#144: How to 10X Your Results, One Tiny Tweak at a Time

If you've enjoyed my previous in-between episodes , then this might be your favorite episode ever. It's one of the most actionable, information-packed interviews I've ever done. This time, it's Joel Stein (@TheJoelStein https://twitter.com/thejoelstein) asking the questions. Joel is one of the funniest writers I have ever read, and he's great at leading an interview. Here's how it all happened: Joel wanted me to help him figure out 5 areas he could improve for an upcoming series he was going to create. I have many different conversations with journalists. It can be painful when I have a 1-2 hour conversation, and then it's cut to a single sentence as a quote in a piece. And it's often a misquote. So how do you fix that? Well, you record it yourself, which is what we did. (With Joel's approval, of course.) This way, you don't "lose" the content, and you cover your ass with media and journalists. In this episode, we discuss a wide variety of topics, including: How I choose what to improve from infinite options How you can subtract your way to success The genius of Ben Franklin Why self-improvement doesn't mean self-centered How I say no to time-consuming lunches, coffees, and other meetings How I tackle cold introductions How I surmounted Lyme Disease My 100% complete break from start-ups (read this for more http://fourhourworkweek.com/2015/10/29/startup-vacation-2/) My podcast process Tools and tactics for reversing email overwhelm Enjoy! This podcast is brought to you by 99Designs http://99designs.com/tim, the world's largest marketplace of graphic designers. I have used them for years to create some amazing designs. When your business needs a logo, website design, business card, or anything you can imagine, check out 99Designs. I used them to rapid prototype the cover http://99designs.com/tim for The 4-Hour Body, and I've also had them help with display advertising and illustrations. If you want a more personalized approach, I recommend their 1-on-1 service http://99designs.com/tim. You get original designs from designers around the world. The best part? You provide your feedback, and then you end up with a product that you're happy with or your money back. Click this link http://www.99designs.com/tim and get a free $99 upgrade. Give it a test run. This podcast is also brought to you by Thrive Market https://thrivemarket.com/tim. If you're anything like me, you care a lot about the food you put in your body. In fact, I think it's much more important than exercise. The problem is that good food https://thrivemarket.com/tim can be extremely expensive…but it doesn't have to be. Thrive Market is like Costco for everything healthy – an online shopping club offering the best brands and groceries at 25-50% off retail prices, shipped nationally for free. There are a lot of Slow-Carb Diet friendly items https://thrivemarket.com/ferriss that I recommend in The 4-Hour Body. You can easily filter everything by your preferences: paleo, gluten-free, vegan, raw, non-GMO, etc. Best of all: each paid membership also sponsors a free membership for a low-income family. Until December 15th only, you have an opportunity to win $10,000 https://thrivemarket.com/ferriss in top-tier healthy food and other prizes from Thrive Market. Go to this link https://thrivemarket.com/ferriss, and when you enter to win the prizes, you'll automatically be sent a link to download the Slow-Carb Diet® Cookbook. Show notes and links for this episode can be found at www.fourhourworkweek.com/podcast http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/podcast.

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

• 0:01Speaker 00

  At this altitude, I can run flat out for a half mile before my hands start shaking. Can I ask you a personal question?

• 0:08Speaker 01

  No, it would seem inappropriate.

• 0:12Speaker 00

  I'm a cybernetic organism, living tissue over metal endoskeleton.

• 0:23Tim Ferriss?

  This episode is brought to you by 99designs. 99designs is a great partner for creating and growing your business. It's a one-stop shop for all of your graphic design needs, whether that's a logo, website, business card, or anything else. I use 99designs to get book cover prototypes for The 4-Hour Body, which went on to become a number one New York Times bestseller. I also use them for banner ads, illustrations, and other things. With 99designs, designers around the world compete to create the best design for you. You give feedback and then pick your favorite. You end up happy, or you get your money back. It's very simple. You can check out a few of my own designs and those of yours, meaning Tim Ferriss Show listeners, at 99designs.com/tim. And right now, my listeners, you guys,

• 1:07Tim Ferriss?

  will get a free $99 upgrade on your first design. That's 99designs.com/tim. Check it out.

• 1:17Tim Ferriss?

  This episode is brought to you by Thrive Market. If you're anything like me, you care a lot about the food you put into your body. In fact, I think it's much more important than exercise. The problem is that good food can be extremely expensive, but it doesn't have to be. Thrive Market, which is one of the fastest-growing startups in the health space right now, is like Costco for everything healthy. An online shopping club offering the best brands and groceries at 25% to 50% off of retail prices, shipped nationally for free. It's awesome. There are a ton of slow-carb-friendly items that I recommend in The 4-Hour Body. You can easily filter everything by your preferences, whether you're paleo, gluten-free, vegan, raw, non-GMO, vegetarian, veterinarian, whatever. So go to thrivemarket.com/tim and check it out.

• 2:01Tim Ferriss?

  You can get a free two-month trial and 25% off your first order. When you sign up for a membership, if you sign up, it's $59.95 per year, which is only $5 a month. At the very least... Go there and check out the avocado mayo they have, which is amazing. Not only that, for every paying member, Thrive gives a free membership to a low-income family, veteran, or teacher, which is awesome and helps level the playing field. So you can get ripped while you're doing some good also. Never pay full price for healthy food again. Check it out, ThriveMarket.com/Tim to start your free two-month trial and get 25% off your first order. What do you have to lose? Nothing. Go check it out. Avocado mayo. It's rad. ThriveMarket.com/Tim.

• 2:45Tim Ferriss?

  Hello, boys and girls. This is Tim Ferriss, and welcome to another episode of The Tim Ferriss Show. I am garbling words late at night, whispering in a hotel room in New York City. Outside of my window is a Christmas tree with white lights on it, and all of the children are snug in their beds with visions of sugarplums dancing in their heads. But I digress. This episode is a special one. And if you've enjoyed in-between episodes in the past, this is not a long-form interview, actually, it is kind of a long-form interview, then this might be your favorite episode ever. Might end up really being your top pick for most actionable information packed into one interview that I've ever done. And it

• 3:29Tim Ferriss?

  came about, in part, because I have many conversations with journalists, and the pain always strikes me when I have a one- to two-hour conversation, and then it gets cut down to a single sentence as a quote in a piece, oftentimes a misquote. And then the one- to two hours just never get used. And then furthermore, I can't use it if they have a recording, and they have a boss who has a boss who has a boss. It just turns into a huge headache, and it makes me sad. So how do you fix that? Well, you record it yourself on your side, which doubles as a way to cover your ass with media and journalists. You say, "Well, hey, I'll record it on my side via Skype with eCam call recorders backup." Cool. And if they're recording, and you're recording, and you all agree, then you're

• 4:11Tim Ferriss?

  not breaking any laws, and it sounds good. And fantastic. And I actually spoke to Joel Stein, who is one of the funniest writers I have ever read, and I'm not alone in this. There are many, many- Many, many people who would agree with me and you have to check him out. I asked him if I could use this audio. He very graciously said, yes, go for it. Do whatever you want with it. And his site is thejoelstein.com. And on the Twitter, you can check him out. One of my favorite people to follow on Twitter, hilarious, right up there with Patton Oswalt, is thejoelstein. So twitter.com/thejoelstein. Please say hi to him. What do we cover in this episode? We cover how I choose what to improve.

• 4:55Tim Ferriss?

  How do I pick the one single thing to tweak out of infinite options? How you can subtract your way to success. The genius of Ben Franklin. Why self-improvement doesn't have to mean self-centered and tactical tips for fulfilling that. How I say no to time-consuming lunches, coffees, and so on, which is a massive time suck. How I tackle and others might tackle the bane of so-called cold introductions. God, do I hate those. The last few things I've improved in my life. Lyme disease, some of the ways that I was able to surmount that by making hypotheses. Couple of notes, mostly taking a break from startups is something I say in this. That is now 100% true. I am off completely, as of six months ago, out of the game completely.

• 5:40Tim Ferriss?

  I did write a public piece called, "Why I'm Taking a Long Startup Vacation," or "How to Say No When It Matters Most." If you just search Tim Ferriss or Ferriss, two S's and startup vacation, it'll pop right up if you are interested in reading the entire manifesto, which applies to almost every possible area of life. My podcast process. We get into how I thought about automating and really streamlining my podcast process. And this was recorded in 2015. This is about 100 episodes ago. So you get to see the early thinking, which hasn't changed that much. So that might be fun for some of you. Tools and tactics for reversing email overwhelm. A couple of notes on that. Number one, Slack. I mentioned that once.

• 6:25Tim Ferriss?

  Pops up again. This is 2015. And Slack, folks, this one's on me. Hope it makes you a million bucks. Okay, next time. Give me some money. Thanks. IBM man who eliminated email. I mentioned this. I'm not sure if it's IBM man or intel woman. I'm not sure, but I believe it was someone at IBM. If you know the name, please let me know via Twitter @Tfaris. Let me know. This was all initially recorded for five episodes that Joel hoped to use to improve himself each time picking an important area. And he wanted to talk to me first about how to select those damn areas in the first place, among other things, when he dig into everything. And he wanted me to promise something that I couldn't deliver, so I'm not going to do that. But I came up with a substitute.

• 7:07Tim Ferriss?

  I implore each and every one of you to watch or re-watch the movie Idiocracy. It might have some relevance for our current presidential election slash process slash theater debacle. Could help you out. So check it out. Idiocracy. Treat it as a documentary, but with some time travel involved. And last but not least, please check out Joel. You will be so happy that you did. TheJoelStein.com and on Twitter @TheJoelStein. So twitter.com/thejoelstein. T-H-E-J-O-E-L-S-T-E-I-N. And as I always say, but seldom comply with, without further

• 7:49Tim Ferriss?

  ado, please enjoy my conversations about 30 minutes with Joel Stein.

• 7:57Speaker 03

  Okay, so the idea for this podcast, I'm just doing five episodes, is that I'm going to improve myself in some way in each podcast. Like I'm going to become a better husband, and I'm going to maybe find a new job and become more assertive, things like that. But we haven't even picked all five yet. So I wanted to turn to you. And first of all, how do you get started in self-improvement?

• 8:23Tim Ferriss?

  Well, I think self-improvement is a dicey... Term and area because there are a lot of charlatans, a lot of motivational speakers who are light on daily practical tactics, things like that. I would just say that you should identify your pain points and an easy way to do that is to sit down with whatever it might be. You could use an application like Evernote or Word or whatever's comfortable for you or notepad and do an 80/20 analysis to identify the 20% of, make a list of the, say, 20% of activities, relationships, people, whatever it might be, that cause 80% of your negative emotions and negative outcomes, right? So really just go through a brain dump

• 9:08Tim Ferriss?

  as an exercise and then you can start to identify the changes that correlate to removing those sources of stress. And I think that one of the failures of most self-help recommendations is that, number one, they don't really have a solid grounding in behavioral change and the science and research behind that. And secondly, they focus on always adding additional things and not creating a not-to-do list. So I think the subtraction can be just as valuable as the addition. So the 80/20 analysis is a good place to start, I think.

• 9:43Speaker 03

  You know, okay, one, this is a very small pain point, but points to something larger. And I feel like you deal with this so much more than me, which is like people you know and kind of like who ask you to lunch and just become a time suck, even though they're nice and interesting and everything, how do you say no to them? When you, I always say I'm busy that day, but then they just pick three more days.

• 10:06Tim Ferriss?

  Right. Then it just gets punted to pain further down the line. I have a couple of different approaches I use and there are many different coping mechanisms for this. Some work better than others. I will, I will say either categorically I'm avoiding certain types of activities. So for instance, I'm taking largely a break from startup investing at the moment for a host of reasons that we can get into if you want, but I won't bore you with it right now. And I'm very highly concentrated in that kind of asset class. So I, when I respond to say an introduction from A venture capitalist to a CEO, which is the hardest to turn down because you're now going to offend two people, not just one.

• 10:47Tim Ferriss?

  And requests for lunch related to categorically that type of activity, I will just respond with heads down on deadlines or on other projects, taking a break, taking a "startup vacation" for the next X period of time. And I've noticed that there are many people who use this, busy people, in some cases worth hundreds of millions or more, who will use this "vacation" in quotations for many different things. "I'm taking a meeting vacation for X period of time to focus on A and B." "I'm taking a fill-in-the-blank vacation for X period of time." And that way, you're not pushing it off and basically, you're not putting a Band-Aid

• 11:31Tim Ferriss?

  solution on it that's just going to rub off and come back to you in a month's time. And they'll say, "Hey, following up just like you suggested." And then you're going to really paint yourself into a corner. So that's one approach. Making sort of public announcements about policies, writing, I mean, you're a writer, so this works perfectly for you. So I will probably be putting out something public soon about, for instance, cold email introductions, where someone doesn't ask permission to email you, and they introduce you to fill-in-the-blank type of person, who can then reply and CC all of the co-founders or whatever it might be. It's a huge problem, but you have the leverage of a platform and the ability to write.

• 12:11Tim Ferriss?

  So that actually gives you a very easy out in some sense, because you can write about tackling these issues.

• 12:20Speaker 03

  Yeah, I thought it was a general rule. You have to ask someone's permission before you introduce them. That's like an Adam Grant rule.

• 12:25Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah, it's a very good rule, but it's violated all the time. And I think it's particularly rampant in the early-stage startup investing world. But it's true in many, many, many other places as well. But the crux of self-improvement, I think, and there are differing opinions on this, could be echoed by Say Peter Drucker, the management theorist. So what gets measured gets managed. I think that nebulous goals produce very, at best mediocre returns. So you have to, for instance, like learning Spanish is not a great goal because it's not measurable. Becoming a better

• 13:09Tim Ferriss?

  husband, in the abstract, a great goal, but in the implementation, a terrible objective because you don't really have, it's not granular enough and you don't have metrics, right? So you'd have to decide how you're going to measure your before, your baseline, and how you're going to assess your progress or your after. And that's, that's something I feel very strongly about, and I'm kind of militant about that aspect when I, when I try to tweak variables in my own life, which are either, you know, oftentimes associated with some type of performance goal, but not always.

• 13:46Speaker 03

  So what are the last few things you improved in your life? So I can get an idea of what's measurable.

• 13:51Tim Ferriss?

  Sure. I had about nine months of my life removed by Lyme disease. I had a very severe, it's very severe symptoms of Lyme disease. And it was confirmed, I contracted it on Long Island, which has one of the highest.

• 14:08Speaker 03

  So did my, my dad got Lyme disease twice. He lives, yeah, he lives right near you, actually. He lives in Quack.

• 14:14Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah, it's, it's, it can be a very debilitating disease with a lot of neurological symptoms and joint pain and so on. So I started experimenting with various diets based on hypotheses that I had, right? So you have to start with any scientific experiment, which is what I would view what you're doing as. You have a hypothesis. So, you know, doing X will make me a better husband. Or in my case, I thought potentially Lyme is similar to say like herpes simplex, that it can lay dormant and then neurotoxins.

• 14:48Speaker 03

  I don't know anything about herpes whatsoever.

• 14:50Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah, well, first of all.

• 14:51Speaker 03

  Just to make that really clear.

• 14:52Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah, no, all you need to, all you need to know is that people talk about chronic Lyme as a recurring condition, right? So there, there were a couple of hypotheses. One is that There could be common triggers like certain artificial sweeteners that I should remove and then I could assess sort of the severity of symptoms as they correlate or don't correlate to that. The other thing is, and I won't go too deep here, but is I have a theory, right? Hypothesis that Lyme may interfere with carbohydrate metabolism in some way. So I tested the ketogenic diet, which is like the Atkins diet.

• 15:31Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 15:31Tim Ferriss?

  And had a device called the Precision Extra, which is intended for diabetics, but it allows me to measure my ketone levels in a millimolar concentration. And lo and behold, my cognitive symptoms and everything else effectively vanished when I got to a certain ketone level. Now, is that causal? Is it just correlative? Are there other variables? Sure, but it's a very promising start. So that would be one way that I might measure it. You could do this in a less technical way where you have, you either assess or someone else assesses you on a zero to 10 point scale. So for instance, I have a friend, he's an older gent, he's in his 60s, he has a very

• 16:14Tim Ferriss?

  good marriage, has a very good relationship with his wife, very good relationship with his kids. Every quarter, his wife grades him on a 10-point scale in four categories: father, husband, provider, and lover. And what was so fascinating, and I thought smart about how they did this, is that he doesn't have to maintain a certain ranking in each category. He has to maintain a certain total. So let's just say for the sake of argument that it's a 30-point scale. Well, he might be traveling a lot for business and not spending a lot of time on the phone or otherwise communicating with his wife for a given quarter.

• 16:55Tim Ferriss?

  So he might have a very high provider score, say eight, nine, 10, a very low husband score, and probably a low lover score, but he could make up for that by being a good father, right? Really focusing on the father category. And that would ultimately give him the total number of points necessary to check the, I am being sort of a good version of myself for my wife and my family. So that's a simple, non-technical way to approach something like that, for instance.

• 17:27Speaker 03

  Yeah, that's a, that sounds like a good way to, to have an excuse to buy your wife's love.

• 17:34Tim Ferriss?

  Well, it's also, I think, underscores something else, which is you shouldn't take advice from anyone who has not been able to implement the same advice successfully for themselves. And in this case, I was not talking to someone who had been married for a year, I was talking to someone who'd been married for 20-plus years.

• 17:52Speaker 03

  Right.

• 17:54Tim Ferriss?

  And

• 17:55Speaker 03

  It works.

• 17:55Tim Ferriss?

  It works, yeah, at least, and again, that, that isn't necessarily the only contributing factor, but he felt very strongly that it was, and all that means is you have a hypothesis worth disproving, right? It gives you something to test, that's it.

• 18:11Speaker 03

  So, one thing I've thought about as far, because I've done things, like, I'm in really good shape now, because I did a story for GQ where they had me get in really good shape. I've, I've done things where I've kind of changed myself. And I always wonder with self-improvement, as I improve myself, and really focus on myself, am I actually just doing more damage by making me a bad person, because I'm not focusing on other people, you know, my family?

• 18:38Tim Ferriss?

  I think it depends exactly, or entirely, I should say, on what you're focusing on, and I don't think improving oneself and improving either or both, your interactions with other people or the world at large are mutually exclusive, right? So I think it's, it might be a false dichotomy, in so much as if you look at, say, Ben Franklin and his 13 virtues, you had humility, sincerity, these are things that affect other people, and ostensibly would improve his ability to interact with the world around him. And I think that it depends entirely on the objectives that you choose. Whether you're focusing on self-improvement

• 19:17Tim Ferriss?

  or not, I think that your focus determines how selfish, self-interested, or otherwise you are. So I think, I think that it can cut both ways, and it just, it depends a lot on what targets you choose.

• 19:32Speaker 03

  But have you found that people who follow your advice sometimes become self-oriented in a bad way?

• 19:38Tim Ferriss?

  That's a good question. I would imagine that is the case. I would imagine it has to be the case. If I have, whatever it might be, 2 million people or so per month coming to the blog as unique visitors, I would imagine that you have all sorts of interesting patterns in the data, including people who end up focusing on themselves to the exclusion of others. Now, I would emphasize, or I would propose that it's possible, I'm not saying this is altogether the case, but it's possible, just in the way that it's easier for people to focus on, say, improving the world and philanthropic work, like Bill Gates, for instance, after they have amassed a certain amount of capital and satisfied the majority of rungs

• 20:21Tim Ferriss?

  on Maslow's hierarchy of needs, I think it's possible that to be as selfless as possible, to be as selfless as you are capable of, you might focus very selfishly on yourself for a period of time. Coming back to what you asked earlier about saying no to people, so saying no to a thousand things so that you can focus on the one most important, highly leveraged project in your life, may, in the long term, allow you to do the greatest good. So I think it's a calculus you have to run. But is it possible that someone could be a selfish bastard by focusing on, you know, reading 1,000 self-help books and never lending

• 21:05Tim Ferriss?

  a helping hand to other people? Sure. I'm sure those people exist.

• 21:07Speaker 03

  And what are the things people most want to improve upon? I mean, I have my guesses, but what does it turn out to be? Stuff they can actually measure?

• 21:15Tim Ferriss?

  I think that, you know, the modern, the fears of modern men and women can kind of be boiled down to getting fat and getting too many email. I think that those are, those are two that crop up continually. I mean, there are many fears, fears of death and so on. So you have the Peter Thiel's and others here in Silicon Valley trying to crack the code of immortality. But if we really want to focus on the daily, the daily grind and...

• 21:45Tim Ferriss?

  The basics, I think, that fat, having too much fat, eating too much fat, whatever it might be, and email overwhelm, or the general state of kind of digital overwhelm, are two things that most people seem preoccupied with. And fortunately, they're both, they both provide a lot of different metrics you could potentially use.

• 22:07Speaker 03

  I thought you were gonna mention, in addition to fat, money and sex.

• 22:12Tim Ferriss?

  I'm sure people worry about those things, and they're also both measurable. You know, I mean, you could, you could say, you could compare Tinder to other dating profiles, you could, you could use data to, say, take five or six profile photos and put them up on OkCupid using a service they offer called My Best Face, which allows people to vote on your photos, so you determine which get the highest click-through rates. And these can all be broken down to measurables. And so I'm-

• 22:44Speaker 03

  My measurable be, I think, cutting down on my time spent on emails and stuff, it would be great. So the measurable is what there?

• 22:53Tim Ferriss?

  Well, the measurable could be the number of email answered, right? So aiming to answer fewer email total, which I think is a good, is a, is a, is a good metric. Simply because if you, if you listen to people like, say, Robert Scoble, who's a technologist, his kind of hypothesis, which is not really a hypothesis, it's based on his experience, is that for every email he sends out, he gets, I think, 1.75 on average in return, right? So you can, the goal should not be to just do more things, right? Because it's, it's possible to be very efficient, i.e. do things quickly, but focus on things that

• 23:35Tim Ferriss?

  are unimportant. So my, my goal is always to try to, in this case, for instance, focus on being effective, which is doing the right things. And in the case of email, is having, say, an auto-response, a piece of public writing that allow you to safely ignore 70 or 80% of your email, as opposed to simply responding to those emails in a faster fashion. Now, the, there, the metrics, you should, you can come up with a laundry list and then pick one or two that are kind of your key metrics. And this goes for behaviors as well. And what I mean by that is- You want to try to pick the variables in your life that have a cascading positive effect.

• 24:16Tim Ferriss?

  So for instance, if your goal is to drink less coffee, you should ask yourself, well, why do you drink so much coffee? Well, it's because I wake up and I feel tired. Well, why do you wake up and you feel tired? It's because I go to bed really late. Well, why do you go to bed really late? It's because I habitually go out three or four nights a week and have drinks with friends. Okay, why do you go out to have drinks with friends three or four nights per week if it makes you feel so shitty? Because I have a tough time saying no to their invitations. Okay, we can kind of track back to an initial snowball that leads to these other things. So if you just try to cut back on your coffee, it won't work unless you address kind of the earlier cascading effects.

• 25:00Tim Ferriss?

  And I think that's true with with variables, right? It's it's possible to improve your speed ranking in answering email, but if that's just leading to you answering more trivial email as opposed to the critical few, you're playing the wrong game. But I mean, for email, for instance, a tool that I think is is very easy to implement if you're using Gmail is Boomerang, which allows you to schedule emails to be sent in the future. It allows you to automate follow up so that if someone doesn't reply, it brings it to your top to the top of your inbox. It removes a lot of the cognitive load of email processing. And those would be a few examples, but neither many more.

• 25:41Speaker 03

  The one, one of the few things I ever fixed about myself was being late, which I fixed in my late twenties. And basically, I had to do all the work you just described, which was figuring out, oh, I'm really self-conscious if I get somewhere early and I don't know what to do physically with myself. It was before you could play with your cell phone. I had to like train myself to go in public and stand there and not feel self-conscious. And then I was able not to be late anymore.

• 26:03Tim Ferriss?

  Right, yeah.

• 26:04Speaker 03

  So I think what you're saying about email is the same thing. Like, I am afraid of confrontation and being thought of as a jerk. So I'm afraid not to respond. So I have to fix that.

• 26:14Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah, exactly.

• 26:15Speaker 03

  Being afraid of confrontation.

• 26:18Tim Ferriss?

  Well, you know, I mean, you could, and we don't have to necessarily go into a Psychoanalysis session now, but I mean, you could even, you could go back, that may not be the end of the story, or the beginning of the story, right? I mean, you could go back even further and say like, why am I afraid of people thinking ill of me, or thinking of me as rude? And it would be very helpful, I know I'm digressing very briefly here, I will sit down in the morning, after I meditate for 20 minutes, which I think is a huge kind of force multiplier for a lot of these behaviors, and sit down and journal for five minutes, and basically try to take all of my anxieties, whatever those might be, and put them on paper. And

• 26:59Tim Ferriss?

  that will oftentimes sort of empower you to make decisions when you see how groundless most of them are. But how do you, it can take, it can take many forms, right? I mean, you could, it takes, number one, there's like the fact gathering mission, right? So, is this assumption actually based in fact, right? So can you find examples where that's the case? And in my, in my particular instance with the startup, the startup world and VCs, you know, venture capitalists are introducing me to founders without asking me first, and then those founders say, hey, great to meet you, Tim, you know, looping in my five co-founders, whatever the hell, it would turn into a mess. And then I looked at my most successful deals,

• 27:42Tim Ferriss?

  and you could look at the most important pivotal projects in your life, just say, pieces of writing, whatever it might be, that led to positive inflection points in your life, were any of those the direct response to saying yes to invitations you otherwise wanted to turn down, right? And in my case, I realized, none of my best startups, if I look at, again, 80/20 analysis, what are the 20% of the deals I've invested in that have produced 80% or more of my returns? None of those deals came from cold email introductions from VCs, not a single one. So I think, I think that decreasing anxiety and tackling some of these thorny or psychological issues starts with testing assumptions and fact finding.

• 28:27Speaker 03

  Wow, this is all incredibly helpful. I'm gonna ask my producer, Shara. Hi, Shara.

• 28:32Speaker 01

  Hi.

• 28:32Speaker 03

  Anything else we should ask him?

• 28:34Speaker 01

  Um, yeah, well, this is a very specific question, but I know that there was a BuzzFeed writer who recently got rid of his email altogether.

• 28:45Tim Ferriss?

  Yep.

• 28:46Speaker 01

  And, I mean, like, what do you think of that? Because we have so many different forms of communication now. Why just, you know, maybe we should just be eliminating some of them, and that could reduce some of Joel's potential anxiety, and the true people who want to get in touch with him, get in touch with him.

• 29:03Tim Ferriss?

  I agree with that. I agree that email is is a tool that has been sort of misappropriated for a lot of tasks for which it was not initially designed. And there are many people who have gone off, I shouldn't say many, but more than a handful of people. There's another gent from IBM who has banished email from his toolkit and has done so for several years. There are, there are many different tools in the toolkit, right? So I think that some of the options worth examining could be, number one, some type of project management software, whether that's Asana, Basecamp, Trello, for instance,

• 29:45Tim Ferriss?

  for assigning tasks with deadlines so that email does not become a follow-up system is very helpful. Identifying, and not to sound like I'm beating a dead horse, but doing an 80/20 analysis of your inbox, right? So who are, say, the top five? Who are the five to 10 people who communicate with you most via email? And trying to identify, asking yourself what other tools could do this job better than email? And I think you'd find that project management software very helpful. But on top of that, you could look at, say, within any given organization, using a tool like Slack.

• 30:27Tim Ferriss?

  Slack has become extremely popular in fast-growing startups who might be hiring, you know, 10, 50, you know, 100 people over the, over the course of several months. It becomes more and more important as you scale. And I think that if, for instance, you're trying to, I'm just using a hypothetical, but in my case, rather than, say, training multiple people to help me moderate comments on the blog, I could use a tool like ScreenFlow, which allows you to record your screen and your voice while you're moderating comments. I take that video, I put it into Dropbox, and I never have to teach that skill again.

• 31:10Tim Ferriss?

  Now I have a link that I can send to anyone I need to train to do that. I never have to explain it again. So for any repetitive task, if you're thinking about this like an engineer, engineers abhor repetitive tasks. That's why they write scripts and get good at programming and so on. If you start thinking about your life in that way, and sort of, for a repetitive task, if you only could do this once and never again, what system would you have to put in place? You can cultivate this kind of tool-agnostic problem-solving mindset.

• 31:43Speaker 03

  And wait, just, because I'm gonna go do this as soon as we hang up. The 80/20 analysis is I figure out what the 20, what the things are that, 20% of my things that are using up 80% of my time are causing me 80% of my pain?

• 31:58Tim Ferriss?

  That would be one implementation, and it doesn't have to be, the 80/20 is a guideline, right? So it could be that 1% of the people who email you produce 99 or more, or 100% of your email.

• 32:09Speaker 03

  But in general, using it to find my pain points?

• 32:11Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah, using it to find both the good and the bad. So for instance, if you're running a company, or let's just say from an income standpoint, because you mentioned money, so it's like, what are, what are the 20% of the projects that you work on that produce 80% or more of your income? This will allow you to separate the trivial many from the critical few. If you're trying to kind of replicate your successes while avoiding... The noise as much as possible. I find it helpful for people because they, people seek out self-help typically, not because everything is working great and they just want to make it perfect. It's because they have pain points or sources of stress that are causing them some type of overwhelm or self-doubt. In that case, I find it helpful to start with, you know, what are the 20%

• 32:54Tim Ferriss?

  of activities in my life that are causing 80% of the stress or negative emotions, insomnia, et cetera? What are, who are the 20% of the people I spend time with who are producing 80% of the headache, the anxiety, the anger, the insomnia, et cetera? And that gives you a not-to-do list around which you can build routines and habits that you can test to assess how those feelings go up or down, for instance.

• 33:25Speaker 03

  And besides, besides the ketones, what are you working on right now on yourself?

• 33:30Tim Ferriss?

  Uh, let's see, besides my ketones, I'm working on podcast process. So, production process, post-production process. And, you know, the first thing that I'll do is I put together Google Doc and we have maybe, I don't know, what, 10 to 12 steps, discrete steps, that I'm currently using to take a podcast from kind of planning stage to booking a guest, to recording, to post-production. First thing I'll do is try to eliminate as many steps as possible. So, rather than just asking, how do I do all these things faster? Like, which of these steps are redundant, unnecessary, or just unimportant? I think they're really important, but they're not actually that important. Such as putting up a blog post. Like, how important is it to put up a corresponding blog post?

• 34:11Tim Ferriss?

  How, and the way you assess important is how is that affecting my, my, my metric? And my metric is, uh, let's just say, uh, number of downloads or listens per episode. Right? Uh, then, so let's say I, I take that 12 steps and I break it, I cut it down to eight. I, I decide that, and I'm in the middle of doing this right now. So with someone else, trying to cut down 12 to eight or seven, or whatever it is. At that point, then I ask, you know, what can I automate here? So, kind of defining things, then I'm asking, automating, what can I use technology to automate here? So, for instance, like, as soon as I put up a blog post, um, if I decide to do that,

• 34:52Tim Ferriss?

  that could, I could use a program like if this, then that, uh, which I think is just I F T T T, or I F T T. To automatically put promotion up on Twitter and Facebook. So I don't have to think about it. I don't have to delegate it. Okay, so it's kind of definition, elimination, removing as many steps as possible. Automation, choosing tech to automate things so that people aren't involved. And then last is the sort of delegation piece. So if, at that point, what is remaining? And what of those can I delegate? So if I, if I need artwork, for instance, for a thumbnail for each podcast, which I don't,

• 35:33Tim Ferriss?

  but let's say I did, I could go to like a 99designs or a Fiverr or one of these sites and have someone else manage that process for me.

• 35:41Speaker 03

  I feel like there are six or seven apps you haven't even mentioned yet.

• 35:47Tim Ferriss?

  There are, you'd be surprised, I don't actually have that many apps on my phone. I think that it's, technology is a, technology is a wonderful tool and a terrible master. And a lot of people can confuse amassing tools or motion with progress. And that's, it's a very seductive, easy path to take. Because we're constantly sold the hype of downloading this one new app and it'll change your life, download this other new app and it will streamline A, B, or C. And I think that most people are drowning in a glut of tools. And the reason for that is that they don't have any precise goals. They don't have precise goals and measurable goals.

• 36:30Speaker 01

  I have, I have one more question, Tim.

• 36:32Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah.

• 36:33Speaker 01

  So one thing, so one thing with this podcast that we've been thinking about is that we have these bigger ideas. And one of the topics that we want to tackle too is assertiveness. So would we, for using assertiveness as an example, we would do the 80/20 for assertiveness and see what the pain points truly are for Joel in what is making him more passive than assertive?

• 37:00Tim Ferriss?

  80/20, well, assertiveness is, I, I, to be honest, I would have to, to think on that. I don't want to give you a knee jerk response that isn't helpful. But the, the assertiveness, I would start with Joel sitting down and journaling and kind of going backwards and asking three or four whys about why he has trouble being assertive, right? So if it's, I am straight, he could do an 80/20 analysis on his sources of stress. This is a general.

• 37:31Tim Ferriss?

  Broad 80/20 of, as I described, the sources of stress. I would start there. Because maybe being assertive or assertiveness is not the problem you need to fix. Right? I will take your word for it, but it's, let's start with just 80/20 to identify the 20% of activities, people, etc., that are causing 80% of the negative emotions that he wants to avoid. From there, then he could sit down and journal, meaning just kind of freehand stream of consciousness, write, you know, trying to answer the question like, "Why do I feel I'm not assertive enough?" And just write for five to 10 minutes. And whenever he thinks he's reached a conclusion, ask, "Why?" Right? So if it's, "I don't answer, you know, I answered more email than I should.

• 38:16Tim Ferriss?

  I feel compelled to answer more email than I should. Why?" Answer that. "Well, it's because I feel A, B, C, D." Right? Well, why do you feel those things? "Because this, this, this." And at the end of it, looking at that and asking, you know, "Which of these assumptions have not been tested?" That's where I would start. And I don't want to make it seem like assertiveness is a very big, broad word, and I get anxious when people are trying to fix anything that is very broad. I think you have to get very specific. But those, so the 80/20 analysis, the journaling, and then I would ask, "Okay, what would the, how could I test these assumptions?" Right? "How could I test these assumptions?"

• 38:58Tim Ferriss?

  And one of them might be, you know, "I need to respond as quickly as possible, or I'll lose the respect of my coworkers." And that will end, you know, "Why do you care about that?" "Well, because it'll have this effect." You could just test that. And I'm not saying this is what you do, right? Because certain jobs are suited to this and some are not. But you could test an autoresponder. And to give you an example, this is one of dozens of potential tools. But let's just say that's how you test the assumption. I had this radio station manager come up to me at South by Southwest. At one point, he said, you know, "I'd love to try an autoresponder, but there's no way I could do it because my boss, my boss would probably fire me. I mean, I need to be responsive at all times, especially during the conference." And I said, "Well, that's, that may or may not be true, but it's an assumption you can test.

• 39:42Tim Ferriss?

  So why don't you set up an autoresponder that you can turn off literally with the click of a button if your boss gets upset?" And no, I think you're underestimating your value.

• 39:53Tim Ferriss?

  During a busy conference, he's not going to hire you or fire you and hire someone new in the middle of the busiest season. It's just, it would be a stupid managerial decision. So he put up an autoresponder and he sent me a follow-up and he said, "I thought you'd love the response." And his boss wrote to him, who was managing multiple stations, and said, "Love this approach. I wish, I wish more of the managers would use this," and CC'd all the other managers. Because this boss was getting CC'd on every bit of minutia and his problem was 10 times worse than those other managers. And so, his assumption was completely unfounded. In fact, the way his boss felt was exactly the opposite. So, that's a lot, but I'm just saying, 80/20

• 40:38Tim Ferriss?

  analysis, as I described, journaling, why this, why that, why, why, why, going back, identifying assumptions that you haven't tested, determining how you can test them, and I can't, I can't spoon-feed you the answers to that. You have to just sit down, do some hard thinking, and then determining the metrics, the numbers that you could assign or use as a measurement for testing those assumptions. And then at that point, you can, you can form the hypothesis, "If I do this, then desirable outcome, X," right? And at that point, then you're moving into behavioral change, but before you can, before you change something, you want to assess your current, kind of current state of matters.

• 41:23Speaker 03

  And so, his final question is, after talking to me on the, right now, what do you think my likelihood of success is?

• 41:32Tim Ferriss?

  Impossible to answer. If you follow the prescription that I have put out and focus on measurable, measurable objectives.

• 41:51Tim Ferriss?

  Changing as few variables as possible. Don't try to change 10 behaviors at once.

• 41:58Tim Ferriss?

  And rigging the game in that way so that it is possible to win. And you have a timeline that is, has been rationally thought through. I think, I think the likelihood of success could be very high. Now, I will tell you, I understand this piece has to be entertaining. And I'm not sure if it would be entertaining if your path to success were very clear. So I'm, so to that extent, that's an unknown in my head. But you're, I mean, you're a smart guy. You've changed behaviors before. I think that there's, there's a very high chance of success. If you kind of follow a framework that has worked for thousands, tens of thousands,

• 42:41Tim Ferriss?

  probably millions of people, because a lot of these principles go back hundreds or even thousands of years. These are not new principles.

• 42:48Speaker 03

  Well, I can't thank you enough. I didn't mean to take this much of your time. We took 45 Tim Ferriss minutes, which you received. That's, that's four human hours. Yeah.

• 42:58Tim Ferriss?

  Got to measure it, measure it in dog years. But any, any friend of Neil's, who's a friend of mine, and I enjoy your work. So I'm happy to, happy to chat.

• 43:06Speaker 03

  Oh, definitely put that in the podcast. And I will call you when this whole thing's over, just to ask some wrap up questions.

• 43:13Tim Ferriss?

  Sure thing. And ping me anytime.

• 43:16Speaker 03

  Thank you so much, Tim.

• 43:17Tim Ferriss?

  Of course, guys. Take it easy.

• 43:18Speaker 03

  Bye.

• 43:24Tim Ferriss?

  Hey, guys. This is Tim again. Just a few more things before you take off. Number one, this is Five Bullet Friday. Do you want to get a short email from me? Would you enjoy getting a short email from me every Friday? That provides a little morsel of fun before the weekend. And Five Bullet Friday is a very short email where I share the coolest things I've found or that I've been pondering over the week. That could include favorite new albums that I've discovered. It could include gizmos and gadgets and all sorts of weird shit that I've somehow dug up in the, the world of the esoteric, as I do. It could include favorite articles. That I've read and that I've shared with my close friends, for instance. And it's very short.

• 44:06Tim Ferriss?

  It's just a little tiny bite of goodness before you head off for the weekend. So if you want to receive that, check it out. Just go to fourhourworkweek.com. That's fourhourworkweek.com all spelled out and just drop in your email and you will get the very next one. And if you sign up, I hope you enjoy it. This episode is brought to you by Thrive Market. If you're anything like me, you care a lot about the food you put into your body. In fact, I think it's much more important than exercise. The problem is that good food can be extremely expensive, but it doesn't have to be. Thrive Market, which is one of the fastest growing startups in the health space right now, is like Costco for everything healthy.

• 44:49Tim Ferriss?

  An online shopping club offering the best brands and groceries at 25 to 50% off of retail prices, shipped nationally for free. It's awesome. There are a ton of slow carb friendly items that I recommend in the Four Hour Body. You can easily filter everything by your preferences, whether you're paleo, gluten-free, vegan, raw, non-GMO, vegetarian, veterinarian, whatever. So go to thrivemarket.com/tim and check it out. You can get a free two-month trial and 25% off your first order. When you sign up for a membership, if you sign up, it's $59.95 per year, which is only $5 a month. At the very least, go there and check out the avocado mayo they have, which is amazing. Not only that, for every paying member, Thrive gives a free membership to a low-income family,

• 45:33Tim Ferriss?

  veteran, or teacher, which is awesome and helps level the playing field. So you can get ripped while you're doing some good also. Never pay full price for healthy food again. Check it out, thrivemarket.com/tim to start your free two-month trial and get 25% off your first order. What do you have to lose? Nothing. Go check it out. Avocado mayo, it's rad. Thrivemarket.com/tim.

• 45:58Tim Ferriss?

  This episode is brought to you by 99designs. 99designs is a great partner for creating and growing your business. It's a one-stop shop for all of your graphic design needs, whether that's a logo, website, business card, or anything else. I used 99designs to get book cover prototypes for The Four Hour Body, which went on to become a number one New York Times bestseller. I also used them for banner ads, illustrations, and other things. With 99designs, designers around the world compete to create the best design for you. You give feedback and then pick your favorite. You end up happy, or you get your money back. It's very simple. You can check out a few of my own designs and those of yours, meaning Tim Ferriss Show listeners, at 99designs.com/tim.

• 46:40Tim Ferriss?

  And right now, my listeners, you guys, will get a free $99 upgrade on your first design. That's 99designs.com/tim. Check it out. And until next time, thank you for listening.