ROLL ON: Ask Me Anything

Welcome to an old-school style of ‘Roll On’—the semi-regular version of the podcast where we ramble on matters of interest across culture, sports, art, literature, politics, self-betterment, and more. My co-host is Mr. Adam Skolnick, an activist, veteran journalist, author of One Breath, and David Goggins’ Can’t Hurt Me and Never Finished co-author. Today we exchange updates on personal goings on, tell highlights from recent travels, share streaming selects and media diet recipes, discuss listener inquiries, and more. Show notes + MORE Watch on Youtube Newsletter Sign-Up Today’s Sponsors: InsideTracker: insidetracker.com/RichRoll Momentous: LiveMomentous.com/richroll Indeed: Indeed.com/RICHROLL Timeline Nutrition: timelinenutrition.com/richroll SriMu: http://srimu.com/rrp Peace + Plants, Rich Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Rich Roll?

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• 0:44Rich Roll?

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• 1:13Rich Roll?

  The Rich Roll Podcast. Good to go?

• 1:17Adam Skolnick?

  Excuse me, I'm having an espresso.

• 1:20Rich Roll?

  Come on, man. This is the part where I introduce the show. I'll allow it, though. Make it quick.

• 1:25Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 1:26Rich Roll?

  While you're sipping. Hey, everybody. Welcome back to Roll On. We are returning after a few... Are you done? You're done. Okay. After a few journalistic docu-drama adventures, sort of audio long reads, if you will.

• 1:43Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 1:44Rich Roll?

  Sprung from the mind of Adam Skolnick into the worlds of AI and sustainable travel. But today, today, we're gonna snap back. We're gonna snap back and do an old-school OG rendition of the show where Sir Adam, Lord of the Swim Mask, and I catch up on life. We're gonna shoot a little bit of shit, share sundry matters of interest piqued. We're gonna answer your questions with a heavy emphasis today on the questions and answer piece. And then we're gonna call it a day. We got things to do, right? We're gonna get in and we're gonna get out.

• 2:22Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, I wanna, I've got, my car is getting detailed out there, so I need to be out of here.

• 2:28Rich Roll?

  Yes. Would that be your Tesla, Adam?

• 2:31Adam Skolnick?

  Why, why isn't there a detail thing in my, in my compensation package? I think I need auto detailing.

• 2:37Rich Roll?

  In your rider?

• 2:37Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 2:38Rich Roll?

  With the show?

• 2:39Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, when I come here, I need to get other stuff done.

• 2:41Rich Roll?

  Well, let me take a look at the download numbers and we'll see. It depends on how it goes today.

• 2:46Adam Skolnick?

  Don't do that.

• 2:47Rich Roll?

  Right? Okay. But how you doing, man? It's been a minute. We've done those other roll-on shows, but we haven't sat down and just kind of like, you know, did a mind meld and caught up.

• 2:58Adam Skolnick?

  I know, I miss you.

• 2:58Rich Roll?

  On life.

• 2:59Adam Skolnick?

  I miss you.

• 3:00Rich Roll?

  Miss you too.

• 3:00Adam Skolnick?

  This is where we connect on different subjects. Over the phone, it's nice, but like, this is, I feel like this is our relationship.

• 3:08Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 3:09Adam Skolnick?

  Right here.

• 3:09Rich Roll?

  It's a bond. It's a bromance.

• 3:12Adam Skolnick?

  Ah, I'm glad you said it.

• 3:15Adam Skolnick?

  But, but happy to be back in this chit-chat friendly format that has been, you know, the, the, people have, have, have requested it.

• 3:24Rich Roll?

  That's true.

• 3:25Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 3:25Rich Roll?

  I'm gonna get into that in a little bit.

• 3:27Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 3:28Rich Roll?

  But first, you dropped a banger on the New York Times once again.

• 3:32Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, thank you.

• 3:33Rich Roll?

  With all kinds of photographs and...

• 3:35Adam Skolnick?

  I know, I didn't do any of the photos. All I was, was the, the photo facilitator, which is my want when I collaborate with a photographer. This was Caitlin O'Hara. She's fantastic. She's based out of Phoenix. And this was the Scar Swim, which a lot of swimmers who listen to this will know exactly what it is. For people who don't know, it's a 40-mile open water swim across the Arizona desert, which does not compute, right? It's this crazy thing. There are, there's a river called the Salt River just outside of Phoenix in Mesa, Arizona. And the Salt River is, was kind of used for thousands of years to feed kind of indigenous cotton plots and squash fields and all that.

• 4:17Adam Skolnick?

  So it's always been kind of this agricultural phenomenon, this water that just kind of moves through the desert and past these amazing mesas and buttes and, and kind of eroding hills with saguaro cactus and mesquite. It's, it's quite beautiful. But they were dammed in the early 20th century to light up Phoenix and Mesa and to, and then to feed the citrus and cotton fields that came up at that period of time in the early 20th century. So these, these dams are like... You know, the golden age of American, you know.

• 4:46Rich Roll?

  Right. Art deco, beautifully constructed, yeah. Monuments to human ingenuity.

• 4:52Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, I know that dams have now since been thought of to be damaging and we didn't know what we were doing. You know, that's always the case, right? You know more later. But I mean, you gotta say like, these things are spectacular. One, in particular, the one on Apache Lake separates Apache from Roosevelt. So the idea is you swim from one end of the dam to the next. And the next day you start at that, the other end of that dam. And then you swim down to the next lake and it's ongoing.

• 5:16Rich Roll?

  Yeah, 40 mile stage race.

• 5:18Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, 10, nine mile, nine, nine and a half mile, nine mile, 17 mile, and then a 10K swim.

• 5:25Rich Roll?

  Wow.

• 5:25Adam Skolnick?

  And the 10K swims at night just to make sure it's not too easy.

• 5:27Rich Roll?

  Right. I like that. This is the natural progression and evolution of ultra endurance, right? We've seen these ultra distance cycling adventures and running, of course.

• 5:39Adam Skolnick?

  Yep.

• 5:40Rich Roll?

  And triathlon, but not a lot. I mean, there's marathon swims out there, but they're sort of standalone things. But a stage race, ultra marathon swim competition is pretty cool.

• 5:50Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, it's cool. It's, it started about, there's been, this is the 10th edition of it. But there was one year where they didn't do it because of COVID. So it started in 2012. Kent Nicholas, who is basically a, um, what's his, what's the, what do I, what's the term I use? They edited it out, the lawyer from Breaking Bad, Saul Goodman.

• 6:11Rich Roll?

  Uh huh.

• 6:12Adam Skolnick?

  He's got a Saul Goodman client list, client list, and he's incredibly charismatic, awesome dude. But has that little Saul Goodman kind of twinkle in his eye. Started it because he's a swimmer and he was preparing to swim Catalina. And so he would swim Seguaro. And he had this idea, cause he could swim a three mile stretch, you know, and then back. So it's a six mile total swim in Seguaro in an area that is kind of cordoned off. So boats can't come in, cause these are, these lakes, you know, boaters are always in there. And the party boats, like pontoon boats, you know? But so he decided, hey, what if we swam all of them? So he called some friends and I don't know, it was like seven or eight people showed up that for that one, I think seven, two finished, including Kent.

• 6:56Adam Skolnick?

  And the next year he stopped swimming it because he was running it. And this year there were 58 swimmers, 38 were women. And that's the other thing I didn't know. I mean, I knew that there were, there's thousands of these of swim races, whether it's 5K, 10K, or even longer ones around the world. And then, of course, there's all the channel swims, which are like kind of the gold standard of the sport. But you're right, stage races are are less common. And what I didn't know, even though I've covered open water swimming, I didn't realize how dominant women are in the sport, which is really cool. I thought that was, and that was so evident when it's almost two to one women, you can't really, even I can't miss that.

• 7:34Rich Roll?

  As the distances get longer, the gender gap shrinks. But there's something specific about open water marathon swimming where that gap is even smaller than it is in other endurance sports. You know, women really distinguish themselves.

• 7:53Adam Skolnick?

  In all of endurance, you're saying?

• 7:54Rich Roll?

  No, I'm saying with marathon swimming.

• 7:55Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, I think so. Yeah, so that was great. I mean, it was, it was an exquisite race with, and what's cool about this race is you get these people, heads of channel associations from all over the United States and people who've swam all these amazing channels from all over the world. They all show up there and they trade secrets and they like advocate, hey, come swim my race, come to, you know, I was invited to like three different races, just being there. It's one of those kinds of flashpoints for this community.

• 8:23Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I feel like it's still, like it resembles what ultra running probably looked like in the, you know, I don't know, mid 90s. Like this, this really specific, very small insular subculture where everybody knows everybody and it's just pitch your tent and do the race and nobody notices kind of thing. But when you start writing about it in the New York Times and everybody's looking for, you know, what's the next cool adventure? And people are talking about it on podcasts like this. These are the things that, you know, the seeds are planted for this to grow.

• 9:02Adam Skolnick?

  Anyway, so a couple last thoughts on this, though, I wanted to say there was a I met an incredible woman named Sarah Thomas, who I mentioned in the piece. You know who Sarah Thomas is? She's the first to swim the English Channel four times in a row. Four times in a row.

• 9:19Rich Roll?

  Wow.

• 9:19Adam Skolnick?

  You know how you like drop your stuff on the poolside and it's cool video? And then we all see it and then do laps.

• 9:25Rich Roll?

  Right. She's doing that between France and England.

• 9:30Adam Skolnick?

  I mean, isn't that amazing?

• 9:32Rich Roll?

  That is.

• 9:33Adam Skolnick?

  She also said.

• 9:34Rich Roll?

  How long did that take?

• 9:37Adam Skolnick?

  Twenty five, was it 52 hours, something like that? I forget. I have to look. It was some crazy number. She swam Lake Powell, 100 miles across Lake Powell or something.

• 9:47Adam Skolnick?

  And she said, my stroke looked solid. That's what she said.

• 9:50Rich Roll?

  There you go.

• 9:51Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, I thought that was nice.

• 9:52Rich Roll?

  You want, is that, is that what you want on the gravestone? Is that the epitaph?

• 9:56Adam Skolnick?

  Sarah Thomas, his stroke looked solid. You know why? But she's a recruiter, like that's her day job. She's a recruiter and she says.

• 10:05Rich Roll?

  You're coming in hot from the New York Times. She's going to tell you that you look good.

• 10:10Adam Skolnick?

  You're, wait, you're discounting?

• 10:13Rich Roll?

  In your swim mask and the whole thing.

• 10:15Adam Skolnick?

  I had the full swim mask. And she said, my stroke is solid. But then I later found out that people come to her in Denver and say, hey, I'm thinking about doing a 5K or 10K. And by the time she's done talking to them, they're training for the English Channel. So she might have a certain way about her.

• 10:28Rich Roll?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 10:28Adam Skolnick?

  But there was a, uh, two brothers I wanted to tell you about, Joe and John Zamantes. And they swam doubles of everything except for the 17 mile swim. They had their own little Zodiac. They swam doubles. And Joe trains all the time. John doesn't even train. He hadn't swam since February. And he just.

• 10:51Rich Roll?

  So he did 80 miles.

• 10:53Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, they did 80 miles. They did, well, they did doubles of everything except for the 17 mile swim. It just wasn't part of their program.

• 10:59Rich Roll?

  Doubles except for the hard day.

• 11:03Rich Roll?

  Okay. No, that's great. Amazing.

• 11:06Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, pretty amazing to see these guys just swimming out there, you know. And like the guy did a flip turn at the dam. I saw him do a flip turn.

• 11:14Rich Roll?

  Just went right back.

• 11:15Adam Skolnick?

  It went back. So, pretty cool. And it's also cool to see, you know, I fall, I have, I myself have fallen into the trap to think of athletes in a certain body type. You know, I've always thought, you know, we know what, we think we know what fit is. And open water swimming kind of really challenges that because people come in all shapes and sizes. And you wouldn't pass half these people on the street and think that's a monster athlete. But these are people that have done incredible feats. And so, you know, it's just, I think, just, it was a reminder for me to check myself on what I think an athlete looks like and who an athlete is because they're everywhere. And we walk past and we have no idea. It's like lockba in Whole Foods, you know.

• 11:57Rich Roll?

  Yeah. And there's something about when the distances become longer and longer and longer, where the, you know, the body shapes that show up and distinguish them, distinguish themselves in those events, don't fit what you have in your mind. Like if you think of the 3100 self-transcendent run in Queens every year, where they just run around the block like all summer long.

• 12:20Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 12:20Rich Roll?

  Until they get 3100 miles. Like, the people that are crushing it, you would never pick out of a lineup and say, "That person is an athlete." And in open water swimming, particularly when cold water's involved.

• 12:33Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 12:33Rich Roll?

  You have to put on a lot of weight. Like, you need to keep your body warm. If you don't put on that layer of blubber, then you're going to be using so much energy to keep yourself warm that you're not going to be able to keep swimming.

• 12:46Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 12:47Rich Roll?

  So, you see people who look quite large, who show up and you think, "That person isn't fit at all." They are very fit. It's just underneath like this added pad or layer that allows them to, you know, stay in the water for extreme periods of time and also float better.

• 13:05Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 13:06Rich Roll?

  So, it's a weird thing.

• 13:08Adam Skolnick?

  It's a...

• 13:09Rich Roll?

  They cover themselves in Crisco and like all that.

• 13:11Adam Skolnick?

  Well, yeah, yeah, Destin now, it's like diaper rash cream now is the main one. Um, have you ever thought about doing Crush That Channel? You'd be fucking great.

• 13:20Rich Roll?

  I don't like cold water.

• 13:22Adam Skolnick?

  But you could do Sugaro like in Japan, or you could do, uh, you know, Cook's Strait.

• 13:26Rich Roll?

  I thought about it. I mean, I, I did, you know, when my back was causing me problems at the outset and running long distances was sort of off the table for a period of time. I thought, well, let me, I signed up for the, um, the Key West, uh, swim, which I think was 10K. And then like the flip turns really aggravated my back and I had to back off. So right now I'm just about getting well, uh, before I can consider.

• 13:51Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, you were thinking 10K.

• 13:52Rich Roll?

  But like putting, like something like, like a race like that, you know, that you were just, that does sound interesting to me. I think that sounds fun because I've never done a pure swim ultra and, you know, I think that I would be fairly okay at that.

• 14:06Adam Skolnick?

  It was super fun, you know, like it was, it was cold, like average temperature, I think in the morning was like 55, but it got up to like the low 60s and the air temperature is so warm. Like they, Kent insisted I get in. He wanted me to get in for at least half an hour and I was in there for like hour 45. And I didn't, you know, I could have kept going. It's just that I got dropped by basically everybody in the field. But, um, but it was.

• 14:28Rich Roll?

  Did you keep diving down looking for fish?

• 14:30Adam Skolnick?

  No, it was, it was like, you know, green, a lot of nutrients in the water. The river was like a green river. Um, I mean, the people are awesome. Um, I definitely recommend it. Uh, you know, if you, if you do feel motivated, I mean, it's, it's cool. I mean, swimming is your, your thing. It's fun to see these, uh, athletes. Catherine Breed and Michael Rice were really amazing to watch, the two, the two winners. So that was that. How are you, man? What have you been? You've been everywhere.

• 14:56Rich Roll?

  Um, I'm good, but why don't we stick a pin in it for right now? Take a quick break and we'll be right back.

• 15:10Rich Roll?

  Do you know how they say a lawyer is his own worst advocate? Or a doctor, his own worst patient?

• 15:17Adam Skolnick?

  Sure.

• 15:18Rich Roll?

  Yeah. Well, I think that adage could be extended to podcasters being the last to take their own counsel.

• 15:26Adam Skolnick?

  How so?

• 15:27Rich Roll?

  Because I was so heavily influenced by all of your inspirational reporting on sustainable travel that in the last month, I have flown to and from Italy, London, and Northern California, and in three days, I'm heading to Australia.

• 15:45Adam Skolnick?

  Well.

• 15:45Rich Roll?

  So I will purchase carbon offsets for all of these things, but I would hardly call that sustainable travel.

• 15:51Adam Skolnick?

  Let's not do that.

• 15:52Rich Roll?

  It's unsustainable travel. It's sustainable for my soul.

• 15:55Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 15:56Rich Roll?

  But perhaps not in the best interest of the planet.

• 16:00Adam Skolnick?

  Instead of carbon offsets, let's make a donation of the carbon offset price to tree people in Los Angeles.

• 16:05Rich Roll?

  All right, I can do that.

• 16:06Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 16:07Rich Roll?

  That's easy. But yeah, I got back from Europe. We were in Italy. Julie and I co-hosted our retreat that we've done many times in the Tuscan countryside. I would say that it's mostly Julie's retreat. She takes over and spins her magic. But we had an incredible time in this beautiful location.

• 16:28Adam Skolnick?

  Whole family, right?

• 16:29Rich Roll?

  Florence and Sienna. Yeah, it's a place called Borgo Isolana. All our kids came. We had an amazing group that bonded immediately, and it was, you know, everything we hoped it would be: community, connection, food, meditation, yoga, breath work, journaling, tea ceremony, fire ceremony.

• 16:47Adam Skolnick?

  Wow.

• 16:48Rich Roll?

  A little witchcraft, some music, some hiking.

• 16:51Adam Skolnick?

  What kind of witchcraft?

• 16:52Rich Roll?

  Well, you know, Julie doing fire ceremony.

• 16:54Adam Skolnick?

  Right, right, right.

• 16:55Rich Roll?

  Anything can happen.

• 16:56Adam Skolnick?

  She's like...

• 16:57Rich Roll?

  We did holotropic breathing.

• 16:58Adam Skolnick?

  She's like the cool fire sorceress.

• 17:00Rich Roll?

  She's a fire priestess.

• 17:01Adam Skolnick?

  She's from Game of Thrones.

• 17:06Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it was, it was really cool. And although I would have preferred my back to be in a little better condition so I could have gone running on the trails and that kind of thing, that was a bit of a bummer. In fact, one day I was kind of totally laid up, which wasn't great, but it was a really great reminder of why it's important to spend time with groups of people in, you know, in and away from your daily life. It was just fantastic and very nourishing.

• 17:38Adam Skolnick?

  So let me ask you, as we're running these retreats, is there a level of customer service involved?

• 17:42Rich Roll?

  Yes, we got a whole team.

• 17:45Adam Skolnick?

  You got a whole team?

• 17:46Rich Roll?

  Mel is our producer. She's amazing and unbelievable with, yeah, all of that. Yeah, she's fantastic. I recorded a live podcast with one of the attendees, Dr. Alan Desmond, who's a outstanding plant-based gastroenterologist in the UK. We were very lucky to have him, so I'll be sharing that at some point.

• 18:09Adam Skolnick?

  He's a return guest. You've had him on?

• 18:11Rich Roll?

  No, I haven't had him on before. No, I haven't, I haven't.

• 18:13Adam Skolnick?

  I've not heard of him before.

• 18:14Rich Roll?

  He's fantastic. He's making all these videos on Instagram that pop up on eating your fiber and stuff like that. Yeah. He was cool. And, and that retreat, I had announced, you know, when we did Roll On last, when I was announcing it, that it was going to be our last one. And it was so rewarding that who knows? Like, there's a question mark there as to whether we're going to do it again or not.

• 18:38Adam Skolnick?

  Count us in.

• 18:39Rich Roll?

  Yeah, well, we're not, we're not committed yet.

• 18:41Adam Skolnick?

  Come spend two days with me.

• 18:43Rich Roll?

  With Adam instead?

• 18:46Adam Skolnick?

  At a hostel in Florence.

• 18:48Rich Roll?

  We would love to have you. All that, all the Skolnik heads coming out of the woodwork to hang out in Italy. Obviously, I'll keep everyone posted on that. And, and the website for that is ourplantpowerworld.com, but this is kind of like a static landing page. But again, you know, I'll share when we have clarity.

• 19:05Adam Skolnick?

  Your, your posts from there were awesome. I mean, I felt the energy.

• 19:09Rich Roll?

  We had Lea, our photographer, that was originally our baby

• 19:14Rich Roll?

  Besitter and nanny that Julie realized had quite an extraordinary eye and invested in developing her and then allowed her to like hired her to photograph two of her cookbooks when she could have hired any food photographer to do it and Leia was just a you know a young person at the beginning of her career and she really thrived in the opportunity and is amazingly talented and has gone on to become quite a notable photographer and videographer and storyteller who works with Zach Bush and his farmer's footprint organization but she came and you know did all the all those amazing photographs that I've been sharing and there's tons more

• 19:55Rich Roll?

  like I don't want to like bleed the feed but like there are so many incredible pictures that she took from Julie is a powerful woman yeah she is yeah she's good she's very good at spotting potential and talent that's cool but then also not just spotting it but then wanting to develop it like getting fulfilled from helping people reach their potential she's she's really good at that yeah and then I went to London for a week with Jaya our youngest stayed on Portobello Road in the heart of Notting Hill which was amazing and just kind of did the tourist thing went to the Tate Modern I love Tate Modern we saw Streetcar Named Desire in the West End oh really yeah which was cool starring Paul Mescal oh wait a remake well yeah it's just up it's it's

• 20:36Rich Roll?

  been playing with great reviews in the West End and it's starring this guy Paul Mescal okay as Stanley Kowalski who is on the cusp of becoming a big deal indie fan any film fans will know him from a movie called After Sun that came out last year okay in which he was great but apparently I heard that he's the lead in the Gladiator two the new Gladiator movie that Ridley Scott is doing so you know when that comes out went and saw Streetcar Named Desire in the West End maybe I don't know well after sun there was one other movie that he did what's it called I forget right now so he's definitely like with young people like they all they're all about this guy okay

• 21:19Rich Roll?

  so that was really fun went to this amazing David Hockney exhibit like an immersion exhibit I shared some stuff on Instagram stories about that where you go into this cavernous sort of gigantic warehouse type room and they project in 360 degrees Hockney's art in this kind of

• 21:42Rich Roll?

  You know, kind of overlapping semi-animated style with not voiceover by him, but kind of guided, like sort of recorded stuff, his voice recorded over the years, like reflecting on his career and his art.

• 21:56Adam Skolnick?

  That's awesome.

• 21:57Rich Roll?

  And that was super cool, especially all the stuff about Los Angeles and why he loves LA.

• 22:01Adam Skolnick?

  I love Hockney.

• 22:02Rich Roll?

  How he painted Los Angeles. You know, no one had really captured it.

• 22:06Adam Skolnick?

  And the desert also.

• 22:07Rich Roll?

  Yeah, his love for the desert.

• 22:09Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 22:10Rich Roll?

  Which was, which was just, I mean, high recommend. It was one of the coolest things I've ever seen.

• 22:14Adam Skolnick?

  It's like the same, is it the same people that did the Van Gogh? And now they're doing Hockney?

• 22:17Rich Roll?

  I don't know. I know there's that Van Gogh immersion. Um, I don't know if it's the same people and I haven't gone to that exhibit yet. So I'm not sure.

• 22:25Rich Roll?

  But this was at a place called Lightroom. If you're in London, you should definitely put that on your list. It was very cool.

• 22:30Adam Skolnick?

  I went to, you know, the Taschen flagship that used to be, there used to be, or it wasn't a flagship.

• 22:35Rich Roll?

  Beverly Hills?

• 22:36Adam Skolnick?

  It was the one on Beverly Boulevard.

• 22:37Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 22:38Adam Skolnick?

  Not the flagship store in Beverly Hills, which is fabulous. But this, they had like on Sweetser in Beverly, I think they had this gallery that they took over and they were doing like pop ups. They did a Bowie thing. They did Michael, uh, the shark photographer. Why am I?

• 22:53Rich Roll?

  Muller?

• 22:54Adam Skolnick?

  Muller.

• 22:54Rich Roll?

  Oh, yeah. He did a thing there. Yeah.

• 22:56Adam Skolnick?

  And they did, they did Hockney. I mean, Hockney was amazing there.

• 22:59Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 22:59Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's, but that's static, you know? This, I would love to see this.

• 23:03Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it's very cool.

• 23:04Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 23:05Rich Roll?

  And made more kind of cool and interesting. Because we were staying at my friend Sasha's office flat. And he happened, he splits time between LA and, and London. Podcast fans will remember him from the Anvil episode. And that, the episode that I did with him and Jamie Dornan over the movie that he made for HBO, My Dinner with Ervey.

• 23:30Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 23:30Rich Roll?

  So Sasha, writer filmmaker.

• 23:32Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 23:32Rich Roll?

  And also, uh, used to live up in this neighborhood in the hills where Hockney's, uh, um, studio was right across the street. And he developed like a friendship with him and would go have tea with him. So he had all these insights about like.

• 23:49Adam Skolnick?

  That's cool.

• 23:50Rich Roll?

  You know, Hockney.

• 23:51Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah. Hockney's still alive, right?

• 23:52Rich Roll?

  I know. Yeah. He's, I mean, he's quite old now, but he's still, yeah, he's still around. And you know, what I took from that. Was the purity of how this guy lived his life. Like he, on some level, is very simple. Like, he's like, "I like to make pictures. I like to sketch. I like to draw. I can just sit in nature and do it. And I've been doing it for 50 years and I still love doing it." Like, he's a guy who is authentically who he is, who's pursuing this thing that he loves for, for the sake of the doing, right? And this amazing career and, and kind of,

• 24:28Rich Roll?

  you know, library of work that he's created, that the world has fallen in love with, is, is really a byproduct of just continuing to do that thing. And in the most simplistic way is just like, "I like this."

• 24:41Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 24:41Rich Roll?

  You know?

• 24:42Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 24:42Rich Roll?

  But there's a profundity in that as well.

• 24:44Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, yeah. There's a zen, zen, like a depth to it. You know, it's interesting, like, I, I think, I mean, I'm no art historian, so correct me if I'm wrong, many people who know more than me. But I'm pretty sure nobody had put swimming pools on canvas in a fine art way but before Hockney. I think Hockney was like the first to really pioneer that and do that.

• 25:03Rich Roll?

  I've heard that as well. That might be apocryphal, I'm not sure. But, you know, he talks a lot about the swimming pool stuff and how he tried to capture water and how it's always moving. And every swimming pool that he painted was different. And, you know, all of that's cool. Yeah, did that. I happened to be there during the coronation insanity, which was super fun, too.

• 25:24Adam Skolnick?

  Were you there?

• 25:25Rich Roll?

  Well, I mean, it's all going down, you know, at, at Westminster, right? So like, no, I watched that on TV with Sasha, who also happens to be a writer on The Crown, so.

• 25:36Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, really?

• 25:36Rich Roll?

  Yeah. He's like, he's got the Royals dialed. So that was fun. The processional between the Westminster Abbey and Buckingham Palace, we didn't go down and stand in the ring to witness that, but I did watch on television as they exited the Abbey and got into the gold-plated. Horse and buggy carriage contraption. You know, I mean, the whole thing is like so insane.

• 26:00Adam Skolnick?

  Never been inspired by Prince slash King Charles.

• 26:03Rich Roll?

  It's so strange.

• 26:05Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 26:05Rich Roll?

  You know, that

• 26:06Adam Skolnick?

  Never been into him.

• 26:07Rich Roll?

  This institution still exists and captures the fascination of the world at a time when we've, we're seeing just this, you know, increasing gash between the haves and the have nots and the economic disparity. And yet there is this institution that for some reason continues to inspire a lot of people and serves as this symbol for an empire that doesn't quite exist anymore, but for some reason retains a level of resonance, which is curious.

• 26:42Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, I mean, you know, I think the, probably the haves and have nots, they've always been, the King's always been at the top of that list.

• 26:49Rich Roll?

  I mean, monarchs, not great.

• 26:51Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, no, say what you want though about King Charles, at least he's an environmentalist.

• 26:56Rich Roll?

  That is true. I mean, he, he sort of came, he, he, he came around the corner with that, right?

• 27:01Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, yeah. He's an organic food entrepreneur, I think, or investor.

• 27:04Rich Roll?

  Yeah, exactly. Um, I had Tim Spector in here, who's a very prominent UK doctor. And the guy behind Zoe, which is this, you know, sort of microbiome app service. And he had very nice things to say about the King and his interest in improving health. And so there is that.

• 27:27Adam Skolnick?

  It's genuine.

• 27:28Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I don't know. So I will say that at one point, walking around London, I, I looked up and I happened to be on Googe Street.

• 27:36Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, yeah.

• 27:36Rich Roll?

  And the Googe Tube Station was right around the corner.

• 27:40Adam Skolnick?

  The Googe Tube Station?

• 27:41Rich Roll?

  At which point I snapped a picture and texted you and immediately FaceTimed our friend William Googe, who was in the midst of his transcon run from California to New York City.

• 27:53Adam Skolnick?

  Amazing.

• 27:54Rich Roll?

  Uh, in the heartland, in the middle of the country. So we should do a Googe update.

• 27:59Adam Skolnick?

  Well, you know, where is he right now? Let's look.

• 28:01Rich Roll?

  I think he's in Ohio.

• 28:02Adam Skolnick?

  Is he in Ohio?

• 28:02Rich Roll?

  We're recording this on Monday. I believe so. I didn't, I didn't watch the latest vlog.

• 28:06Adam Skolnick?

  He's in the final, like, thousand miles, I think.

• 28:09Rich Roll?

  He's crushing it. He seems to be getting stronger and stronger and his, his, I think his mileage last week was, you know, bigger than ever. He was hitting like 62 mile days. I mean, he's a beast.

• 28:21Adam Skolnick?

  He looks like an athlete.

• 28:23Rich Roll?

  He does, yeah.

• 28:24Adam Skolnick?

  He looks like an athlete. What's, what's, so did we talk about him before? Like, he was a former, I don't know if he was professional, I think he might have been.

• 28:31Rich Roll?

  I think we've talked a lot about him.

• 28:33Adam Skolnick?

  No, but about his-

• 28:34Rich Roll?

  He first came up as the hype beast slash ultra runner.

• 28:37Adam Skolnick?

  No, I know.

• 28:37Rich Roll?

  Fashion model.

• 28:38Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, he, but he is like a former rugby player. He was like a 220 pound rugby player.

• 28:43Rich Roll?

  I didn't know that.

• 28:44Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, and then his mother died from cancer and he went on this run to support cancer and kind of process that loss.

• 28:53Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I knew that part. I didn't know about the rugby part. And so this whole, all of his running is to raise money, you know, in memory of his mother.

• 29:00Adam Skolnick?

  Right, and so he's been doing it since then and, but he's like, like I said, he was a, he's, he was like a big beast of a, of a, kind of like David in a way, like a beast of a Navy SEAL guy that became an ultra and the body's different, but still strong. He's not like a weedy little kind of like endurance guy, like he is yoked.

• 29:19Rich Roll?

  Yeah, not at all. And, and that apparently is controversial. I don't know if you watched the, some of the stories and the other vlog. So there's some haters out there.

• 29:29Adam Skolnick?

  I saw that, yes.

• 29:30Rich Roll?

  Because, you know, let's, let's face it, William likes his Gucci. He's not afraid to have a, you know, sit for high tea or, or wear a bathrobe or talk about his skincare regimen.

• 29:40Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 29:41Rich Roll?

  And that is not the mold from which the ultra runner, you know, emerges. So he's a very different type of person. And I think there's people out there who don't like that and started to think this guy isn't for real. And all of that hate got directed towards him, which he then channeled and fueled into just upping his mileage every single day.

• 30:02Adam Skolnick?

  Some dude showed up to try to, to prove that he was cheating.

• 30:05Rich Roll?

  Oh, I didn't know that.

• 30:06Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, that's it. There's, it's in one of the episodes of the audacious report docs. I don't know if you've been seeing all the mini docs.

• 30:11Rich Roll?

  I know, which are which are filmed, edited, directed by Reese Robinson, our friend who first came on one of our retreats and ended up doing a bunch of content for us and working on the podcast back in the day. He's fantastically talented.

• 30:28Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, and Robbie, who is like the crew chief, he's he does, he looks great on the, he's a great character.

• 30:35Rich Roll?

  His mustache is world class.

• 30:36Adam Skolnick?

  He's awesome, dude. And he's with, he sent me a text the other day from like the world's largest gift shop or something.

• 30:42Rich Roll?

  Yeah, like things you find on Route 66.

• 30:45Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, yeah. And but they've been, you know, it's been great to see. Love the audacious support. And I'm thinking about getting Newcom. They're really, they're really selling me on this Newcom.

• 30:55Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it's working.

• 30:57Adam Skolnick?

  It seems to be working.

• 30:58Rich Roll?

  Well, I like how William posts his Newcom update, like he, how much he slept and then his, it's all about like that restorative, regenerative nap time where that technology and protocol will drop you into this restorative state. And in a very brief period of time, you know, kind of allow you to bounce back and Robbie swears by it.

• 31:20Rich Roll?

  And obviously, you know, it's working for William and they're a sponsor of that, of that feat. So that's cool.

• 31:27Adam Skolnick?

  I'm excited to see it all happen. Are you, are you thinking about, you were at the starting line. You think about going to New York for the finish?

• 31:33Rich Roll?

  It depends. When, when is the, what's the anticipated date?

• 31:36Adam Skolnick?

  They were gonna do it in less than 62 days from the start date, but at this point, I think there gotta be under 60, like they're shaving days off. So.

• 31:44Rich Roll?

  I'd like to. I mean, obviously, I'm not running right now, but I'm gonna look into that. It would be cool to be there.

• 31:49Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, yeah, it would be really cool. Casey Neistat was at Hella's.

• 31:53Rich Roll?

  That's right.

• 31:54Adam Skolnick?

  Right?

• 31:54Rich Roll?

  And I think Hella this week is coming up on, is it his six year anniversary of the run streak? He's doing a group run in, in New York City to celebrate.

• 32:05Adam Skolnick?

  He is, okay.

• 32:06Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I don't know what day it is exactly, but you know.

• 32:09Adam Skolnick?

  Like 600, like 6,000 days or something.

• 32:11Rich Roll?

  Something like that. There was a six involved and it was big. That's all I know.

• 32:16Adam Skolnick?

  I mean, dude.

• 32:18Rich Roll?

  While I was in London, I also did a couple media appearances. I guessed it on this podcast called Diary of a CEO, which is a pretty big show in the UK and growing really quickly all over the world. I think it's like third or second biggest show in the UK, hosted by this guy, Stephen Bartlett, who's a bit of a UK celebrity entrepreneur turned podcaster, who

• 32:42Rich Roll?

  became well known as the youngest guest judge on Dragon's Den, which is their version of Shark Tank.

• 32:48Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 32:49Rich Roll?

  And it was it was a real honor to do his show. Like, I think what he's doing is interesting. He's super pro, a great interviewer. So

• 32:57Adam Skolnick?

  Cool.

• 32:57Rich Roll?

  That's coming out soon.

• 32:59Adam Skolnick?

  Is it kind of like a how I built this type of?

• 33:01Rich Roll?

  No, it's it's more it's more directed than that. It's really not. I mean, I think it started as a business type podcast. How did you become successful? But now it's gotten so big that he has all different kinds of people on. But he's very good at asking questions and kind of getting beneath the beneath. And he invited Jai and I to join him for the Manchester United West Ham

• 33:28Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, awesome.

• 33:29Rich Roll?

  Which was super fun. I had never been to a Premier League football match before. So I went in knowing absolutely nothing, like a complete dullard, you know? For the experience, Stephen was very patient with my ignorance, you know, around this game that everybody else in the world is a fan of and knows about.

• 33:47Adam Skolnick?

  We're like, why don't they pick up the ball, Stephen?

• 33:49Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I did have some questions. What is the pitch?

• 33:53Adam Skolnick?

  No one's pitching it.

• 33:55Rich Roll?

  Yeah, but that was that was really an incredible treat and, you know, shocking at how little you know, I know about that sport, but sort of like F1 or like anything, really, the more you learn about something, the more kind of invested you become in following it. And I, you know, started to fall in love.

• 34:14Adam Skolnick?

  And it's the it's like the beautiful game, but it's also like worldly. It spreads so far and wide because it's actually pretty simple. You know, you kick the ball over there.

• 34:22Rich Roll?

  Right. You can know nothing and follow it.

• 34:24Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 34:24Rich Roll?

  Right. And then it gets From there.

• 34:26Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 34:26Rich Roll?

  Basically.

• 34:27Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 34:27Rich Roll?

  And I also did Chris Evans Breakfast Show on Virgin UK Radio. For those that, if you know, you know, Chris is a legend, broadcasting legend. Anybody, you know, in the UK knows who he is. He hosts this, you know, gigantic morning radio show to a massive audience every weekday morning. For those that don't know, he's just a, you know, a quality guy, like so positive and optimistic and enthusiastic and is also a fan of the podcast. Like he's, he is always talking about the show. In fact, I think he did today. He was talking about Neil Passerica, our latest guest on the show this morning.

• 35:11Rich Roll?

  And because of his enthusiasm for the RRP, we end up like doing better in the UK than we do in the US.

• 35:19Adam Skolnick?

  Really?

• 35:19Rich Roll?

  Solely because of his, you know, kind of free promotion, which is very kind and generous of him. He's our secret marketing weapon, deploying positive awareness across the British Empire.

• 35:34Adam Skolnick?

  He's amazing.

• 35:35Rich Roll?

  Yeah. And a big runner and just, you know, all the good stuff, right?

• 35:40Adam Skolnick?

  Not just him, but like a lot of his crew are marathoners now, right?

• 35:43Rich Roll?

  Yeah, like exactly, exactly.

• 35:44Adam Skolnick?

  Because of your show.

• 35:45Rich Roll?

  Like, you know, a bunch of people who work for him, producer, et cetera, are all running marathons. And his like right-hand guy is getting ready to do Western States.

• 35:55Adam Skolnick?

  Exactly.

• 35:55Rich Roll?

  He got in the lottery.

• 35:57Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 35:57Rich Roll?

  And he'd run UTMB. So I got to meet, you know, some of his staff. And I had met Chris once prior, but I had never done a show before. So that was really fun. It did not disappoint. We had a really good time doing it. But the main thing and the reason primarily I'm bringing it up is that not only is Chris, you know, a big podcast fan of this podcast, he is the number one roll-on fan. He just might be king of the skull necks. He loves you so much, Adam.

• 36:27Adam Skolnick?

  That's very kind.

• 36:27Rich Roll?

  Basically, 75% of our 20 minutes on air was devoted to the adoration of Adam. So I sent it to you. I was like, I don't know how you're feeling today, but if you need a little boost, like maybe check out, you know, Chris and I on the, on the radio this morning.

• 36:42Adam Skolnick?

  No, thank you. I, I did, I did listen to the interview. Loved it. I mean, he's so high energy and so positive. It's like, you know, someone had called in on, we didn't include the question in this show, but it was like, you know, how come there's not more good, not more good news people out there spreading the good energy and all of that. And he is one of those people in media and at a real high level that does it. And it's really cool to hear that he's responded. I did hear it. He's also not only the number one Roll On fan, he's, he's head of the faction that wants to go back to strictly the OG format.

• 37:15Rich Roll?

  When I say Roll On, I mean old school. Yeah. Yeah. He did have a lot to say about the docu-series, but he did have, he did want to talk about, you know, streaming choices and like all the knucklehead stuff that we do. And look, you know, he's, he's, he knows from whence he comes. Like this is a guy who's been around for a very long time. And he told me like, Roll On is great. Rapport is really hard and rare and you guys have it and there's something really fun and unique about that. Don't overthink it. Like just keep doing that thing. And, you know, that was encouraging to hear.

• 37:51Adam Skolnick?

  It was encouraging. It was, it's cool. It's really cool to hear that, that, that plays. And, and cause he used an example of he had a music show and he'd have like the best bands in the world on there, like the biggest acts in the world, U2, whoever. And they would have this chit chat interview that was, that kind of off the cuff. And then they'd cut to the band playing a song, like a live rendition, and people would turn the channel. Like it was the off the cuff, impromptu stuff that you, you didn't know was going to happen. It interests people more than going to something that seems overly produced or something more familiar.

• 38:27Rich Roll?

  Right. The, the, the prologue that you think is sort of fluff and not that important becomes the thing ironically that the people are tuning in for rather than the main act.

• 38:38Adam Skolnick?

  Exactly. I think we do have some subjects lined up to continue to explore, but maybe we do it in, in some eluser format like we're doing now.

• 38:46Rich Roll?

  We'll see. Yeah. But I will say that, that Chris is a big fan of streaming recs.

• 38:54Rich Roll?

  He told me, he's like, we all here, you know, ended up watching White Lotus. Cause you guys talked about it. I was like, you had to hear about White Lotus from us?

• 39:02Adam Skolnick?

  It's surprising, but you don't know what really transfers, right? Like what, you know, they have so many shows that are huge hits that we never see. And it must be both ways, right?

• 39:10Rich Roll?

  Right, right, right. Anyway, it was a total joy and honor to do Chris's show. I have so much respect and admiration for him. Uh, and we love you, Chris. Thank you so much. I mean, he has been so gracious and generous with his support for this show. It's just, you know, it's, it's extraordinary. So Chris, I know you're listening, listening right now.

• 39:31Adam Skolnick?

  He's listening right this second. Uh, Chris, man, hey, thank you so much for the support, for listening, for, you know, talking about the show, advocating for the show and for Roll On. It's really cool to, you know, I appreciate all of Richie's listeners. It's very cool to hear that you're listening and for the advice and for the, and for the love. You know, just the idea that there's positive kind of media happening at a really high level is super cool.

• 39:58Rich Roll?

  Yeah, absolutely. All of which brings us to our hotly anticipated uh, media diet recipes, which are coming right up on the heels of our discussion about White Lotus. Uh, but first let's hear from a couple of the sponsors that helped make this show possible.

• 40:22Rich Roll?

  Media diet, the people have asked for it and we deliver what the people want. Adam, what's in your queue?

• 40:29Adam Skolnick?

  Lakers, Lakers and more Lakers.

• 40:32Rich Roll?

  I'm blinded by the purple and gold over here with the wardrobe change.

• 40:36Adam Skolnick?

  Speaking of LA, Wash Beef.

• 40:38Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 40:39Adam Skolnick?

  Very, a very LA slash.

• 40:41Rich Roll?

  Yeah, that's a wild.

• 40:43Adam Skolnick?

  K-Town meets Calabasas.

• 40:44Rich Roll?

  Chaotic ride, uh, with a standout turn by our friend, David Cho.

• 40:49Adam Skolnick?

  Amazing.

• 40:50Rich Roll?

  Came in here recently. We haven't published that episode yet, but I did round two with him.

• 40:54Adam Skolnick?

  Who saw that coming? Who saw him as like a great actor coming?

• 40:58Rich Roll?

  Yeah, he really acquitted himself.

• 41:00Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 41:01Rich Roll?

  Quite well.

• 41:02Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 41:02Rich Roll?

  Um, going toe to toe with Steve UN and, uh, and Ali Wong.

• 41:06Adam Skolnick?

  I mean, Steve, Steve UN, we know is spectacular. I don't know if you saw the, what's the Oscar, uh, the Oscar nominated one?

• 41:13Rich Roll?

  I forget, but yeah, he got, he has an Oscar nomination.

• 41:16Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, yeah. And then. That's a great movie. Takes place in eighties in Arkansas. And he like to compare that character to like what he played in Beef. And then Ali Wong, I mean, she is incredible. What an incredible artist.

• 41:29Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it's a superstar turn for her. And it was just fresh in its chaos.

• 41:37Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 41:37Rich Roll?

  And then enter David Cho and it's like just, you know, a whole new level of chaos, like unpredictability. We talk about it a lot. I don't want to spoil that conversation, but it's pretty special. And what's funny about watching Beef is I know all those locations. It's filmed all around this area here. Like I know that house. Like I know exactly where that house is where Ali Wong lived.

• 42:02Adam Skolnick?

  And LA too, right? So it's both, right? It's kind of going back and forth.

• 42:06Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it's, yeah, it's, it's, it obviously has a lot to say about class in that regard as well.

• 42:12Adam Skolnick?

  Super, super fun. I found it to be the freshest thing I've seen since the first season of Atlanta. It reminds me of the first season of Atlanta in its kind of, you know, not exactly the same tone. Atlanta is more of a straight up comedy, I think, although this is very funny. But at least the first season of Atlanta was, but similar kind of like offbeat, you know, abstract kind of.

• 42:38Rich Roll?

  Sure. Everyone is terrible in this show, right?

• 42:42Adam Skolnick?

  That's the difference. Atlanta, you have people to root for. This show, there's no one to root for.

• 42:46Rich Roll?

  Speaking of a show where everybody is terrible.

• 42:49Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 42:50Rich Roll?

  There's a little show on HBO. You might have heard of it.

• 42:53Adam Skolnick?

  A little baby show called Success.

• 42:57Rich Roll?

  Success. Succession.

• 42:59Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, I've been watching Succession.

• 43:00Rich Roll?

  Not exactly a hot take to say like Succession is in your, is in your queue, but that show is just on a whole other level.

• 43:08Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, I don't want to, I don't know how much spoiler we want to get into, but this season there was a noticeable departure. And I've been kind of like off this season a little bit more than on than I have been in the past, but the election night was sublime.

• 43:26Rich Roll?

  I mean, that was exquisite, yeah. It's just unbelievably well considered piece of television.

• 43:34Adam Skolnick?

  Amazing.

• 43:35Rich Roll?

  It was an art form in and of itself.

• 43:37Adam Skolnick?

  I agree.

• 43:38Rich Roll?

  Created by a bunch of Brits to tell the most American story with a level of incisiveness.

• 43:47Rich Roll?

  That I haven't seen, you know, I mean, it's so reminiscent of the 2016 election. And done with satire, but also with a heaviness to it that distinguished that episode from many of the others. Like, I'm all in on this season. And it's just been riveting for me to watch.

• 44:10Adam Skolnick?

  You're all in on the, on the current drama as to where it's going. It's interesting. Roman is making his power move.

• 44:18Rich Roll?

  I mean, he's gone full Darth Vader.

• 44:20Adam Skolnick?

  He's going full.

• 44:22Rich Roll?

  We don't want to spoil anything. If people are like behind, it's, it's dark. It's, it's getting really dark.

• 44:28Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 44:29Rich Roll?

  As, as Jeremy Strong, who plays Kendall Roy, has said, it's Richard III, which, if you know that play, you have a good sense of where the chips may fall at the end.

• 44:39Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 44:40Rich Roll?

  But we shall see. Two more, two more episodes left.

• 44:44Adam Skolnick?

  All I know is Kendall won't win.

• 44:48Rich Roll?

  Well, even if he wins, he doesn't win.

• 44:50Adam Skolnick?

  He loses.

• 44:50Rich Roll?

  That's the thing. Nobody's winning.

• 44:52Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 44:52Rich Roll?

  This, you know, and it's not a mystery.

• 44:55Adam Skolnick?

  Craig, Craig might win.

• 44:56Rich Roll?

  It's not a mystery box show either. It's not about like some big reveal. I think it's just going to be a situation in which nobody wins and the earth is scorched and the rich people sort of ride off into the sunset without repercussions for their behavior. You know, it's going to have a kind of very grim dire, you know, sort of thing to say about.

• 45:22Adam Skolnick?

  But that's always there, right? Like, the fact is that that's part of why the characters are not ultimately likable, although you, you feel yourself feeling for them. But they're not likable because it, they're, the stakes are like in terms of their lifestyle, nothing will change. Their lives will be at a certain level, no matter what.

• 45:42Rich Roll?

  When Roman says like, it doesn't matter.

• 45:44Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 45:44Rich Roll?

  Like he's, like, nothing matters.

• 45:46Adam Skolnick?

  Power, that's why power is the currency that matters because everything else is already done.

• 45:51Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 45:51Adam Skolnick?

  It's already taken care of.

• 45:53Rich Roll?

  Anyway, yeah, I don't want to spoil too much more, but you know, I've, I've found it to be just on a whole other level.

• 45:59Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, that, that, those are the two shows I've watched, but it sounds like you've watched a lot of.

• 46:03Rich Roll?

  I have.

• 46:05Adam Skolnick?

  Let's see where it's

• 46:06Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I was trying to think. I mean, it's been so long. It's been so long since we've done this. I guess the first thing, because it's top of mind, that I would want to make sure that everybody is seen is all quiet on the Western Front. There's obviously nothing new, this recommendation. I just, you know, it got a ton of BAFTAs and Oscars. I might have even previously mentioned it on the show. Obviously, also based on the classic 1929 novel about World War I told from the point of view, not of the victor, but of a young German soldier at the very end of that devastating conflict. And this movie was a bit of a sleeper. I was a latecomer to it.

• 46:44Rich Roll?

  But when I watched it, I was just absolutely riveted by its exquisite-ness. It's haunting. It's horrifying. It's beautiful. And it's got this aftertaste that really lives with you, that sticks with you. And the reason I'm bringing it up now is because yesterday I had Leslie Patterson on the podcast, who is the film's Oscar-nominated screenwriter, which in and of itself is amazing and worthy of, you know, an appearance on the podcast. But her story is just gonna absolutely melt your brain when that show comes out. In addition to winning the BAFTA and being nominated for an Oscar for her script and all kinds of other accolades,

• 47:23Rich Roll?

  she's also a five-time world champion in triathlon, in Xterra, and she won three Xterra World Championships, but not in her past life before getting into filmmaking during her screenwriting journey to get the film made. So as this nobody in the business with no credits, she optioned the book in 2006.

• 47:48Adam Skolnick?

  Who would even think that you could option that book?

• 47:50Rich Roll?

  Right. Well, she didn't. She thought some studio would have it tied up. And I think it was Paramount, I can't remember which studio, had let an option lapse and it went to the estate. And she was able to negotiate with the estate and option it. And then she spent 16 years trying to get this film made. So every 12 to 18 months, she would have to renew the option, which was somewhere between 10 to 15 grand each time. And her way of doing that

• 48:23Rich Roll?

  Was to be a professional triathlete, win races, and then use the prize money to renew the option, which she did for many years. She's, she went out of pocket over that period of time, over 200 grand to keep this thing alive. I think they mortgaged their house to keep it going. Talk about belief. And it's not like, oh, she's an athlete and a writer. Like, this was a person who, in 2011, at the Maui Xterra World Championships, she flatted on the bike, fell way behind, and then ran so fast in the run leg that her split was exactly the same as Michael Weiss, who won the men's race, and 10 minutes faster than Lance Armstrong.

• 49:07Rich Roll?

  Like, she's an absolute baller. And then in 2016, she had this protracted battle with Lyme disease that had her, like, bedridden forever. Holy shit. You know, it took her years to kind of crawl out of that. Finally, starts to feel like she's starting to come back together. And she enters this race, not because she's super fit, she's only just starting to dip her toe back into being an athlete, but because the option's about to lapse, and they have no money, and she doesn't know how she's going to pay for this thing, but she just can't let the book go. Like, she's obsessed with getting this movie made. So she goes to this Xterra race in Costa Rica.

• 49:51Rich Roll?

  And the day before the race, Xterra Off-Road, I can't remember which one, she does what you do, which is you recon the course. Like, you get out on your mountain bike and you ride around it, so you have a feel for what's happening. And she crashes, and she breaks her shoulder. Breaks her shoulder, no way she can race. Her husband convinces her, "Well, why don't you just try to race anyway? Like, you're pretty good with the one-arm drill."

• 50:17Rich Roll?

  And she's like, fine, you know, I guess I could swim out, you know, 50 meters. And if it's bad, like I'll just stop, right? We're here. So she does that, gets through the swim, comes out, I don't know, last out of the water, gets on her bike and rides through the entire field into second place and then outpaces everyone on the run and like wins the freaking race and wins the prize money and just in time, like is able to renew the option.

• 50:43Adam Skolnick?

  Holy fucking shit.

• 50:44Rich Roll?

  And then over the years of development hell with producers who go to jail and this person attached and that person attached, the universe finally conspired to make this dream happen.

• 50:55Adam Skolnick?

  And she's the director and writer?

• 50:56Rich Roll?

  No, just the, she's a screenwriter. Yeah, she's a screenwriter. It's a great, I mean, I've given you the highlights, but that's an incredible podcast that's coming up at some point. So anyway, in preparation for that podcast, if you have not seen All Quiet on the Western Front, I strongly suggest you check it out.

• 51:12Adam Skolnick?

  What a, that sounds like there should be a Hearts of Darkness type documentary about that movie, you know what I mean?

• 51:17Rich Roll?

  Well, it's a biopic in its own right, you know? So like her life story is insane. She, she played rugby when she was seven years old in Scotland and played with the boys and like, there's all these episodes in her, in, you know, in her bio and over the years that, I mean, she's remarkable.

• 51:34Adam Skolnick?

  How cool.

• 51:35Rich Roll?

  Very cool. The AI episode, remember when we did that, Adam?

• 51:40Adam Skolnick?

  The AI, the AI episode today, Sam Altman of OpenAI was getting in the set, getting grilled.

• 51:48Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 51:49Adam Skolnick?

  It's getting grilled on possible.

• 51:51Rich Roll?

  That's inevitable.

• 51:52Adam Skolnick?

  Possible regulation.

• 51:53Rich Roll?

  Right. Well, that's, that's a case of, of the tech titan realizing that he has to appear friendly to regulators, regulators to sort of say, we need regulation, we want regulation.

• 52:05Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, this is the friendly one.

• 52:06Rich Roll?

  Not really.

• 52:07Adam Skolnick?

  It's not a hostile one.

• 52:08Rich Roll?

  What is the succession, you know, season about like, you know, going in before Congress and talking about regulation? It's sort of like, yeah, like what would Cousin Greg say? Well, we, we kind of like regulation. Do we like it?

• 52:19Adam Skolnick?

  I would love to see Cousin Greg getting, getting in those hearings.

• 52:22Rich Roll?

  We like regulation, right? Oh, we don't like it?

• 52:24Adam Skolnick?

  We saw Tom in the hearings, right? Tom was in the hearings.

• 52:27Rich Roll?

  Tom would be, Tom would be the guy. Yeah, that's right. Tom was in the hearings.

• 52:30Adam Skolnick?

  Tom was in the hearings.

• 52:31Rich Roll?

  That's right. I forgot about that. And then, and then these, these sort of elected official bureaucrats who are trying to wrap their heads around AI, like you can't, you know, it's hard to imagine. The complexity of this is so intense. Like, how do you, how does someone who's not fully immersed in this world understand the best way to regulate it?

• 52:52Adam Skolnick?

  I don't know. We did a whole episode. It was kind of trying. We, we thought we were behind when the episode came out. Turns out, we were way ahead. Like, since the episode came out, we called out, there's gonna be an AI-written screenplay. South Park dropped their episode. We called out, there's gonna be AI-written novels. They're all over the place. You know, like, it's happening.

• 53:13Rich Roll?

  We're using so many AI tools here in our workflow now. It's insane. But it's creating unreal efficiencies. So we can do more of the cool, creative stuff.

• 53:23Adam Skolnick?

  I am AI right now. This isn't even Adam.

• 53:25Rich Roll?

  Of course.

• 53:26Adam Skolnick?

  This is an AI in a Laker sweater.

• 53:28Rich Roll?

  I'm having a light, a lightbulb moment. But I bring up AI because there's a couple interesting AI-themed series out there right now that I've enjoyed. The first one is Rabbit Hole with Kiefer, Kiefer Sutherland.

• 53:43Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 53:44Rich Roll?

  Which is kind of a taut, fun thriller in the style of 24, where he plays a guy who is hired by corporations to do corporate espionage, you know? And, and then all of this sort of intrigue happens as a result of these, of an AI-related kind of situation, which makes it fun. But it's fluffy network television, but it was a fun watch. And then, there's this show called Mrs. Davis. Have you seen this show?

• 54:16Adam Skolnick?

  I have not.

• 54:17Rich Roll?

  This show, which is on Peacock, the streaming service Peacock, was created by one of my favorite writers in Hollywood, Damon Lindelof, who is the genius master storyteller, also a dream podcast guest. He'd be great. I would love to get him.

• 54:35Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 54:36Rich Roll?

  Behind, first, he's known best for Lost.

• 54:39Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 54:40Rich Roll?

  And then, was on the receiving end of so much criticism on Twitter as a result of the way that Lost ended, that he quit Twitter.

• 54:47Adam Skolnick?

  Oh.

• 54:48Rich Roll?

  To spare his mental health. But he went on to create The Leftovers on HBO. He is the genius behind Watchmen on HBO, which is an extraordinary limited series, which everyone should watch. And he wrote Prometheus, which I think is a highly underrated and misunderstood.

• 55:07Rich Roll?

  Exploration of the origin of mankind that's set in the extended alien universe. Did you see Prometheus?

• 55:13Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 55:13Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it's a very cool movie.

• 55:15Adam Skolnick?

  And he did a Twitter, he was doing a Twitter novel or something during or

• 55:19Rich Roll?

  He did that, yeah, I remember that.

• 55:20Adam Skolnick?

  He came back to Twitter and did it during the

• 55:23Rich Roll?

  Did he do that on Twitter? I remember, I remember that, I remember something about that.

• 55:26Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, no, no.

• 55:27Rich Roll?

  It was before the pandemic.

• 55:28Adam Skolnick?

  It was part of NextDraft newsletter, you know, that newsletter NextDraft? And he was, he was writing, I believe he was writing a serial novel.

• 55:37Rich Roll?

  Oh, I don't know.

• 55:38Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 55:38Rich Roll?

  I don't know.

• 55:38Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 55:39Rich Roll?

  He, he recently anchored, as they say in Hollywood, a new Star Wars project.

• 55:45Adam Skolnick?

  So he's anchored.

• 55:46Rich Roll?

  Anchored, you don't know that?

• 55:47Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 55:48Rich Roll?

  Do you live in Los Angeles?

• 55:51Adam Skolnick?

  Let's go, Lake.

• 55:52Rich Roll?

  Do you even Variety or Hollywood Reporter at him?

• 55:56Adam Skolnick?

  No, but I

• 55:57Rich Roll?

  That's sort of like the parlance of the trade rags where they're like, like when an executive leaves one studio and goes to another, they say they anchored Sony for DreamWorks.

• 56:05Adam Skolnick?

  Ah.

• 56:06Rich Roll?

  You never heard that?

• 56:07Adam Skolnick?

  Never heard it.

• 56:08Rich Roll?

  Yeah, that's insider talk.

• 56:10Adam Skolnick?

  Here you are.

• 56:11Rich Roll?

  Anyway. But

• 56:13Adam Skolnick?

  I'm an outsider, baby.

• 56:15Rich Roll?

  Anyway, so Damon has co-created this new series called Mrs. Davis.

• 56:20Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 56:21Rich Roll?

  That he, that he co-created with this veteran TV writer called Tara Hernandez. And she's really the one who's running the show. He's more in the background, but his fingerprints are all over this thing because if Damon is anything, he's somebody who knows how to create really compelling, unique stories that just defy your expectations and, and always, you know, take you places you never expected to go. I don't want to give out spoilers for this show, other than to say it's kind of a heightened, semi comedic sci-fi series where a nun uses her faith to essentially wage war on an all-powerful

• 57:06Rich Roll?

  super AI that everybody else is in love with. So if you think of it as this, kind of like the most advanced Algorithmic her, you know, the movie her.

• 57:18Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 57:19Rich Roll?

  In the form of this like ear pod that everybody has in their ear where they're in constant communication with this.

• 57:24Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 57:24Rich Roll?

  You know, super consciousness is sort of like if chat GPT became a religion. And this AI that's called Mrs. Davis sends this nun on a mission to find the Holy Grail. And then it just goes like bananas from there and.

• 57:41Adam Skolnick?

  So sexy nun on a mission to find the Holy Grail.

• 57:44Rich Roll?

  Kind of.

• 57:44Adam Skolnick?

  And to destroy AI.

• 57:46Rich Roll?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 57:46Adam Skolnick?

  I'm in.

• 57:47Rich Roll?

  It's, it's, I mean, come on, right?

• 57:49Adam Skolnick?

  I'm in.

• 57:49Rich Roll?

  Yeah. This nun who's trying to destroy the all powerful AI. And that's not even the crazy part.

• 57:56Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 57:57Rich Roll?

  You know, everything that Damon has ever done is, is just, you know, super unique and fresh and unexpected and unpredictable and wildly entertaining. But also, and this show certainly does that, managed to, manages to, you know, grapple with, with big questions in this show in a really fun way, not in your face, but kind of operating in the, in the backdrop is, you know, this, this, these, these sort of, you know, big questions around existence and what is God and, you know, the singularity and stuff like that, which makes it pretty fun. So anyway, I would check that one out.

• 58:36Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 58:36Rich Roll?

  Uh, those are my big ones.

• 58:38Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 58:39Rich Roll?

  You know, I'm a sucker, as I've said before, by anything CIA, Mossad, MI5, MI6. So I rushed through Slow Horses while I was in London.

• 58:50Adam Skolnick?

  All right.

• 58:50Rich Roll?

  I'd go deep Brit while I was there and I really enjoyed that. Um, which is on Apple Plus, I think, right?

• 58:57Adam Skolnick?

  You're doing, you're, you're, you're, you're just knocking out episodes before bed usually, right? In the tent.

• 59:03Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 59:03Adam Skolnick?

  On the plane.

• 59:04Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I have a lot of plane time.

• 59:06Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 59:06Rich Roll?

  So I fired up a lot of this, uh, flying around. Uh, and let's face it, uh, Jack Ryan is returning June 30th on Amazon. Pure dad core, like just.

• 59:18Adam Skolnick?

  You should be able to get him on.

• 59:19Rich Roll?

  Bring it on.

• 59:20Adam Skolnick?

  Can't you go through, um?

• 59:23Rich Roll?

  That guy's A-list.

• 59:24Adam Skolnick?

  Soul, Soul Bloom. Can't you get, can't you get to Krasinski through, uh?

• 59:28Rich Roll?

  I can't ask Rain for that.

• 59:30Adam Skolnick?

  You can't ask Rain? They're still in touch, right?

• 59:33Rich Roll?

  Remember when, remember when, um, Krasinski during the pandemic did that?

• 59:38Adam Skolnick?

  I love it.

• 59:38Rich Roll?

  Good news YouTube show? He should have kept doing that.

• 59:41Adam Skolnick?

  I think he sold the rights or something like that. And then I don't know what happened.

• 59:45Rich Roll?

  They were gonna make- It just disappeared. Yeah. Nothing ever happened.

• 59:47Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 59:48Rich Roll?

  But that was pretty cool. I mean, that was an incredible example of right place, right time, right guy. And everybody just wanting something to feel good.

• 59:56Adam Skolnick?

  Well, also because he went, he made this conscious decision to do action stuff. And he was smart. He was making, and it's probably what he loved to make and wanted to make. And he got buff and all that. But like, the good news was back to Jim, almost. It was like if Jim was doing it from, you know what I mean? It was almost like more Jim.

• 1:00:15Rich Roll?

  Right. Like there's just the wholesomeness of it.

• 1:00:17Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:00:18Rich Roll?

  Exactly.

• 1:00:19Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, which was cool.

• 1:00:20Rich Roll?

  So those are my picks for now. I mean, I had a few other things here. I mean, on the podcast front, uh, there were a couple of interesting things that I stumbled across. I think I mentioned this podcast series called The New Gurus. Did I talk about that with you before? This woman Helen Lewis-

• 1:00:34Adam Skolnick?

  You have mentioned it to me, yes.

• 1:00:36Rich Roll?

  Who writes for The Atlantic, did a series, a podcast series on the kind of guru sphere.

• 1:00:40Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 1:00:41Rich Roll?

  Particularly, you know, in the content YouTube podcast space. She recently released this bonus episode on the manosphere, which I thought was super interesting. Like the influence of male podcasters on young men that I thought was fascinating and is-

• 1:01:01Adam Skolnick?

  For the better and worse, I guess.

• 1:01:02Rich Roll?

  Yeah, right, right, right. And Rick Rubin launched his podcast Tetra Grammaton. Have you listened to any of those episodes yet?

• 1:01:10Adam Skolnick?

  I have not.

• 1:01:11Rich Roll?

  Do you know what that word means? I had to look it up.

• 1:01:14Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 1:01:15Rich Roll?

  Is the Hebrew name for God translated in four letters?

• 1:01:19Adam Skolnick?

  I thought, I thought it was.

• 1:01:21Rich Roll?

  R I C K, Rick.

• 1:01:23Adam Skolnick?

  Adonai is God.

• 1:01:25Rich Roll?

  No, like Yahweh without the vowels.

• 1:01:27Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 1:01:28Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:01:28Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 1:01:29Rich Roll?

  Anyway, it's pretty cool. He's doing something really unique and original in the long conversation space.

• 1:01:35Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 1:01:36Rich Roll?

  He had Alejandro Iñárritu. I know I'm mispronouncing his last name, the director behind Birdman and Babel. He had Phil Jackson on. You're gonna want to tune into that one.

• 1:01:47Adam Skolnick?

  Love Phil Jackson.

• 1:01:49Rich Roll?

  It's cool. So I would check that out as well. And.

• 1:01:53Adam Skolnick?

  I'll check that out.

• 1:01:53Rich Roll?

  That's it. This concludes the media diet.

• 1:01:57Adam Skolnick?

  You know what? You're a good person to do the media. I've always been like, can I say I've always been an advocate of the media diet? You've always kind of shied away. You're like, who cares what I watch? People care.

• 1:02:08Rich Roll?

  But what's funny is, you know, given the kind of themes and context of this podcast, you would think I'm gonna say, here's a documentary and here's this, you know, really philosophical, deep piece that's gonna change your life. And, you know, I'm kind of just sharing entertainment and fluff, which feels a little bit orthogonal to the, you know, recurring themes and focus of the show. So it feels indulgent, but it's okay to have fun too.

• 1:02:38Adam Skolnick?

  You know, but it also shows the art side. It shows your kind of why you are attracted to the entertainment business as a lawyer, because you love film and, you know, it shows that.

• 1:02:46Rich Roll?

  And we do have a question, a listener question. I think it's the last one that we're gonna answer where I'm being asked for stories from that period of my life, of which I have many. So if you're interested in that stuff, stick around to the end.

• 1:02:59Adam Skolnick?

  Meanwhile, I watch sports and I'm still watching Apocalypse Now. I started it three weeks ago. And then I'm watching it in like, this is what happens when you have a young, when a toddler, it's like.

• 1:03:08Rich Roll?

  You have plenty of time to go to Lakers and Dodgers games and watch sports for like hours and hours a day, but Apocalypse Now takes you a week to get through.

• 1:03:16Adam Skolnick?

  A week? Yeah, that's a good, that's a good week.

• 1:03:19Rich Roll?

  You have a small child. It's understandable.

• 1:03:21Adam Skolnick?

  Exactly.

• 1:03:22Rich Roll?

  My kids are grown.

• 1:03:23Adam Skolnick?

  You got, you got time. You're in the tent. You're like, I'm gonna knock out five spy shows.

• 1:03:28Rich Roll?

  No.

• 1:03:30Rich Roll?

  Anyway, what do we got next? We're gonna go right into the AMA.

• 1:03:33Adam Skolnick?

  We are, but first, a wardrobe change.

• 1:03:43Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 1:03:44Rich Roll?

  We got some questions?

• 1:03:44Adam Skolnick?

  We do. We're starting with Sam from Fort Wayne, Indiana.

• 1:03:50Speaker 02

  Hi, my name's Sam from Fort Wayne, Indiana, and I was calling for some tips on fatherhood. I am expecting my first child in about a month, and I'm really excited and really nervous. And I really respect both of your guys' opinions and would love any tips or advice on becoming a dad.

• 1:04:11Rich Roll?

  Great question, Sam. Thank you for that. Adam?

• 1:04:17Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 1:04:17Rich Roll?

  You're not only a new dad, I think you're a parenting guru. You're a self-help guru. You have some parenting advice. It's been 15 years since I had an infant.

• 1:04:27Adam Skolnick?

  Calling me a parenting guru is a bit of a stretch.

• 1:04:30Rich Roll?

  Own your space, Adam. What is the advice you have for Sam?

• 1:04:33Adam Skolnick?

  I will say this, as an older dad, I was 48 when Zuma was born. I have a natural inclination to what I'm about to say, but because being an older dad, there's certain advantages. There's disadvantages, of course, physically and otherwise. But one advantage is, you know, when you have the baby and you go through that process in labor and your wife does it and you're there, the excitement is just everywhere. You know, you feel the excitement. You feel it from other people, your neighbors, your family, your friends. Having the baby, this new life in your hands, it's exciting and dizzying. But that fades, and I think what any new parent needs to do is accept more than the excitement,

• 1:05:17Adam Skolnick?

  more than embracing excitement, because the excitement's going to happen. Really, the next stage is complete acceptance. Accept this new phase you are in. Do not compare it to anything that came before. Do not compare it to your other friends that are in different seasons of their lives. Accept exactly where you are and what your new role is and you'll have a much easier time staying in the moment. As, as a, an older dad, that came easy to me since I had basically a full adult life not being a parent. I didn't have this, any sort of FOMO whatsoever. It was easy for me to not give a shit about anything else and just kind of really click in. But I do notice, uh, younger parents, that isn't more of an issue and it's, of

• 1:05:59Adam Skolnick?

  course, it's like human nature. So, I sent, I don't know how old Sam is, but I would, I, that, I, that's a piece of advice I give myself even, right? So this is not just me talking to you, it's me talking to me. Um, also, exercise, grab what you can, you gotta stay fit. You gotta, you gotta do that from the outset. You don't wanna try to catch up like six months later. Um, so catch, you know, 30 minutes is all you got, go get a 30 minute, you know, take them on, take, as soon as the baby can, go outside, go on long walks, go on walks with your family. Um, and then when you can, start to run or do what you have to do to stay fit. Change as many diapers as you can, early on, just, just be there, be there for your partner, be kind to her, be kind to yourself, be kind

• 1:06:42Adam Skolnick?

  to the baby, um, you'll go far. And, uh, say no to the snoo. No to the snoo.

• 1:06:48Rich Roll?

  What is the snoo? The snoo's, the snoo's bar?

• 1:06:50Adam Skolnick?

  It's that, no, the snoo is the, this bassinet contraption that you kind of, you swaddle the baby and you strap them down and it like rocks them back to sleep. So you don't have, it's, it's to get ba- babies to sleep through the night and it's supposedly like a sleep training without the, without the, uh, mean kind of cold shoulder aspect to it. And I, we, he, you know, Zuma was a great sleeper up to four months and he got too big for the snoo and supposed to be six months, so we didn't have a chance to like do what they say to kind of

• 1:07:20Rich Roll?

  Phase it out.

• 1:07:21Adam Skolnick?

  Phase it out. But in, really in retrospect, it's kind of a crutch and it, it doesn't really help. Like, once you take the snoo out of, out of, you're starting at zero. So we had, we thought we were getting, you know, we had whole nights with Zuma at four months and then this first sleep progression happened and took him out of the snoo and it's like, it was like bananas. So.

• 1:07:41Rich Roll?

  That's interesting. We had a, we had, well, first of all, that's great advice.

• 1:07:44Adam Skolnick?

  Hey, thank you.

• 1:07:44Rich Roll?

  You are a self-help guru. You wrote on the outline, acceptance is your golden chalice.

• 1:07:49Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 1:07:50Rich Roll?

  And then you didn't actually say that out loud? And I'm thinking, this is the title of your parenting book, Adam.

• 1:07:58Rich Roll?

  Acceptance is your golden chalice? Are you fucking kidding me?

• 1:08:03Adam Skolnick?

  Excitement is at your fingertips, but acceptance is your golden chalice.

• 1:08:07Rich Roll?

  Only a guru would come up with that phrase.

• 1:08:09Adam Skolnick?

  When I speak about, when I give advice to people, I try to just make sure my fingertips are connecting.

• 1:08:15Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:08:15Adam Skolnick?

  In a certain manner, so I really look like I'm, I've thought this through.

• 1:08:20Rich Roll?

  Yeah. Projecting confidence, presence, calm.

• 1:08:25Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah. When I'm 98 and I finally get my TED Talk, it's going to be full fingertips connecting the whole time.

• 1:08:31Rich Roll?

  Right. Okay, good. Although I do take issue with this snoo thing. I, I would say it was a lifesaver for us to have, you know, I don't, we didn't call it a snoo, but it was like this hammock thing and we hung it from the ceiling and it had a little bit of a spring in the, in the, in the cord, right?

• 1:08:50Adam Skolnick?

  An analog snoo.

• 1:08:51Rich Roll?

  And it was right next to Julie's side of the bed. And so if the baby started crying, we could put the baby in the, in the, in the hammock, in the sling, and the movement of the baby gently, you know, makes the thing bounce a little bit and puts him back to sleep. And that was a lifesaver. So I tell all young parents that they should invest in that. Now, you had a transition like kerfuffle, but like if you had figured out how to segue out of that, that was very helpful actually for those middle of the night situations.

• 1:09:26Adam Skolnick?

  Yes, but that seems gentle compared to what the snoo does, which is like.

• 1:09:30Rich Roll?

  See, this is a different thing. This is like a sling that hangs and it was beautiful, like organic cotton. I don't remember the model of it, but I'm sure people can find it. But yeah, acceptance, that's huge. I agree with that. You know, not comparing it to anything that came before is super important. I, you know, agree with that completely. I think it's very easy for a young father, young parent to, you know, project or develop.

• 1:10:01Rich Roll?

  An attachment or an expectation of what it's going to be like because we've been imagining it for so long and we've seen it portrayed not only in friends and family, but on television and in movies. And we think we're supposed to have a certain type of response when the baby comes and you know, we think about, you know, sort of modeling ourselves after, after, you know, what we've seen out in the world. And I think everybody is different. You know, there's this narrative, it's love at first sight. You see the baby and your life changes in a moment and it's never the same. And that's true for some people, but that's not true for everybody. And I know lots of young fathers who actually had

• 1:10:41Rich Roll?

  to play a little bit of catch up with that, where they couldn't connect immediately. Because there's no personality yet. There's no like, you know, it's hard to, you know, yes, this is your, your child. But the development of the emotional bond for a lot of people is something that just only emerges over a more extended period of time. So because I've heard that story so many times, like I always want to let people know, like you shouldn't, if you're not feeling the way that you think you're supposed to be feeling, like everything is okay with that and to kind of let that go and forget about that projection or that ideal. And to be in acceptance, it's really about like showing up and being

• 1:11:25Rich Roll?

  flexible and being kind, right? And you're just like, if you're in a disposition where you're just waiting for things to calm down, or when is it going to be like kind of normalized? Like you're going to drive yourself crazy. So just being cool with the flow of obstacles coming up constantly and you not getting your way and things not kind of going the way that you would like in order for you to be rested for your job or whatever it is, like, it's just not going to go that way. And you can either get on board with that, or you can resist it. But that resistance is only going to create more suffering for yourself.

• 1:12:03Rich Roll?

  You know, I think that's a big thing and you're going to be sleep deprived. So your coping mechanisms are going to be compromised.

• 1:12:08Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:12:08Rich Roll?

  But they're not going to be in the type of deficit that your partner is experiencing.

• 1:12:16Adam Skolnick?

  Yes, also true.

• 1:12:17Rich Roll?

  You gotta be really conscious of like not like being this, you know, like I need to be selfish, like they're enduring 100 times more than whatever you're experiencing. So shut your mouth, suck it up and like be cool.

• 1:12:31Adam Skolnick?

  Especially, you know, when you come, if you, I don't know if you're having a hospital or whatever, we did it in the hospital and came home and, um, you know, like they've, they've gone through a car crash. So, you know, that, you know, especially those first days, you gotta be on point. You got, I mean, you have to be on point anytime, but that first day home, you better be on point.

• 1:12:49Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:12:49Adam Skolnick?

  Cause you're going to be the primary caregiver.

• 1:12:52Rich Roll?

  Yeah. So prepare for that now.

• 1:12:53Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:12:53Rich Roll?

  What is that going to look like? How can you be best prepared to do that? How can you anticipate needs? I think is a, is a, is a really big one.

• 1:13:04Rich Roll?

  And, uh, and, uh, you know, forgetting about whatever your old routine was, cause that's gone.

• 1:13:09Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:13:10Rich Roll?

  So judging yourself against your ability to adhere to the way you used to kind of navigate your day is a losing battle. Um, so just try to create a reasonable, sustainable framework going forward and just being in the flow. I, I think also a huge thing is, um, learning how to anticipate the needs, like I said, of your partner. Like if you can read your partner's mind, you know, it would be helpful to get Oz in here to teach us how to be mentalists for our partners. So you could get ahead of that.

• 1:13:45Adam Skolnick?

  He would tell you, it doesn't work. He doesn't, it doesn't help.

• 1:13:48Rich Roll?

  You can't do it. It doesn't work with his wife.

• 1:13:50Adam Skolnick?

  It does not help him.

• 1:13:52Rich Roll?

  Yeah. And just always being mindful of, of what your partner needs and being in that space of service, I think is huge. And yeah, you're going to have to find moments where you need to take care of yourself, but whatever those moments are, uh, be sure that your partner is getting more of those than, you know, than you are like.

• 1:14:13Rich Roll?

  Whatever you can do, whatever you can afford to make sure that your partner is getting self-care, like if you can afford the occasional night nurse, or you can, like, then you should do that.

• 1:14:23Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:14:24Rich Roll?

  But if you can't, then, you know, finding other ways to provide breaks, I think, for, for her is super important. And then the other thing I would say is, as somebody who, whose kids are older now, it's just so fast. And I know that's a tired, you know, trope, or a cliche, but it really is true.

• 1:14:45Adam Skolnick?

  Clichés.

• 1:14:45Rich Roll?

  It's insane how quickly it's going.

• 1:14:47Adam Skolnick?

  They're clichés for a reason.

• 1:14:48Rich Roll?

  Like, Mathis is traveling Europe right now with her boyfriend and is going to college next year.

• 1:14:53Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, shit.

• 1:14:53Rich Roll?

  And it's like, yesterday, she was a baby, and I shared a picture on Instagram for Mother's Day of Julie pregnant with Mathis, you know, in her belly, and it just doesn't feel like that long ago.

• 1:15:05Adam Skolnick?

  You guys look like kids in that photo.

• 1:15:06Rich Roll?

  And when they're babies, the phases come and go so quickly, as you know, right? So, learning how to really be present for all of those phases, I think, will enhance your joy through the experience.

• 1:15:20Adam Skolnick?

  But it sounds like you're excited about it, and so, you know, you're already in the right...

• 1:15:25Rich Roll?

  Having another baby? Oh, you're talking to him?

• 1:15:27Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah. Sam. It sounds like Sam is excited.

• 1:15:31Rich Roll?

  Yeah. I mean, the fact that he's even asking the question, he's miles ahead of most impending dads.

• 1:15:37Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 1:15:38Rich Roll?

  When I start to feel like, am I really living up to my potential as a parent? Like, and I call friends, or I share that, they're like, well, the fact that you're thinking about it, and you're processing it, and you're seeking advice on this already means that you're, you know, trying to navigate this with more conscientiousness than, than most people, so that's good.

• 1:16:01Adam Skolnick?

  I don't know, Kendall asked, was talking, asking aloud about it.

• 1:16:04Rich Roll?

  Kendall Roy?

• 1:16:05Adam Skolnick?

  You know, I'm not sure I'm a great dad, and in his case, he's right.

• 1:16:08Rich Roll?

  He wanted Shiv to let him off the hook there so badly.

• 1:16:12Adam Skolnick?

  In his case, in his case, he's right.

• 1:16:16Rich Roll?

  Not so much.

• 1:16:16Adam Skolnick?

  He's a shitty dad.

• 1:16:19Rich Roll?

  Anyway, um, cool. Let's go to the next one.

• 1:16:22Adam Skolnick?

  All right. We're going to Boston.

• 1:16:24Speaker 03

  Hi, my name is Karen. I live in Boston and the question I have is about, this is really a big, broad question. It's about your dreams, not the dreams you have when you're asleep, but your goal in life, what you want to achieve in your life. The situation that I have or that I'm in is that I have this vision for who I want to be in the world, and that's really reflected through the work that I do. I work for myself and I have a very specific niche that I help and a specific way that I do it. And I absolutely know that I'm in my zone of genius and my zone of Dharma when I do that work.

• 1:17:07Speaker 03

  However, it's not ramping up at a rate that allows me to support myself. And this is one of the pieces of it that I really want to get in place. And I keep telling myself, because I'm in my Dharma, it's going to happen. But I guess my question is, how long do you try to make something work? When you know in your heart it's what you're destined to do, like the Mark Twain quote that Rich just had on his podcast, like, I know it's what I'm destined to do. However, I have yet to see the 3D results that allows me to have a sustainable business and support myself. So that's my question.

• 1:17:50Speaker 03

  I hope it's clear and any inspiration you can provide, I would love. Namaste.

• 1:17:57Adam Skolnick?

  All right, let's do, I'll go first, hot take, and then Rich will weigh in with the, with the wisdom. I'm going, going in hot. Um, Karen, it sounds to me like you're already doing it. You're already doing the thing.

• 1:18:11Adam Skolnick?

  And as someone who had a goal, like a life goal to become a writer and it wasn't always working at first, and you know, the definition to me was being a professional. I understand the impulse to think about the money and if the, if the money isn't what you want it to be or to be sustainable as a career on its own, you feel like you're not doing it. You feel like you're, you're actually not there. But in reality, you are already there because you know what you want to do and you're doing it already and you're doing it at a high level. And so you are there. You know, the business side is an altogether different question. It's not the same question as, you know, you've, you've already solved

• 1:18:53Adam Skolnick?

  the real riddle people are trying to figure out, which is what, what do I want to do? Who, who am I? The business side is just something specific. It's like, and that is a riddle that there's, there's people out there that can help you solve. I don't know what your business is, but just because you're not making a living at something does not mean that thing is not worth orienting your life around. It doesn't mean that it's not worth doing. It doesn't. So you gotta be careful not to fall in the trap of because I'm not making a living at it, I'm not doing it. Cause that's not true. And if, you know, a good recommendation, Liz Gilbert talks about this dynamic in Big Magic a lot. It's just something that she talks, it's kind of on the side, but that's a good reference point for this, that book, Big Magic, and just talking about like, it's not necessarily

• 1:19:38Adam Skolnick?

  your plan. That it's not supposed to unfold in a way that you've already envisioned. It doesn't have to. It can unfold in its own way and it sounds like you're doing it already. So that's, that's my main point is just don't lose sight of that.

• 1:19:51Rich Roll?

  Adam, I'm sitting here thinking about how Helen Lewis is going to have to do another bonus episode of the new gurus, featuring Adam Skolnick's life advice, because you're so good at this.

• 1:20:02Adam Skolnick?

  It's another.

• 1:20:03Rich Roll?

  Book two.

• 1:20:04Adam Skolnick?

  Another, no.

• 1:20:06Rich Roll?

  Pursuing your Dharma by Adam Skolnick.

• 1:20:09Adam Skolnick?

  Dime store Dharma wisdom from Adam Skolnick.

• 1:20:11Rich Roll?

  That's pretty good. I mean, my, my take is, you know, no different than what you had to say. I mean, first of all, yes, you know, congratulations, Karen, on not only knowing what your dream is, but being extremely clear on that fact and not only pursuing it, but actually living it. But not recognizing it as the gift that it is. I mean, it's pretty rare that people kind of stumble upon what it is that they want to do, pursue it, and really, you know, live it on a day-to-day basis. So I would acknowledge yourself for that. That's a gift that many would kill for and immediately puts you in a very privileged place.

• 1:20:55Rich Roll?

  So I think connecting with that might provide a little bit of gratitude for where you're at right now, instead of criticizing yourself or wondering why it's not generating revenue, you know. Instead, shift the lens a bit, one away from lack and guilt, because your Dharma doesn't also happen to be a revenue generator, and turn it on that gratitude piece, because you're doing something that's providing you with purpose and happiness and meaning. The second thing I would say, which is in total agreement with Adam, 100%, is that you're doing the thing, and that you shouldn't confuse the thing that brings you joy and

• 1:21:40Rich Roll?

  makes you feel alive and gives you a sense of purpose and provides meaning and purpose and fulfillment with the thing that pays the bills. Because I think it's a fallacy and an illusion that these things are, can be, or should be even, the thing from which you derive money, let alone make a living. But in our culture, what we do, how we make a living, is how we craft our identity, right? So if your thing that you're really passionate about isn't the thing that is your job or your vocation, then somehow it holds lesser sway in how you construct the narrative around your identity. So I think, you know, just kind of understanding how you can decouple those two things might

• 1:22:25Rich Roll?

  give you a little bit of...

• 1:22:28Rich Roll?

  Comfort and space.

• 1:22:33Rich Roll?

  And what else do I want to say? I mean, if these two worlds happen to line up, like your, your passion and the thing that produces finances, economics and ethosnomics, or whatever you want to call it, then that's great and you're lucky. But it's hard to say if this is or isn't a possibility in your case, because we actually don't know the details of the thing that you're doing.

• 1:22:58Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:22:59Rich Roll?

  But the important piece is that it doesn't have to be that way. It rarely is. And in many, perhaps most cases, maybe it shouldn't be. Because once you introduce economics into that thing that, you know, gives you like sustenance, it has a tendency to corrupt the thing, to corrupt the, to kind of degrade the purity of it and over time can suck the joy out of it altogether. Like you see this even in, like, pick any professional athlete who's been around in their sport for too long, like that thing that they loved doing as a kid is now, you know, this massive revenue generator and it's not fun anymore. It's like a whole different relationship with that thing.

• 1:23:41Rich Roll?

  So there's gifts in that thing not being the thing from which you're, you know, extracting resources.

• 1:23:48Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:50Rich Roll?

  But the question was, how long do you keep doing it?

• 1:23:54Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:23:54Rich Roll?

  If it's not kind of headed in the direction that you want it to go in terms of creating financial stability. I mean, the answer is the rest of your life. If this is the, if this is your Dharma.

• 1:24:04Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:24:05Rich Roll?

  The question of you abandoning it or, or giving it up shouldn't even be entering your consciousness.

• 1:24:10Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 1:24:11Rich Roll?

  But what you should be thinking about is how to incorporate it into your life in a sustainable way. And maybe if you detach from that pressure or interest in having it be a revenue generator and you really develop this new relationship of, of doing it for the thing, just to do it, to do it for the joy of it. I don't know, man. Sometimes that's where the magic happens and doors start opening and it leads you in a different direction because your relationship with that thing is pure.

• 1:24:42Adam Skolnick?

  No doubt about it. Um, I think of two things. One is, I remember doing a story on Polynesian healing and healers and I met this awesome Kahuna in Tahiti, in Papayete. And He was telling me that he can't earn a living. Practice, you know, Kahuna is like a shaman, right?

• 1:25:03Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:25:03Adam Skolnick?

  A medicine man. And so he can't earn a living by healing. So people will turn up at his house with like, you know, livestock or with, you know, something they made at home or some sort of craft or, or item, commodity. That's never money. And

• 1:25:21Rich Roll?

  That's old school Substack.

• 1:25:23Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, man, that's way old school. But like, it's, that's like beyond old school. That's like roots, you know? And, and that comes from a place of the purity. Like you're talking about it.

• 1:25:32Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:25:32Adam Skolnick?

  But on the other hand, I mean, there are business, like there are life coaches that are specialized as business coaches. Right? I mean, you heard of that before? Or is there, are there, there must be some consultants you can talk about? Like, there is, like I said, like figuring out how to make a better living at something? That's a different riddle and it can be solved. I'm sure it can be solved.

• 1:25:52Rich Roll?

  Right. Again, it's hard to know in your, in her particular case, because we don't know what the thing is. But I can tell you that in my case, trying to figure out how to translate these things that I was interested in into a vocation was a very, you know, long and difficult and drawn out process that required, you know, a lot of faith and, and toil and hard work and, you know, pivots and the like. It certainly didn't happen overnight, but you got to stay in it to win it. If you really do want to translate it into, I'm sure there's some way of bringing on people who are entrepreneurs or business wizards or coaches who can look at what you're doing and try to figure out a model that might work.

• 1:26:34Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:26:35Rich Roll?

  So maybe seek that out as, you know, a way of getting help in that specific area.

• 1:26:42Adam Skolnick?

  Or maybe you're already in the middle of it.

• 1:26:44Rich Roll?

  Keep doing it.

• 1:26:44Adam Skolnick?

  Maybe you're already in the middle of like figuring that out and you don't even realize it, you know what I mean?

• 1:26:48Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:26:48Adam Skolnick?

  So it's like

• 1:26:49Rich Roll?

  What if, what if the thing that she's doing is generating her $10 million a year? But she just feels like she needs, you know, $30 million a year?

• 1:26:58Rich Roll?

  It's just not quite cutting it, Adam.

• 1:27:00Adam Skolnick?

  Wow.

• 1:27:01Rich Roll?

  It's her Dharma, but you know, it's not working out financially.

• 1:27:04Adam Skolnick?

  It's her Dharma, but you know, she wants floor seats at the Laker game. Um, all right, or Celtic game. She's up, she's in Boston.

• 1:27:13Rich Roll?

  All right, let's move on.

• 1:27:14Adam Skolnick?

  Moving on to a place called Fargo, North Dakota. Heard of it.

• 1:27:19Speaker 04

  Hello, Rich and Adam. This is Simon from Fargo, North Dakota. Uh, many of your guests on your show talk about shifting mindset, whether it's around positivity, love, or other outlooks on life. And I'm wondering if you have any tips for embracing this change? Once you've acknowledged a desire to change, how do you act these mindset changes in your life? I'm loving the new roll on format and thanks for all you do.

• 1:27:39Rich Roll?

  Uh, well, Adam, you know, you, you're on a roll. Like I said, keep rolling. I'm gonna go to the bathroom. You just take this one.

• 1:27:46Adam Skolnick?

  Simon is loving the new roll on format. How about that? Um, I don't have much to say here other than, um, I've always thought that we are the sum total of our actions, like it or not. So, small actions that reinforce any change in mindset is crucial. So, any, you know, and that could be, it doesn't have to be an act, a physical action. If what you're trying to do is go from a negative first mindset to a positive first, like half cup, cup half empty to have a cup half full. Sometimes it's really just note, remember noticing when you trend negative and try to come with an appreciation, a thought of gratitude in that moment.

• 1:28:26Adam Skolnick?

  I had that exact thing happen to me when I kinda started to change my, my outlook in life as a, I think I was 22 and just that switch flipped in a way. Um, that was like life changing for me, but it took conscious thought and I still do it. It takes, sometimes you have to take, it takes conscious, conscious mental notes, basically at all times to get yourself to that point where you're really starting to see the world with a positive outlook first. But, you know, at the same time, I am, I think naturally optimistic, but like, like doing that would help and then any sort of action that follows that thought, any, you know, you say thought follows action, right? Or is it action follows thought? I forget what you say.

• 1:29:11Rich Roll?

  Action first.

• 1:29:12Adam Skolnick?

  Thought follows action. So you agree with this?

• 1:29:15Rich Roll?

  So the way I think about it, I agree with all of that. And this is a subject matter that you're kind of tiptoeing around that I was trying to get at in that recent monologue episode. The yin and yang of change. On the one hand, there is this mindfulness, presence, eastern piece, which is when you're paying attention, you can notice the recurrences of your thoughts and you can catch yourself before you react mindlessly. And you can decide to behave differently. And you can remember like, oh, here I am doing that negative thing. I'm not going to do that anymore. Okay, here's my opportunity to do the positive thing. And that only happens when you slow things down

• 1:29:59Rich Roll?

  and you develop that muscle of mindfulness and paying attention and being present. The other side of it is the action piece. So the mindfulness piece is like, it can be like a lightning bolt. Like you could change your mind and your life is different all at once.

• 1:30:15Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:30:15Rich Roll?

  It can happen in an instance. So there's the lightning bolts and then there's the bricklaying part, the action part, the atomic little pieces, the James Clear kind of habit-forming behavior that leads to incremental change over time. And I think both of those things are important. Mood follows action, action first creates

• 1:30:38Adam Skolnick?

  Mood follows action.

• 1:30:39Rich Roll?

  The mindset changes and the emotional changes. So all of these things emanate from action. So when you say, I want to change my mindset, first of all, great. Let's recognize and applaud you for, you know, having that, you know, desire. But I think everybody kind of wants to be better, has a desire for their life to be a little bit better than it is. So let's not make too much of that.

• 1:31:08Rich Roll?

  Rubber meets the road when we start talking about how you translate that desire into something, anything, behavior, right? It's all about execution and action. So when you say, "I'm looking for a mindset change," A, what does that mean? That's such a vague thing. "I want to be more positive." Still, super vague. You have to be very specific. You can't just suddenly start thinking differently because mindset is, like I said, both a reflection and a product of behavior. And it's less about what you're thinking and it's more about what are you doing on the bricklayer side of things?

• 1:31:51Rich Roll?

  Like, act first, the mind will follow, mood follows action. And that is effective when you have clarity, specificity, and structure around what that looks like. And so, you need to translate that desire to change into, first, like, what does it look like? And what are the doable, repeatable, sustainable actions that you can take every single day? Like James Clear talks about in Atomic Habits. And how do you protect them and prioritize them so that they're repeatable and sustainable within the construct of your busy life? If it becomes disruptive to your life, you're setting yourself up for failure.

• 1:32:35Rich Roll?

  The people who are successful, who are the people who are able to make those tiny, invisible, atomic tweaks, repeat them enough until they become rote, and then build upon them. So their lifestyle shifts gradually in, you know, kind of proportion to the changes that are being made. And you kind of expand in this organic, gradual way. And I think it's going to be different for different types of changes and goals, like mindset goal. Again, what does that mean, specific? But if it's something that can be tied to a date on the calendar, like it's, "I want to run a marathon," there's a mindset shift that's going to take place as a result of setting that goal and doing the preparation to...

• 1:33:18Rich Roll?

  Get across that finish line and that destination date on the calendar is your deadline and you work backwards from there to create the atomic habits, the stepping stones that are gonna move you in that direction. So that's always good, but not all goals are time bound in that way. And there's nothing wrong with that either, because ultimately what we're looking for is a lifestyle shift that is going to stay with you and isn't going to expire when you cross that finish line, right? Right. Which causes all the relapses and the kind of, you know, reverting back to the norm that we see with people who are trying to make changes. I also think it's really important to strike when the iron is hot, because those moments

• 1:34:02Rich Roll?

  of willingness, like, "I'm ready to change," they're fleeting and they pass quickly. So when you notice yourself experiencing that level of willingness, I think it's important to develop the reflex or the habit of actually translating that as immediately as possible into doing something, like taking an action, a specific action that's repeatable. Because it's a very kind of, you know, as Liz Gilbert, I'm sure, would agree, like, these things live in the cloud, you know what I mean? Right. Like, if you're not grabbing them quickly, they're gone, right? So presence, the lightning bolt kind of mindfulness aspect of being aware when that

• 1:34:43Rich Roll?

  willingness arises, and then the bricklayer piece of like, "I'm willing right now, what can I do? What choice can I make in this moment that's gonna kind of just tweak my trajectory a little bit, and then how do I build upon that? How do I protect and prioritize the repeatability of whatever it is I just did? How to then create momentum and then respect that momentum?" Because once you've string, you string together even a couple days of something, that's real. You know, there's a power in that. There's a reason why streaks are such a, you know, such a thing. We have Hella, you know, about to celebrate six whatever years, 6,000, whatever. The guy's run every day for a long time, right? And he's not gonna wake up tomorrow and not run.

• 1:35:27Rich Roll?

  There's so much momentum behind this streak and the repeatability of this action that he decided to take a long time ago. And that's something that I think you have to really respect.

• 1:35:41Adam Skolnick?

  I love that. That's a great note.

• 1:35:43Rich Roll?

  Accountability, I think, is big. Accountability to yourself, like if this is really important. And then accountability to other people, as long as you're choosing wisely, like who you select to be accountable for. Make sure it's somebody who really wants the best for you and isn't gonna, you know, kind of work at cross purposes with you building this new behavior set.

• 1:36:05Adam Skolnick?

  That's a good point. Like the accountability aspect and the momentum aspect, you know, I didn't think about the accountability part.

• 1:36:13Rich Roll?

  I also think patience is huge, and I've been beating this drum forever, but everybody wants these changes to happen so fast. And when they don't see immediate results or anything noticeable, it's just easy to revert back. But these things are hard. They take a long time. They're nonlinear. It's, you know, one step forward, two steps backward, all that kind of stuff. And so if you're thinking about it in what Gordo Byrne called on the podcast, like thousand day increments, or decades, or even years, as opposed to, well, in six months, I want to be this. Allow yourself, you know, that room and be gracious with yourself when you slip, because that's part of the process, and not hold yourself to some unrealistic

• 1:36:57Rich Roll?

  set of expectations or rules around perfectionism, you're going to be in a better stead. And I think it takes 90 days to really even begin the process of letting go of an old habit and building the foundation for a new one.

• 1:37:12Adam Skolnick?

  Is that a 12 step principle?

• 1:37:14Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I mean, the 28 day rehab thing. I mean, honestly, 28 days, like... I think 90 days is much more grounded in reality, in my experience. And even if it is a goal with a date on the calendar, I think it's important to, you know, it's cool to like have that as a North Star to motivate you and as something to work towards, but it's also important to not be too destination oriented. This is the other yin and yang, right? Like you have to be loose with it. The goal is long-term change, which means, you know, moving towards this better self

• 1:37:52Rich Roll?

  where your actions cohere to a greater extent with your values. They're a greater reflection of your values. I mean, that's the real goal here, right? Of change. And that's meaningless if it's flimsy or doesn't stick.

• 1:38:12Adam Skolnick?

  And you think overnight, switch-flopping change tends to not stick as much as incremental change?

• 1:38:19Rich Roll?

  I just think it's, you know, it's very contingent, specific.

• 1:38:23Adam Skolnick?

  It's conditional.

• 1:38:24Rich Roll?

  It's contextual. It depends on the person and the situation. You know, people make a decision, I'm gonna go vegan, they never eat meat again. I'm gonna go sober today, they never drink again. And then some people relapse and relapse and relapse and relapse and they put together a year or two and maybe for the next 10 years, they only drank a couple of times and it's not perfect. Everybody's different. It's your relationship to that and it's the, you know, how are you spending most of your time compared to what it used to look like? And I think we're all really hard on ourselves when it comes to this kind of stuff. And when we experience failure or it becomes difficult, like we just, we give up too soon.

• 1:39:02Adam Skolnick?

  That's fucking great, man. That was a hell of a rant. I loved it.

• 1:39:07Rich Roll?

  All right. Yeah, so thank you, Simon, for the question. Fantastic. And let's go to Josh from Portland.

• 1:39:12Adam Skolnick?

  This next one, I'm gonna play it for you. I just wanna make sure you know, listeners know, he's really choosing his words carefully. It sounds halting at times, but I think it's because it's an emotional question and he's choosing his words extremely carefully, which I had a lot of, you know, respect for. It's obvious what was happening and, and his words are, you know, well-chosen. So the pacing is maybe a little bit different, so just so you know going in.

• 1:39:40Speaker 05

  Hi, I'm Josh Casey, Portland, Oregon. I'm curious, what has helped you specifically connect with your teenage children? What started open communication? What were the first steps around awareness of maybe even transparency around your sobriety? And the teenage experience that's growing within the same household as yourself? Like, what is an approach that you've taken? And how has it developed or changed over time?

• 1:40:18Speaker 05

  I am working with a teenage recovery community and developing mindful practices or simply self-reflection across the teenage demographic. And starting those conversations on how to have a more mindful conversation around drug use? And what our bodies are circling our thoughts around? Or how to better take care of ourselves is a topic that I'm struggling in this moment to have and to support.

• 1:41:01Speaker 05

  I thank you for your time and energy and conversation around how we change over time. I appreciate it a lot. Goodbye.

• 1:41:11Rich Roll?

  Yeah, my heart's breaking hearing that. It's pretty heavy. Yeah, I can only infer, but I have a sense that he's dealing with a teenager of his own who's going through something that he's struggling to understand and figure out how to navigate for himself and for his child. I don't know that to be the case, but it feels like that's what's going on here. And it just, you know, there's few things harder than knowing how to, how to deal with that. And I want to be compassionate.

• 1:41:54Rich Roll?

  Because it is so hard and there is no right or wrong or a clear path or way to answer this question, particularly when

• 1:42:09Rich Roll?

  the communication channel is only trying to be developed now when you're in an acute crisis situation as opposed to a history of building that such that it can be leveraged when that crisis period arises. So it's hard to construct that in the heat of a very challenging situation.

• 1:42:36Rich Roll?

  So I think, you know, I would say as a backdrop to this, I'm a big believer, no surprise, in in open communication and transparency with your kids.

• 1:42:52Rich Roll?

  Josh wanted to know kind of how I've handled that or how I think about that. And I'm somebody who made a decision to be very open with my kids about my addiction and my recovery their whole lives. So they've never known anything different. They've all been to AA meetings with me. It's a topic of conversation at dinner. So there's nothing hidden around that. And Julie's shared her history over those years. And I think that has allowed us to build trust and create and maintain a channel of communication where the kids feel safe

• 1:43:34Rich Roll?

  coming to the table and sharing their experiences because there's no fear of judgment or.

• 1:43:44Rich Roll?

  Or punishment as a result of that because the most important thing is the communication piece and the truth and the minute that you bring that punishment sensibility into that dynamic, the communication shuts down and the person starts to just, it doesn't change their behavior, it just puts them in a place where they're going to start hiding it and lying about it. So I've always been very mindful about that. And I think, you know, listen, when teens, when kids become teens, they all, you know, they become different people. Like, you're like, who is this person? And part of that is hormonal and part of

• 1:44:28Rich Roll?

  that is a very healthy desire to differentiate that is important in guiding them towards adulthood. And it's to be kind of respected, right? You want them to do that. So as they become different, rather than resisting it, or being confused by it, or being upset about it, like finding ways to dance around it and embrace it. And part of that is withdrawing from the openness that you enjoyed when the kids were younger. So it becomes harder to keep that channel open. And I'm sharing this as no master of this, I'm telling you. Like, we had a lot of rocky teenage years. And so I've taken my lumps in this world

• 1:45:12Rich Roll?

  as well. But I can tell you that you can't force the kid to open up. You can't force the dialogue. You can't schedule it. Questions like, how was school? Or what happened today? Generally go nowhere. But there are moments, if you're patient, and those moments arise in unpredictable, brief flashes, where if you're spending enough time with your kid, just driving or doing whatever you're doing, suddenly they'll come to you and say something. And you just have to like, live for those moments and appreciate them when they come because you can't will them into being.

• 1:45:56Rich Roll?

  And one way into that is to try to find a way to be interested in what they're interested in, right? You can't force them to be interested in what you're like, you may think like, oh, they'll love this, or this is what I like, so they should like it, or I'm going to take this teen to go do this thing that I enjoy and teach them that. Instead, what are they already into? Are they playing video games? Are they listening to music? Are they playing a certain sport? Whatever it is, developing an interest in that is a way in to connection with the kids. So, an example would be, let your kid play the music they want to play

• 1:46:37Rich Roll?

  in the car, and when a song comes up that you've never heard before, like, ask them about it, talk to them about it, or, you know, what TV show are they walking, watching, or what YouTuber do they like and why? And just be curious about their life without your bullshit and your baggage, tends to work. And it's not an immediate thing, but it's a practice, I think, that I think is beneficial. And it doesn't matter what you say, it's what you do. So you got to lead by example. If you're interested in your children being more mindful, then you have to be an example of mindfulness in front of them. But I think in this acute example, the important thing, first of all, is figuring out a way to take care of yourself. I mean, clearly, Josh is suffering.

• 1:47:22Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:47:22Rich Roll?

  And he is not in a position to help his teen unless he takes care of himself. And my biggest suggestion would be that he seek out Al-Anon meetings, where he has a community of people who are weathering similar situations and have a lot of experience and tools that could be helpful.

• 1:47:44Adam Skolnick?

  Or maybe he's sober himself and he's

• 1:47:48Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I don't know. There's a lot of question marks here, but if that's an unexplored situation or terrain, I would, I would suggest Even if just for the community of people, you know, that you can talk to about what you're going through and maybe extract a little bit of wisdom that would be applicable in your life. And then, you know, assuming Josh has a teen who's going through a drug situation at the moment, understanding that as painful as it is, there's very little that you can do to get the person to stop. Because that person has to want to, has to be willing to, if they truly are an addict or an alcoholic, like if this, if the grips of addiction are really in there and it's

• 1:48:30Rich Roll?

  not just teenage rebellion or a phase or something like that, it becomes very unwieldy and difficult to untie that knot. So it's a dance. They need to know that you're not happy with what's going on. You need to make sure that you're not codependent in the behavior or afraid to confront them on that behavior. And it's certainly appropriate to create rules around the teen's behavior such that if they're broken, there are repercussions to that, of course. But the trick is to not be so emotionally activated by the whole thing and to hold

• 1:49:12Rich Roll?

  it a little bit more loosely, because it's so confusing and confounding to watch somebody engage in self-destructive behavior or kind of blaze their way towards some self-destructive end. And you know the way out of that and you can't understand why they can't see it or they won't do the right thing, et cetera. It can be baffling and incredibly painful. And also, there's this amazing sense of powerlessness that you have because you just can't, you can't make it stop, no matter what you do. Do you intervene? Do you get a bunch of people and like kidnap the person in the middle of the night and put him in the back of a van and take him off to... You can do that.

• 1:49:55Rich Roll?

  And that person might stay sober for a little while. Chances are not for very long, though, because it wasn't their idea. So how do you gracefully kind of nudge them towards a realization that maybe there's a better way to live? And I'm certainly no Jedi master when it comes to that, but I can tell you, keeping communication open, making sure that they know that you love them and that you're available for them, but not available to participate in their bullshit, but available if and when they're ready to get help. And then finding a way to create trust in a space where they can share what's going on with

• 1:50:37Rich Roll?

  them without being on the receiving end of a lot of judgment, I think, is super important. Like, we have two younger ones. One comes home, TMI, tells us everything that happened at the party, and it's just like enough to induce, you know, a permanent panic attack at what teenagers are doing.

• 1:50:56Adam Skolnick?

  Malibu parties.

• 1:50:57Rich Roll?

  Yeah. And the other one keeps it all inside.

• 1:51:02Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:51:03Rich Roll?

  And it's a mystery box. How do I unlock this person and figure out what they're thinking? And how do I get them to open up? One's too open, the other one's not. So it's like, I've swung between these extremes and, you know, I'm trying to figure it out myself every single day. But I think they both know that if they come to me to talk to me about this kind of stuff, that I'm available and that I'm not going to judge them, and it's okay. You know, that the most important thing is that they're safe, and that I love them, and that I care about them, and I'm gonna take care of them. But that didn't happen in the heat, that, that, that, that sense of trust didn't, didn't arise in the heat

• 1:51:44Rich Roll?

  of an acute situation. It was kind of created over a long period of time. So I would seek out counsel. It sounds like Josh is already doing that. Al-Anon would be huge. And again, there's no right or wrong. I mean, there's nothing more painful than to watch a loved one suffer. And when the loved one is your child, it's just, it's the worst, right? It's the absolute worst. And, you know, I have a lot of compassion for my parents, who were in a lot of pain when I was going through what I was going through. And I couldn't see that, and I didn't care. And, you know, it's just when you're in the disease, that's all that matters. So it's not personal.

• 1:52:22Rich Roll?

  And they're not bad people. They're suffering from a disease that is distinct from the person that you love. And trying to remember that, I think, is important also. And being curious about it, just like being curious about their interests, like, hey, how'd that go last night? How do you feel? Like, feel good? You want to keep doing that? Maybe you need to keep doing it. We'll see how it goes. You know, how can you be a little more dispassionate and unattached to that result? And when you let go of that, like, that attack, like, this person needs to get better, and why can't they see it?

• 1:53:03Rich Roll?

  If you just take all of that away, there's a vacuum. And I think the teen will feel that vacuum all of a sudden, like, hey, I'm not getting vibed anymore. How come? Oh, it's on me? I mean, I don't need to get sober for him. He's off my back now. That's all I wanted. I thought I just wanted my parents off my back. Now they're off my back. Suddenly, you have to look at yourself in the mirror. And that can work to prompt a little bit of self-accountability. Not always. Who knows? It's just one way of thinking about it and looking at it. And then one day, hopefully, there will be a little opening. You know, maybe he or she will come to you and say, hey, this isn't

• 1:53:46Rich Roll?

  working out for me. And you need to be prepared for what to say and what to do in that moment. Compassion, non-judgment, boundaries are huge. Taking care of yourself, seeking out counsel and advice, not keeping it to yourself. The fact that you called and left this message, I think is huge. But if you can develop the practice of having conversations with trusted people who are part of this community, who can help you in your area, I think that would be unbelievable. And you're in Portland. I went to treatment in Portland. So, there's a Hazleton down in New Burke, and there's an Open AA meeting there. And they probably have Al-Anon meetings there. That's where I got sober.

• 1:54:33Rich Roll?

  And I know the recovery community in Portland is strong and it's very strong with young people. The teen sober community in Portland is kind of a very cool remarkable thing. So those are my thoughts. I hope there's something helpful in what I had to share.

• 1:54:50Adam Skolnick?

  Beautiful. Heavy stuff. Josh, good luck, man. Here's a fun one, a more fun one, kind of to close it out. Thanks, everyone, for your questions. Please keep calling. The line is open.

• 1:55:03Rich Roll?

  That's right. The voicemail number is 424... No, what is it?

• 1:55:08Adam Skolnick?

  424-235-4626.

• 1:55:12Rich Roll?

  There you go.

• 1:55:13Adam Skolnick?

  And keep them coming because we're going to keep doing this. In the meantime, here's Mario.

• 1:55:17Speaker 06

  Hey, Rich and Adam. This is Mario in sunny San Diego, California. Thanks for all the years of great podcasts. I've learned so much and it's helped my life measurably. But my question is one of the fun one. Rich, you never talk about your time as an entertainment lawyer. My question was, you got any good stories about your entertainment lawyer days? Maybe some crazy client demands or client behavior? Of course, you don't have to give any names unless, you know, you don't want to. Thanks.

• 1:55:43Rich Roll?

  That's such a cool question. I don't think anyone's ever asked me that. I don't know if it's interesting to anybody other than Mario, but yeah, I got lots of stories.

• 1:55:50Adam Skolnick?

  Let's hear them.

• 1:55:51Rich Roll?

  It's a little dicey. There's a couple stories. Probably shouldn't share those. A few names that probably are better left unrevealed.

• 1:56:02Adam Skolnick?

  The redacted.

• 1:56:02Rich Roll?

  I do live here. It is a town that talks a lot. Not that I'm in that world at all anymore. So yeah, a lot. Disappointingly, you know, very far from A-list.

• 1:56:13Adam Skolnick?

  That's even better. That's even better.

• 1:56:16Rich Roll?

  I'm not like, I don't have great Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt stories. Although I did, I did share that I stood next to Brad Pitt inside the Mercedes garage at the Formula One race and no words were exchanged. Is that an encounter? I wasn't a lawyer. Anyway.

• 1:56:30Adam Skolnick?

  You're an extra.

• 1:56:31Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it's, you know, listen, Hollywood's a weird place and kind of dancing around the edges of that business. There's just going to be weird stories that happen. And just off the cuff, like I thought about this for a minute, like what are, I'm sure there's a million more, but the ones that I had a bunch, I kind of made a list of a few that had happened.

• 1:56:53Rich Roll?

  I moved to LA to work at this entertainment firm. And in short shrift, found myself working under Robert Shapiro of OJ fame. So I was his associate on one or two cases.

• 1:57:09Adam Skolnick?

  Just after.

• 1:57:09Rich Roll?

  Two cases. I worked on two cases with him. So this was after.

• 1:57:13Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:57:13Rich Roll?

  I mean, I was studying for the bar when the Bronco chase happened. And that's just cemented into my brain forever. And if you're like, if you're a younger person listening to this, it's really hard to really appreciate or imagine just how all consuming the OJ trial was.

• 1:57:29Adam Skolnick?

  It was before the trial, it was like, we just thought his ex-wife had been killed. And it was really, we felt bad for OJ. And next thing you know, we turn around and OJ is on the run for the T1 border.

• 1:57:40Rich Roll?

  It was the craziest, most riveting thing ever. And then of course, everything that followed and ensued after that. It just captured everybody to such a level that I don't know, has anything since? I mean, it was a monoculture back then that has kind of since vanished.

• 1:58:00Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:58:01Rich Roll?

  There was no Twitter. There was a lot of this, a lot of social media wasn't. So it was a different time. But anyway, it was, let me just say, if you didn't experience it, it was a big fucking deal. And like, the lawyers representing OJ were just, I mean, again, seared into your brain. Johnny Cochran.

• 1:58:18Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:58:18Rich Roll?

  Kardashian.

• 1:58:20Adam Skolnick?

  They're just great characters.

• 1:58:21Rich Roll?

  Yeah, like the, you know, the patr familiar ass of the whole Kardashian thing. Tracks back to OJ.

• 1:58:27Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 1:58:27Rich Roll?

  You know?

• 1:58:28Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 1:58:28Rich Roll?

  And of course, Robert Shapiro. So it was very surreal when I suddenly started working for this guy that I'd been watching on television. And I worked on a matter, you know, some civil suit stuff with him. But I do remember one night. Working late in the office and he was there and me and maybe two other associates, I can't remember, we were eating Chinese food in a conference room with Bob, call him Bob.

• 1:58:56Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:58:57Rich Roll?

  And we had the TV on and this was around the civil verdict in the civil suit.

• 1:59:03Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 1:59:04Rich Roll?

  And I just remember watching the news with him of helicopter point of view over his Brentwood estate as like people were going in and out of the house and like taking out his like prized belongings of the, I have this vague memory of that, sitting with him, like talking to him about the OJ trial, watching OJ stuff like on the news.

• 1:59:24Adam Skolnick?

  Crazy.

• 1:59:25Rich Roll?

  And this was like right after I'd moved to Los Angeles and suddenly I was like at this firm that was in, you know, kind of at the vortex of a lot of, you know, Griffin Dunn-esque Vanity Fair type, you know, Hollywood intrigue and disputes and it was kind of fascinating and bizarre.

• 1:59:45Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:59:46Rich Roll?

  That was my introduction.

• 1:59:48Adam Skolnick?

  What was his take on it? Was it, was he like?

• 1:59:50Rich Roll?

  He was just curious. Well, first of all, of all the partners in this law firm, he seemed the happiest. Like, he kind of did his own thing. He sort of had an office there. He was sort of part of the firm, but he kind of did whatever he wanted outside of it.

• 2:00:05Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I don't know. I was too sheepish and young and to like really, I don't remember talking to him about it directly. I just remember thinking how strange it was that I was working with him. And anyway, I ended up leaving that firm when I kind of was like, I can't do this anymore. And a client that I had been working for, who was Bob's client, called me and said, I know you left the firm, but I could really use your help on this case that's still ongoing. Why don't you just come and work for me? You don't have to go to a law firm. You can come to my house. And I had no money and I thought, this is cool. So I thought, sure, I'll do that. Well. He lived in the Marion Davies Estate behind the Beverly Hills Hotel.

• 2:00:47Rich Roll?

  It is the house that was built by William Randolph Hearst for his mistress. And it's a house most of you are probably familiar with because it appeared in The Godfather.

• 2:00:58Adam Skolnick?

  Oh.

• 2:00:59Rich Roll?

  And it's the house, the producer's house.

• 2:01:00Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 2:01:01Rich Roll?

  Who wakes up with the horse head.

• 2:01:02Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 2:01:03Rich Roll?

  And I worked every day at that house in the pool house, right next to that pool.

• 2:01:10Adam Skolnick?

  Crazy.

• 2:01:11Rich Roll?

  Working on a very strange case. The details, it was a horrible case. Let's just leave it at that.

• 2:01:18Rich Roll?

  I remember Brian Wilson wandering the halls of the law firm that I was working for, looking like he was lost and didn't know what was going on. I think he was having his deposition taken in some manner.

• 2:01:27Adam Skolnick?

  For what?

• 2:01:27Rich Roll?

  Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys.

• 2:01:28Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 2:01:29Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 2:01:31Rich Roll?

  I snuck into Steven Spielberg's office one night at DreamWorks. I remember that. Me and a buddy who shall remain unnamed. Well, he had some kind of business there and he had a friend. He's like, oh, let's go into, well, you know, we went into DreamWorks like after hours and everyone was gone. And he's like, hey, let's go into Steven's office. And we were like in his office and sitting behind his desk.

• 2:01:53Adam Skolnick?

  Steven?

• 2:01:54Rich Roll?

  Steven. I've never met the guy.

• 2:01:56Adam Skolnick?

  Steven should lock his office.

• 2:01:58Rich Roll?

  I had to go to Richard Dreyfuss's house and meet with him at his house in Rancho Cucamonga once.

• 2:02:04Adam Skolnick?

  He lives in Rancho Cucamonga?

• 2:02:05Rich Roll?

  Yeah, he lives in like a horse ranch property in San Diego area. That was a very strange meeting that amounted to nothing.

• 2:02:13Adam Skolnick?

  I follow his son Ben on Twitter. He's funny.

• 2:02:16Rich Roll?

  I represented Michael Bolton for a hot minute.

• 2:02:22Rich Roll?

  And I remember, this is like when

• 2:02:25Rich Roll?

  cell phones weren't quite a thing yet. They were kind of new. It wasn't the thing that you used all the time. And he had my cell phone number. And I remember he called me one night when I was laying in bed with Julie. And I was like, babe, it's Michael Bolton. I gotta take this call.

• 2:02:40Adam Skolnick?

  Babe, would you like to hear Michael? Michael hit it.

• 2:02:44Rich Roll?

  I did production legal, or not production legal. I did some legal work, financing docs on a movie called The Cooler, which people might remember as the film starring William Macy and Alec Baldwin.

• 2:02:58Adam Skolnick?

  I don't even know that movie. No.

• 2:03:00Rich Roll?

  Well, Alec Baldwin got an Academy Award nomination.

• 2:03:02Adam Skolnick?

  Really?

• 2:03:03Rich Roll?

  For appearing in that movie. That was the movie that kind of resuscitated his career out of the action hero phase and into kind of better work. And that was a fun one. Yeah, you should check it out. The cooler. You never saw that one.

• 2:03:15Adam Skolnick?

  Never saw it.

• 2:03:16Rich Roll?

  Shout out to my boy Brett Morrison, my friend Brett, who was my client on that.

• 2:03:22Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 2:03:22Rich Roll?

  Who was one of the financiers of that film.

• 2:03:27Rich Roll?

  That movie had a rap party that would never fly in 2023.

• 2:03:30Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 2:03:30Rich Roll?

  I'll leave that there. Yeah. Here's a good one.

• 2:03:37Rich Roll?

  I helped Rick Schroeder, Ricky Schroeder, make a little movie called

• 2:03:41Adam Skolnick?

  It's Rick.

• 2:03:42Rich Roll?

  Black Cloud.

• 2:03:42Adam Skolnick?

  It's Rick now.

• 2:03:43Rich Roll?

  Yeah, did some legal work on that movie. Was on set with Rick. It's a movie about a Native American boxer.

• 2:03:50Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 2:03:51Rich Roll?

  And I play a cameo.

• 2:03:53Adam Skolnick?

  Really?

• 2:03:54Rich Roll?

  So find that movie, seek it out, watch it, send me a screen grab of my cameo if you can identify me.

• 2:04:01Adam Skolnick?

  Can we get a screen?

• 2:04:02Rich Roll?

  There's photographic evidence out there.

• 2:04:04Adam Skolnick?

  I want to see a screen grab.

• 2:04:06Rich Roll?

  On that note, I also worked on a movie called See This Movie. It was another little independent movie that that shot in Montreal and I did production legal on that. That starred a young Seth Meyers. I think he had just finished like his first year at SNL and John Cho. And that was really fun. And I also played a bit part in that movie, if you can find it. Yeah.

• 2:04:29Adam Skolnick?

  And that's how you know Chris White.

• 2:04:31Rich Roll?

  But this brings it back to you because it was produced by Chris Whites, who's your boy.

• 2:04:36Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 2:04:37Rich Roll?

  For those that don't know.

• 2:04:38Adam Skolnick?

  He's not, I mean, I wouldn't say, I mean, I love the guy, but I haven't seen him in a while.

• 2:04:42Rich Roll?

  He's a, he's an amazing, amazing person.

• 2:04:45Adam Skolnick?

  He's an amazing talent, a great guy and a better guy.

• 2:04:47Rich Roll?

  Him and his brother made American Pie, wrote and directed American Pie and then About a Boy. And he wrote Star Wars Rogue One.

• 2:04:54Adam Skolnick?

  Which is great as well.

• 2:04:55Rich Roll?

  And here's a, here's a maybe less known fact about Chris Whites. Huge burner, Burning Man guy.

• 2:05:02Adam Skolnick?

  Yes. That's where he met his wife.

• 2:05:04Rich Roll?

  So much so, he like, he's part of, he's part of like, what is the, his little, his little tribe or his little community of Burning Man?

• 2:05:11Adam Skolnick?

  I don't know the name, but he was on the-

• 2:05:12Rich Roll?

  Something Galactica? That he was on the board of? Like, he's heavily involved.

• 2:05:16Adam Skolnick?

  He was on the board of Burning Man, I think, for a period of time.

• 2:05:18Rich Roll?

  Maybe, yeah, I wouldn't be surprised. And, and the reason I bring that up is, we were shooting this movie, I think it was September. When is Burning Man? Is it September?

• 2:05:29Adam Skolnick?

  August, is it August or September?

• 2:05:30Rich Roll?

  Well, anyway, we were a couple of weeks into production. He's like, I gotta go. I'm, I gotta go to Burning Man. And he just left the movie in the middle of production to go to the desert. And he was like, I think it's cool that your producer can go to Burning Man in the middle of production. It means I trust everybody.

• 2:05:48Adam Skolnick?

  I mean, he, he's, uh, he's a veteran now. You know, like, he started out as Wonderkins and they're veterans, you know, like, doing it all. It's amazing, amazing career for both he and his brother Paul.

• 2:05:58Rich Roll?

  Right. Um, he's a brilliant, brilliant talent.

• 2:06:01Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 2:06:03Rich Roll?

  I did, so on that movie, I was, part of my job was negotiating all the talent deals and, and, you know, creating all the contracts for them. And I don't remember the details of it, but I remember colossally screwing up Seth Meyers' deal, where I had like, stated the wrong rate, like, his fee and all that kind of stuff, and had to eat crow and call his agents. And I was like, I didn't really know what I was doing. And it was so humiliating.

• 2:06:30Adam Skolnick?

  So he thought he was getting paid, boo boo?

• 2:06:33Rich Roll?

  I don't know. Well, the information probably never trickled down to him, but I had to like, like, call up these agents who were like, this guy's an idiot. He's doing it all. And they were correct about that. But I'll end with maybe my favorite Hollywood encounter story, which is the time that Sylvester Stallone complimented me on my calves.

• 2:06:56Adam Skolnick?

  They are wonderful calves. They are wondrous. They are wondrous, uh, you know, carved from granite.

• 2:07:03Rich Roll?

  I was at a sort of family oriented event, the details of which are not important, but he, uh, I was introduced to him and I was wearing shorts and he wanted to talk about how I made my calf muscles the way that they were, to which I said, "Ask my mother. I have nothing to do with it." They're just like, they just, they are what they are.

• 2:07:23Adam Skolnick?

  That's what you say, but you're, you're-

• 2:07:25Rich Roll?

  They've always been that way.

• 2:07:26Adam Skolnick?

  Your athletic resume, uh-

• 2:07:28Rich Roll?

  They're, they've always been that way.

• 2:07:29Adam Skolnick?

  Tells another story.

• 2:07:30Rich Roll?

  But anyway, my calves being the envy of Sylvester Stallone is the appropriate ending to this already too long podcast.

• 2:07:38Adam Skolnick?

  That's what we do in the old school roll on space. We go, we go long, we go sometimes deep, long and occasionally deep.

• 2:07:48Rich Roll?

  Uh, always long, occasionally deep.

• 2:07:51Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 2:07:52Rich Roll?

  That's a good, there's another, there's another book title for you.

• 2:07:54Adam Skolnick?

  Always long winded, occasionally deep.

• 2:07:58Rich Roll?

  There you go. Uh, maybe we'll do this again. You guys let us know. Looking forward to your feedback.

• 2:08:04Adam Skolnick?

  I like moving back and forth. I like it.

• 2:08:07Rich Roll?

  Yeah. We're done, right?

• 2:08:08Adam Skolnick?

  I think we're done.

• 2:08:09Rich Roll?

  We go. I gotta go. I'm outta here. Goodbye.