "In a nutshell..." A nutshell is easy to carry. It's easy to stick into your pocket. It's easy to bring with you. When you put something to a nutshell for someone, it's considerate. It makes it easy for them to carry around.
Armen
I like that visual. That is considerate. You're thinking of the person here. You can take a couple of these with you for the next two weeks. These are things, "Oh, I can look at it. Okay, great thought. And now I can work on that and grow in some way." That's considerate. That's true. There's like for the user, for self, how to make content, how to look at things. One thing that comes to about really being for something or not doing it.
Armen
What is an example of that for yourself in the last few years where you have been like, "Okay, heck yes, this is something and where is a no if it comes to mind?" How have you used that recently? Or in the recent few years, potentially?
Derek Sivers
Okay, let's do in the recent few days.
Derek Sivers
"Hell yeah or no" is another way of saying, "I'm going to raise the bar all the way up. I've said yes to too many things. I'm spread too thin." If you're in that situation where you're overwhelmed, it helps to raise the bar all the way up so that almost nothing gets past it. So you say no to almost everything. You leave lots of empty room, lots of time in your life. You thing comes into your life, you have the time and the energy to give it your all.
Derek Sivers
So in the last few days I had to do that, because I am too interested in too many things and after spending two years writing my last book called "Useful Not True" I had pushed aside all of these other things I'm interested in for two years. And now that the book is done and released, I put these things back onto my plate all at once. And it was like ordering everything on the restaurant menu. It was making me nauseous. So I sent everything back to the kitchen and said, "Maybe someday I will do that." And I kept just one single thing on my plate.
Derek Sivers
On my computer I have a folder called "In", a folder called "Projects", and a folder called "SomedayMaybe". It's a mindset thing: which folder I'm putting a project into. I had pulled 18 things into my current projects folder, and that's what was making me nauseous. It was sincere, but just undoable. So I took all but one of those things, put them into the SomedayMaybe folder, which required a mindset shift to say, "Maybe those things will never happen. And that's okay. Maybe I will never learn to speak Chinese. Maybe I will never make that project happen." And I'm just going to have to be okay with that. Because if I'm not, it's just going to bother me and keep me from focusing on the one thing I need to do. So I just picked one thing that was important, worth doing, and timely to do right now. And I'm only doing that. That's the only thing I'm doing except talking with you right now.
Armen
How cool is that? Do you ever think to yourself that, "Okay, I'm going to say no to this thing, no to this thing and as long as I maintain all my things that are in good order, things will show up that are the yes that I was preparing for or building up for," even though you might not see the yes beforehand?
Derek Sivers
Yeah. It depends on whether you've organized your life so that you're dependent on the opinion of others. Like getting famous on YouTube? Well, that's not up to you. You can do your best, but the outcome is completely dependent on others. I knew a guy once that he made it his life's mission that I'm going to be on Oprah's show. Well, that's not up to you. You could do your best, that's up to you, but getting on Oprah's show is up to Oprah.
Derek Sivers
So I have no fear that I will ever run out of things that fascinate me, that I desperately, sincerely want to do. I have a folder of 500+ things that I really want to do. Projects that I've even spec'd out exactly how I'm going to do it, why I'm going to do it, how it's going to happen. And there it sits in a folder called "SomedayMaybe." And we'll see. Maybe I'll do it. Maybe it'll just be a nice idea. Daydreaming for its own sake is valid.
Armen
I agree with both parts. Our mind to explore, and then also how cool is it that you have it written down versus you might have forgotten it if it was not put down. But then this one, okay, look. And then at some point, maybe you're feeling like, "I want to get something in this category done this way. Let me look it up." Thought already taken care of. Thanks past Derek. Current Derek is glad for that. Let's go. Let's make some moves.
Derek Sivers
I do a lot of things now for my future self. Credit where it's due, David Allen's book called "Getting Things Done" was really the main inspiration behind this. His core point is that you have to capture all of these fleeting thoughts, plans, ideas. Just capture them all so that you can get it out of your head and you can know that it's recorded somewhere. Whether that's pieces of paper or a voice recorder or typed into text files, it's somewhere. And then you can put it out of your head. So I've been doing that for over 20 years. All of my stuff is in text files.
Armen
We give this a check plus. Long live David Allen and GTD. When I was writing my blog 2008, 9, 10, 11, 12, I would listen sometimes to his audio book. People would cover it. They would talk about it. And what a system because it felt like if you actually did that system, none of your thoughts would go to waste. Everything would be well managed. A great way to go versus do I have to rehash it again, some things will be lost, that's terrible.
Derek Sivers
Speaking of, it's interesting to go back to books like Getting Things Done that seem to be about productivity tips. But if you go back and read it again, you'll see that it's actually quite philosophical. It's a whole way of living to externalize these things that are floating around in your head. Get it out. I was thinking the metaphor of the clown or magician that pulls the ribbon out of their mouth like this, you know? It's taking what is a jumble inside your head and turning it into one single stream that's more legible and helps you straighten out your thoughts, literally, with that metaphor. So it's useful for yourself and and gives you the peace of mind of knowing that it's out of your jumbled head.
Derek Sivers
Same thing when I went back to read a book called "You Can Negotiate Anything" by Herb Cohen. "You Can Negotiate Anything" by Herb Cohen is a book I read long ago when I was a teenager, and it seemed to just be negotiation advice. But I went back and read it again now, 30 years later, and it's a deep book about how life is negotiable. And everything that people tell you isn't necessarily true, unless it's a hard, concrete fact that might be true. But most things people say are subjective. Including prices, of course. When somebody says, "The price for this item is $16.95." He points out that's not etched in stone, that wasn't handed down to Moses on a stone tablet, that wasn't written in the sky by God, that was a price that somebody in the back room just decided, "Ah, should we make it $19.95? No, how about $13.95? Just make it $15. No, you know what? We'll choose $14.95." So the salesman comes out and tells you, "This is $14.95," and the author of You Can Negotiate Anything says, "I don't think so. I don't agree. I don't accept that reality. And reading it again now then, I saw that it's applicable to life, not just prices. Somebody says, "You're not that kind of person." Or somebody says, "That's just the way things are." And you say, "That's not necessarily true. I disagree with that."
Armen
It's very true. It's not just the way things are. Three wonderful points you brought up there. One of them right there, I want to go into the things you are given. You went into the back room in the music industry or distribution, and so then you see it on the other side, and then you think to yourself, oh, these agreements or how we do things are created. There's a person on that end. There's something funny about being on the end where things are described already. You say, "Okay, that's the system." But then when you're on the other side, you say, "Oh, somebody came up with this. "Okay, it seems like it would work "for someone like myself earlier." And then it doesn't look as fixed in place. And then you have a sense of, "Oh, I have more room to do this." Actually, this is a life question.
Armen
How does someone get more of that sense? Do they have to go more on the other side of the table sooner? How do they get that sense that things are not so fixed?
Derek Sivers
Yes, it helps to put yourself on the inside, but mostly I think it's just adding a question mark to all of these sentences. When somebody says, "Immigration is bad," you put a question mark on it. "Immigration is bad? Are you sure? Let's look at that. Let's try to disprove it. What are some ways that immigration is good?" Somebody says, "People in L.A. are shallow." You say, "People in L.A. are shallow? Let's look at that. Everybody? Have you met them all? Let's find examples where people in L.A. are not shallow." And this keeps going with any subjective thing you hear people say about the state of the world, about what's going to happen in the future, about what did happen in the past. Unless it's a concrete evidence fact that any alien or octopus could observe and agree, it's probably just a perspective and there's another way of looking at it.
Armen
That's a great point. We don't want to take it as a fixed item. Look at it, critical thinking, use our minds. The more we do that, we'll get even to into more critical thinking because it's, we're working on it, we're building a consistent base of thinking about things. And next thing you know, we're not stuck in some sort of I have no thought rut. We're full of thoughts and we're figuring things out. There's a momentum to it which can build.
Derek Sivers
One of my favorite chapters in any book is chapter six of the book, "Tricks of the Mind" by Darren Brown, the British magician. Chapter six of "Tricks of the Mind" snapped me into such a different way of thinking because it takes the question, "What are the odds of that?" And it answers the question! Instead of saying that this must be some supernatural forces at work here because what are the odds of that? "I was just thinking of my cousin 10 seconds ago and then my cousin called for the first time in months. What are the odds of that? Clearly there's a spiritual connection here!" And so Darren, in trying to dispel magical thinking in chapter six says, well, let's look at the odds of that. There are probably many times that you've thought of your cousin that your cousin didn't call. There have probably been many times that your cousin called that you weren't thinking of him at that time. And there are some overlaps there where you're thinking of your cousin and then your cousin calls. But we notice those times because they seem so special and because they would fit into a wonderful magical tale if it's true. So we remember them more than all the times you were thinking of your cousin. And you didn't call her, he called and you were thinking of him. So we tell those tales and then they pass on because it makes life more special.
Derek Sivers
And another one is somebody that came up to him at one of his events and said, "I usually don't believe in this stuff, but I think my mother is a Reiki healer. As soon as I walked into the room, she sensed the energy that there was something wrong with my thumb. As soon as I walked in, she said, 'Harold, what's wrong with your thumb? I can feel the energy from your thumb. Something is off.' Whoa, how do you explain this, Darren?" And he said, "Well, let's look at five different options. First, maybe you're remembering the story wrong. Maybe your mother actually named a few body parts that might have something wrong with you, and you just remember that your thumb was one of them, she guessed. Two, your mother knows you very well. She could probably tell that you were holding yourself a little different, or maybe you didn't realize that you were holding your thumb when you walked into the room. Three, he goes through like number three, number four, and then it's like number five, oh my god, Reiki healing and energy sensing is absolutely true and real and science is wrong for not acknowledging it. He said, okay, let's leave that as an option. But I like that he brought out five options which puts you into a mindset of critical thinking and answering the question, "What are the odds of that?"
Derek Sivers
It was a beautiful way of demystifying that could be applied to anything, including how to be a Hollywood actress. You could take something that seems like pure random luck and you can say, well, let's think about this. What are the odds of that? Increase the odds. I want to be a millionaire. What are the odds of that? How can I increase those odds? You can demystify it.
Armen
It's very true. You can take that away from me. I've had an actress on the show a few times, Cat Faraway, and there was a few times where parts of her career, she described it kind of like, what were the chances that that worked out that way? But putting herself in that position may have led to her making these connections, whereas I wouldn't have made that random connection because I'm not in that field. But it makes a nice mental description, a kind of a story, something that may not have the most specific actuality to it, but it is useful, as some would say. And so it may be the usefulness of it, this power of stories that you've alluded to many times, and then we can build off of that because Now we're part of that, it's like we're in the movie versus we're outside the movie as an observer. Darn, we don't get to participate that same way.
Derek Sivers
Living in Los Angeles helped me a lot with that. I moved to LA at a time in my life where I was just starting to understand the inside of the music industry. I had been running CD Baby for a couple years. Then moving to LA really put me inside that whole magic-making machine there of the entertainment industry. And it was so useful to see how often these things are just up to people skills. You can just put yourself into the place where things are happening, get to know the people that are making the things happen, that are in the positions that have the job, where where they control the purse strings and decide who gets to do what. If you're there knowing those people and you're physically present in that place, you're way more likely to get chosen than if you're just stewing about the lucky ones while you sit at home in Belgium or whatever. It was amazing to me to see how often things happen just through physical proximity.
Armen
These examples are funny because, again, once I had a guest that was from Belgium, he was a music maker, and then he was talking about how opportunities didn't pop up when he was there. That's why he was partially here and he felt like he was stuck in place. It's funny, your examples are so specific to items that are actually... Well, let's do one more.
Derek Sivers
There's one more that I know is specific to your family's history too, is I was talking with a white American friend about luck. He said, "You're a great entrepreneur." And I said, "No, I'm not. I'm just lucky." And he said, "Bullshit. There's no such thing as luck." I said, "Of course there's such a thing as luck." He said, "I disagree. I don't think there's such a thing as luck." And so I said, "All right, dude, you were lucky to be born white in America in the year 1980. That was luck. That was not skill." And he said, "No, you are dismissing the sacrifice that my great-grandparents made when they left Poland in 1910 and moved to this country not knowing anybody because they were giving themselves a harder life in order to make their children's life better. They had a feeling that America was the future. They sacrificed so that their grandchildren could have a better life and I'm just the product of that. That wasn't luck. Acknowledge my grandparents' sacrifice." I went, "Wow. That's a really good point." That wasn't luck. That was maybe-not your skill, but you are the product of other people's wise choices and hard work.
Armen
There is something to that. There is like a placement of where we are in existence, but then there's also once we get started and we go as who we are and make moves from there. So both can be taken into account. That's true. It's nice to look at background but also the person there. One could think of it could be looked at heavily but I like the concept of you are something and you go. You let go with it. You flow forward. It's a nice clear concept there. That's a funny one. Long live the nations a bit.
Armen
One thing earlier I wanted to bring back: I liked how you described that we were talking about getting things done and putting all and it made me think of something very valuable for myself and I believe for yourself that we have so much that we see to give that that's what we have built over time is frameworks to be able to give all that because we see like oh such an opportunity loss if it's not the case do you feel that way
Derek Sivers
I'm not sure what you mean.
Armen
Do you feel like you have built systems and efforts over time that have helped you be more giving of your nature than if you, like 20 years ago, would have been able to to people and/or those around you?
Derek Sivers
I was about to say I've been very lucky that people wanted to hear my opinion on things. But maybe they've wanted to hear my opinion on things because I tried to always do the difficult thing and put myself into the harder position. What I mean is, I've had a rule of thumb since I was a teenager that says, "Whatever scares you, go do it." So when I graduated college, the scary thing was to move to New York City. This was 1990, and New York City was a much more intimidating place then than it was now. It was a dangerous place. Times Square was a crime-filled shithole of porno theaters. It was an overwhelming place for a boy from Hinsdale, Illinois. But I did the scary thing and kept pushing myself into these scary but ultimately enviable positions: getting a job inside the music industry and pushing to get a job as this guitarist for a Japanese pop star, and then pushing myself to quit my job and be a full-time musician, and pushing myself to start this record store. I guess I kept trying to push myself, which then meant that I had this unusual experience to share and tell people, and then people seemed to want to hear it.
Derek Sivers
Sorry, this was a long way of answering your question to say, it's only because people seemed to want to hear my thoughts that I persisted with taking the time to write them down and broadcast them so loudly.
Armen
That is, okay, that's very informative and quite cool. I like, first, I like that you put yourself in difficult positions, I always see those as the individuals that are the base of how we get somewhere. Like the individuals that move from their country to a far off country, take the risk, and they might be forgotten later, but if it wasn't for that effort, there wouldn't have been the relocation or whatever. That is very meaningful. And they don't get, they usually get more hits or the daggers in the back than the individual that doesn't do that. And then everybody shows up later like, "Yeah, it is pretty nice over here, but okay, but about the early part? Yeah, it would have happened. Somebody would have done it. We need that somebody, that somebody is very important. And that's the person that puts themself in a difficult position. Very valuable.
Derek Sivers
I think of the classic explorers, the Portuguese and the Spanish and the British explorers that went off on their boats into the world to find unknown parts that, maybe hacking with a machete through the jungle to find a beautiful oasis by a lake in the middle. But I think of that culturally now. Like, often I'm choosing to do the thing that's less comfortable and might even reduce my happiness, but I think would ultimately be more interesting and maybe even better for the world if I put myself out there as an example of somebody who's done this weird thing, like I renounced my US citizenship, legally removed my middle name, go to countries that I don't understand to try to make friends, things like that. And I try to spread that when I'm doing it so that maybe just somebody somewhere that thought that the idea of living in India or making friends with Emiratis in UAE would find that unthinkable. But if they hear me talking about it, it becomes just a little more thinkable for them.
Armen
It's very vital, the person that creates the first or the item. I like how in one of, on your website - https://sive.rs/ulysses - where you say go to this place and then read this book and then go to this location at this time period. That's like a full thing and that's in the intellectual space. We don't usually have that. Usually it's like go to this, I don't know, water park and these are the slides people go down. But yours, I like the way you described it. Take this path. You can have these thoughts, read this book the same way I did it over this period of time. It will bring out these thoughts and feelings. That's to me a wonderful item. What leads you to that kind of description to put that out there for people? Did you want them to have a sense of how you felt at that time?
Derek Sivers
I find it really useful when people give instructions with no options. Instead of saying, "Here are 10 different things you might want to try. Here's 10 different accounting software packages you could use." That's useless to me. Don't tell me 10. Tell me the one and give me a big argument why you've tried the 10, and here's the one that I should use, and tell me to use that one.
Derek Sivers
I find this in tech a lot, where I run my own web server, and of course there are many different options for the operating system, the software I use for the web server. I'm really thankful when somebody is opinionated and says, "No, use the OpenBSD operating system. Use the Caddy web server. Use the Radicale software to manage your contacts and calendars. Use this mail server, here are the specific instructions to set it up.
Derek Sivers
Or, you want to incorporate a company? Do it in Wyoming. Do it like this, set it up like that. This is what you want.
Derek Sivers
It's so considerate when somebody is opinionated. Brian Eno, the record producer, said that's his job as a record producer, is to go into the studio with the band and have strong opinions. Because if somebody's on the fence, then his strong opinion will get them off the fence, even if it's the other direction. Somebody says, "I'm not sure, maybe this, maybe that," and he says, "This is the way, let's do it this way." Somebody can reject it and say, "No, that's terrible. I don't want to do it that way." He said, "Great, I'm glad I could help." Now you have a stronger sense of what you don't want. So I find it very to not list many options, but to choose one and say, this is the way.
Derek Sivers
Which, by the way, is the difference between religion and philosophy.
Armen
This point is very useful to take into account, and I would use it as well. And when people use AI services, they are looking for, what's the thing? You should this, that, that. Because you want to put-- if you're a creative person, You want your creativity to flow, but all the other items like which email server, I can't exactly think of an example to use. We don't want to use our thoughts on that. We want to use it on maybe the writing or the music or the something we're building. We don't want to use our decision energy on that. So then you want a specific item and it's good to be more pointed.
Derek Sivers
That's a great point. I love that. I actually never thought about it from that point of view. I really like that. We don't want to think about this. Just tell me how to do this so it's done, so I don't have to decide. I have other things I'd rather be thinking about. I like that.
Armen
And it makes me think that also I should be more pointed in my descriptions. I don't usually describe things in much of a pointed nature. I'm more open-ended in how I describe things, but that doesn't help the outside person as much as something for them to bounce off of. So if I say, hey, I really value individuals like Derek Sivers or you may know Tim Ferriss or other wonderful authors and writers and speakers, if I give a certain set of people, then they can be like, "Oh, Armen is that -- bounce off his thoughts. These are people he finds to be wonderful and interesting," versus if I keep it more broad and have it be intellectuals or that kind of category, it's harder for a person to pin down what to bounce off of me or even to remember what I said because they need something to latch on to in some way. Yeah. So being more pointed in some way. It's not really my style so much, my default style.
Armen
Do you know the Myers-Briggs and Big Five qualities? I looked at yours. I'm more the P type in Myers-Briggs, like perceiving. Yours I think is more J type and more structured and pin things down. That's a good quality. Maybe.
Derek Sivers
It's been a while since I've done that. I wonder if it's still pretty fixed. You know, one more thought on this. When somebody gives too many precursors and too many apologies for saying, "Well, you know, this is just my experience. It might not be the same for you. Maybe this, maybe that. I don't know. But hey, from my personal experience, I've found it useful to do this." All of that wishy-washy talk just dilutes the message, but more importantly, it assumes that we have high respect for your opinion. Whereas if instead we assume the opposite, that I don't assume anybody's looking to me as their leader, then I just feel free to say, "Do this exactly like that. Do that exactly like this. This is the way. Just do this." I know that I'm just one little voice in the chorus. So why not just sing with a clear voice, boldly, knowing I'm just one of many voices instead of giving all these disclaimers as if I'm expecting you to actually do everything I say.
Armen
There's a nice humbleness innate in that, which is good. And I could incorporate that style and more match that. It's a great point. This is a funny, this is a funny connection points but that's true if you are doing that but if you actually thought everybody was gonna follow every single item you would be more cautious in that way but maybe they're not they got a million things they're doing this is a great point this is good some things are connecting here I should do more that's a great point but I do like Derek Sivers, I like Tim Ferris, I like a lot of these wonderful books I have this bookshelf also that I recently built or made not built but God put together but wonderful figures in that. But now the stories that we resonate with and how we take our reality and look at it useful not true useful to us because we're living here we're trying to get to great things or make something or connect with others or whatever it might be does it have to be that describe the way that is agreed upon or detailed, not so much.
Armen
How have you viewed your usage of "useful not true" at the current time? Have you used it? Do you use it daily?
Derek Sivers
Oh yeah. It's acknowledging that feelings matter. Feelings concretely affect your actions. How you feel about something will change your strategy towards it, and your actions that come out of that strategy are all affected by your feelings. And so, different perspectives can change your feelings about something.
Derek Sivers
The classic case is if somebody's acting like a jerk in traffic and cutting between lanes and speeding. Your first thought is, "What a jerk!" But your second thought can be, "Maybe they're rushing a sick child to the hospital." And just that thought changes your perception. It lets you relax. It gets you out of your own head and gets you a little more empathetic. But notice it doesn't really matter if it's true or not. Whether there's actually a sick child in the back of that car or not doesn't matter. What matters is it changed your emotions. It got you to slow down. It got you to relax your shoulders just thinking that way.
Derek Sivers
Same thing with being invited to a social event with a bunch of strangers. You could think, "Oh God, this is going to be hell. I don't know anybody. Everybody's going to be looking at me like I'm an idiot. I'm going to be the laughingstock." Or you can think, "Everybody there is a stranger. Nobody there knows anybody. Everybody's waiting for somebody else to break the ice. They need me to be the one to go up to strangers and break the ice. Everybody else is waiting for someone else to do it. I seem to be the only person aware of this, so it's up to me. I'm going to go up to strangers and do them a favor. I'm going to say, Hi, my name's Armen. Who are you? What do you do?' There, I'm going to go to this party tonight in a generous mood to do some favors and help some people get out of the ice." It's just a change in perception, but that change in perception will completely change your actions and lead you to a better strategy.
Derek Sivers
So I do this almost every day with my daily work, with parenting, with communication when somebody sends me an email and they seem to be having some mental health issues. Every day I stop for a few seconds and ask myself what are some different ways to think about this and which of those ways will lead me to a better mindset that will lead to better actions.
Armen
All your examples are very palpable. I do what you described there. I'm always socializing. I'm the most social person in all of wonderful Los Angeles County and I always think about that way that if it goes well great I created a wonderful opportunity of joy for an individual from scratch with my sometimes flirting or socializing whatever it might be and if it doesn't go so well I'm an entertaining story that they might tell to their friend later like can you believe it this guy so that gives a good like that created something that's like a description whereas there wouldn't have even been that story and then there's a few other categories it fits in. So it brings something. So I feel like I'm doing that. And then it ends up being that way generally. It might not always be true. I'm not sure how, but if it wasn't true, then I'd still go with that because I keep rolling with my momentum. It's so valuable. I don't know anybody that said it that way.
Derek Sivers
Thanks. It was new to me too. I wrote this last book called Useful Not True, not starting out with answers, but starting out with the question, noticing that I had been taking a "useful not true" approach to life and wanting to learn more about it. So I contacted philosophy professors and asked them to point me towards books about this and those led me to other books and I contacted theologians, religious people, and asked them to guide me on thoughts about beliefs and where I can learn more about the beliefs that guide people. I spent two years researching this subject and along the way learned so much. It was so fun to learn so much about this world of perception and how choosing a different point of view changes the actual concrete actions. It's such an interesting subject and ultimately it's It's very personal. You just gave this great example saying, "I'm very social. I go do these things. Maybe even somebody ridicules me for it, but that's fine because it works for me." It's personal. You have to find out what works for you. That a certain approach that works for somebody else would not work for you, but you don't know it until you try it. You try it and you find out, "That doesn't work for me. That makes me want to crawl into bed and hide. If I think about it this way, this makes me want to do the opposite and go put myself out into the world and make things happen." Then okay, whatever belief that is that works for you, that makes you take the actions that you need to take or be who you want to be or just feel at peace, then that's right for you.
Armen
This is a very deep point added on to that that you're bringing up is that let's say I am on the freeway and a lot of people are going and they're very shaky and I with my view of society I think oh these are all my colleagues we're all going to the same place let's do it everybody it makes sense for me now let's say I said it in a different way which I can't even think of maybe if I thought about it more but that didn't suit my the way of my being I couldn't do that useful not true methodology so that says something about me the items that I can do that are useful, not true, are a representation of me and the things I believe about myself and my abilities. So there's truth in there.
Derek Sivers
Yeah. It's interesting noticing that for some people, they need to think of something as absolutely true in order to act on it. To say, "No, I don't just *think* that God wants us to do this. It's not just my point of view I'm choosing. God wants this! I will go to hell if I don't do this, and I will go to heaven if I do this, and that's just true! That's not my perspective. That's not my point of view. That is an absolute fact!"
Derek Sivers
From my point of view, I think, "All right, great. I'm glad that that way of thinking works for you." You need to think that that's true in order to take that action. it doesn't really matter what's in your head, what matters are the actions you take. So if that's the belief system that helps you take the actions you need to take, then that works for you.
Armen
Very valuable. You see people of different frameworks group up usually, useful not true in this way, useful not true in this way, but not so much mixing because there's not matching components, then that's okay and that's collaborations here, collaborations here, and once in a while there might be mixing, but there may be some gaps in the things that are believed to be true, even if the basis is not like set in stone.
Derek Sivers
Okay, Armen, I don't have any scientific background. I just went to a music school. Let me ask you a question. This is going to sound embarrassingly naive, but... When you're studying science, somebody can have a hypothesis, and then do you ultimately say, "Well, do the test. Show me your results." It's not about what you think might happen. Let's see the outcome. Do the test. Let's see the results. I wonder if philosophy would be better suited to say, "Well, it doesn't matter what you think. Show me the results." If you follow this philosophy, what are the end results, meaning the actual physical actions that you take? Or if many people follow this philosophy, show me the actual interpersonal social actions that happen because of it. Don't just leave this as a theory in your head. Show me the actual physical results. Otherwise it's just one thought of many. What do you think of this comparison?
Armen
It's a wonderful point because that would negate the individual that creates a... like, I'm intelligent in this way but it's in my own little circle of what I'm describing that has no connection with the world that we are in. And now let's say it has a function for personal health benefits, the person comes out more peaceful, that is a sign of some sort of intelligence on... but that's a result, some sort of outcome. up, but if there's none, I would put it as being more pointed now, like the person's almost like looking to fool the other person with a, it's like a ruse, kind of like a magic trick in front of you, right? There should be that somewhere, in some way, it doesn't have to be the societally described result but something that is a thing, a well-being or an improvement or an ability to connect with others or less chance of Alzheimer's 20 years down the line. Something.
Derek Sivers
Right. Yeah. Show me the actual actions. You know, the economist/philosopher Nicholas Nassim Taleb often says to people, "Show me your stock portfolio. If you say AI is going to destroy the world, well show me where you've shorted the market. Show me that you've taken action on your beliefs. And if you haven't, well then I don't believe you. I won't believe you until you show me your portfolio."
Armen
That's a good double right there because Nicholas is one of the most pointed people I can think of. He will not, and you don't forget an individual like that going back to that concept, a compliment to that concept. You won't forget that. You might not be a fan or you'll be a great glad about what they're saying but there's no chance you're mid-range with Nicholas there's no way because he's making some points of like these people are not mathematically inclined and so their material is not a good basis for that view boom classic Michael Scott boom roasted that's it it's cleared out that way but your point there yet the result like he will break it down and if there is some sort of where is are you putting the things you're saying to the thing or Or else, once again, it's like you're fooling the person you're talking to. You're trying to trick them in some way because you're not actually linking this and this and you're just hoping this person maybe thinks of you better and then off you go and there was no link to the end. It seems like a fooling trick.
Derek Sivers
So beautifully put: you hope that this person thinks of you better. Did you just simplify social signaling?
Armen
I think about these things quite a bit. Whenever I have something that really connects with us because I've been thinking about it for years and it's bugged me in some way. 'Cause I don't like that when someone describes things and I start to figure out, okay, but it's not linked to something. So the whole point is my looking at you as making good decisions or something. And then off you go and off I go. There was no, I was fooled. I was fooled. I don't want to support that. But I see it when it's happening and then I don't take too much weight in it. And if it's ever linked to the actual thing later on, I'll be like, "Okay, great. So there was a... I just didn't see it." Or they had a long-term view. But it doesn't usually happen that way. Usually it is just a full viewer or observer, reader, whatever that might be. That's a funny one.
Armen
"Our thoughts aren't true." I like this one. "You are the strange one." I am atypical. You are the strange one. We are the strange one. How does that connect with our thoughts not being true? I think it's great to be strange, by the way.
Derek Sivers
The metaphor is: you have an accent. We all have an accent. No matter where you go in the world, everyone has an accent. Your thoughts are not unbiased. I moved to Singapore at the age of 40. I'm born in California, grew up in California, New York City, Chicago, Boston. I grew up in a very individualistic culture. And I even think that California, maybe even Los Angeles in particular, is the most individualistic corner of the most individualistic country. And then I went to Singapore, where I met so many bright young people saying things like "I wanted to be a musician, but my parents said no. I had to get a degree in law. So I got a degree in law." And I'd say, "No! You have to follow your dreams! You have to do whatever you want!" And they'd say, "No, you don't understand. I have to do what my parents want." I thought, "No! You're just objectively wrong! You don't have to do what your parents want!" And it took maybe 200 lunches with 200 Singaporeans before I finally got it into my head that I'm the weirdo. They have a perfectly valid point that is sound and harmonious and works. I'm the weirdo off to one edge that grew up in an extremely entrepreneurial individualistic place. They're very right for doing what their parents say is best. That's when I realized, "Oh, right. My way is not the center way. My way is off to the edge."
Derek Sivers
We can realize that about ourselves in so many aspects of life. You can be trying to tell your friends, "No, you need to delete your Twitter account to stick to the man and we're going to go spray paint some Teslas." You can feel that that is just objectively sound and right. You have to realize that's just one way of looking at it. That's off on one angle, one of many potential angles to look at that. It's not the right answer. It's just one perspective. It helps so much to see the whole world this way. Anytime somebody's telling you, "This is right and that is wrong," you say, "That's one perspective. That's not necessarily true."
Armen
Another link. Your links are sharp. I don't know if I've met the whole planet, but I once had a guest, Celestine Chua from Singapore.
Derek Sivers
Oh my God, I know her very well. I've spent days with Celestine. She's ruthless when playing board games. She is not kind. She does not aim for social harmony when playing board games. She destroyed me in the Settlers of Catan in a ruthless way.
Armen
That's hilarious. Long ago, I always tend to show up at the beginning of people's things. She was switching her website from something to embraceliving.net and then I was helping her with some website stuff she was asking me. And then one time she came to Los Angeles, we hung out, wonderful individual. And she did all this stuff and built her platform. When you brought up Singapore, I remember she would write so many articles about we have the way things are done and we have to, my parents would tell me to get married at a certain age and these are the guidelines for work that I need to do to be productive. It was so cut and dry, kind of like what you're saying, they would, so if there's a lot of that, there's no way you saying, "Hey, go work on those guitar skills and let's build up that bass." They're over there like, "He doesn't get it. He just doesn't get it." And it's like a counterforce.
Derek Sivers
Celestine Chua asked me a really interesting question. When I mentioned that I left home at 17 and never went back, she was shocked and said, "Wasn't your mother upset? Weren't your parents insulted?" And I said, "Wait, I don't understand the question." She said, "Well, where I'm from, if I were to leave home at 17 and never come back, that would be the biggest insult to my family ever." And I said, "No." I said, "My grandparents left home at 18 and never went back. My parents left home at 18 and never went back. I left home at 18 and never went back. This is normal in my culture." And she was shocked, and I was shocked, that she was shocked. It was a funny comparing of cultures.
Armen
The culture clashes are real when they occur, because there's such a different base. And then, wait, you do that, but you do that. How are you still alive? That's a funny thing.
Armen
I like your energy very much. Pointing that out for the people out there, very pointed today. Derek Sivers' energy, wonderful addition to Earth, making it a place I'd rather be on.
Derek Sivers
Thank you. I meant to ask you this before we hit record. I'm embarrassed to ask you this while we're recording. But when you emailed me the first time and I checked out your show, first on your website and then the YouTube, the first thing I noticed that made me interested to learn more about you is that you have so many women as guests, which is, to be clear, my number one complaint about most podcasts, I think don't have enough women. It's so skewed, dudes talking to dudes or women talking to only women. Is that deliberate and what are your thoughts around it?
Armen
It is not deliberate. I would say part of it is because I have connected with people through people who I've talked to, so there might have been a base of women that I had on the show and then they had a co-author or a colleague or... before I would connect, I would find people through Twitter so it would be through people I already knew or I had already talked to. So I would follow people I had already talked to and then if I saw someone new and then they already were connected to, which I can't see anymore, Twitter doesn't do that anymore, but connected to people I had already talked to, I was like, "Oh, okay, this is more in category of people I have spoken with like followers you know or one of those things. I'm kind of confused right now but it would link me to people I've already because I like the idea that like people know each other like you just mentioned Celestine Chua that's so cool that's like someone I know and so that to me this is like a very cool network and it's so specific it makes it so specific too because that makes sense to me but if I brought my friend Gary who who does fishing, he's been on the show, he would have no link to this whole network. It's a completely separate fishing network of fishermen. So because of that, I really value it and it only builds over time. I like things that build over time and there's more and, "Oh, you didn't realize that." I would have never, how would I have known? And you hung out with Celestine, what's the chance of, I couldn't even predict it then. I'm pretty good at predicting things. So that wasn't the case. But I forgot the question. How do I do that?
Derek Sivers
Well, most of my friends are women. But it surprises me that most podcasts by men don't have many women on. It's usually just men talking to men and women talking to women, which I guess is maybe a reflection of their personal preference in social circles. So, are most of your friends women?
Armen
I have known a fair amount of women I have friends that are women. And actually, yeah, you're bringing up a good point here. Some of it is related to I'm very people-oriented, human behavior, and that's more covered there. I'm not likely to talk about chemical engineering. I think it's great, but I can't connect with it. There's no, or like a bridge engineering or astronomy. When I go to the science section, I'm always looking at science books, but usually more related to people in some way. But if it's astronomy, I can't. It's cool. I'm very good at numbers and math and science, but I can't link to it. It's not full of life to me. I think people are the most interesting thing on the planet, so that's my base. Yeah, there's a lot of flow. I enjoy that part. That's true. This is a good point. I like bringing on... In a couple weeks, I'm going to talk with two women, one past guest and another about aquaculture and marine sustainability. She's bringing her colleague from New York on the show, which I didn't plan that part, but how cool is that? I like that when there's more. There might be something to that, that it's in that category. I resonate, and I've always been socializing. I usually, as my friend would say, like 95% of my socializing in Los Angeles is with women, but I also once in a while socialize with men. There's something with men and women that's a nice linkage.
Derek Sivers
Okay, so maybe it is reflective of your personal social circle. That's cool It would be for me too If I had my own podcast where I interviewed people they would probably be mostly women too because those are my best friends.
Armen
How cool is that? Actually on that note because you brought up something that I often ask people I'm talking to about because if they mentioned something about me and I have a show I'm like, what would your show be, Derek, if you had a podcast? Or what would it be about?
Derek Sivers
Technically, I do have one. You're the first person I've said this to but I had an interesting idea where I would have three podcasts - three channels that you could tune into: one is called questions, one is called answers, and one is called thoughts. So questions would be me interviewing other people. I'm just here filled with questions. That would be one channel you could tune into. Answers would be like this one, where other people are asking me questions. So today I'm full of answers, whether I have to make them up on the spot or not. And then a third channel of just thoughts. Musings, essays, just spoken monologue. Saying things I've written so somebody can just listen in the car instead of having to read a screen.
Derek Sivers
I like that idea of three different channels because there are some thinkers, like for example Tyler Cowen from Conversations with Tyler, where sometimes I'm in the mood to hear Tyler's questions. I love it when he gets a polymath guest and peppers them with his polymath questions. That is so much fun. But sometimes, I just want to hear Tyler's thoughts. I want to hear him full of answers today. And other times, I would just want to hear whatever's on his mind. So I realized when thinking of other thinkers, that I have these three different channels I would like to tune into for any particular person. So I thought, I should have those three channels too. A questions podcast, an answers podcast, and a thoughts podcast.
Armen
I have to mention a few things related to this. One, super cool. Three! Who comes up with three at the same time? Nobody. Absolutely nobody. Another one, I think Q-A-T, Qat is like a good word in Scrabble that gets a lot of points. That's one.
Derek Sivers
Is that a real word, Qat?
Armen
Let me just, but I have another cool thing too. It's a word. I thought it was.
Derek Sivers
I mean, Qatar. It's the first three letters of Qatar, the country. Qatar.
Armen
I thought it was a Scrabble word.
Armen
It made me think of a Scrabble word.
Armen
So it might be worth points in Scrabble.
Derek Sivers
I found out that Qantas, the Australian airline, which is not spelled with a U, QANTAS: it stands for Queensland and Northern Territory Aerial Service. It's an acronym. aerial services. -AS, aerial services. There you go. Thank you.
Armen
TAQ: that is your version of the talk show segmented into parts similar to how the chapters are segmented in parts so that you have each thing be a distinct self if that's not award-winning why are awards being given out? That's another question that's funny that was good boy how cool is that question to answer if anybody could do such a thing uh... it would be yourself that is a cool distinction because each one is separate and people do like uh... but at some point there would be super fans that would say we really want you to put them all together, we want it all on one channel or one section so we can just be... And you'd be like, "Guy, I did this for you. I separated it for you so you could have it." "Yeah, we liked it, but we became really liking this one and then we liked the other one." And we're like, "Wait a minute, there's three."
Derek Sivers
You can't always give the people what they're asking for. Sometimes you just got to give them what they need.
Armen
Right. And then later on, YouTube will do like a linking feature where they'll be like, "If you have three channels or four channels you want to put into the same feed of the exact same one channel. We'll do a link maybe a future. How cool is that? Oh, I like the concept. I put it out there. I like I'm very supportive of. Oh, that's another thing. I've noticed that in life that I'm often for a lot of people. I'm there right at the beginning of a change or like a tough part of their life. And once they're going off, I go because they're going and then it's like an airplane once it's already there. I'm like air traffic control.
Derek Sivers
I love the metaphor that most of a rocket ship's fuel is just to get out of the atmosphere. Activation energy. You have to pass that hump of the friction, the friction of life.
Armen
So many of these things connect, but so much of what you write about reduces friction for a person's day such that they can flow through it.
Armen
Because like useful, not true, reduce friction on the freeway, reduce friction for decision making, reduce friction, dealing with people, you can flow through and get to the things that you really value. I think that's very relevant. Do you think about friction at times?
Derek Sivers
Oh yeah. Unhappiness is friction. Tiredness is friction. Fatigue is mental friction, physical friction. If we were frictionless machines, we we would be unstoppable.
Derek Sivers
If we could just go, go, go, go, go 20 hours a day, a little bit of sleep, that's someone who's operating without friction. They're congruent. They're doing what they love, and they love what they're doing, and they're not encountering obstacles.
Derek Sivers
Actually, friction is part of my definition of home. My personal definition of home is the place with no obstacles. Wherever has no obstacles feels like home to me.
Armen
That's such a good visual or concept. Yeah, that's where you belong. Or like when people say go where you're celebrated, not tolerated, some version of that. You're shining. It just flows. That's home.
Derek Sivers
Los Angeles was actually the first place that felt like home to me. I didn't move there till I was 32. And as soon as I arrived, it was the first time in my whole life that I felt, oh yeah, this is my place. It's the first time I felt at home. Everywhere I'd ever lived, I mean, I was born in California, but when I was two, we moved to Chicago. I never felt at home in Chicago. I moved to Boston, I moved to New York City, which was challenging and growth-oriented, but then I went to Portland, which was a little too slacker for me, a little too unambitious. And then I got to Santa Monica, California, and I went, "Ah, this is, this is home. This is just right."
Derek Sivers
And it's because I was so comfortable and so happy at the age of 32 in Los Angeles. Actually, I should say from the age of 32 to 39. I lived there about seven years. That's why I left America for good is because I was too happy. I was too comfortable. I was feeling done. I was feeling I was at the end of the rainbow, but that's too young to be at the end of the rainbow. I wanted to be at the start of something new, not at the end of a thing. So I forced myself to leave my happy place, leave my home, and push out into the world to challenge myself to keep going uphill.
Armen
Great decision making along the way. Let's say when you're 25, 22, 26, before you have gone to a place that felt like home, do you know there's something off? Do you feel like there's something wrong? Do you know there could be a home yet if you have not been to the home?
Derek Sivers
Good question. I guess it's different for everybody. A lot of people have an idea in their mind of a place that they think they would fit. You know, they'll say, "Bali. Bali seems like my kind of place. I'd be happy if I lived in Bali." Or, "Berlin. That's my kind of place. I want to be right in the middle of Berlin with the electronic music and this, the cafe culture, and I want to wear black all the time. Berlin's my place." I get a sense of that sometimes, but you've seen my book called How to Live. You know that I have many chambers in my heart, and I find it hard to imagine myself ever being just one thing and therefore ever having just one home.
Armen
Oh, that's good. Right. Oh, that's good. That's good. That's true. Because you have multiple right so there'll be multiple places. The book how to live is pointed using the style you described earlier. You're saying how to live. You're not saying options for your living. It says how to live. What kind of direction are you giving directly to the individual? It shows a lot of different ways. That's really good though. You're telling people and so you're, it's actually, isn't that funny? You're more humble by telling people how to live than having it be, here's some ideas for you. That's funny. It's very funny. Humble boss. Humble boss. That's true. That book came from, do you want people, but yeah, there's a humbleness to it, so that's funny that answers its own question, but it's not too, it's like a guide.
Derek Sivers
"How to Live", sorry, for anybody listening: How to Live is a funny little book. I'm not bragging to say it's like nothing you've ever seen. Every chapter tells you that it has the answer to life. is exactly how you should live, this is exactly what you should do. It's a book of directives. Do this, do that, do this, do that. But every chapter disagrees with all of the other chapters. So one chapter will say, "Live for the present. There is only now. The future is just your imagination. The past is just memories. The only real thing is now. Therefore, take this to its logical conclusion, live only for the now, put everything else out of your head. The next chapter will say, "Here's how to live. Live for the future. Defer all gratification. Push everything to make a brighter future for your future self, for your grandkids, to make the world a better place 200 years from now." And it gives all of these arguments That's why this is the way to live. And the next chapter will say, "Here's how to live. Get rich." Money is a neutral indicator of value. It's the most noble thing you could do is to try to make money because it's a clear indicator that you're being valuable to the world. So I put together all of the arguments why this is how to live. And so each chapter is a know-it-all thinking that it has the answer. And that's such a fun format. There are 27 of these back to back, and then it ends with a weird little conclusion, which is just two hand-drawn images. And then you're left to interpret those as you will.
Armen
One thing I thought of visual of it when I saw it is that the 27, it's a representation of people. There's like a people representation of what you're going to run into in life because every Maybe two months, four months, there's an individual. This is the way and we figured it out. Then somebody else, this is the way and we figured it out. Okay, it worked for you and it worked for you, great. And here's some things, but they're not, you have your specificity to yourself. It's such a good representation of what you're going to run into. It's like a 27-story building, floor building, 28. You're on floor one and you just go up each floor and each one is like, no, this actually is this. You get to the top, you're like, "I liked floor 14, parts of 26 were pretty good." 26. You take pieces.
Derek Sivers
Comparative religion. Is that a major? Is that a university major? Comparative religion?
Armen
It sure sounds like a class.
Derek Sivers
Yeah, I think there's a comparative literature. It would be interesting to compare religions, to try to even unearth unusual religions that maybe didn't quite catch on, but had a very congruent, cohesive point of view. Include them equally in the mix, even if they didn't get popular. Because it's like that, you said, the 27 stories. It's like, okay, let's take 27 religions.
Armen
Let's look at 27 answers to how you should live. And each one is said, this is the thing I've always said with life. It's presented so matter of fact. Each item, no, no, no. It's confirmed. Like, it's on this stone, or it's on this paper, or this guy said it to me. Anything in life that's been matter of fact presented to me, I've always looked back like, how are you talking so matter of fact? And then there's so much ambiguity-- not ambiguity, but there's elements of life that we don't... The matter of fact never matches up with the person's whole life. So that part always bugs me. I'm like, "This part is matter of fact, but the other 50 parts apparently are, well, this part is managed by him, not by me. OK, how can it be matter of fact?" And then this part I just kind of made up, I went with it. When you break things down, you're like, "Oh, there was no base to this part." But then this one part you're really punching with me and matter of fact. can this be I'm being fooled again kind of thing so I'm always careful of that that's a funny one one thing that came to my mind some more connections may have been in the blogging days do you think of some of those periods of time 2008 to 2012 I think of people like Scott Young and Farnoosh Brock, Dale Neil Brenner, Celestine was part of the crew. It's funny because I didn't know at the time. It was early times and then later, that was even before some of the people that started the podcast. Later after that, they weren't even part of that group but would have been if they were there.
Armen
Do you think of the blogging times every once in a while?
Derek Sivers
I didn't know it was past tense. I know what you mean. But I had actually never heard it described as past tense. I think of it as not even necessarily that it diminished as much as just other things grew and the blogging carries on.
Derek Sivers
These days I really love reading simonwillison.net Simon Willison writes wonderfully about the cutting edge of what's going on in AI and how to use it. And every day when a new model comes out, he tests it, shows you his tests, makes some great tools to help you experiment with the cutting edge of AI.
Derek Sivers
MarginalRevolution.com, Tyler Cowen has been blogging every day for 150 years or whatever.
Derek Sivers
Seth Godin at Seths.blog - I read his stuff almost every day.
Derek Sivers
So for me in my world, blogging never went away, it's just that other things got more popular and I've been blogging the whole time.
Derek Sivers
I like the world of blogs because it's not dependent on any corporate platform. That's also true of email lists and it's true of podcasts in their purest sense. If you don't depend on Spotify, you don't depend on Apple or YouTube for placement, but you're just putting out an RSS feed that links to MP3 files, it's an open standard than anybody can tune into with any client. You don't need to pay a fee to any company. But as soon as something gets locked behind one company's walls, like after Twitter became X, and now if I try to go to somebody's profile there, I can't. It just redirects to a page to say, "You have to log into Twitter to see this page." And I just close the browser. I think, "I'm not gonna log into Twitter." So anything that is on LinkedIn, anything that's on Twitter, there's some other examples, I don't consider those to be on the internet. They're locked in a corporate garden that I'm not going to pay the fee to enter. I like things that are on the open non-commercial internet that anybody can access with any non-commercial protocols.
Armen
I did a lot of school for a year which did not suit me, but after that year and then a year and a half, I actually let my website expire because I was in a different frame of work, frame of mind, which I would never have normally done. So that's why I would describe it in the past tense, but in fact, Seth has been blogging the whole time. So I have to take that. I don't agree with it as like, it had a more of a, it's the main item and now there's other more resonant or popular items, but I can't really give it that past tense credit because words, we are communicating with wonderful articles and newsletters.
Derek Sivers
I think of the comparison with the music industry: some people wanted CDs, some people want vinyl, some people will only listen to streaming services, some people will only buy mp3s. Some people will only bootleg or they'll only use whatever pirate site they can to get the new album. Some people will only buy from Amazon, etc. So if you're a musician putting out your music, it behooves you to use every channel to reach all the different people with different preferences. And as a writer, it behooves me to use every medium, to use an RSS feed from a blog on my personal website. I guess maybe I should also mirror my essays on Substack, maybe. I should put it out in audio podcasts. I should put it on YouTube for people that would rather watch. I should just put it out on all channels. Ultimately, all of these channels are just distribution of the original core.
Armen
But what do you know about distribution, Derek? That's what people are wondering. What could you possibly, this is not a field. You have to stick to the category You are well versed in, and this is distribution, it's a whole thing. We'll make some calls.
Derek Sivers
You know what's funny? Years ago, when I was running CD Baby, I had 85 employees, I had 4 million albums in a warehouse, actually 3 warehouses with 150 shelves, and I was the sole owner and basically the creator of this whole business. I did all the coding myself, I didn't hire any programmers. I did all the programming myself. And my accountant was there in the office one day, and I said, "Al, it seems like the bookkeeping is really complicated." And he physically turned and looked around and goes, "Derek, have you looked behind you?" He said, "I think you can handle the complexity." He said, "To me, the stuff you've already made is a hundred times more complex than than anything I'm talking about with the bookkeeping. The bookkeeping is dead easy compared to what you've done. Went, oh, I hadn't thought about it that way. This stuff seems easy to me. Accounting, bookkeeping, that seems complicated, but I guess it's just that it's outside of my realm.
Armen
I have two great points. I lost the first one, but the second one is very important. What you just said, you may have already done the hard part. I have this concept in life that you've already done, I can't guarantee it for everybody, but for a good chunk of people, I've noticed you've already done what I would call the hard part. This is bonus time, if you can see it clearly. So for example, I've done a lot of talks. Now when I'm writing a book, good old AI, my talks, content related to my subjects I'm putting out there, boom, we did the hard part. So I've told people this for their whole, their own life. Sometimes look at where you already did, which we usually did, because usually there's more friction earlier in life. That was the hard part. And then take advantage of those parts. The perspective is odd, like, oh, this was the easy part, but that's so difficult. Maybe not. Maybe some old person that's 85 years old would look back at you and say, no, no, you already took care of it. Just do these little odds and ends and you'll get this great result. Boy. The wonderful concepts that come with, this is why, this is the, This is my main top reason for the program, this kind of interlinking and connection and understanding. It's very important. I find it very valuable. And being pointed here, as I've said to some people I know, if some individuals such as yourself were not on the planet, I'd be like, "I don't know about Earth." But when they are, I'm like, "Cool. This is a great place. Long live us spinning around." So that is wonderful. in organizing nature and keeping of a certain, I guess, order structure. If you had, I always like to do this, and maybe in the future we can have more exploration, but for this current time I'll keep it at a thing which is not my style at all. It's not my style at all to do it, but for the people.
Armen
What would be, if you had a megaphone to the world, what would be one message you would want to tell people right now that might be something, obviously there's, yeah, What would be one message you might want to share with our fellow Earth?
Derek Sivers
Right now, the message on my mind is a question. Should be to ask everybody, "What's another very different way of looking at that?" That would be the question. What's another very different way of looking at that? About whatever that is that's going on in their life where they think they've got a strong answer that their point of view is just true I'd ask what's another very different way of looking at that and they'd have to come up with it
Armen
Great addition of perspective right there and critical thought that comes into place place what a wonderful one Derek on at this time I am glad for having you on the program joining for this discussion writings thoughts the connections between it's so cool I give it a big I never do I should I give it a two thumbs up it's a new thing I'm doing now in the program I give it the standing of it something I give it a lot of support because it's so cool and it means a lot I don't always notice it in the moment sometimes when I backtrack later and I see it like okay cool cool cool so I try to be more representative representative of it in the moment very glad to have you on and we may return and we may talk about what or your talk show either way or other topics because I've like the amount that I left out is off the charts which is a good sign.
Derek Sivers
Thanks Armen.