Roll On: E Pluribus Unum

Election week. Healing the national divide. Environmental progress. Weekly wins. And, of course, listener questions. Welcome to another edition of Roll On. Commanding co-host duties as always is my hype man Adam Skolnick, an activist and veteran journalist perhaps best known as David Goggins’ Can’t Hurt Me co-author. Adam has written about adventure sports, environmental issues and civil rights for outlets such as The New York Times, Outside, ESPN, BBC, and Men’s Health. He is the author of One Breath and is currently hard at work on a novel. Some of the many topics explored in today’s conversation include: • Recapping our whirlwind election week; • Making sense of the 70 million votes for Trump and the implications this presents; • Understanding Biden and the presidency to come; • Bridging our cultural and political divide as a national imperative; • Rich’s latest Esquire piece and thoughts on the writing process; • Chris Nikic, the first athlete with Down syndrome to complete an Ironman Triathlon; • and Rich’s newest offering, Voicing Change. In addition, we answer the following listener questions: • How do you stay focused on your journey and minimize distractions? • How do you embrace change and take a step into the unknown? • How do you make time for your partner as parents to young children? Thank you to Frank from Southern California, Davin from South Florida, and Michelle from New Jersey for your questions. If you want your query discussed, drop it on our Facebook Page, or better yet leave a voicemail at (424) 235-4626. The visually inclined can watch our exchange on YouTube. And as always, the podcast streams wild and free on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Enjoy! 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.

• 1:23Rich Roll?

  All right. Adam Skolnick is back, and it's time to take roll call. Let's do the show.

• 1:34Rich Roll?

  All right. What's going on, everybody? Welcome to another edition of Roll On, where me and my hype man, Adam Skolnick, who's sitting across from me right now, my bestie, journeyman, journo, adventurer, author, environmentalist, break down topics of public interest.

• 1:51Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 1:51Rich Roll?

  Today's going to be a bit of an election extravaganza. So if you're burned out on that, I understand. But we're not going to let this moment pass without sharing a few thoughts about that in addition to our typical teachable moments, a little show and tell, some listener questions, and as always, kicking it off with a little fitness check-in. But I think today, Adam, we should start with how our mental fitness is doing.

• 2:16Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah. Well, you tell me, how are you feeling? Where were you when all this stuff was going down?

• 2:21Rich Roll?

  It's been a roller coaster.

• 2:22Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 2:23Rich Roll?

  I feel good today. I'm definitely feeling a sense of relief. I feel like I can breathe. I feel calm, like my blood pressure is settling in. And I think it didn't really become completely apparent to me until I was watching Harris and Biden deliver their speeches the other night.

• 2:46Adam Skolnick?

  Saturday night.

• 2:47Rich Roll?

  And I could just feel myself settling and I was much more emotional than I expected to be. Because I think those speeches were great.

• 2:54Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 2:54Rich Roll?

  But in the grand scheme of things, they were relatively banal, but in juxtaposition to what we've been enduring over the last four years, I felt like they were exactly what we needed to hear. And it all kind of like dawned on me how much tension and anxiety I had been holding, even while simultaneously trying to create healthy boundaries between myself and the news cycle, you know, out of self-preservation to just exercise a little bit of self-care amidst all the chaos and insanity.

• 3:25Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, it's like we've been trapped in solitary confinement, listening to death metal for four years. And then Kenny G came through.

• 3:34Rich Roll?

  Guantanamo or something?

• 3:35Adam Skolnick?

  Guantanamo. And then Kenny G came through and you're like, I always hated Kenny G, but boy, it's beautiful.

• 3:41Rich Roll?

  That's a pretty good analogy, I think.

• 3:44Adam Skolnick?

  But no, apologies to death metal. I didn't mean to insult death metal like that.

• 3:49Rich Roll?

  How's your, how's your mental state?

• 3:52Adam Skolnick?

  You know, I'm good now. It was, it was funny. Like, I've been very positive. I've been very, I've believed that there was a chance to win this whole time, but on, on Tuesday, when it was not going well, I have to admit, I did not feel like, it didn't feel like a win. It felt like we were going somewhere dark. It felt like, and I wasn't shocked by it. I'm not shocked by the numbers Trump got, and we'll talk about why.

• 4:17Rich Roll?

  We're gonna get into all of that.

• 4:18Adam Skolnick?

  But. But and I wasn't surprised at the time and I wasn't like affected like I had I was four years before, you know, where I was really, really, really upset. This time I was like, okay, trying to stay on top of it. And then the next day, waking up to better news and then following it throughout the course of the day on Wednesday and into the night where it looked good. Again, I felt like I could sleep well. I wasn't like super consumed with it. And then on Thursday, when like we had turned the corner and I think by I forget what time it was that we took the lead, we were on our way to taking the lead. We, meaning Biden, Pennsylvania and Georgia and all of that.

• 5:01Adam Skolnick?

  Right when it started looking really good, I started freaking the fuck out. You know, like I was like, I was like, is this gonna work? And I couldn't sleep and I checked like three times in the middle of the night and like I was, I was, I don't know why, but I was like, I was afraid like it was all gonna be like a mirage and evaporate.

• 5:21Rich Roll?

  The rug was gonna get pulled out from underneath you.

• 5:23Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 5:24Rich Roll?

  And I think that's like PTSD from the experience of, of, of the last four years, knowing that anything is possible at any given moment. I mean, my experience was a little bit the opposite. The first evening, coming into the dawning realization that so many people had, had voted for this person that I had such strong opinions about was a difficult pill to swallow. And I've been processing that over the last week and I have some thoughts I want to share about that. That was a struggle for me, but then the following day and the days that have followed, I found myself in a state of greater equanimity increasingly.

• 6:03Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 6:03Rich Roll?

  Every hour that passes.

• 6:04Adam Skolnick?

  I'm with you and like after that really bad night's sleep on Thursday, I just realized I'm too, I'm too close to it. I'm too attached to it. It's going well, just let go. And then, and I have not even come in close to touching the like angst over who voted for Trump. I mean, like to me, it's like one thing at a time. And the one thing is Biden won. We're in a better position today than we were yesterday. There's lots of work to do, but I'm not doing that work right now. I'm gonna take a deep breath and be happy where we are right now.

• 6:35Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 6:35Adam Skolnick?

  And that's kind of where I, I would advocate everyone should be at the moment because no one's like, unless you're in Georgia, there is no big electoral fight anytime soon. Georgia's the exception. So then let's, let's start to build and figure out the best strategy going forward. But at the moment, worrying about and, and, you know, blaming and shaming, I don't think it's the time right now. It's the time is to celebrate and, and be content with where we are and figure out how to get forward.

• 7:06Rich Roll?

  Yeah. Well, before launching into the, the bullseye of this whole issue, while we're still technically talking about our fitness check-in.

• 7:16Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, right.

• 7:16Rich Roll?

  I think we should give a shout out to our boy Davey, who's taking pictures over here, who just ran his first half marathon.

• 7:22Adam Skolnick?

  Davey.

• 7:23Rich Roll?

  By passively absorbing the podcast content over the last couple of months. Took it upon himself to start running for the very first time, conquered his first 13.1. Shout out, brother.

• 7:33Adam Skolnick?

  It's amazing.

• 7:34Rich Roll?

  Good job.

• 7:35Adam Skolnick?

  You're built like a runner.

• 7:37Rich Roll?

  The big story, the election thoughts, we talked a little bit about the speeches.

• 7:42Adam Skolnick?

  Yep.

• 7:43Rich Roll?

  Those speeches are set in juxtaposition against this background hum of count the votes, don't count the votes.

• 7:49Adam Skolnick?

  That's funny.

• 7:50Rich Roll?

  This idea, this trope of media doesn't decide elections, courts decide elections. I thought voters decide elections, but.

• 7:57Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 7:58Rich Roll?

  All culminating in this kind of glorious, desperate, pathetic, display of Rudy Giuliani at the Four Seasons Total Landscaping Company, which is so impossibly delicious.

• 8:15Adam Skolnick?

  It's like a step down from Borat 2. Like, he keeps finding new ways.

• 8:18Rich Roll?

  It really is like out of Veep, right? And I think the important thing, and I don't want to spend too much time on this, is that it triggers my, my kind of instinctual desire for some level of schadenfreude, and that's an unhealthy impulse. Like, as funny as that is, I think it's quite beside the point. And to kind of start, I'd like to begin with the experience that I was having.

• 8:44Rich Roll?

  On the eve of election night, when it became adamantly apparent that this was going to be a very close race, that there was a tremendously large swath of America that were voting for Trump, and this idea that despite the rampant corruption that we've experienced over the last four years, the blatant self-dealing, the incessant lying, the pernicious and sociopathic egomania, the science denialism, this reprehensibly bungled pandemic response, the utter failure to lead, the unabated cronyism, the autocratic self-congratulating,

• 9:25Rich Roll?

  the climate change denial, and the pathetic utter refusal to concede to reality and instead crouch behind bloviating bluster and megalomania, all supported by a propagandist media machine called Fox and a lily-livered Republican legislature too afraid to challenge the baby king, and this foamy AR-15 armed base caravanning across America, and this weaponized campaign of social media disinformation led by QAnon and others, we awake to this realization, this undeniable realization, that nearly half of America decided more of this guy. How is this possible?

• 10:09Rich Roll?

  And this was the pain point for me on that evening. And as the days unfolded afterwards, we see 70 million votes for Trump, 57% of white Americans voted for Trump, 32% of the Latinx community voted for Trump, Trump had gains with Black, Latin, and Asian communities, Mitch McConnell and Lindsey Graham were re-elected, Republicans retained control of the Senate, Kushner is now pushing for new Trump rallies, and we even have Emily Murphy, this Trump appointee, who's refusing to release transition

• 10:46Rich Roll?

  team funds, and this inability to kind of acknowledge that Biden has carried the day. And all of this leaves me... In a place of trying to understand what is going on and what of what all of this means. And I think what where I've arrived is that, you know, the first inclination is the reality of America is not what I thought it was. But I think a more healthy lens through which to perceive all of this is to understand and really like Grok that America really never has been the progressive ideal that we hold it out to be.

• 11:27Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 11:28Rich Roll?

  And this realization of just how divided and split we are has shed light on a system of systemic ills that have always been there.

• 11:39Adam Skolnick?

  Mm hmm.

• 11:40Rich Roll?

  Right? And if you were to ask a black person, a person of color, a minority, they would tell you, yes, this is my experience all the time. And I think white America is waking up to a more crystallized sense of all of this.

• 11:57Adam Skolnick?

  Yes. Well said, man. A couple of things kind of jumped to mind. One is, I thought I liked it when you read my resume, but when you read Trump's resume, it's even better. I like that. That soliloquy.

• 12:13Rich Roll?

  And I want to, you know, quickly, you know, at some point soon pivot into, you know, solutions because I have thought a little bit more deeply about this, but go ahead.

• 12:25Adam Skolnick?

  But, you know, I think, like I said, I have not focused on who voted for Trump because for a long time I knew, you know, in my mind, I was never, I never really thought. Look, it's never as bad or as great as they say it is, right? So for years, you know, as we grew up, we've been taught, you know, these myths of America. And there's truth in myth, but it's not all truth. There's truth in history, but it's one perspective of truth. And so we create in our own minds. This, this, this version of America that we experience. But it's never, it's never the great ideal. It's never was the great ideal that they taught.

• 13:09Adam Skolnick?

  And it's not as bad as we like to think of it sometimes now. You know, it's not, it's never, it's never as great and it's never as awful. That's my feeling about, certainly about America. But yeah, no, it's never been the progressive ideal. I think that the one thing Trump has given us is this revelation of some deep fissures and deep problems that we haven't dealt with for a long time. I think that, you know, that four years ago, when Dave Chappelle hosted Saturday Night Live right after the election, one of the skits that sticks out for me is him and Chris Rock went to an election night party and they were joking because all the white people were like in tears and, you know, America might be racist and they were laughing about it.

• 13:54Adam Skolnick?

  Because you're exactly what you're saying. But, um, but now it's right, right there out in the open and maybe worse than anybody has thought. But the, the, the problem is we need to figure out a way, we have such deep problems that we need to figure out a way to bridge this bizarre gap. You know, I think I read, we're going to get into some, some of the reading, but Roxane Gay's op ed in the New York Times kind of encapsulated it for me. And she That's the I'm shattered, but I'm ready to fight article. Exactly, exactly. And she wrote, "The United States is not at all united. We live in two countries. In one, people are willing to grapple with racism and bigotry.

• 14:39Adam Skolnick?

  We acknowledge that women have a right to bodily autonomy, that every American has a right to vote and the right to healthcare and the right to a fair living wage. We understand that this is a country of abundance and that the only reason economic disparity exists is because of a continued government refusal to tax the wealthy proportionally." The other United States is committed to defending white supremacy and patriarchy at all costs. Its citizens are the people who believe in QAnon's conspiracy theories and take Mr. Trump's misinformation as gospel. They see America as a country of scarcity, where there will never be enough of anything to go around. So does every man and woman for themselves. They are not concerned with the collective because they believe any success they achieve by virtue of their white privilege is achieved by virtue of merit.

• 15:23Adam Skolnick?

  They see equity as oppression. They are so terrified, in fact, that as the final votes were counted in Detroit, a group of them swarmed the venue shouting, "Stop the count." In Arizona, others swarmed a venue shouting, "Count the votes." The citizens of this version of America only believe in democracy that serves their interests.

• 15:40Rich Roll?

  I think that there is some truth in that.

• 15:42Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 15:43Rich Roll?

  But I also think it's important to point out, in some respects, I think that paints a somewhat unfair picture of a lot of Trump voters. I think there's a large swath of people that just feel very strongly about pro-life, and they're willing to overlook all of President Trump's, you know, issues because that is of paramount importance to them.

• 16:08Adam Skolnick?

  No doubt.

• 16:09Rich Roll?

  And I also think there's a lot of people who bristle at identity politics, and I think there's a conversation to be had around the extent to which the overly woke community tipped certain voters in a particular direction. Like, there's a lot of people who just, when they hear "defund the police," the lights go out, and they don't want any part of that conversation. And they're gonna vote for Trump, knowing full well that, you know, he is who he is. And I think that we need to have an honest conversation about the extent to which, you know, these conversations around equality, you know, move us in the right direction or move us away from, you know, the shared common good that we seek.

• 16:53Adam Skolnick?

  I agree. I mean, I think there- The progressive people are painting already very bold lines in an us versus them fashion. And I agree that that's why I'm not touching that 70 million number and letting that make me feel worried about the condition of America, because I was already worried about the condition of America. I already know that we have misinformation. I already know that we have division. I already know that we have people in the streets actually already fighting out little skirmishes. I get it. I know that. But the progressives who have the biggest ideas on how to fix problems like systemic inequality, whether it's ethnic, racial, or

• 17:33Adam Skolnick?

  economic, you know, fighting climate change, climate justice, social justice, preserving wildlands, preserving marine protected areas, all these kinds of things, these big ideas, it's going to take more than half the country. It's going to take more than 50% of us. If there's 70 million over there, we got to get 10. We got to get 15 million of them.

• 17:54Rich Roll?

  And in order to do that, you have to fundamentally understand and appreciate the importance of coalition building and reaching across the aisle, which gets into, you know, a perhaps underappreciated advantage of somebody like Joe Biden, which we're going to unpack in a minute. And yeah, I mean, I agree with that. And as much as I adore AOC and so many of the ideals that she stands for, and I just have so much respect for her energy and enthusiasm and her ability to, you know, articulate difficult concepts and, you know, hold truth to power and all the things that she does, when she tweeted the other day that we need to kind of make this list of people and hold them accountable, there's an aspect of that that I can get on board with, like, okay, like, let's not

• 18:39Rich Roll?

  forget how we got here. At the same time, I'm not sure that that's really the productive way forward if we want to establish the kind of coalitions we're going to need in order to enable the change that we'd like to see.

• 18:52Adam Skolnick?

  Right. I mean, of the 70 million who voted for Trump, 10% of them is the stat I heard voted for Obama.

• 19:00Adam Skolnick?

  So 10% of that 70, seems like that should be up for grabs. We have to communicate in good faith. I'm with AOC when it comes to finding out who separated children, who made those orders. You know, we have 550 kids whose parents were sent away and deported and weren't kept track of. And then we have 500, I guess it's 500 kids here that we don't know when they'll, or if they'll ever see their parents again. I mean, that's a crime against humanity. People who committed crimes against humanity, and I put Kristin Nielsen, who was head of DHS in that category, I will gladly put her in there, it's my personal opinion. And I will put anybody who oversaw that and was a part of that and a party to that. That's a crime against humanity.

• 19:43Adam Skolnick?

  The only way that you can get redemption and keep going in public life, in my opinion, after committing a crime like that, is to have some sort of justice around it, which is, if a restorative justice would be coming out and telling people what happened and exactly how it happened, and what your role was in it, and ask for forgiveness. But no more denial that this is the same policy that Obama had, no more denial that it didn't happen. So those people, I think, they belong on a list of investigations should be really conducted and figure that out. People who are having office jobs, I think that's just a little bit too much for me.

• 20:19Rich Roll?

  Yeah, we have to be careful that we're not fomenting some form of McCarthyism.

• 20:25Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 20:25Rich Roll?

  That's gonna exacerbate the divide that we need to hear.

• 20:28Adam Skolnick?

  No, no, you don't, no McCarthyism, but if there was a crime, I think that's okay to investigate. And if it was just these people worked for Trump, I don't think that's fair enough, right?

• 20:39Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 20:39Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah. Because what if, because the problem is, once you do that, and then the pendulum swings again, the people that work for you, AOC, are gonna be on some list.

• 20:47Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 20:48Adam Skolnick?

  And that's not very safe.

• 20:49Rich Roll?

  It always, it always swings back the other way.

• 20:51Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 20:51Rich Roll?

  And I think that there's a shortsightedness that these...

• 20:57Rich Roll?

  You know, policies that we set in motion remain, they persist when regime changes occur.

• 21:04Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 21:04Rich Roll?

  And then they rubber band backwards in the other direction.

• 21:06Adam Skolnick?

  We've talked about this before. That's the, that's the problem with some of the progressive politics that we experience is they include ideals that are not liberal. Um, there is a thought police, speech police aspect to it. There is, um, you know, make us against them aspect to it, um, a superiority aspect to it. And the other side has it too. I mean, like the right wings have this really skewed view of what a Democrat is and because of the media domination on that side of things.

• 21:34Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 21:35Adam Skolnick?

  Um, you know, the, it's not just Fox News. It's, um, it's the incredible conservative media empire that's all over the radio. It's, uh, their, their incredible manipulation of Facebook and YouTube to dominate there. They, they dominate the media.

• 21:50Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 21:51Adam Skolnick?

  They, they, they hit people where they live and they spread messages that are to us unbelievable, but if you get them enough, I guess they become believable. Like a guy like Biden, who's a center as you can get, being called a socialist. It's like, if you say the word socialist enough, people, it starts to stick.

• 22:08Rich Roll?

  Yeah. That's the amazing thing. I mean, this guy's been a centrist his entire life. He's the furthest thing from an ideologue. And by just perpetually repeating this mantra that he's a socialist and we should fear socialism, it somehow becomes true in the minds of millions of Americans.

• 22:25Adam Skolnick?

  Right. And the truth is, we've had corporate, uh, welfare in this country for far too long. Oil company, oil companies get big federal subsidies. Is that socialism? Big agriculture companies get big federal subsidies. Is that socialism? Um, is Medicare socialism? Uh, is public education socialism?

• 22:44Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 22:45Adam Skolnick?

  Like, like we have to decide what is what. And at the same time, you know, as, as Democrats that want to have bigger policy ideas around helping more people and creating a more equitable society, you have to get ahead of that argument.

• 22:57Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 22:58Adam Skolnick?

  And, and how do you do it?

• 22:59Rich Roll?

  And I think the Democrats did a poor job at messaging particularly the Latin community around this, treating it more as a monolith than, than it, than it truly is. I mean, I think when you look at Florida and Dade County.

• 23:11Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 23:12Rich Roll?

  You have a huge population of Cuban Americans who are, who are scarred by, you know, the, the communist legacy of Cuba.

• 23:21Rich Roll?

  And any dint whatsoever of socialism is going to push them in the other direction because of their legacy and their history.

• 23:28Adam Skolnick?

  That's true. I mean, but that community is typically Republican anyway. I mean, they were involved in the Bush and Gore recount and, but yes, and I think I read there was this information around there. And then in Texas, there was a more kind of Mexican-American base that was also kind of conservative, moderate conservative, mostly around pro-life issues, I think, or religion. But in Arizona, the reason Arizona is looking blue right now is because of younger progressive Latinos.

• 23:58Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 23:59Adam Skolnick?

  So it's, it's a moving target. I mean, like the idea, to me, if I could have one solution, it would be two solutions. One, appoint Stacey Abrams as the head of the Democratic Party. Let her organizational genius kind of basically take over at the Democratic Party. And the other thing is, I think field offices have to be opened up in the middle of the country. We can't cede the middle of the country to, to Republicans. You can't just say, because we're not getting, we don't have the media reach and we're not, we're not going to catch up to that anytime soon. So if, if there, if people are getting it in their phones, they're getting it at home, they're getting it in the car radio, they're getting it television, we got to have people knocking on their door saying, no, this isn't how it is.

• 24:43Rich Roll?

  Analog.

• 24:44Adam Skolnick?

  You know, like, you, you got to go analog to beat the digital. It's, I'm telling you, like, it's like, the landline is better tech than our cellphones. I love my landline. We need to have people.

• 24:53Rich Roll?

  But I don't even have a landline.

• 24:55Adam Skolnick?

  Exactly.

• 24:56Rich Roll?

  And nobody's probably going to knock on my door.

• 24:58Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 24:59Rich Roll?

  I think, I think we also need to get a better handle on these digital tools. I mean, certainly, there's a lot to be learned and there's so much danger there at the same time, but they're not being marshaled properly.

• 25:11Adam Skolnick?

  Not by, not by Democrats. But I do think there's something about, like, A more physical presence, more like, and, and, you know, my friend Tom Zollner, who's a writer, was volunteering in Arizona. And he was, he's, he's from Arizona, he used to write for the paper there. And he was assigned to go to Kingman, Arizona. And I guess he was supposed to like be at a polling place. And at the polling place, they had too many volunteers there. So he got sent somewhere else. And he decided, you know what, they don't need me there. I'm gonna just get out the vote. I'm gonna knock on doors and get out the vote in Kingman, Arizona, small town, rural area. It's 38% Democrat,

• 25:53Adam Skolnick?

  I think he wrote on Facebook. And he just took it upon himself, did the, covered the entire town and got like a half dozen to a dozen people to go out and vote that weren't going to vote. Because the Democrats that lived there thought they'd been forgotten about. They hadn't been reached out to. They hadn't been, I mean, this is according to him. And if that's happening in Kingman, Arizona, and Arizona is kind of a purple state, you know, like, that's not good news. Like, the Democratic Party has to do a better job. Stacey Abrams registered 800,000 voters, or something in, in Georgia. Like, we need that kind of energy. We don't need the, the cozy up with celebrity energy anymore, because that's part of the resentment. You know, there's too much, there's too much

• 26:35Adam Skolnick?

  cozying up with celebrity. There's too much cozying up with, with Silicon Valley, too much cozying up with millionaires and billionaires and cultural elite. It's too much.

• 26:45Rich Roll?

  Well, it's repellent.

• 26:46Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 26:46Rich Roll?

  For a lot of people. And the most important thing you said is that these people feel like they've been forgotten.

• 26:51Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 26:52Rich Roll?

  And I think there's a lot of people like that. And when you, when you're in that place, and you feel like you have no agency, and you're not being heard, and then you're getting messaged with political, you know, I don't even want to call it propaganda, but messaging that triggers that fear impulse, or exacerbates that sense of being forgotten, that's going to marshal a powerful emotional reaction and instinct in people. And the Democratic Party has done a terrible job at figuring out how to, how to really answer to that. And I think that's really where the work. Needs to be, you know.

• 27:29Adam Skolnick?

  I agree. I mean, in 2008, Obama was a genius at grassroots organizing. He didn't take any contributions over a certain dollar amount. He had more small donations than a history of presidential politics, as far as I know, in modern campaigns. And he was a genius at it. And we need to get back to that. You know, we need to, we need a return of that. I mean, the one thing, last thing I'll say on, because before we get to the Biden and kind of moving us forward. There was a great Politico article I shared with you.

• 27:59Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 28:00Adam Skolnick?

  America's eerily retracing Rome's steps to a fall. Will it turn around before it's too late? This came out, I think, Monday before the election or on election day.

• 28:08Rich Roll?

  It was before, I think it was just before election day.

• 28:10Adam Skolnick?

  Just before election day. And it's not your typical, like, we're fucked because of Trump article. This is a historical deep dive into Julius Caesar. It's an incredible read. I mean, I've recommended it to some people. Some people are scared by it. It's definitely eerie.

• 28:27Adam Skolnick?

  But what, there are these crazy parallels that I never knew. I never knew Julius, you know, like, I was forced to read Julius Caesar by Shakespeare, but I don't, I don't recall ever knowing these kinds of.

• 28:37Rich Roll?

  The details of it. I know, I sent it to, I sent it to Ryan Holiday because I felt like he could have written it because he's so steeped in Roman history. But the parallels between, you know, the end of the Trump era and the end of Julius Caesar's reign are unbelievable.

• 28:51Adam Skolnick?

  Well, his first reign.

• 28:52Rich Roll?

  Right. And this is like a 5,000 word, you know, think piece.

• 28:56Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 28:57Rich Roll?

  On this whole thing.

• 28:57Adam Skolnick?

  Just, I'll just give the highlights to the listeners. Big sex scandals. Julius Caesar was rumored to actually have had, slept with a king prior to his rise.

• 29:06Rich Roll?

  That I did not know.

• 29:07Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, no. He was very famous before he came into office. He was in crippling debt. He was despised by intellectuals. He promoted his own image with these ostentatious festivals and the Gladiator Games. So the, the Trump rally thing is there. His opponents ridiculed his attempts to disguise his balding. He wore the oak wreath on his head because of his bald spot, so the comb over.

• 29:30Rich Roll?

  And he took his message right to the people. It was like a preternatural Twitter.

• 29:35Adam Skolnick?

  He did. He rallied against the elites and he did it in this, something called Contio, I think it was called. And it was, Contio was a public forum of debate where people from the left, the right, the center, everyone would come together and they'd scream at each other. But, but they were actually a part of a political apparatus where ideas were kind of debated there and some of those ideas ended up making it up to Senate and the Senate would adopt them into law if they were approved and all of that. So it was this, it was a vital political forum and, and he turned that completely upside down where he'd go there with his big following and he turned them into rallies where he'd rail against elites. And basically what happened was, everything became so polarized on both sides.

• 30:19Adam Skolnick?

  So, and that's what we're seeing here, right? So like the right is, is aligned with Trump, the left is, is angry, still angry, grieving, pissed off, you know, celebrating at the same time, dancing in the streets, but a lot of people are, are still angry and, and, and feeling like we got our country back when, you know, they're taking, they're taking a polarized view. What happened there was Julius Caesar, you know, Rome, the Republic crumbled, Julius Caesar ended up returning to Rome with a big army, took over and installed himself as emperor for life until he was assassinated. I mean, that's basically the, that progression. Of course, Trump didn't win the election. This was the prediction, if Trump had won the election, we were going to be, so now

• 31:02Adam Skolnick?

  we have this opportunity, right, to, to distance ourselves from this Roman narrative and that's where we're at. But, but the conditions that we have, the polarization, all of that needs to be dealt with.

• 31:14Rich Roll?

  Yeah. It's very, it's eerily similar in so many interesting ways. It's a fascinating read. We'll, we'll link that up in the show notes.

• 31:34Rich Roll?

  But let's shift gears and get into how we're going to move forward. You know, like I said at the outset, as kind of hilarious as the Four Seasons Total Landscaping situation is. Yes. I really feel it's important to resist that schadenfreude impulse. And I think we need to start investing in how we're going to heal as a nation and, you know, coalesce and coexist because we are so split. You know, somebody who grew up, you know, I grew up in Washington DC. It was very much an inside the Beltway environment. My dad was a government lawyer. My next door neighbor was a Republican Senator.

• 32:18Rich Roll?

  The Director of the FBI lived around the corner. And the school that I went to was filled with the kids, you know, the sons of prominent politicians all across Washington. So I was very much steeped in politics from a very young age. And what I remember most, aside from the fact that I was very up to speed on everything that was going on, much more so until recent years, was the comedy that existed across the aisle. Like Republicans and Democrats coexisted in an environment of mutual respect to the point where, you know, I would, we would go. Comedy with a T. Yeah, there'd be dinner parties that you would get, and it would be Republicans

• 33:01Rich Roll?

  and Democrats, and everyone was hucking it up and getting along. Like, there were differences and, you know, distinct, you know, distinction in how these people would see the world and what they thought was best for the country. But there wasn't the acrimony and the divide and the inability to communicate that we see now, which is really like this disease that's infecting us at a rate that's far more fatal than what we're seeing with coronavirus, frankly. And I think if we're going to proceed and move forward as a country, we have to figure out a way. To return to some level of that comedy.

• 33:42Rich Roll?

  And that's one reason why, on the eve of the election, I wrote that piece for Esquire, which is kind of about, you know, how to navigate the week to come and the weeks that follow.

• 33:52Adam Skolnick?

  Great piece.

• 33:52Rich Roll?

  I wrote that, I wrote that, you know, it's not a political piece in any regard. It's really a self-care piece.

• 33:57Adam Skolnick?

  Fantastic.

• 33:58Rich Roll?

  Like, how do we maintain some level of equanimity amidst the chaos? But implicit in all of that is this idea that we need to figure out how to communicate with each other.

• 34:09Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 34:09Rich Roll?

  The importance of meaningful conversation and what we try to do here on the podcast, and how we apply, you know, what I try to practice here in our daily lives with the people that we encounter. And it's a tough pill to swallow, and it's difficult because we're so disharmonized at the moment, and because we see things so differently. And, and that difference has been, you know, infected with this, you know, this, this, you know, this sense of, of confusion and acrimony that we all feel like it's an impossible bridge, you know, to, to cross for, for each other.

• 34:48Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 34:50Rich Roll?

  I loved Dave Chappelle's opening monologue on Saturday Night Live, where, you know, that's a guy who could have gotten up and said all kinds of, you know, hilarious but, you know, divisive things. And instead, he sees that opportunity to, to say, like, I don't hate anyone. I hate that feeling that nobody cares about you, which speaks to what we just talked about, this idea that there are so many people who feel overlooked in this world.

• 35:17Adam Skolnick?

  Yep.

• 35:17Rich Roll?

  And that we need to find forgiveness and joy in our lives, right? And I think that's super powerful, coming from a guy like that, who, you know, has become, in many ways, this, you know, this sort of, you know, comedian prophet for our times.

• 35:34Adam Skolnick?

  He's a healer.

• 35:35Rich Roll?

  He is a healer.

• 35:36Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah. It also helps, I think, part of his perspective, I don't think you could take away the fact that he lives in a small town in Ohio, where he's living around in farm country, where it is red, red state land.

• 35:48Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 35:49Adam Skolnick?

  And he's had good experiences there, and he's had negative experiences there, where he's talked in his comedy show.

• 35:54Adam Skolnick?

  And And but for the most part, he trusts his neighbors and likes his neighbors. And he just wants to live life and like and enjoy people and love people like we all do. I mean, that gives us like to me, Joe Biden is such an interesting person and such an interesting moment for him, you know, to me, like he ran the classic rope a dope campaign like we'd never seen before. He was never seen for for months. You didn't find him. He let Trump just throw all these wild punches and punch himself out, basically. And the bet was with a few kind of weeks of showing up in in certain states with with Obama and without Obama and wherever they went, and mostly Pennsylvania.

• 36:34Adam Skolnick?

  I think there was a lot of Florida, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, right? If I remember correctly, that that would be enough. And it almost was not enough, you know, because we picked a candidate that from my perspective at the time when when Biden won, we were picking somebody who was as as as blank as you can get.

• 36:55Rich Roll?

  When he won the nomination.

• 36:56Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, when he won the nomination. He was just this blank guy that might appeal to people that we need to get to vote for us. And in a in a way to get enough Trump Trump people to come on board or to get enough people turn out. He was nice, a nice guy that that, you know, that give Bernie Sanders a lot of credit. You know, he he rallied progressives to to bond with Biden. The progressives themselves saw what happened last time and they learned from their mistakes. And then he had Stacey Abrams and these great voter turnout machines that came up and everything came up and it helped Biden barely eke it out. And at the time, when on Tuesday night, when it wasn't looking good, I thought, maybe the Democratic Party missed the boat.

• 37:40Adam Skolnick?

  Maybe you can't pick a blank guy that nobody really has strong feelings for or against, really, and make that your candidate, even when the other guy is Trump. Maybe the idea of picking a guy who's just not that guy isn't the right move.

• 37:54Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 37:54Adam Skolnick?

  It turned out to be. The right move and and now I think he's in incredible position and he could be actually the right guy for this moment exactly for the reasons that you're talking about.

• 38:06Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I think there's there's something to be said for that. I mean, when you I'll be the first to admit that I was hardly excited that Biden was the nominee.

• 38:15Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 38:15Rich Roll?

  There's just nothing that inspired me about him. He's fine.

• 38:20Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 38:21Rich Roll?

  But here's a guy who's 78 years old. He's clearly lost a step. You know, in that first debate, he did look very old. I wouldn't say feeble, but not energized.

• 38:30Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 38:31Rich Roll?

  In the way that somebody like Trump is. And he's a guy who ran a campaign, you know, as this sort of blank slate individual, very much in opposition to Trump as opposed to what he's for specifically, right?

• 38:47Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 38:48Rich Roll?

  This is a guy who's, you know, the furthest thing from socialist, has never been an ideologue in any regard. He's very much a pluralist, somebody who's always been a voice of compromise. I mean, when he first ran for Senate at 29, it was like, what do you what's your platform? And I don't think that he had a platform and he'd probably admit to so much.

• 39:08Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 39:08Rich Roll?

  Right?

• 39:08Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 39:09Rich Roll?

  Probably driven more by ambition at that time than anything else. There is no single issue that has ever animated him or any platform that he's put out there. It has been defined, a campaign defined, you know, in many ways, simply in opposition to Trump.

• 39:25Adam Skolnick?

  Yep. Trump dominated the conversation.

• 39:28Rich Roll?

  Right. It was always about, you know, why Trump's bad as opposed to what he's for.

• 39:31Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 39:32Rich Roll?

  Not that he's not for certain things and he didn't, you know, he articulated those throughout the campaign, but that got kind of backtracked by, you know.

• 39:40Adam Skolnick?

  It mattered less.

• 39:41Rich Roll?

  Exactly.

• 39:42Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 39:42Rich Roll?

  You know, this is a guy who's about, and I think to the to your point of like, this might be, you know, the guy for the moment. This is a guy who's a negotiator. He's about procedure and process over passion. He has this life experience that's been marked time and time again with with tragedy, and that's instilled this deep empathy that he has right now and the way that he carries himself. And it's very interesting that he's from Delaware, because if you look at Delaware on the map. It's like this symbol of centrism.

• 40:13Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 40:13Rich Roll?

  It's right there, smack in the middle between. It's neither the south, it's neither the north, it's right in between.

• 40:19Adam Skolnick?

  Yep.

• 40:19Rich Roll?

  And that is kind of who this guy is, right?

• 40:23Adam Skolnick?

  Mm hmm.

• 40:23Rich Roll?

  Um, and that's how he approaches policymaking.

• 40:28Adam Skolnick?

  He comes from that generation that you were talking about, of the generation of comedy.

• 40:32Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 40:33Adam Skolnick?

  Comedy with a T, by the way.

• 40:34Rich Roll?

  And that's his big thing, like, his big thing, his big lament is the breakdown in communication in the Senate.

• 40:40Adam Skolnick?

  He liked those parties.

• 40:41Rich Roll?

  And the lack of protocol.

• 40:42Adam Skolnick?

  He liked going to those dinners.

• 40:43Rich Roll?

  When he was able to attend them, I mean, when he was a young senator.

• 40:46Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 40:47Rich Roll?

  He was Amtrak Joe, because he was always going back to Delaware to take care of his, to take care of his boys.

• 40:52Adam Skolnick?

  That's right.

• 40:52Rich Roll?

  In the wake of his, his daughter and his wife perishing in that car accident.

• 40:56Adam Skolnick?

  That's right. Um, but I think Bernie embracing Biden, I think you're seeing Mitt Romney and some senators that, that do like Joe Biden, that, that definitely helps, I think. Um, and, uh, we'll see, we'll see if he's gonna have enough. You know, Georgia looms very large, there's two Senate seats that are out there, I feel very good about where Georgia's at. But Georgia, you know, and thank, thank you Philly and thank you Atlanta for rising up and Detroit. I mean, these incredibly, uh, beautiful cosmopolitan, multi-ethnic cities with incredible black traditions, really saved this country. I think that needs to be said. Um, and so I, I appreciate that.

• 41:38Adam Skolnick?

  And Atlanta is this interesting case study because Atlanta is, um, doing very well economically. It's becoming increasingly progressive. It's got, uh, incredible history, um, positive history, you know, and, and now, uh, it's got the Hollywood aspect of it. There's so much Hollywood production there.

• 41:58Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 41:58Adam Skolnick?

  And so it's this thr- it's in, in a, in a time when there's a lot of economic crunch, pandemic aside, Atlanta, maybe now is not the right time to say this, but in general, over the last five years, Atlanta is really trending way up. It's like one of these cities that's just booming and becoming a, a global city.

• 42:15Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 42:16Adam Skolnick?

  And, um, and it's a success story and that's changing the way Georgia votes. Um, it's very interesting to me that, that, that's happening. And, and now we have this moment where in a month, if you get two senators, then Biden's really in a good position to govern. But if you don't. If you get one, or if you get, if you get neither, then, you know, then we're going to see, we're going to see if we can bridge that gap.

• 42:40Rich Roll?

  Well, just to conclude this, you know, discussion about Biden being the cipher for the moment, all of these things that we're discussing about his kind of personal proclivities, I think, you know, an argument, a solid argument can be made that he is appropriate for this moment, you know, to kind of hearken it back to, to what Dave Chappelle was talking about, and what we were speaking about earlier, we do need somebody who, you know, understands that there is this divide right now, and can, you know, listen, a centrist isn't the most exciting thing for anybody, but perhaps that centrist mentality can be a force for

• 43:21Rich Roll?

  healing right now. And, you know, I hold out hope, and I'm optimistic that he can unite us where, where we need it most. We'll see.

• 43:30Adam Skolnick?

  Definitely.

• 43:31Rich Roll?

  Two final thoughts on that. The first is, there's a very interesting deep dive on who Biden is as an individual, if you want to learn a little bit more, kind of, you know, behind the curtain about what makes this guy tick. Ezra Klein put up a great podcast the other day with this guy Evan Osnos, who's a Biden biographer, and they kind of talk about the evolution of Biden over the years, and I found that to be very helpful in wrapping my head around who this human being is. And secondarily, I loved how Bill Maher closed out his latest show from Friday night in his closing monologue, talking about Blake Shelton and Gwen Stefani, and their, their, their impending nuptials

• 44:15Rich Roll?

  as this symbol of reconciliation between red and blue amidst this acrimonious election, calling them rodeo and Juliet. You know, he's a good old boy who sings about trucks and beer, and she's the pop princess, Hollaback Girl from California. And we need that, that marriage to work for America.

• 44:33Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 44:34Rich Roll?

  Right?

• 44:35Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 44:36Rich Roll?

  As a symbol that we can come together with his closing sentiment, that actually no president can unite us, but that we must unite ourselves.

• 44:44Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah. And, and it comes down to that, like, question I have for progressives who are still feeling like they want to

• 44:53Adam Skolnick?

  Yes, we need to push for policies that are inclusive and that can help make some substantive change. But instead of shaming people who voted for Trump, for whatever reason, I would suggest looking to bridge the gap. And you know, because it comes down to this, do we want to be right or do we want to be effective? Do we want to be the ones that are superior or do we want to be the ones that build a better world? And to me, that's what it comes down to. I think that's what you're speaking to. And I also wanted to say that, you know, you changed your entire, you pivoted in your podcasts. You took your podcast that was going very well, doing well for you, you didn't have

• 45:38Adam Skolnick?

  to do anything. You could have stuck with the interview and you decided to tackle some really thorny issues and get into some political discussions that are not necessarily, a lot of people would tell you not to have done that. And you decided to do that and I think that that helped.

• 45:54Rich Roll?

  Yeah, well, I hope so. I mean, I always, I struggle with this a little bit, like we were talking before the podcast, you know, there's certainly more that I could have done, but I felt strongly about making this pivot. And the pivot has been at my peril. You know, I know that I've lost listeners and followers as a result of it. Plenty of people have, you know, freely left their one star reviews on Apple Podcasts to voice their displeasure with me broaching, you know, politics on the show. But I felt strongly that, you know, I wanted to have these kinds of conversations and I don't want to be somebody who's shying away from them.

• 46:33Rich Roll?

  And I understand that some might find it divisive or unpalatable because it doesn't match their worldview. And that's okay. Yeah, that's okay. I mean, my hope is that You know, look, I'd be delighted if I never had to talk about national politics again. Maybe this is the last one that we'll ever do.

• 46:53Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 46:54Rich Roll?

  But in the meantime, this is what's going on in the world. This is what's top of mind for me. And I think having meaningful conversations that are laced with nuance are important as a prerequisite for us moving forward as a healthy country. And I stand by it, you know, even if the show has shrunk as a result of it. I don't know. I mean, there's a lot of people who've, you know, celebrated the fact that I'm doing this as well.

• 47:18Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 47:19Rich Roll?

  I don't know how it all balances out, but I understand that it's controversial. And controversy is not something that I've ever courted on this podcast. I've always used this modality as a way to reach the most number of people and to appeal to people of all walks of life. And I maintain that desire, but it can't come at the cost of speaking my personal truth, whether you disagree with it or not.

• 47:42Adam Skolnick?

  Well, what do you think? You said you could have done more. Like, what do you, why, why do you have that feeling still?

• 47:48Rich Roll?

  Well, you can always do more.

• 47:49Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 47:49Rich Roll?

  Right? I mean, I wasn't out, like, I have friends on social media that post constantly their political opinions. And I made the decision not to go overboard on that and to choose my moments and to focus the advocacy that I wanted to do, you know, in front of this microphone rather than in visual form on Instagram, because I think it allows the, the space for that kind of nuance.

• 48:13Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 48:14Rich Roll?

  That it, that it requires. But I, I think, looking back, like, should I have, you know, done more? Like, Trapper, my stepson, worked the polls for three days straight at our polling station. Like, I could have done that. I could, there are other things I could have done. Yeah, it was great, you know?

• 48:29Adam Skolnick?

  But you're doing this. I mean, you have a big platform and you're using it in, in that way that is inclusive as well as influential.

• 48:36Rich Roll?

  Right. I'm trying to be inclusive and I'm trying to be mindful that there are all different kinds of people that listen to this. And there are plenty of Trump people that tune into the podcast. My interest is not in alienating them. I want to bring them in. I want to be able to be truthful and honest. I don't want to be editing myself or operate from a fearful place that I might say something that will, you know,

• 49:00Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 49:01Rich Roll?

  upset somebody because the minute I do that, this whole thing is dead. Like, it has to be a forum for open, unbridled discussion.

• 49:09Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, and if you're posting kind of a photo of yourself that has only one interpretation, I think that gets in the way of a more influential message.

• 49:19Rich Roll?

  Well, everybody has their own form of advocacy, and I think there are people, you know, there's something, like, the people that go out and just push it hard with their political view, we need those people, whether on the right or the left, like, that's fantastic, you know, knock yourself out. It's just not, it's not, I don't think it's the way that I operate, so I would prefer to do it, you know, the way that we're doing it right now.

• 49:41Adam Skolnick?

  Well, I think, we talked about this over the phone this morning, but like, the woke, ultra-progressive side, they're really good at flagging an issue that needs, that isn't getting the attention it deserves and needs to be dealt with. BLM is a great example of that, but, you know, very good at flagging the issue, but to solve an issue, you need more people than that.

• 50:02Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 50:02Adam Skolnick?

  And I think that's where your influence comes in handy. Like, you're hoping to solve problems, not just identify problems.

• 50:10Rich Roll?

  Yeah, and I think, I think the, you know, the unbridled, you know, super hardcore, you know, whether it's progressive or conservative, that's what gets the issue on the table to decide in the first place. You need that groundswell of support in order for it to be, you know, on the legislative docket to begin with.

• 50:29Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 50:30Rich Roll?

  But then, when you confront the process of actually trying to pass legislation or get things done, there does have to be, you know, the ability to work with others. And I think that- Biden is somebody who understands that.

• 50:45Adam Skolnick?

  I agree. And then I think we should just before we move on completely Kamala, we got to talk about Kamala, the first woman, the first black woman, the first South Asian woman. I mean, there's so many firsts with Kamala. California's own, you know, our senator that becomes the vice president. What are your thoughts on that?

• 51:04Rich Roll?

  I mean, it's what's not to love about that. It's unbelievable. You know, when that video of her when she's calling Joe and saying, we did it. And she's in her like running gear. Like, you know, it's fantastic. And the impact of that on young girls, young girls of color, particularly as a source of inspiration is really a beautiful thing. And the fact that she came out and did her speech in all white, you know, the uniform of the suffragettes. It's like, it's a really cool symbolic thing. And I think she's going to be great. My boys are excited because they kind of know Doug a little bit because they know Doug's kids. So they're like, Doug.

• 51:42Adam Skolnick?

  And Doug's a Jew. We got a Jew. We got a Jew close. That's the closest a Jew's been since Henry Kissinger.

• 51:47Rich Roll?

  Which is hilarious, right? So Aviator Nation it is.

• 51:52Adam Skolnick?

  Yes, I'm a fan. I thought I liked her early on in the democratic process. And then, you know, somehow her campaign stumbled. But she's, she's a great speaker. I think she's going to be able to prosecute some cases for issues that are really important. She can really be influential in the way she presents evidence and she's a brilliant mind. And I'm very excited to have her in there. And so that's pretty exciting. And, you know, we'll see what happens. But, you know, thank you all for, for voting. And, and, and the one thing I'll say to your more conservative listeners.

• 52:34Adam Skolnick?

  Is not trying to convince anyone how to vote, but I mean, I do, but not trying to convince you how to think, how to think. But the one thing I would ask you to do next time an election comes up, and this is for everybody, is to consider the environment first because you're listening to Rich Roll, you care about animal welfare, you care about plant-based eating, most likely, you care about these issues. The environment is critical. To me, it's the it's the issue that we can use to unite more the most people and and pass some really important policies that can be good economically and environmentally and and address climate and justice at the same time. And we need more people. And so if I

• 53:16Adam Skolnick?

  conservative listeners, I would just ask you to really examine the policy, environmental policies of the people you're voting for at all times. And that should be number one, I think, for everybody who's voting. We should all be doing that. I know that's my number one issue. And I would encourage you, I think it's every should be everyone's number one issue because of where we are at with climate change, because of where we're at with the clock ticking. And I would, I would really suggest to people out there that are kind of in the middle to look at that.

• 53:45Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I would second that. I mean, I would have preferred a candidate who was more progressive on climate issues than somebody like Joe Biden, somebody who's really on top of it, somebody who, you know, is very single minded about how important that is. But here we are. And I was glad that when he gave up, when he got up and gave his speech that he included climate change in his address.

• 54:11Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 54:11Rich Roll?

  And I think that's important and gives me hope.

• 54:13Adam Skolnick?

  Whoever it was, it wouldn't have been good enough for Greta.

• 54:15Rich Roll?

  Certainly not. Definitely not. All right. Well, let's take a break and we'll come back on the environmental tip. We have a few things to share. And we're going to do a little show and tells, a couple wins of the week and take some listener questions.

• 54:33Adam Skolnick?

  Beautiful.

• 54:46Rich Roll?

  And we're back. Let's kick it off with a little show and tell, shall we?

• 54:50Adam Skolnick?

  I'm very excited for you. This is a, it's a great day.

• 54:53Rich Roll?

  I can't think of anything to show and tell right now.

• 54:56Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, come on.

• 54:58Rich Roll?

  So today is November 9th. We're recording this on Monday. This will go up Thursday morning.

• 55:07Rich Roll?

  At that point, the book will be in the wild. It's called Voicing Change. I talked about it. We don't have to go on and on about it because we shared about it the other day, but

• 55:17Adam Skolnick?

  Interview Anthology.

• 55:18Rich Roll?

  The book is officially available through our website, richroll.com/vc to purchase. We're shipping globally. I'm very excited. We're actually a little ahead of the curve because we already have shipped out some of these books and I'm starting to see them pop up on social media. People seem to be enjoying it. Really proud of it. Basically, it is inspiration and timeless wisdom lifted from the podcast. We feature 50 guests over the years with beautiful photographs and we've transcribed some of the more impactful aspects of those conversations and distilled them down with essays and just, I'm really proud to be able to share what I think is a really fair and beautiful representation of what I strive to do here on the show.

• 56:04Rich Roll?

  And I'm excited that it's now in the wild.

• 56:07Adam Skolnick?

  It's a beautiful book. It's on my coffee table.

• 56:09Rich Roll?

  Thank you, fun.

• 56:10Adam Skolnick?

  And you also had that great piece in Esquire. We referenced it before and you were, it's, you're, I mean, that's a big deal. Like Esquire is, right?

• 56:18Rich Roll?

  It was a big deal. I mean, first of all, shout out to Jeff Gordonier.

• 56:21Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 56:22Rich Roll?

  Who connected the dots there with the editor at Esquire. Because I reached out to him. I'm like, I got this book coming out. I should probably, you know, explore some press stuff. I don't have a publicist or anything like that. And he made some introductions and the editor at Esquire was like, yeah, we'd love to hear from Rich. And then I was like, oh, shit, I have to write something. And of course, I waited until the last minute. The, the assistant editor was like sending me emails. Are you gonna write this thing? I create these deadlines so that I'm pulling my hair out thinking, what is it that I could possibly say? And intimidated because of the literary tradition of Esquire, like I started

• 57:03Rich Roll?

  thinking about R S Thompson and like all these people that have written for that publication over the years.

• 57:09Adam Skolnick?

  All in, maybe?

• 57:09Rich Roll?

  And, uh, yeah, exactly.

• 57:11Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 57:11Rich Roll?

  And, um, got it together though, and shared that piece and, and they ran it.

• 57:15Adam Skolnick?

  It's like 4,000 words, right?

• 57:16Rich Roll?

  It was a big, well, here's what's funny. They said, I said, well, you know, what's the deadline and like, how many words? And they were like, 800 words, 800 to 1,000.

• 57:24Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 57:24Rich Roll?

  So I write the thing, it's 2,000 words.

• 57:27Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 57:27Rich Roll?

  And I thought, I'm not going to edit it down. Like I'll send it over. If they want to cut it, I'll cut it down. But, um, I thought that the version I sent them was, was the better version. And it was digital. It wasn't going in the print magazine anyway. And they liked it. I mean, we did a round of edits and trimmed it up a little bit, but yeah, I mean, that's no small thing for me. Like it's a big deal.

• 57:47Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, it's a big deal.

• 57:48Rich Roll?

  You, you publish in the New York Times and in Outside all the time.

• 57:51Adam Skolnick?

  But never Esquire.

• 57:52Rich Roll?

  I've never written for a magazine before.

• 57:55Adam Skolnick?

  Esquire's never had me.

• 57:56Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 57:57Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 57:57Rich Roll?

  Well, I might know someone over there.

• 57:59Adam Skolnick?

  You might know a guy.

• 58:01Rich Roll?

  But, uh, yeah, I was gonna ask you, can I add magazine editor to my bio now?

• 58:05Adam Skolnick?

  Not editor, writer.

• 58:07Rich Roll?

  Right. That's what I meant. Writer, magazine writer.

• 58:09Adam Skolnick?

  Which is better, you know, like, uh, yes, you can. And what's fun is, uh, we had this discussion of the writing process, right? Like a quick back, back and forth and just like, how the low level torture of that it is.

• 58:22Rich Roll?

  Right, right, right. It's so painful. I mean, the truth is, I set aside an entire day to write that. I think I worked on it for like 10 hours straight and maybe got up twice to go to the bathroom or something.

• 58:36Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 58:37Rich Roll?

  Um, cause that's what it takes. And

• 58:39Adam Skolnick?

  Did you outline it?

• 58:40Rich Roll?

  When you're in the, I, I kind of threw an outline together, but you go through that. Phase of just wanting to pull your hair out and kill yourself because you can't make it good and you don't see the way through.

• 58:52Adam Skolnick?

  Well, the first draft's never really good.

• 58:54Rich Roll?

  It's terrible. And no matter, yeah, but no matter how many times you tell yourself it doesn't matter, you know, that the first draft is terrible and that you'll, and no matter how many times you've seen it through to its conclusion and been proud of what you created, when you're in the weeds like that, it's, it never gets easier.

• 59:11Adam Skolnick?

  No, we have a really nice process happening at my place where the first, it's the, when I'm doing the first draft or put, starting a project, I'll write all day and for a couple of days and whine, you know, periodically over the course of the day, how horrible it is. This is a bad one. This one's not going to be any good. And I say that over and over again.

• 59:34Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 59:34Adam Skolnick?

  And then my wife's like, but you always say that. And then the next day is the time I'm kind of rewriting it.

• 59:39Rich Roll?

  You don't understand this time.

• 59:40Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 59:40Rich Roll?

  It's different.

• 59:41Adam Skolnick?

  I go through it. I go, I do three major passes. And by the third one, I'm like, you know what? This one's pretty good.

• 59:46Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 59:48Adam Skolnick?

  Because writing is rewriting. That's the process. You outline it.

• 59:51Rich Roll?

  And April rolls her eyes.

• 59:53Adam Skolnick?

  And April tolerates all these discussions. But that's how it does feel though. It does feel like this one sucks. And sometimes they're not as good. I mean, the, the, the big thing for me is, you know, you, you, you have this vision of what it's going to turn out to be before you start and it very rarely hits that mark. And that's okay. That's the process. But like, that's, that's the, I think that's where the torture lies. And this is how I envisioned it. This is what I want to say. And then getting there, especially when you're doing a work of journalism and you're trying to find the evidence to get you there. That's the work and it, and it's hard to get there.

• 1:00:31Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:00:32Adam Skolnick?

  And that's, that's the torture.

• 1:00:33Rich Roll?

  Yeah. I mean, with this thing though, is it was a little, it's a little bit like, if you're doing a journalistic piece, you, you kind of know what the story is.

• 1:00:41Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:41Rich Roll?

  You're, you try to refrain from having a thesis, but you're out like sourcing all the, you know, information that you can to, you know, establish the facts of what is actually occurring. And then, you know, supporting that idea with this, they're like, well, what do you want to write about?

• 1:00:57Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah. It's worse.

• 1:00:59Rich Roll?

  I know.

• 1:00:59Adam Skolnick?

  It's harder.

• 1:00:59Rich Roll?

  Yeah. That blank page, you know, is just the most terrifying.

• 1:01:04Adam Skolnick?

  Tell me about it. I'm at war with a novel right now. It's not pretty.

• 1:01:09Rich Roll?

  And you know, part of my thing going in was like, I want to write something that will, you know, connect and unite people. I wanted, I wanted to be well-written so that I'm in service to, you know, that, that, the standards of something like Esquire that I aspire to be able to write, you know, at that level. I wanted to get a bunch of traffic and then maybe they'll ask me to write something else. And as soon as I turned it in, I'm like, do I want to go through that again?

• 1:01:36Adam Skolnick?

  Exactly. That, that, welcome to my life. Yeah.

• 1:01:39Rich Roll?

  And you're rewarded with another assignment. And then you have to go through it again.

• 1:01:43Adam Skolnick?

  First of all, you achieved all those things, I'm sure. And second of all, yes, I've realized that a long time ago, that I chose the one profession where you always have homework.

• 1:01:51Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:01:51Adam Skolnick?

  There's always a homework assignment. That's the whole life.

• 1:01:53Rich Roll?

  Exactly. This podcast is similar in that regard. There's always homework. There's always prepara-, it's like I'm constantly doing homework. I mean, I love it, but it's still, it's work.

• 1:02:03Adam Skolnick?

  There's a question down the line that we can, when we, one of the listener questions, we can kind of tap into that. But our friend, Rob Bell, has a writing class. So for all, the reason I wanted to ask you about the writing process and to have this discussion with you is just for your listeners that are curious about, about that process. And, and if you are, Rob Bell, who's a friend of the show, guest a couple of times, right?

• 1:02:24Rich Roll?

  Yeah, he's been on a couple of times. Amazing, amazing individual. And, and one of the most gifted speakers and writers that I know. Like, he has such a command over not just the English language, but how to communicate effectively with people. And he does it in such a seemingly effortless way, that it almost inspires rage inside of me because his facility is so profound. You know what I'm talking about? Like, he's so good at it.

• 1:02:51Adam Skolnick?

  You know what? Why isn't he running?

• 1:02:52Rich Roll?

  How do you do that?

• 1:02:53Adam Skolnick?

  He should run for office. Can we get a Rob Bell for Senate campaign? But he's got a writing class coming up. It's, it's going to be a Zoom session. I think they're two-hour sessions. He's got like a list of dates on his website. We can link to that, right?

• 1:03:10Rich Roll?

  Yeah, we'll link it up in the show. I think it's just robbell.com.

• 1:03:12Adam Skolnick?

  I'm, I'm, I'm thinking I should probably attend it. And then I'll report on it to you.

• 1:03:17Rich Roll?

  One thing that I did do was take his, it's not a course. He's got an online, it's essentially an audiobook. I think it's like eight hours long. And I believe it's called Something to Say. And it's basically him taking you through

• 1:03:34Rich Roll?

  The entire process of how you put together an oral presentation, a talk essentially, and how he thinks about that and how he assembles his ideas to create a structure so that he can most effectively communicate what it is that he's trying to say. And I would say, you know, as somebody who writes a lot and also does a fair amount of public speaking, it was the most helpful and profound, it's not really a lecture, but series or

• 1:04:06Adam Skolnick?

  Seminar?

• 1:04:06Rich Roll?

  Seminar, yeah, that's a good, that's a good word, on, on how to do this thing. And I can't recommend that enough. I don't know if it's still up on his website. I think it was a couple of years ago that I, that I listened to it, but I found it to be unbelievably helpful. And I think just, it's all on Zoom, right?

• 1:04:22Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:22Rich Roll?

  So is he capping the number of people that can take it?

• 1:04:25Adam Skolnick?

  You know, I didn't ask him. I haven't called him or texted him, telling him I'm going to take it yet. I will do that. All I know, it's two hours, it's 50 bucks, it's, it's, it's going to be entertaining and informative. I can guarantee that.

• 1:04:37Rich Roll?

  Hundred percent.

• 1:04:37Adam Skolnick?

  And the reason I'm interested in it is like, I always, you know, I was, when I first started out, the craft of writing, I was trying to write screenplays at the same time as I was breaking into writing stories for magazines. And, and I read a lot about the screenwriting process, but I didn't really, in the journalism process. And I've never really, I'm not, I'm not one of those guys that dives into the craft, really. I don't, but, but now, I guess I'm at the stage in my career that I am interested in that. And I follow a guy, Chip Scanlon, has a newsletter, or an email newsletter that he sends out. I can't recommend that highly enough. He talks to really accomplished journalists, and he's a writing instructor and teacher, and was a journalist for a while. And, and

• 1:05:22Adam Skolnick?

  that's really helpful. And then I'm, I'm interested in writing classes. I want to learn more about storytelling now that I'm kind of like mid-career. I don't know why, but I've just like attracted to the philosophy of it more than I was kind of coming up.

• 1:05:34Rich Roll?

  Hmm. We'll take the class and then come back and report back.

• 1:05:37Adam Skolnick?

  You got it.

• 1:05:38Rich Roll?

  Is he doing it alone?

• 1:05:39Adam Skolnick?

  Is that an assignment?

• 1:05:39Rich Roll?

  Is this one of the things that he's doing with Elizabeth Gilbert?

• 1:05:42Adam Skolnick?

  Seems like it's not, it's not Liz. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

• 1:05:45Rich Roll?

  Because I know that they did a little bit of a tour together.

• 1:05:48Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:49Rich Roll?

  And it was all about like how to, you know, kind of cultivate your creative.

• 1:05:53Adam Skolnick?

  They've done a lot of creativity workshops together. Yeah. Like they'll, they'll do.

• 1:05:56Rich Roll?

  And we went to their live show.

• 1:05:57Adam Skolnick?

  We did.

• 1:05:58Rich Roll?

  Remember that at Largo?

• 1:05:58Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, yeah, fabulous. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:06:00Rich Roll?

  Shout out Rob. What's up, dude?

• 1:06:01Adam Skolnick?

  Shout out Rob, shout out Liz.

• 1:06:03Rich Roll?

  Um, while we're on the subject of show and tell, I think you got something else you want to show us, right?

• 1:06:08Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, yeah. So, um, my Instagram wanted me to try Barucas. So congratulations, congratulations.

• 1:06:18Rich Roll?

  You got delivered the ad of Darren explaining to you.

• 1:06:22Adam Skolnick?

  Congratulations.

• 1:06:23Rich Roll?

  The benefits of Barucas.

• 1:06:24Adam Skolnick?

  The algorithm is, is, has made me buy these.

• 1:06:27Rich Roll?

  Yeah. Well, that kid from those three twins from The Social Dilemma that are standing behind your avatar.

• 1:06:35Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 1:06:36Rich Roll?

  Uh, and deciding what to deliver to you were like, well, this guy's co-hosting the Rich Roll Podcast.

• 1:06:42Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:42Rich Roll?

  I think he would, I think he'd really jump on the Barucas thing.

• 1:06:45Adam Skolnick?

  But then the other guy's like, yeah, but he's not nearly as healthy or, or like, he's not quite there.

• 1:06:49Rich Roll?

  But that's all the more reason why maybe he needs it.

• 1:06:51Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah. He needs Barucas. We're helping him and he needs to be helped.

• 1:06:55Rich Roll?

  Ching.

• 1:06:56Adam Skolnick?

  So there you go. So I saw this thing.

• 1:06:58Rich Roll?

  You got the trail mix.

• 1:06:58Adam Skolnick?

  I, I loved the post. It was promoted, true, but I didn't click on it. Um, and, and, you know, I love the idea of this kind of wild, it looks like a Brazil nut, kind of, um, but tell me, tell me.

• 1:07:09Rich Roll?

  Have you never tried these?

• 1:07:11Adam Skolnick?

  I've never heard of them or tried it before.

• 1:07:12Rich Roll?

  Oh, wow. Well, crack it open. I mean, first of all, this is the trail mix.

• 1:07:15Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:07:15Rich Roll?

  Which people that know the show and listen to my podcast with Darren, apologies, because we talked about this at length when he was on, but there's the nut, which is in there, but then there's also, the Baruca is like this nut that comes inside a very hard shell. It's like the size of a tangerine and you need this like heavy duty machinery to crack it open. But the shell, when, when you kind of take like pieces of the shell, you can actually eat it and it's pretty delicious and super nutritious as well.

• 1:07:46Adam Skolnick?

  It's good.

• 1:07:47Rich Roll?

  So it's pretty good, right? It's like this unbelievable trail mix.

• 1:07:51Adam Skolnick?

  Tastes like a peanutty thing.

• 1:07:52Rich Roll?

  And the, the nuts are smaller than a Brazil nut. They taste more like a peanut than a Brazil nut, but they have a pretty rich flavor.

• 1:08:00Adam Skolnick?

  And this is the shell?

• 1:08:01Rich Roll?

  Um, exactly. Yeah. It's like, that's a flake, flaked off piece of the shell itself.

• 1:08:06Adam Skolnick?

  Where did he find this?

• 1:08:08Rich Roll?

  Through his superfood hunting in the Brazilian Serrado, uh, Sahadu, I think is how you say it. Um, and he connected with these indigenous farmers there who've been growing these nuts forever and created a coalition of them to supply.

• 1:08:26Rich Roll?

  This product to markets across America. And I think it's a great product and they're really, they're healthy. I eat them all the time. I love them. High in antioxidants, lots of micronutrients.

• 1:08:39Adam Skolnick?

  Really?

• 1:08:40Rich Roll?

  Yeah. What's your verdict? As a, as a first time imbiber?

• 1:08:47Adam Skolnick?

  Sweet, nutty, crunchy, definitely more peanut-y.

• 1:08:52Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:52Adam Skolnick?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:08:53Rich Roll?

  It's like a better, it's like a better tasting peanut.

• 1:08:56Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:08:57Rich Roll?

  And that could almost be like a granola. Like you could put almond milk over that and eat it.

• 1:09:02Adam Skolnick?

  Have it for breakfast?

• 1:09:02Rich Roll?

  Like a breakfast.

• 1:09:04Adam Skolnick?

  Or just put it in some vegan yogurt, cocoa yo.

• 1:09:07Rich Roll?

  Yeah, exactly. Exactly.

• 1:09:11Adam Skolnick?

  I love it. I mean, I'm always looking for kind of snacks like that for the trail or for whatever. That's beautiful.

• 1:09:17Rich Roll?

  There you go.

• 1:09:17Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, Darren, thank you. And thank you Instagram algorithm and Zuckerberg.

• 1:09:22Rich Roll?

  I think I might have like a vanity URL, barucas.com/richroll or something like that.

• 1:09:27Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, really?

• 1:09:28Rich Roll?

  But we'll put it in the show notes.

• 1:09:30Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 1:09:31Rich Roll?

  Yeah. And that was, that happened because you were delivered an ad on Instagram.

• 1:09:36Adam Skolnick?

  That happened because I was delivered an ad on Instagram and said, be one of the first people to try this. And which is like, I'm like, I like to be one of the first to try something.

• 1:09:43Rich Roll?

  Right. I found myself vulnerable to Instagram advertising. I bought a couple things.

• 1:09:49Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 1:09:49Rich Roll?

  Based on ads that were delivered to me. But then what I found is that when you buy the thing, like I bought a sweater the other day.

• 1:09:55Adam Skolnick?

  You bought a sweater on Instagram?

• 1:09:56Rich Roll?

  Birdwell Britches sweater, like a card, like a, what are those called? Were they buttoned down the front?

• 1:10:02Adam Skolnick?

  Cardigan.

• 1:10:03Rich Roll?

  Yeah, cardigan.

• 1:10:04Adam Skolnick?

  You don't need a cardigan.

• 1:10:05Rich Roll?

  I liked it though. And I bought it. And then suddenly I got flooded with cardigan ads. And I was like, but I already bought the cardigan. That's where I know AI just isn't where, you know, I'm not worried about AI yet because it should know that I've sat, I've scratched that itch by now.

• 1:10:22Adam Skolnick?

  But.

• 1:10:24Adam Skolnick?

  What time of day, I wonder, are we most vulnerable to Instagram ads where we actually make the purchase?

• 1:10:30Rich Roll?

  I don't know, but I'm sure the algorithm knows that, right, at this point. It's logging, it's logging.

• 1:10:34Adam Skolnick?

  Anyway, Darren, I have not met you, but I think that you should know that your investment in the Instagram ads that your company bought may be paying off.

• 1:10:45Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I'm surprised you guys haven't met, actually.

• 1:10:48Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 1:10:48Rich Roll?

  With all the time you spend.

• 1:10:49Adam Skolnick?

  You gotta bring them out to the reef.

• 1:10:50Rich Roll?

  Point Doom. We'll make that happen.

• 1:10:53Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:54Rich Roll?

  All right, so what else have we got here? Let's do wins of the week.

• 1:10:58Adam Skolnick?

  Wins of the week.

• 1:10:59Rich Roll?

  We got two. One's obvious and we already talked about it.

• 1:11:02Adam Skolnick?

  Well, yeah, but I wanna promote my 2020 Triple Crown.

• 1:11:07Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:11:07Adam Skolnick?

  I had one other thing. Where's my?

• 1:11:10Rich Roll?

  Talking about the Lakers.

• 1:11:12Adam Skolnick?

  Lakers, Dodgers.

• 1:11:13Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:11:14Adam Skolnick?

  If I can find my mask. I have a Dodgers mask. If I can find it, I might have put it aside. No, it's got right here. And Joe Biden. So that's what we were talking about. So my son was born and I thought, what's a better way for Zuma to enter the world than to have the 2020 Triple Crown? Lakers, Dodgers, and old Joe.

• 1:11:40Rich Roll?

  Old Joe. All right, that's your win of the week.

• 1:11:42Adam Skolnick?

  That's my win of the week.

• 1:11:45Rich Roll?

  Awesome. My win of the week should be obvious.

• 1:11:50Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:51Rich Roll?

  It's Chris Nikic, the breath of fresh air we all need right now.

• 1:11:55Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, great story.

• 1:11:56Rich Roll?

  So Chris, for those that don't know, became the first athlete with Down Syndrome to complete an Ironman this past weekend. He completed Ironman Florida in Panama City on Saturday. And it's just so inspirational. This 21-year-old kid who earned a Guinness World Record for finishing this race, which is really historic. He did it 14 minutes prior to the cutoff time, so it was a nail biter all the way down to the end. No previous person with Down Syndrome has ever even attempted an Ironman, so that puts him heads and shoulders above, you know, anybody else in his category. And this is a kid who survived two heart surgeries,

• 1:12:40Rich Roll?

  has been in seven schools, has had all these... Ear canal reconstructions, like it's been a road to get him to this place.

• 1:12:48Adam Skolnick?

  Even walking was like, he learned to walk late, right? Using a walker and all?

• 1:12:53Rich Roll?

  Yeah, exactly. And what's beautiful about it is that it's all founded in this idea of being 1% better every single day. And I think it was his dad or somebody said, you know, like, just try to be 1% better every single day. And he kind of cottoned on to that mantra. And that's become like his sort of thing now. He had a T-shirt, you know, his kit says 1% better and all that kind of stuff. And, you know, in a moment of, you know, despite what's going on with the election, like hearkening back to what we were talking about earlier, like this divided culture that we're in, like this is, this is like the symbol of inclusion and leadership and normalcy that, that we can all get behind. So, congrats to Chris.

• 1:13:35Rich Roll?

  It's so inspirational and it would be great to get him on the podcast. I'm going to see if I can make that happen.

• 1:13:40Adam Skolnick?

  Congratulations, Chris. What an incredible accomplishment, man. I mean, what a beast going full Iron Man. And, you know, sometimes the people that are out there the longest actually are the, are the biggest champions.

• 1:13:53Rich Roll?

  Of course.

• 1:13:54Adam Skolnick?

  To keep fighting.

• 1:13:55Rich Roll?

  It's so much harder.

• 1:13:56Adam Skolnick?

  It's harder, there's more pain that you fought through and.

• 1:13:58Rich Roll?

  The elite guy's out there eight hours and he's out there twice as long.

• 1:14:02Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah. And it's, it's a credible accomplishment. So, congratulations to Chris and his entire family. It's a, that's a tearjerker, that one.

• 1:14:09Rich Roll?

  Hmm, very much so.

• 1:14:11Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:14:12Rich Roll?

  All right. Few teachable moments before we pivot into listener questions.

• 1:14:16Adam Skolnick?

  Sure, a couple of quickies. I'm not going to belabor them too much. Center for Food Safety sent out a press release that a federal court declared genetically engineered salmon to be unlawful. So, the story dates back to a 2016 lawsuit where the FDA had approved a genetically modified salmon to be grown in aquaculture farms, I believe off the East Coast. I have to check that. But, basically. It was engineered to grow twice as fast as the typical Atlantic salmon. It included DNA from the Atlantic salmon, the Pacific king salmon, and Arctic Ocean eel pout, whatever the hell that is.

• 1:14:56Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:14:57Adam Skolnick?

  And so they created this thing to grow faster, obviously to make more money. And the FDA approved it, even though there was real concern about could it leak out. That's what happens with aquaculture. Sometimes fish do get out.

• 1:15:12Rich Roll?

  Right. The idea is that this will be restricted to these farmed fisheries, right? And there's no connection between those and our natural waterways.

• 1:15:22Adam Skolnick?

  Right. But I don't know where these farmed fisheries were, if they were land-based or not. That was the idea. If it was land-based, that's different. But even then, you can't guarantee that a fish will never wind up. And if it's in a river, that's where salmon goes.

• 1:15:36Rich Roll?

  Nature always finds a way.

• 1:15:37Adam Skolnick?

  Nature always finds a way. So it's like the Frankenstein fish was, the lawsuit finally was ruled in favor of Earth Justice and Center for Food Safety. I mean, I personally am in favor of open water aquaculture because the way I see it is a way to reduce the pressure on natural tuna populations and salmon populations. The two most plated fin fish in the world are tuna and salmon. And if we can avoid going in and harvesting those populations, you have a better opportunity for their predators to eat, especially when it comes to salmon. We're talking about orca in the Pacific Northwest and elsewhere. So I'm in favor of open water aquaculture.

• 1:16:20Adam Skolnick?

  I think it's one of Paul Hawken's solutions. It's a drawdown solution for climate change. I am in favor of it, especially when it's paired with kelp growing and oysters and that kind of stuff.

• 1:16:34Rich Roll?

  How do you define aquaculture?

• 1:16:37Adam Skolnick?

  A fish farm, any, any sort of water-based farm, but open water agriculture is different than how they, so a lot of the bad salmon farms that have caused real problems are so close to shore that they end up polluting the entire coastline and, and especially in Chile is a bad example, there are some bad examples there, Scotland too. But in the way they're trying to do them now with making sure there's current that's coming through so the nutrients don't, so you don't just have a bunch of fish poop everywhere, basically. You don't overcrowd the pens. You can do things that are more humane. You can do things that are more natural and that don't negatively affect the ecosystem. So there are examples of

• 1:17:19Adam Skolnick?

  that in Hawaii, Kampanchi farms in Hawaii, Kampanchi farms in Baja. It could be a solution as we get more and more people on planet earth and, and it could be a food solution that is, that is positive going forward. I've written about it before. Isn't that Poki story that we talked about before? But when it comes to genetically modified food, I'm not 100% against it. There was, the Hawaiian papaya was saved with a genetically modified papaya that saved the entire industry back in the day, but that came out of the University of Hawaii. It was not driven by a business model. It was driven by scientists trying to save individual farmers, family farmers on, on the big island.

• 1:18:00Rich Roll?

  Were the genetic modifications made to render it more pestilent resistant?

• 1:18:05Adam Skolnick?

  More resistant to a specific infestation, a specific pest that was just decimating papaya trees on the big island.

• 1:18:14Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:18:14Adam Skolnick?

  And so.

• 1:18:15Rich Roll?

  By, by, by creating a hybrid with like mouse eyeballs or something like that?

• 1:18:21Adam Skolnick?

  I don't think mouse eyeballs were involved, but like I understand why people hate that stuff, but I'm not like, I'm not an all or nothing guy with any solution. But when it comes to creating an animal. I'm hell bent against fucking with DNA to create an animal.

• 1:18:35Rich Roll?

  There's such a hubris built into that. I mean, in this particular case, it had to do, I mean, the District Court for the Northern District of California ruled that the FDA violated core environmental laws in approving this as a violation of the Endangered Species Act. And my understanding is that it tracks back to their inability to establish that it wouldn't cause harm.

• 1:18:57Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:18:57Rich Roll?

  Right? And they're just kind of, the FDA was saying, there's no indication that it's going to cause harm. But that's very different from establishing that it won't.

• 1:19:06Adam Skolnick?

  Right. There's a human hubris.

• 1:19:07Rich Roll?

  And that hubris is just like, it's not a problem. Like, we'll just, like,

• 1:19:10Adam Skolnick?

  We'll deal.

• 1:19:11Rich Roll?

  I mean, if history tells us anything, that it's that these things go sideways in a way that you couldn't predict.

• 1:19:18Adam Skolnick?

  Yes. You should always beware the unintentional consequences of good intentions. Like, that's always the deal. The second one, a rewilding proposition passed in Colorado, Prop 114, to reintroduce wolves to the Rocky Mountains in Colorado. It's very exciting. For those who don't know, wolves were basically all but extinct based on settlers moving to the West in 1920, I think. There was like, between 1915, 1920, there was a real effort to try to kill wolves because they were in danger, they would endanger the livestock and kill the livestock. And so there were no wolves really in the West for a long time.

• 1:19:59Adam Skolnick?

  Yellowstone Park started reintroducing them in the Clinton administration, and it's been such a success. It's created healthier elk herds, it's changed the course of rivers, it's been, and the wolves have really taken, they found wolves, I think, up in Canada, the Arctic regions of Canada, and they brought them down and they did a very real careful job on, I mean, top shelf rewilding project. There's a book called American Wolf, which is absolutely fantastic, that really handicaps that, and it follows some amazing charismatic wolves, and some great scientists. Highly recommend that book. Anyway.

• 1:20:38Adam Skolnick?

  That's been a success. There's pressure now to take the wolves, the American wolf off, the gray wolf off the Endangered Species Act because some ranchers still don't like wolves there because they will come at livestock. But if they do take down livestock, that rancher is compensated. They still want to kill the wolf afterwards. There's a, there's a thing about the wolf.

• 1:20:58Rich Roll?

  The revenge.

• 1:20:58Adam Skolnick?

  The revenge, the revenge impulse. But Colorado doesn't have wolves. Idaho has them now. Montana has them. And Wyoming has them.

• 1:21:07Rich Roll?

  So what is the logistical process of introducing these to Colorado look like?

• 1:21:11Adam Skolnick?

  It's a good question. I think they'll probably, what happened in Wyoming is they, they took a population that was wild and they reintroduced them and had them in a certain area. And eventually they dended up and they had litters and they were monitored and they were chipped and they could be tracked.

• 1:21:27Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:21:28Adam Skolnick?

  And I would imagine the same thing is going to happen. The reason there's 6,000 wolves now, started in Wyoming and they're in Montana and they're in, they're in Idaho, they're in, somewhere in Utah. That's all, a lot of that is because, not all, but a lot of that is because of those, the success of the Yellowstone project. Because, you know, wolves have their territories. And so Colorado is going to have them. And, and the point is, is that having an apex predator in the vicinity is good for the ecosystem. It's scientifically proven, it's scientifically sound. And, and I think that's the, the goal here is to reintroduce the apex predator.

• 1:22:04Rich Roll?

  Right. That's cool.

• 1:22:05Adam Skolnick?

  It's cool.

• 1:22:06Rich Roll?

  It's really cool. Have you been to Wolf Connection out here?

• 1:22:10Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 1:22:10Rich Roll?

  Do you know about this place?

• 1:22:11Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 1:22:12Rich Roll?

  It's a wolf sanctuary. It's maybe hour and a half, two hours outside of town, like kind of on the way to Vegas.

• 1:22:19Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 1:22:19Rich Roll?

  I can't remember exactly where it was, where it is. But it's this organization, it's mainly this one dude. I can't remember his name, but he's got all these wolves and he takes care of them. And he takes them in when they, I don't know what the process for that is. And he's got this like kind of educational arm where they do tours and Mathis, our daughter, many years ago, she was like obsessed with wolves and we did her birthday party there and we took all these kids there and spent this entire day with the wolves and it was unbelievable.

• 1:22:50Adam Skolnick?

  Is it like a recovery project?

• 1:22:51Rich Roll?

  I know Rogan's like a fan, he's been out there a couple of times, he's posted about

• 1:22:55Adam Skolnick?

  it. Is it like a rescue for people that had wolves and couldn't handle them or something?

• 1:22:58Rich Roll?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, some of it is that, some of it is that.

• 1:23:01Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, that's cool.

• 1:23:02Rich Roll?

  But it's, it's kind of magnificent and if you enjoyed that book, which I haven't read yet, I'm gonna check out. If that spoke to you, you would, you would, I'm sure, enjoy checking that out as somebody who just did an animal tracking workshop.

• 1:23:16Adam Skolnick?

  I did.

• 1:23:17Rich Roll?

  What?

• 1:23:18Adam Skolnick?

  I did.

• 1:23:19Rich Roll?

  What is that? You come in today and you're like, I did this thing, I was like, don't tell me anything more, just wait until the podcast, because I need to hear about this.

• 1:23:26Adam Skolnick?

  So Saturday morning, I left Santa Monica at a quarter to six in the morning and drove to the Kuyama Valley, which is in this Los Padres, behind Ojai, in the mountain valley there. I came through from the five, so I actually drove through 30 mile blowing snowstorm.

• 1:23:42Rich Roll?

  Wow.

• 1:23:43Adam Skolnick?

  Because we got some weather here and by the time I got there, Biden had been declared, it was like very metaphorical, but the reason I was out there was to, to take this workshop, it actually is an evaluation too. And so these experts in animal tracking, that is a, this specific tradition of animal tracking, which I had no idea until I showed up there, it connects to the bushmen in South Africa Botswana area and it's their kind of, it's, it's, it's their oral tradition put on paper by a South African naturalist that had done that years and years ago and now it's worldwide and there's these subculture of people that go out and hang out and have

• 1:24:24Adam Skolnick?

  what they call dirt time, where they look at tracks, circle them and try to decide what animal it is, what foot it is, like what, where they were going, what the gate was and try to really analyze what's happening. And this one area in Ventura County. There's a perennial stream that runs through in a valley and it's incredible place for tracks and we saw mountain lion, bear, black bear track, lot of bobcat, great horned owl, red tail hawk, you know, cotton tail, jack rabbit. I mean, you like 16 mammal species, 18 bird species, something like that, all in this one area. And I did it for a project

• 1:25:05Adam Skolnick?

  I'm working on that includes tracking, which I'd never done before. But you know, for me, a lot of my recreation is, is if it's not running, it's swimming and often it's swimming and diving and I love looking at animals underwater. And so this was an opportunity to kind of do that on land. And you know, big fan of doing that. It was, it was cool. It was, it was, it was a lot of fun. I turned my ankle at one stage and fell in the river, but let's not talk about that. I'm on the DL for about a week or two.

• 1:25:34Rich Roll?

  Let's talk about only that.

• 1:25:37Adam Skolnick?

  I was so mad. I'm like, damn it. I was just getting back in shape.

• 1:25:40Rich Roll?

  The motivation is in part because it's, it's, it's related to an article that you're writing or something that you're researching right now?

• 1:25:48Adam Skolnick?

  It's, it's related to the novel I've been working on. And so I have already written a draft of it. I'm in the second draft now, but I never, there's char, there's a character in it that is a tracker. And, and like now I'm in, I'm trying to meet, you know, beef up some of the finer points now.

• 1:26:05Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:26:05Adam Skolnick?

  The, the big.

• 1:26:06Rich Roll?

  Did April go with you?

• 1:26:08Adam Skolnick?

  No, because you know, we had the kid, we have Zuma. So no, she stayed home. She would have loved it. I mean, it was cold. It was like, it was like rainy and sleety and 39 degrees the whole day. But I, I really enjoyed it. What was scary about it was I get there, I think I'm going to a workshop that becomes an evaluation for people who want a certificate. And it turns out like, it's really, the whole thing is a test. The way they do the teaching is they, they line up, say a half a dozen of these tracks, they find them and they circle them and they ask you a bunch of questions. Then you write down your answers in your notebook and then they go back through and explain what it is and why it's, why you, you know, what to look for. So for someone like me, who literally

• 1:26:49Adam Skolnick?

  didn't study at all and has no idea what they're doing, it was like, right away, I'm like.

• 1:26:54Rich Roll?

  What is this?

• 1:26:57Rich Roll?

  Is that Bigfoot?

• 1:26:58Adam Skolnick?

  It was, it was a human foot. I got that one right. I got like 50% right.

• 1:27:03Rich Roll?

  What was the most unusual thing that you learned?

• 1:27:09Adam Skolnick?

  Cat, felines, their front paws are more compact, their back paws are more elongated. And if you take your thumb out of the equation, a feline track will be asymmetrical. So the second pad will be kind of up. It'll be just like our hands. So if you take your thumb out of the equation, that's how a feline's pads will be. Whereas dogs won't have that asymmetry.

• 1:27:38Rich Roll?

  And that's how you distinguish feline from canine?

• 1:27:41Adam Skolnick?

  Canine. And canines, you'll, you might have a little bit of claw. You can see a little claw and it's very rare you'll see that with feline.

• 1:27:48Rich Roll?

  Cause they retract their claws.

• 1:27:50Adam Skolnick?

  Retract their claws. And then birds, you know, there's like a K. I think the talon for, for an owl is kind of more K shaped. It's not the classic bird.

• 1:28:02Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:28:03Adam Skolnick?

  Foot. So not all birds have that kind of classic foot. And so learning that was interesting. Yeah. I already knew what rabbit poop looked like. So that wasn't new.

• 1:28:13Rich Roll?

  Amazing, man. Very cool.

• 1:28:15Adam Skolnick?

  It was fun.

• 1:28:16Rich Roll?

  All right. So we are on to listener questions.

• 1:28:20Adam Skolnick?

  Listener questions. Let's do it.

• 1:28:21Rich Roll?

  Let's do it.

• 1:28:22Adam Skolnick?

  What are we going first? Oh, Frank. I see you Frank. Frank from SoCal. All right.

• 1:28:29Speaker 02

  Howdy, Rich. Howdy, Adam. Hope you guys are doing well. I'm Frank and I'm calling from Southern California.

• 1:28:37Speaker 02

  My question is for both of you. Well, first of all, before I get into that, congratulations, by the way. I think what you guys are doing is such a benefit and I'm so thankful that I have this as a resource. I think it's incredibly valuable to most people to have this kind of guidance available to them. And podcasts in general has just been a great resource for me. My question is, I find myself struggling sometimes. I have a thirst and a desire for self-improvement. It leads me down a lot of different rabbit holes. Many of them result in a beneficial change and it's tangible in my life and I

• 1:29:17Speaker 02

  I value that, but sometimes I find that the noise it creates distracts me almost to the point where it's a detriment that I feel like I get easily caught up in some of the tribal battles that are going on in the environment that I'm exploring and and I almost have to distance myself from it so that I don't get caught up in the in the fray. And one of the things that I've done as a result of that is I've deleted some of my social media accounts, Instagram and Facebook in particular, so that I am not

• 1:29:57Speaker 02

  distracted throughout the day with these thoughts that tend to kind of take me off my path and lead me someplace that isn't that healthy for me. So my question is, Rich, someone who's dealing with this on a daily basis, do you have any techniques that you utilize to kind of keep you focused on your journey or your exploration or whatever it is that you're you're trying to achieve without getting caught up in the side play and the battles, especially, you know, given the election, you know, we're all being inundated with ads and all of this negativity and I really want to protect myself from that.

• 1:30:42Speaker 02

  And I'd really appreciate hearing your thoughts on that.

• 1:30:46Rich Roll?

  Hmm. Thank you, Frank. Not only is that a great question, I think it's something that we're all grappling with. I feel like you answered your own question in part, like you've already enacted some roadblocks between you and whatever it is that's triggering you. And I think that's a great start. From my own perspective, you know, I try to pay attention to

• 1:31:15Rich Roll?

  When I stumble across something and I have an emotional reaction to it, like that's usually a pretty good indication that that's going to lead to me losing a little self-control over how I'm digesting information. And my overall rule, and I wrote about this in that Esquire piece, is to try to control the controllables, let go of things that you don't have control over, and understanding that not every issue needs to be your issue, just because it is an issue and it is out there. And as much as I applaud your curiosity and your quest for knowledge and understanding

• 1:31:56Rich Roll?

  that's leading you down these rabbit holes, it's important to self-regulate around that and to erect healthy boundaries. And that requires a little bit of self-inquiry to understand when it is that it becomes unhealthy, because part of it, of course, like intellectual investigation is part of what's being human, and I think there's something laudable about that, of course. But once it tips into you getting triggered in a certain way, and whether that means you're engaging with social media, you know, and getting involved in arguments, I don't know, you were a little vague about that, obviously that's, you know, gonna throw you off kilter. And if you find yourself powerless to erect those healthy boundaries, say like, oh, these

• 1:32:41Rich Roll?

  are the hours that I use my phone and these are the ones that I don't, I've removed these apps from my phone, I've grayscale'd it, or all these other kind of prophylactic things that we can do to try to protect ourselves a little bit, that, you know, short of that, like you've gotta just put it aside. And there are certain people that go to great lengths because they feel so powerless around this. Like, I know people that have lock boxes in their houses that have timers on them, and they can put their phone, or their iPad, or their computer in there, and put a timer on it, and you're just unable to access it for

• 1:33:16Adam Skolnick?

  Really?

• 1:33:16Rich Roll?

  A set period of time. Like, I know people that do that. There's also all kinds of apps out there. That will limit your screen time and like lock your phone down for set periods of time and that way it makes it impossible for you to be your own worst enemy.

• 1:33:31Adam Skolnick?

  I like that.

• 1:33:32Rich Roll?

  There's one called Focus Lock.

• 1:33:33Adam Skolnick?

  I'm gonna try that.

• 1:33:34Rich Roll?

  And basically it will hide all your downloaded apps for a certain set period of time and then when that time lapses, they appear like magic. You know, I think there's a variety of apps out there like that. So those would be, you know, kind of the last ditch efforts when you just feel like things are totally out of control. But I think from an internal point of view, it's about, you know, kind of calibrating yourself so that you don't need to use those things, right? Like, so if you're paying attention, if you're interconnected enough, you can feel when it doesn't feel right and you have to have the wherewithal to say, this is not in service to me and to put it aside.

• 1:34:17Rich Roll?

  A book that I would recommend that you read is Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport. He was a guest on the podcast. We went into this subject at length and basically the thesis of which is we have to take control over our digital lives because when we're not, and most people aren't, they are controlling us. And it's becoming increasingly more and more difficult to erect that distance between ourselves and that device that is so all powerful. If you watch the movie Social Dilemma, you understand this very well. And it's not, you know, it's not necessarily our fault. Like, these things are designed to, you know, activate that addictive dopamine response

• 1:35:01Rich Roll?

  and render us powerless from an addiction perspective. So it's not about self-flagellation or beating yourself up because you find yourself mired in these battles that you don't want to be in, but it is incumbent upon you to take responsibility and to be in control of them rather than allowing them to control you. So that's the most that I could say in the most general terms about how to do this. I think because, you know, this is this peak election moment, we feel like we all have to be so deeply engaged in every nuance of the news cycle and to step away is to experience FOMO, like, oh, my God, the world's happening and I don't know what's going on. But in truth,

• 1:35:45Rich Roll?

  These things are going to play out whether you're engaged with them or not.

• 1:35:48Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:35:48Rich Roll?

  And to understand how little control you have over them, to exert the control that you can, of course, do that, but to separate yourself from the results of that and making sure that you're taking care of yourself, because you can't be the advocate, or the servant, or the seeker that you aspire to be if you're a victim of, you know, this kind of scrolling culture that we're in.

• 1:36:13Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, and we all are victims of it to a certain degree.

• 1:36:17Rich Roll?

  Yeah, and I relate to this deeply, like, this is a war that I wage with myself every single day.

• 1:36:21Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, but how do you engage, engaging in the battles is a different thing, and I seldom engage in those battles.

• 1:36:27Rich Roll?

  I never do that.

• 1:36:27Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, because, because I keep it real simple. From my perspective, it's like, I might scroll and check it out, but I don't let it dictate my action.

• 1:36:38Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:36:39Adam Skolnick?

  And so it doesn't become that distraction for me, really.

• 1:36:42Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:36:43Adam Skolnick?

  Just try to keep it as simple and keep it local and keep the focus there, because ultimately, whoever wins any election is not going to be the reason your life is the way your life is.

• 1:36:55Rich Roll?

  I've just found over time that getting involved in digital squabbles not only completely throws me off my kilter.

• 1:37:03Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:37:04Rich Roll?

  It's just, it's not productive.

• 1:37:05Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:37:06Rich Roll?

  You know, it rarely results in some meeting of the minds between two people.

• 1:37:11Adam Skolnick?

  Exactly.

• 1:37:11Rich Roll?

  But it does require discipline, like, I'll come across a comment or somebody saying something about me that's just so utterly false and rife with, you know, misinformation about me, and it takes everything in my power to just not engage with that person. But I've learned over time that not only does that, like, really just ramp up my, you know, my, I become, I just get into this very heightened emotional state and I become very reactive, and that person is just seeking attention. Like, I'm basically playing into their, their goal, which is to get me to engage, to get me to, you know, get all activated over something. And ultimately, there's no winner in any of that, and you end up being the one who suffers the most.

• 1:37:56Adam Skolnick?

  You're the depleted one.

• 1:37:57Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:37:57Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, I'm with you. Great question, and thanks for the positive vibes, Frank. All right, next one. I feel like this one is one you can relate to as well, Rich.

• 1:38:10Speaker 03

  Hey, Rich. Hey, Adam. Thank you both so much for all the work you do. My name's Daven. I'm 24 years old and I'm from South Florida. Over the last two years, I felt this passion growing inside of me for conservation and environmental protection, and I really enjoy photography and being out in nature. Problem is, I'm a third-year law student who's on the brink of starting his lifelong career. And the truth is, I'm not sure that practicing law is what I want to do. Every day I go into the office and I feel like my creative spirit is being crushed. I feel as though I'm at an inflection point in my life, and that I need to decide where exactly I want to go in my career. I've been working so hard for this degree for seven years now, but also, I'm pretty sure that I want to

• 1:38:54Speaker 03

  pursue something that embraces my passions and my creative spirit. So my question is, how do you rationalize to yourself that taking that first step into the unknown is what is truly good for you? That despite leaving what you've worked so hard for all your life, everything is going to be okay? Thank you guys so much for listening and answering questions. I really appreciate you guys.

• 1:39:16Rich Roll?

  All right, awesome. Is it Gavin or Daven?

• 1:39:18Adam Skolnick?

  I've listened to it a few times and I keep thinking it's Daven.

• 1:39:21Rich Roll?

  All right. What's up, Daven? If it's Gavin, I apologize. I'll say, what's up, Gavin?

• 1:39:26Adam Skolnick?

  Exactly.

• 1:39:27Rich Roll?

  Thank you for your question. I feel highly qualified to answer this one.

• 1:39:33Adam Skolnick?

  This one's right up your alley.

• 1:39:34Rich Roll?

  As a former lawyer myself, I've often thought, over the years, that I should put together a lecture series and take it across America to visit all the law schools and deliver a keynote on the realities of what it actually, what's actually entailed in being a lawyer, and the difference between your experience in law school versus what it's like when you're in the practicing world. I wish that I had seen a lecture like that when I was in law school. I might have saved myself a decade, but we're neither here nor there with that. The first thing I would say is, you know, I'm compassionate to your dilemma because I have lived in that very place. The good news is, you're only 24 years old. You've got your entire life ahead of you.

• 1:40:20Rich Roll?

  And you have the opportunity to be patient with all of this. I think that at this point, you're in your third year of law school. You should see your way through law school. I don't think you should drop out of law school like you're almost done at this point. You should finish your law degree because you're so close. And you don't have to practice if you don't want to practice. You know, even though I found the practice of law, you know, not to my liking and I felt ill-suited to it, I don't regret going to law school. Like, law school taught me a lot. It taught me a manner of thinking, a way of thinking. It taught me how to write clearly and argue a point. And there's a lot to be said for that.

• 1:40:59Rich Roll?

  And I think that my law degree comes into play today as a podcaster and as a writer and somebody who writes books and is trying to, you know, articulate ideas for the world. Like, I credit my law school training and experience as a benefit to all of that, even though, you know, I spent a lot of years chasing a career that ultimately was not in service to, you know, who I wanted to be in the world. So I think you can begin, first and foremost, by perhaps expanding the idea of what a law degree can do for you and what it can be. It doesn't mean that you have to just go work in a law firm. You know, perhaps your creativity could be sated by pursuing, you know, a legal career

• 1:41:42Rich Roll?

  in conservation advocacy or in environmental protection or in environmental law. God knows, you know, we need some passionate, young, good lawyers who are well-versed in how to best protect our environment. And maybe you could find, you know, I'm sure you've probably already thought about this, but a way of merging that passion with your training could be something to consider. And, you know, that aside, if that's not doing it for you and you really do want to...

• 1:42:13Rich Roll?

  You know, seek out something that's more personally satisfying outside of the law altogether. I think it's okay to, it sounds like you're already employed because you're saying you're going into the office. So maybe you're working while you're in law school to, um, to learn as much as you can in the situation where you are right now. And I've said this before on the podcast, but to, to live as leanly as possible. Like, I don't know if you've incurred any debt for law school. If you haven't, good for you. If you have, try to pay that debt off as soon as possible. Because the leaner that you can live, the more, uh, opportunities you can make yourself available for.

• 1:42:53Rich Roll?

  Like, you don't want to get caught up in a situation where you're in service to, uh, you know, a certain kind of lifestyle that is befitting like a young lawyer because you're trying to keep up with the Joneses. So you're leasing a certain car or living in a, you know, posh apartment, all those kinds of things. To the extent that you could cut all of that out and, uh, put yourself in a position where at any moment you could just pull the trigger and get out. Like, that's the best advice that I could give you. And then again, being patient with yourself, like you don't, it's okay that you can't see your way through this right now. So I would go easy on yourself and, you know, relinquish that pressure that you're shouldering,

• 1:43:37Rich Roll?

  that you have to have it all figured out right now. You're 24. I didn't figure things out until I was 40. Now, Lord knows that took too long, but, you know, I think it's okay to be in this, you know, questioning inquisitive phase that you're in right now and just continue to ask yourself those questions. And when you feel an impulse that's pulling you in a certain direction, to say yes to that and to investigate that. And it, and indulge that, like, you know, I think, you know, to the extent that you're pulled towards the environment or photography or whatever it is, like even though. You're in law school and perhaps you're practicing on some level, like carve out the

• 1:44:16Rich Roll?

  time to continue to fertilize that kernel, that interest, because you never know where those things are going to lead you. So whether it's a side hustle, or a hobby, or just something that you've got on the back burner, stay in contact with that, because you never know where those things are going to lead. And to keep your options open, right, to pay attention to what the world is throwing in your direction, so that you can be open and flexible, and able to say yes to certain things when they come in your direction.

• 1:44:49Adam Skolnick?

  Really well said. The earth definitely needs a good lawyer. I will say that. And there's interesting philosophy that's kind of happening in law, in international law, where ecosystems have a right to exist. There's like this new kind of area of the law that's being explored. And so that's interesting to me. Like, you know, you can't just log a forest without the forest approval kind of idea. And it's very out there and abstract, but it's actually taking root. Like, a natural resource has its own right to live, its own right to survive. And there are lawyers working on that kind of interesting, intricate legal philosophy.

• 1:45:27Rich Roll?

  Like in the way that a corporation is given personhood, that a forest could be given personhood?

• 1:45:32Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, to combat that.

• 1:45:33Rich Roll?

  That's super interesting.

• 1:45:34Adam Skolnick?

  Interesting. So there's like, there's like a trip, there's some stuff in there. And, you know, the Natural Resources Defense Council is a wonderful organization, and what they do is litigate cases in favor of earth and defending the environment. Earth Justice is another one. There's places that need lawyers. But that doesn't mean you have to be a lawyer. And the only thing I'd add is just reiterate what Rich has already said. I mean, I think of the Andy DeFranco song, where she said, "Generally, my generation wouldn't be caught dead working for the man. And generally, I agree with them. Trouble is, you got to have an alternate plan." And, you know, when I first decided to become

• 1:46:14Adam Skolnick?

  a writer, I didn't make a living as a journalist, or as a screenwriter, or any of that. First, I was writing grants to make a living. So you have to have that plan. You have to figure out what you're going to get into, and how you're going to pay those bills and keep the lights on. But that, even if you have to do that, and maybe law, that's You can never regret the steps you took because they're gonna, you're gonna use that training at some point. And there's something that you are gonna be able to use from law school, from this training, from this last seven years of working so hard, that's gonna help you keep the lights on until you figure out where you're going next.

• 1:46:47Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:46:48Adam Skolnick?

  But it sounds to me like you've already made your decision. To me, it sounds that way. And you just are looking for the permission. And I give you the permission to, like, we both do, to take a step into, into the direction of your dreams. Do it. You won't regret it. And, and, but it won't be, it won't be easy necessarily.

• 1:47:07Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:47:08Adam Skolnick?

  You know, I had a whole eviction notice phase, you know, like, it's not always easy. And, and sometimes you're gonna feel like you made the wrong decision, if, if it goes the way mine went. I mean, I certainly, I felt that way at times. But, so you just know that, going in.

• 1:47:22Rich Roll?

  Yeah. I, I, I don't think that there will be regret at taking that leap into the unknown.

• 1:47:29Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 1:47:30Rich Roll?

  But I think there perhaps will be regret if you don't. And if there's anything that I can tell a young 24-year-old, as somebody who's now 54, now's the time.

• 1:47:43Adam Skolnick?

  Do it.

• 1:47:44Rich Roll?

  Like, when you're 24, you have so little responsibility in the world compared to what it's gonna look like later. So if there's ever a time where you're liberated enough to take risks, 24 is the time to do it.

• 1:47:59Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:48:00Rich Roll?

  And seize that opportunity. And like Adam said, that doesn't mean that it's gonna all unfold in front of you, and that it's gonna be easy. It may be the hardest thing that you ever do, and you're gonna have to pivot 20 more times. But it does sound like you've already decided this is what you wanna do, and you're using the, the word, how do you rationalize it? I wouldn't, I think that's the wrong word. I think justify, or permit might be a better word to use.

• 1:48:27Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:48:29Rich Roll?

  So I give you permission to do it.

• 1:48:31Adam Skolnick?

  Do it, man.

• 1:48:32Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:48:32Adam Skolnick?

  And let us know how it goes.

• 1:48:34Rich Roll?

  But finish law school.

• 1:48:35Adam Skolnick?

  Definitely finish law school. You don't quit something.

• 1:48:37Rich Roll?

  Don't pull the ripcord on law school when you're in your third year.

• 1:48:40Adam Skolnick?

  No, I mean, like, like I said, like, I had to, I had to stay in the job I was doing for a period of time to get out. There's a transition period. It doesn't have to be tomorrow that you stop going to that office.

• 1:48:51Rich Roll?

  I was still practicing law when I was writing Finding Ultra.

• 1:48:54Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:48:55Rich Roll?

  You know, I, you know, that idea.

• 1:48:57Adam Skolnick?

  That's in the book, I believe.

• 1:48:58Rich Roll?

  It's, it's, there's a tension between, and we can close with this idea, like, there's this tension between wanting to be responsible. So you're straddling two worlds, right? Like, you have, you have your foot in the new thing and you're still holding on to the old thing. Sometimes that's the responsible choice because you got bills to pay. But at the same time, on an energetic level, there's, there's something about that that inhibits the growth. Because as long as you're holding on to the other thing because you're afraid to let go, because you're uncertain about what the future might look like or what it'll bring, you're actually preventing yourself from really embracing that opportunity. So at some point, you do have to let go and not be straddling, you know, two different

• 1:49:41Rich Roll?

  worlds at the same time. But that's not to say that I'm giving you permission to be irresponsible in that regard. Like, there's, timing is important with these things.

• 1:49:50Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, no, I totally agree. And, and for me, the timing just becomes, it just like happened, like, that other work just stopped coming, you know, and like, that, that could happen. So it's, it's, it's, you know, it's cool is that you're 24 and that it's all out there for you. And it's, it's very exciting time. So try to also enjoy it, even though it's stressful.

• 1:50:08Rich Roll?

  Cool.

• 1:50:09Adam Skolnick?

  All right. One last one. We're going to Joyzy.

• 1:50:13Speaker 04

  Hi, Rich and Adam. This is Michelle. I live in New Jersey. I'm a mom. I'm also a vegetarian who's trying really hard to be vegan. And I'm excited to try the Shrimu cheeses that I just subscribed to. My question is, did you find your relationship strained, even foreign, or just a lot more work when you had young children? I'm a mom to a one year old boy and a three year old girl. I work full time and my husband cares for our children. We are both amazing, caring, loving, present parents.

• 1:50:44Speaker 04

  But we are really struggling to find time for each other to even show our love to each other. We honestly don't even find any time to talk to each other anymore. I hope you and Adam can share some advice on how to keep connected during this really difficult time. This also really magical time, having two babies that need our attention and care 24/7. I know this time is temporary and our kids will get older, but our marriage really needs help now. I hope this plays on the air and I look forward to hearing your advice. Thanks so much.

• 1:51:18Rich Roll?

  Thank you, Michelle. I can hear the strain and the pain in your voice. And you know, to kind of speak to the first thing you said, I mean, you opened this question by asking if my relationship or Adam's relationship has been strained or more work when you had young children. And it's like, of course, of course it is. I don't know anybody who, you know, wouldn't agree with that, right? Like, how's it going for you, Adam? You've got a baby right now.

• 1:51:49Adam Skolnick?

  We got into it this morning, you know, like, like over something minor. Part of it is the exhaustion, right? And the tension from just being overtired and overworked. But for the most part, you know, with us, it's going, it's again, the keep it simple formula. But we don't have to. And after listening to this call, I don't think we're going to have a second child.

• 1:52:10Rich Roll?

  Yeah, well, you think when you have the second, that it will be double the amount of work, but it's actually exponentially more.

• 1:52:17Adam Skolnick?

  Right, I've heard that.

• 1:52:18Rich Roll?

  It's not a linear equation. And it's quite overwhelming. Like, my heart goes out to you. I empathize with the situation that you're in. It's, it's a super hard thing to do. And it appears that your relationship is at an inflection point, like this tipping point, where you can feel it slipping away. And what's tricky about all of this is that when you have young children, it feels indulgent to exercise any self-care whatsoever, because it's all about the kids. And because it's such a heightened experience, it's very easy to lose sight of checking in with yourself, let alone checking in with your partner.

• 1:53:02Rich Roll?

  But I don't have to tell you that the well-being of yourself and your relationship is absolutely critical to the welfare of these young humans that you're trying to raise. And as indulgent as it may strike you, you've got to carve out time to tend to yourself and to tend to your relationship. And it may feel like that's impossible because there is so little time, but it's really a function of priorities. And when you have babies, life is happening to you more than you're kind of in control of your life. And without kind of putting your foot down and erecting, you know, that like sort of

• 1:53:46Rich Roll?

  setting in motion that priority, erect, you know, creating that priority for yourselves, it's never gonna happen. So I think it begins with communication, acknowledging that the relationship is faltering in some regard, and having a conversation with your partner about how to get back on track. I think that's the first step. And then saying like every day, or you know, today at five, or whenever it is that you can work it out, that you're gonna sit down and it's not gonna be about the kids, it's gonna be about, hey, how are you doing? Like, how are you feeling? Like, how can I help you? How can I be, make your life a little bit easier? How can I be in service to what you're trying to do? And to develop some mutuality around that.

• 1:54:29Rich Roll?

  Because without that, it's never gonna happen. Like, relationships so easily can become transactional in this regard, and it's just about logistics, and it's just about the kids. And then you're gonna wake up one day and realize you're not in love anymore. And that's not because something actively occurred that divided you, it's, it's really like a war of attrition, right?

• 1:54:53Adam Skolnick?

  What do you mean by transactional?

• 1:54:55Rich Roll?

  Transactional in the sense that every conversation and interaction that you have with your partner is about the calendar, and like, who's taking the kid there, and you know, who, who has to go to the store, and, you know, running the, running the, the household, essentially.

• 1:55:09Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 1:55:10Rich Roll?

  And you think that you're engaged with your partner, but you're not, because what you're overlooking is the most important thing, which is how you're connecting with each other.

• 1:55:19Adam Skolnick?

  You think you're communicating as you're talking, but you're not actually communicating.

• 1:55:21Rich Roll?

  Yeah, and that, you know, maybe it's impossible for you to have a date night, like, I don't know. The particulars of your circumstances, but you can't tell me that you don't have 10 or 15 minutes to focus on your relationship.

• 1:55:33Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:55:34Rich Roll?

  You know, on the daily. And I think it's critical. Like, I've said this before also, but we have this idea that our lives are static. You know, when I was in, when I was in rehab, a counselor said to me, every thought that you entertain, every word that comes out of your mouth, every behavior that you engage in is either moving you towards a drink or away from a drink. And I think that's super wise advice that's applicable across the board to life, right? Like, we think we're in a static situation. I'm married to this person, I'll always be married to this person. Or, I do a podcast, so I'm just gonna do this podcast until I die. Like, we're always in flux.

• 1:56:14Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:56:14Rich Roll?

  And things are either growing, or they're regressing, right? And the more you can kind of be consciously aware that that static notion is a fallacy, it's an illusion, the more I think you'll be motivated to pay attention to your relationship, to understand that, you know, without that attention, that it's gonna wither. You know, it just, it just will. And you've gotta have the wherewithal, even when you're exhausted and overwhelmed, to make it a priority. So, again, I don't think it's, I think it's less a time management thing and more of a priority thing. If it's important to you, and it sounds like it is, or you wouldn't be asking this question, then you can find the time to do it.

• 1:56:59Rich Roll?

  And you can impress upon your partner how crucial it is at the same time, and hopefully, you know, he feels the same.

• 1:57:06Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah. I don't feel as qualified to answer this, since I'm in the, in the foxhole right now.

• 1:57:12Rich Roll?

  I think that makes you, I think that makes you more qualified.

• 1:57:15Adam Skolnick?

  Maybe it does. But I will say that I feel for you, and I appreciate the question. And, you know, we communicate all the time about, as much as possible about how we're feeling, just to, this morning, we did, but sometimes we don't. Sometimes we miss it. Sometimes...

• 1:57:36Adam Skolnick?

  Sometimes it's impossible to be an amazing parent all the time and be fully present all the time. Right. And that's cool, too. It sounds like there's a pressure there around that. And I try not to put that pressure on myself because I know that I'm... I just try to be as positive and happy and present with Zuma, but I'm not trying to reach a certain standard outside of myself. It sounds like you have high standards for parenting, which is awesome. Your kids are going to benefit from that. But I wouldn't want you to put such a high standard on it that you guys are both so worried about that, that you're missing just the enjoyment of being.

• 1:58:20Adam Skolnick?

  And I think one thing we're doing well right now, we're doing a lot of things well, but one thing that we're doing well is we're not putting a lot of pressure on things. And if something's going on with Zuma, we're not stressing out so hard on it. And the first couple of days notwithstanding, that's a very stressful kind of time. You've got to learn how to roll with the trivialities and not turn them into major crises. Right. We try not to turn anything into a major crisis. But I try to do that in general with my life, anyway. It's something that I've just learned, is keep it calm. And when it comes to real-life issues like this, I'm real good in a crisis because of that.

• 1:59:02Adam Skolnick?

  And so try not to make it worse than it is. Because maybe the answer to this is actually simpler than you think. Maybe it's not as bad as you think it is. Maybe it's just that you're not communicating as well as you want, or he's not up for the communication. And you're exhausted. And you're exhausted. And so maybe the answer to this is a simple thing and a positive thing, and it won't be a really hard thing to decode. And I would keep that in mind, because there is something to the placebo effect of mindset and to think, you know what? Our marriage might need help right now, but it's we're not in a critical phase.

• 1:59:44Adam Skolnick?

  We're just I'm seeing it going in a certain direction and it's time to kind of right the ship and to take it lightly. And I would I think I think taking it lightly in both the way you parent and and the way you work with one another could be something that I would offer as could be a positive solution. But again, I'm not trying to speak from any real knowledge base, other than just my experience the last 10 weeks. So take it or leave it, please. But yeah, that's my feeling on it.

• 2:00:14Rich Roll?

  Well, I think that if you feel like it's beginning to falter, that interrupting that flow with some kind of, you know, prophylactic solution is super important.

• 2:00:25Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 2:00:25Rich Roll?

  You know, and I think that if that means just opening the channels of communication, or perhaps that means going to therapy. Like, I think everybody should go to therapy and everybody should go to therapy before they're in a problem.

• 2:00:38Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 2:00:39Rich Roll?

  You know, this is how you learn how to communicate effectively and learn how to, you know, understand the signals of your partners. Like, you know, there's so many things that can be mined from that experience. And, you know, it doesn't have to be, you know, stigmatized and it doesn't have to be, you know, because you're in a crisis.

• 2:00:59Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 2:00:59Rich Roll?

  You know, it's just they're just tools for how to better live together. And, you know, in closing, I would say it's important to understand that, like, this is temporary, like, you're in a very heightened situation and it will get easier. But to not use that idea that it's temporary as an excuse to put off dealing with whatever's going on in your relationship. Like, I think that's sort of a an instinct, like, well, this is really hard right now. I know our relationship isn't isn't going great, but let's just get through this.

• 2:01:31Adam Skolnick?

  No, yeah.

• 2:01:32Rich Roll?

  And then we'll deal with the relationship. I think that's misguided.

• 2:01:34Adam Skolnick?

  No, if you know.

• 2:01:35Rich Roll?

  Because when you get to that point, it may be, you know, in a in a far worse situation and God forbid, beyond the, you know, that point of no repair.

• 2:01:43Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, if you know it needs to be addressed, then by all means, address it.

• 2:01:46Rich Roll?

  It has to be it has to be a priority now. And when in doubt, if all else fails, you can start a podcast with your partner and that will force you to talk to each other.

• 2:01:55Adam Skolnick?

  There you go. That sounds very healthy.

• 2:01:56Rich Roll?

  This is how Julie and I have our deepest conversations.

• 2:01:59Adam Skolnick?

  That sounds very healthy. You know, I I thought I was in therapy right now. Like, twice a month, I come to therapy. It's the Rich Roll Podcast.

• 2:02:10Rich Roll?

  I don't go that hard on you.

• 2:02:12Adam Skolnick?

  No, no, it feels good to talk to you.

• 2:02:15Rich Roll?

  On that note, let's land the plane.

• 2:02:18Adam Skolnick?

  Is your therapist hard on you?

• 2:02:20Rich Roll?

  Well, I do like my, I do, I do group therapy now with a bunch of dudes and, and a therapist. And, you know, I get feedback like I come in and I say, here's what I'm doing and like, isn't this great? And they're like, really? Like, you know, like, did you think about this? And I'm like, no, I never thought about that. Like, I get called out on my bullshit.

• 2:02:40Adam Skolnick?

  That's interesting.

• 2:02:40Rich Roll?

  And that happens to me in, in, in 12 step also.

• 2:02:43Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 2:02:44Rich Roll?

  But it's very direct in this therapy group because we just share about what we're dealing with in our lives and as parents and as professionals or what, you know, what we need feedback on. And what's constantly impressed upon me is the extent to which I'm unaware of my blind spots, which is why you go, right?

• 2:03:04Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 2:03:05Rich Roll?

  Like, I don't want to go and get pat on the back. I want to go and, you know, let people know what I'm going through and have them point out to me what I'm not seeing. And I think that's the real value. It's one of the, you know, real values in it.

• 2:03:19Adam Skolnick?

  Very interesting. I want to hear about that sometime. But I would also offer one last thing. Have you seen Working Moms on Netflix? If you've not seen Working Moms on Netflix, it's hilarious, female-driven show created by Catherine Reitman, who's connected, you know, the, the daughter of Ivan Reitman, legendary Hollywood director and Jason Reitman, a great filmmaker. And she's the stars and, and it's hilarious. It's all about women having babies and navigating life's problems in very, very funny sarcastic ways. And that could be a good little blow off scene. I'm watching that with April and that we laugh. It's hilarious. So that could be a good little trick.

• 2:03:58Rich Roll?

  I haven't heard of that.

• 2:03:58Adam Skolnick?

  Working Moms with an N.

• 2:04:00Rich Roll?

  All right, right on. All right, we're ending this thing. How do you feel?

• 2:04:04Adam Skolnick?

  I feel good. It's been, um, man, it's been a long four years.

• 2:04:10Rich Roll?

  It's been a long four years and it's been a long two plus hours. Every time we do these, I'm like, this is, we're only going to be doing, this is going to take an hour. And then these things are always like two hours.

• 2:04:20Adam Skolnick?

  I don't know. I think that, I think we're both long-winded. You turned in 2,000 words for 800. I do that all the time.

• 2:04:26Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 2:04:27Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 2:04:28Rich Roll?

  All right. To be continued two weeks from now. In the meantime, give Adam a follow, at Adam Skolnick. I'm at Rich Roll. If you want your question answered, leave us a voicemail, 424-235-4626. Don't forget to hit the subscribe button on YouTube, Apple, Spotify, wherever you enjoy this podcast, send us a comment, leave us a review. As always, check the show notes on the episode page at richroll.com. We'll have links up to everything that we talked about today. And in the meantime, pick up Voicing Change. God damn it. I worked hard on this book.

• 2:05:02Adam Skolnick?

  It's a beautiful book.

• 2:05:03Rich Roll?

  And it's something to be proud of. People are enjoying it. Richroll.com/VC to check that out. Shipping globally. What else?

• 2:05:12Adam Skolnick?

  That's, that's serious.

• 2:05:13Rich Roll?

  I think we've said it all.

• 2:05:14Adam Skolnick?

  You said it all.

• 2:05:15Rich Roll?

  Let's end this.

• 2:05:16Adam Skolnick?

  Land the plane.

• 2:05:17Rich Roll?

  All right. I appreciate everybody who worked hard to put on today's show. Jason Camiolo for audio engineering, production, show notes and interstitial music. Blake Curtis for videoing today's show. Jessica Miranda for graphics. Davey Greenberg for portraits. He's taking pictures right now. Georgia Whaley for copywriting. You could do the rest in your BBC voice. DK for advertiser relationships. And theme music, as always, by Ty Trappa and Ari. Thanks for the love, you guys. See you back here in a couple of days with another amazing, I don't know who's going up next. We'll figure it out. It's going to be good, though, I promise. Peace. Plants.